Happy Holidays 2013

summer days campchaos style

Summer seems to have campchaos on the move and we've been lucky to have enjoyed some great adventures. The pups love it when we load up in the 4Runner put the windows down and sail away on the warm currents of summer air.

They loved it all- the supermoon rising over the Atlantic, the trips to the dog park or a weekend camping. Life is full of adventure for these pups and they love it. We've got the traffic patterns dialed in a bit better this summer and have been avoiding the crowds even on the busy weekends. 

 We've managed to take full advantage of the weather and was able to spend a long weekend in July in northern Maine. It was the type of weekend that made time obsolete. The only thing that mattered was enjoying the sun and sleeping under the stars on the beach.

Spring Adventures

Now that summer has hit the seacoast we've had to give the beaches back to the tourists. We managed to snap one last group shot on a warm day in May. 

Our daytime beach adventures may be over for the summer but we can still do the occasional evening on the salty shore. A few weeks ago we pulled out the camera and took the pups for a walk in the park where the first blooms of the season were coming out with the warmer weather. 

I'm still learning how to shoot manually and have been enjoying the process. I'm not always getting the image I want but I'm getting closer. I lucked out as the rhododendrons move much less then the pups.

Dave's been in training mode this spring and his coach, Mayhem has been really encouraging on their runs. Mayhem puts aside his urges to chase squirrels and runs (mostly) alongside Dave. Chaos hangs at home and waits for me to get home to go for our nightly walk. The runs are a bit too much for the big guy and we have to respect what his body tells us. Dave's had two 5k races this season and his coach has been impressed. He's shaved time off each race but most importantly has been enjoying the runs.

Chaos enjoys the quiet times and loves his perch on the steps overlooking the backyard and his pesky  little brother. Don't let this pose fool you- behind those mellow eyes is a playful pup who comes out for a bit of zoom time each day.

We're all loving the tired, young pup who mellows out in the evenings after running with Dave and playing with his favorite toys outside. 

Moose Alley

You may recall that last year Elvis ripped up Sugarloaf. This year we met up with her again along with some friends for a weekend filled with sunshine, warm weather, puppies and skiing.

After the morning drop off we took a short hike down the Golden Road before dropping deep into Brackett Basin. 

Elvis hit up Mountain Magic for the day to work on her skiing and have fun with friends before showing off her skills by visiting her friend Amos's house on Moose Alley off off Whiffletree.

It was a beautiful day to hit up the mountain and I'm pretty sure that a good time was had by all. 

I even managed to get a bit of knitting done in the warm sunshine. This doesn't happen often- knitting outside in the warm sunshine on Timberline. First off, it's the east coast- a sunny warm ski day is to be treasured. It means getting out of bed early to walk the pups so you can still get on the hill at a decent hour and not lingering over the Bag Burger at lunch time... even if it is so much better now that they offer gluten free buns that really just makes the Gucci burger. 

We were able to squeeze a lot of good times in and were pretty exhausted by the end of the weekend. We missed our cousins by one weekend but thankfully they had sent along photos of the crew regrouping at the Bag over lunch so we got to live vicariously through text messages. 

Of course Elvis went home with new knitwear from Aunt K8 Knits... 

for more photos from the weekend click here

winter waves and a bit of snow

We found Nemo

A little mayhem...

This past spring Mayhem had a seizure. It is just as awful as it sounds and we were in a rocky place. It was a rainy, cold day and he had been acting funny. He was restless and whined as if he needed something. This went on for a while and eventually he just hung out. He was by my side and started to jerk. I held him as we entered into the next five minutes that seemed endless. I barked orders at Dave and Sara. They called a local vet (not helpful) and Home Safe. The local vet wasn't our vet and brushed Sara off the phone. Home Safe gave solid advise and helped talk us through a scary day. There isn't much that we could do and the little dog was fully normal the next day. 
This weekend Mayhem gave us another scare and had his second seizure. Again- terrible and time moved slowly- Dave and I both went to Mayhem's side as the pup jerked around unable to control his little golden body. His after shocks seemed to go on for longer and once again I called Home Safe. They took my information and kept me on the line while they consulted their vet. We ended up going to the emergency clinic in Portsmouth and saw a great crew who checked the little dog out and ran his blood work.
The results came back all within the normal ranges and we're back to the waiting game. We're hoping for a nice long wait...

campchaos welcomes 2013

Happy New Year from the beach... 

A visit to Plymouth Rock with Sparky*

Plymouth Rock isn't my favorite landmark that Camp Chaos has hit but a day with Sparky* makes it more then memorable and bumps the day way up on the list of favorites. We've been friends since the last century and have endured ups, downs and a lot of turns.

These days a visit with Sparky is filled with great conversations, a bit of history, silliness and a bit of yarn in some form.

