Knitting Retreat

Some of my friends. L to R: Gladys, Pat, Laurey, Gayle, Marney, Carin.

Aren't these fun dishes?!!

One of Barb's zucchinis she grew this year resembles her Mallard duck. Isn't that cool!

Barb, showing us what we hope our bird baths will look like.

1. We poured out sand on the table, to make a cushion for our Hosta leaf. At this point, the leaf is hiding the sand.

2. We sprayed water on the sand so it would stick together better, covered it with a sheet of plastic, and placed our leaf over it, making sure it was raised at the deepest part of the leaf.

3. Bit by bit, we spread wet cement over the Hosta leaf, building it up from 1/2" to 1" thickness.

4. We formed a nice edge to the leaf, used the empty cottage cheese carton to form a flat base on the bird bath, and incised our initials. I also put cement into an empty carton to make a pedestal. All of the cement leaf bird baths were loosely covered with plastic to dry for a week.

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Each year one of the members of our knitting club invites the members to her cabin up north - near Nisswa, Minnesota. As always, it was so much fun!

Some of the ladies went up on Thursday, some Friday morning, and Gayle and I went up Friday after getting out of work. Other years we have gone up in October and the fall color was pretty. Though the leaves haven't begun changing yet, it was still nice up there - nice to get away.

Arriving at dinner time, we walked in to a beautifully set table and the aroma of good cooking. 9 of us gathered around the table and sang grace - The Doxology - with beautiful harmony. There was lots of conversation and laughter, and delicious food! Some stayed up way into the late hours talking.

Saturday morning Gayle and I prepared breakfast for all - a baked French toast, baked in an orange, sugar, cinnamon, butter combination, along with fresh fruit, sausages and orange juice.

All of us brought snacks for the weekend, but I thought the best of all were the home-made peanut butter and orange/oatmeal cookies that Marney made. Yummy!! I'm afraid I overdid it with them.

Each retreat we make a project. This year was so fun. We made bird baths from Hosta leaves and cement. They have to dry for a week, so Pat will pick them up next weekend when they go back up to their cabin. I sure hope mine turns out!