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Saturday, February 20, 2010

"April in February!"

That was a headline in today's paper. The skies were blue, the temperatures mild, and signs of spring were everywhere you looked. We couldn't resist the temptation to hop in the car and decided to take the Cascade Loop over Stevens Pass to Leavenworth and then go home over Blewett Pass which is a tad higher than Stevens.

As you can see, Leavenworth is a town with a Bavarian theme. All the buildings reflect this and the signs are all in German. Usually there are lots of tourists, and today was no exception,but we finally found a parking place and had a nice lunch at Sandy's Waffle House before continuing our journey.

Before you start up to the pass, if you watch carefully, you can turn off on a snippet of the Old Cascade Highway and view a very long tunnel.
If you take the train from Seattle to Chicago like we did in 1979, you will go through the tunnel.

Just seeing it and the sloping train bed with Highway 2 in the distance makes me think of my Grandpa Curtis who worked "out West" on the railroads in this area as a young man. What hard work that must have been!

We saw lots of folks skiing at both passes. It was a perfect day to be on the slopes or in the car. I got a lot of knitting done too! And that reminds me, I finally found the button for this hat that I finished last week. It's from a pattern I first saw on Dee's blog and also on Ravelry, but I "shrunk" it down to toddler size.

The last thing I want to show is the pretty Valentine's surprise I received from Pat Winter. She is so clever, and even the way she packages her gifts is always extraordinary. This time she made a tiny pocket from what looks like an old pattern of some sort. Isn't that little heart cute? Thank you, Pat, for thinking of me.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Beautiful pictures of the mountains.

I love the button you found for the hat. Will that be for Sophia?

Carol B. said...

Beautiful scenery and sounds like you had a nice day. Send some of that nice weather down this way, we are colder and wetter than usual.
Cute hat and love the button.

Rian said...

What beautiful mountains. Thanks for letting me know bloglines was down. I've missed everybody's blogs!

Ranae said...

Beautiful photo's!
Love the little button on the hat.
Sweet Valentines too

Lynn said...

Beautiful hat, and the button is perfect. Isn't it funny how sometimes just a little thing like a buttons makes such a difference. It's a beautiful color - for a grandbaby? It's almost the same shade as the blue sky in your picture.

Wildflowerhouse said...

Hi Lady, I love your road trip. You went right by my turn off coming home. And all my ski haunts. Love the hat and sweet button. Also love that scarf you did a few posts back. I think we need a shopping trip or maybe just lunch. What do you say? I have lost your phone # am sure it is here somewhere but I can't find it. So email it to me and I will give you a call. I am sure a little get together won't cause to much damage.LOL Sharon

Jane said...

Wow, thats a long tunnel.. I'm afraid my claustrophobia would kick in big time. Wonderful pics. Great to knit and road trip together. Bloglines has been a pain... I have gotten very spotty updates lately. Those look like wonderful gifties from Pat.

deb said...

what beautiful scenery, thank you for sharing it!

Sheri said...

Beautiful pictures!

Crazee4books said...

Hi Judy,

I love mountains!! The very first
picture on your blog post had me
thinking that you'd gone off to
Europe for a holiday or something.
Then I remembered that you're lucky
enough to live where there are not
only mountains, but the ocean as
well. How magnificent the view!!

And what a wonderful day you and
your DH had driving around and
making the most of the wonderful
Spring like weather that you've
been lucky enough to have.

That tunnel is incredible!! 7.8
miles long. The train journey
from Seattle to Chicago must have
been a wonderful experience. Do
you remember how long it took and
did you sleep on the train???

I remember the one and only train
journey that I ever took. I was
six years old and traveled with
my Mom and my Grandmother to the
town of Kenora near the Ontario/
Manitoba border in norther Ontario.
That train trip is one of the few
things that I remember very well
from that age. We had sleeping
births and a private room and I
remember falling asleep with the
train rocking me gently in my
birth.

We had a fairly warm day here
today, with temperatures around
+4 Celsius which means that the
snow that we got last week is
melting away fairly quickly.
And we're more then happy to see
it go!!

What a sweet hat, knitted in a
beautiful shade of blue. And that
sheep is too cute!! Reminds me
of the sheep from the Serta
mattress commercials. (do you get
those??)

Your friend Pat made some wonderful
Valentine gifts for you indeed.
The little lace trimmed heart is
so pretty. Wonderful treasures!

I haven't read the sequel to
Tea Rose yet, but it's in my
library waiting to be chosen.
Beatrice Potter's biography is
taking me quite a while to read
and will probably keep me
occupied for another week or
more. She was a fascinating
lady. That sequel to the "Rose"
series is a long time coming.
I thought that it was suppose
to come out in '09.

Have a great week Judy.

Cheers!