Colorways by Vicki Welsh

We arrived home yesterday afternoon after 4 days (over 30 hours) of driving.  I’m not an early morning person but my primary driver is. Thanks to him, I had the “pleasure” of watching the sunrise as we left Greenville, TX for Knoxville,  TN.

For the first 2 days, I worked on finishing the wheelchair blanket. The yarn was some Caron yarn that had been in the stash for about 5 or 6 years. It’s a pretty purple that didn’t photograph well. The color in the post preview photo is the most accurate. The donation center can use it as a baby blanket if they prefer.

The pattern is based on this one from Yarnspirations. It’s 97 stitches wide + 3 stitches. The 2 end stitches on ever row are DC. The pattern calls for alternating 3 rows of DC with 3 rows of V stitches. I changed it to 5 rows of each. I like this for donation blankets. It’s super easy but has some pattern interest to it.

The last to days my crochet was more intermittent but I still finished 2 chemo hats. I’ve made lots of these hats. This is the pattern that I use. I used an I hook for the body and H for the brim, per the pattern. The yarn is a discontinued polyester yarn that makes a very soft hat. When I got home I pulled out all the rest of the yarn I have and I’m going to focus on these hats for a while to try to use it up.

That’s 4 for the whole trip. I have enough yarn to make at least 8 more.

On the second morning of our trip, we made a detour to Carlsbad Caverns. I was surprised to learn that we would actually check off 2 national parks that day. That’s 3 new parks, plus a revisit to Saguaro National Park.

The surprise parks was Guadalupe National Park. We drove by the Salt Basin Dunes and El Capitan (not the famous one). We did stop at the visitor center to check out the views but it wasn’t a “real” visit. I doubt that we will ever get back to this area. Honestly, there isn’t much else there unless you love hiking and camping.

Carlsbad Caverns was the real visit. It was only long enough to walk the Caverns but it was definitely worth the trip detour.  I went to Mammoth Cave last year and the two experiences are very different. Carlsbad is probably a little more spectacular but Mammoth is very much larger. The Carlsbad tour is self guided. The Mammoth tours (multiple of them) are all ranger guided, which made it a little more interesting to me. They are equally awe-inspiring.

We got home yesterday afternoon so I had plenty of time to unpack, do laundry and re-orient myself. There was even still a little snow around and ice on the pond! Today and tomorrow are sewing days and it’s going to be good to catch up with Mom and our friends.