2009 has been a busy year long effort to build up my Holiday Bazaar Inventory. My partner in crime (Pam) & I went out on a limb and signed up for a booth at the Trailing of The Sheep Festival in Hailey. We thought this would be a great testing ground for our wool felted hats & bags. We left Boise on Friday afternoon & spent the night with my BFF Sally in Gooding. Her son was playing in the High School Football game that night so we donned our newly hand knit "Hoodies" and headed out to a fun-filled, bitter cold night at the game. We looked just like three "grandma's" nestled together trying to steal the heat from each other. What a HOOT !
When we got home we settled in for hot chocolate & a half night marathon of "Catch up on the latest gossip"session. I think I ended up with 3 hrs sleep!
By 6:30 A.M. we were on the road headed to Hailey.
Talk about COLD ! ! ! By the time we got our booth set up, I began to wonder if I had any feet left! I could have sworn they had frozen themselves off after the first half hr of tramping in the frosty grass to get set up. But by noon the sun was shining & it turned out to be a fabulous day.
It surely did not take long to test our wool hats in this market place. Our prices were extremely competitive and the choices were endless. At any given time we had at least 10-12 shoppers in our booth. The products we had labored over for the last 9 months were flying out the door.
After giggling ourselves silly over the profits we had made a sudden panic set in! We had 9 more shows to do and we have minimal inventory! The we would giggle again about our success and in the next breath panic strikes again! ! So very funny when you look back on it.
We will definitely be back next year!

Dad's 76th Birthday Party

For the first time in about 30 years all four of us kids, (Dan, Diane, Debbie & Darr) were all together at the same time & same place & we got to have an entire family photo taken with Mom & Pop. We met on Saturday Feb 7, 2009 in Ontario Oregon at the Fiesta Guadalahara Mexican restaurant for some pretty fabulous mexican food. Debbie came from Payson Utah & in tow were three of her kids, (Angie, from Phoenix, Amy & Nate & their 2 sets of twins, Mike & Ali and their 3 kids). Then there was Dan & Wanda coming in from Lincoln City, Oregon. They had his daughter Jennifer there along with her husband Pat & two kids. Darr showed up with his three kids, Sara, Neal & Alison. Gary & I made a long afternoon trip over from Boise. Pulling up the rear was Mom & Bennie...all of us to wish Dad (escorted by Janice) a fabulous birthday. We gave each of our parents a digital photo frame loaded with a few photo's just to get them started. Dad also got some shoe grips for his boots so he will no longer slip & fall on the ice when he goes out to get the mail. His last little trip out there on the ice resulted in his taking a brief little nap under a 55 gal drum for a few minutes. As he woke up wondering what haad happened, he did make it into the house just in time to keep Janice busy washing all the blood from the back of his head. I think shoe grips is a GREAT idea. All his great-grandkids gathered around to watch him open the wonderful gift they got him...a pair of hand knit grandpa slippers. And of course, he got a new stadium seat to take to the races. His tender little hiney needed somthing just a little softer to rest on. The employees adorned his head with the traditional sombrero and sang to him in their native tongue. Several photo's later & ending with yummy fried icecream, we all departed to our separate destinations. A photo gallery will follow in a couple of days. A GOOD TIME WAS HAD BY ALL. HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!