The Co-Driver's USA Report / Part 1

The Co-driver here!
Thought I’d share a couple more things that were happenin’ in South Dakota after Mr. W went home.
Firstly, we had a fabulous JAM session.
Gramcraker made us jam every year for Christmas. As a way to honor her life, all the women folk got together and had a Raspberry-Rhubarb jam making day at Kelly’s in her swish new kitchen. Kay thought ahead and had aprons in various colors made for all (I think there were 11 of us).

Carin had given me a frame with a photo of Gramcraker’s hands so that sat among us while we all took turns measuring, stirring, washing & bossing. No such thing as too many cooks spoiling the jam – it was DELISH! I even 'smuggled' some back to Australia with me.
As I don’t wear an apron much, I’ve tied it to a chair in my little house;
Looks cute, doesn’t it?

The weekend after Mr. W left, 12 gals headed to Adams, Minnesota for a quilt retreat at Whispering Willows Cottage.
O-M-G, it is an absolute gem of a facility. I highly recommend it. There was absolutely nothing that we could have wanted for, other than perhaps an extra bed (one of them was supposed to be for 2 people but they would have had to be miniature people to be comfortable in the bed).
So, for 3 nights and 3 1/2 days, 12 women sewed and crafted and laughed and ate and drank and played games and had massages and ate and drank and gambled and shopped…..oh, and did I mention that we ate and drank? It was such a nice weekend. There was a bit of concern that 12 estrogen dependent women might struggle to get along for that long but no worries….other than a little niggle or two, there were no problems. One night we even had The Quilt Goddesses in residence……they were a hoot!

I also spent quite a bit of time doing yoga while I was back in hopes of staying in my ‘zen zone’. It worked. I stayed in my ZZ the entire trip (well, pretty much so). I found a delightful little studio called EastbankYoga in Sioux Falls.
Gina and Cena are great teachers. I also took a class from Mary at The Butterfly Rainbow Center and she was wonderful. My only regret is that I didn’t have enough time to join Cena for that glass of wine she offered.
The best part was spending some quality time with family and friends. It gets to be a long dry spell between visits and although my home is in Australia, I dearly miss my family and friends in the USA - Skype, phone calls, emails and snail mail just don’t quite hit the mark.