LL Bean back in 2004

Sparky* bought me my first set of knitting needles and my first yarn (I still have both) and she attempted to teach me how to knit on her visit to Maine in 2004 but I wasn't quite ready. I eeked out 3" of a swiss cheese scarf and tucked it away. When I unearthed it in 2010 I was ready to learn, by that time I was in Colorado and she was in the Pacific Northwest so I resorted to youtube videos. She's always been my knitting mentor and I love being able to have that be a part of our friendship story. 

The original needles and yarn on my deck in Colorado in 2010. 

 A lot of knitter's have stashes of yarn- some of this is for yarn that's "next in the queue" but some of it's sentimental  I have small balls of yarn from my early projects, the first yarn I got from Sparky and now some yarn my uncle found from my grandmother's collection.

Canadian wool- it was the preferred yarn requested by her kids. I can see why- there's some balls of acrylic in there which are very scratchy! There was also a set of metal dps (double pointed needles) tucked away in the stash.

It was great to be able to add this to my stash of memories...

my uncle, Dave and Kendra all dressed up for a walk in the Maine woods 

Cider Mash 5k

About a month ago Dave learned of a 5k that was happening at the local apple orchard. Gary had been looking for a race and Dave jumped on board. They were joined by Marc and Dave began training. He picked out some new kicks at the running store which is no small feat as to find high performance trainers for his small feet.

Dave found the best Coach and motivator in Mayhem. The three year old golden spins circles whenever Dave touches his running shoes and the light up collar with the green light that keeps the pair safe on their nocturnal training runs. They started slowly and ran a few times that first week and built up stamina.

This wasn't your standard 5k road race... this Cider Mash was a cross country tour of the orchard including some deccent hills and terrain. Thankfully there were no apples for ankle rolling. The three started out together along with 300 of their closest friends as they ran along the road and turned into the apple trees.

There were no dogs allowed at the race so Coach stayed home with Chaos eating treats and napping anxiously awaiting to hear how Dave's run went.

Dave and Marc stuck together and Gary wasn't far behind as the runners came back into view.

Ok... so they weren't in the font of the pack but that's not the point. Dave didn't get into this to bring home medals or anything. It's more about finding an outlet for Mayhem's energy and a great way to stay in shape for when he's able to get back on the rock again.

Colby kept watch for his Dad's orange hat bobing through the trees as he hung out with his Dzia Dzia, plus he sported his 'loaf hat that he earned from his first turns at Sugarloaf last winter.

 As a post race bonus there were gluten filled apple cider donuts...

but mostly Dave was just happy to have a good day in the chilly sunshine with his brother and Gary.

Beaches

I'm back to playing with the good camera and have been using the pups to hone my skills behind the lens. They don't seem to mind and have been enjoying our trips to the beach where I work on learning about light and the many settings that need to be tuned in the right pitch to get a beautiful shot.

The first session went well but there was a lot of editing that went into the photos... yesterday I shot in bright midday sun and had a lot of washed out shots in the beginning a few tweaks and many test shots and I was in my grove. 

Fall Colors and Colorado Visitors

There's something about Fall in New England that brings people home. The nostalgia of vibrant colors, the smell of apple pie or the flavor of cider doughnuts- whatever the reason there seems to be a homecoming trend going on here.

It started with the our favorite clamah' returning to the Coast of Maine. We loaded the pups up and traveled north with a yarn shop stop along the way. If there was a theme for the weekend it would have been beautiful buddies... it started with these guys being sweet brothers.

it did get a little fishy at times...

but it came back around...

There's something about beaches to really bring out the beauty in all of us. 

Tinker Toys and Yarn Swifts

Life at campchaos has been spinning quickly and the last few weekends have been full of cool nights in the tent, duck tours with Elvis,  puppy adventures, a weekend upta camp and the parking lot that is I-95 Southbound on a summer Sunday. We've managed to stay in place for a weekend and I was finally able to tackle some yarn that's needed to be wound. Dave helped me out on Friday night and held the skein and suffered through 400 yards of sock yarn. He was a good sport but I could tell that he'd rather be petting the pups instead of watching yarn slowly spin.

The next night I searched for alternatives to aid in the project and found this site, which used old school Tinker Toys to make a DIY Yarn Swift. I hadn't been a huge tinker toy fan as a kid but my sister loves them. It just so happened that Dave had a box of tinker toys from 1983 laying around so he blew off decades of attic dust and quickly went into construction mode.

We referenced the how to but also modified the design here and there. Dave even had a little Tinker Toy Guy that became the center piece of the swift.

We started out with a small base and tested a good size skein of yarn.

The moment of truth... would I end up with a ball or a tangled mess?

Between my hand crank ball winder and the tinker toy swift we made short work and I was quickly able to wind a half dozen cakes of yarn before taking the swift apart and stashing it in my knitting bag... for you non-knitters out there- a normal knitting swift is a really cool umbrella like contraption that retails at least $65. That's a lot of yarn back in this knitter's budget, plus the tinker toys break down for easy storage. Now I can get back to my knitting...

Here's the swift in action after a couple of design modifications.