We had a toast to our friend, Michael Reardon, last night. There were shots of whiskey, pints of beer, smiles, laughs and stories being told around the room.

The Reardon Family requested that we record the evening. Luckily Sam got the message before she headed over to the bar. I hope the videos and pictures came out all right.

We miss you, Michael.

CrimperMag.com: To conclude, if the unthinkable ever happened, what would you most like to be remembered for? ...

Michael Reardon: Don’t shed a tear, raise a pint and laugh because I’m living hard and loving harder than anyone has a right to. Besides, the devil won’t have me and we know the old man upstairs isn’t opening the gates so I’ll still be around and giggling right along with you until we meet again.

I don't know when you start referring to someone who's missing and feared dead in the past tense. "I'm lucky enough to call Michael Reardon my friend." or "I was lucky enough to call Michael Reardon my friend." I don't know...

Michael Reardon has spent the last month climbing in Ireland. This past February he was here in Philadelphia, and he kept talking about how great it was to climb in Ireland last year, how he longed to go back to the place of his ancestors, how amazing the terrain was, and how magical the views were. He was really looking forward to climbing there again. In his last installment of his Pro Blog on Climbing.com, Michael wrote about this year's trip to Ireland, you can hear the excitement in his words. As its been reported, Michael had just finished climbing along the cliffs of Ireland, when a wave struck him and washed him out to sea. Rescure boats were searching for him within 15 minutes. That was 3 days ago.

Michael Reardon posing with Sam, Colleen and a knitted womb at the HERA Women's Cancer Foundation's Climb4Life 2006 in Salt Lake City

I met Michael last year at Climb4Life in Salt Lake City. I actually had no idea who he was. At Climb4Life you and your group are assigned to a different pro to climb with you each day. On our first day out, we got put with Michael (along with his wife Marci, and daughter Nikki). I remember having to ask my friends a couple times who he was and why he was famous. It was raining that day, so we were all forced to climb inside. Despite the plasticized rock, we all had a great time. In the afternoon my sister and I went upstairs to the bouldering room at the gym. She'd never really bouldered before, so I was trying to help her climb a V0. A few minutes later Michael wandered upstairs and we started chatting, and then he started working with Diana on the bouldering problem. It was SO neat to watch him work with her. You could see he was enjoying it, too.

Michael was incredibly impressed with and inspired by my friend Samantha. She's courageous. She's strong. She's beautiful. Honestly, who wouldn't be impressed by her. While we were in Salt Lake, Michael mentioned to Sam and Colleen that he'd be doing a speaking tour in early 2007, and that maybe he'd come to Philadelphia so that we could hook up with his talk and raise some money for the HERA Foundation. We were thrilled.

We auctioned Michael off on eBay, and we held a raffle at his talks at the University of Pennsylvania and at Rutgers. I think we raised over $500 while he was in town. Plus we got to spread the news about the HERA foundation and Ovarian Cancer.

Michael poses with Sam and I at the climbing gym, after we auctioned him off to raise money for Ovarian Cancer Awareness through the HERA Foundation

It was great to spend a few days with Michael and his PR guy, Zach. To see Michael's talk at Penn and then to talk to him afterwards was really a treat. I'd be delivering a few workshops for JBoss the next week, so it was great to watch someone else deliver a technical (albeit non-software) presentation. To see how he reacted to the audience, how he engaged them, and how he transitioned form one topic to the next was great to learn from and observe.

I feel sorry for the climbing community if Michael is really gone. His personality, his enthusiasm, his humility, his energy... its irreplaceable. He has the persona to bring climbing into the mainstream: to be the extreme one who makes the headlines to bring awareness to climbing. From Michael, I've learned about mental strength, about climbing ethics, about endurance, and about training. He's made me a better climber, a more aware climber, and a stronger climber. I hope that everyone can find that person who can effect their passion like Michael has for me.

A bunch of us will be getting together to toast Michael on Wednesday night (9.18) - whiskey and beer all around. If you're in the Philadelphia area and would like to attend, let me know.

Michael, having fun with the camera.	Michael relaxes before his Soloquest talk at UPenn

I've worked on a bunch of sweaters. I think I have 3 WIP's (Works in Progress) upstairs in various stages of completeness. I do plan on finishing them at some point.... just not at *this* point. Really, I do.

But, I need something new -- so, for my next project, Di and I found this great green yarn. It's Cascade Yarn's 220 Superwash wool, Color 891 (it's pictured in the 5th swatch down). It'll be soft to wear, and easy to wash. I think it'll make a great sweater.

The only tricky part is that this yarn is 4.5 stitches per inch on size 8 needles, and the pattern calls for 4 stitches per inch. So -- instead of making the medium, which would normally fit me, I'll make the large -- which should work down to being the size of the medium, because of the smaller guage yarn.

I was a good girl and even made a yarn swatch:

Sake poses with my guage swatch of Cascade Yarn's 220 Superwash wool.

I finally finished my yoga mat bag. It only took me 5 months... As I explained in my intial blog about the project, the bag is made using Tapestry Crochet". Its a relatively simple technique where you use a small hook and a worsted weight yarn to produce a tightly woven fabric.

• materials
  • six balls Paton's Classic Merino Wool (3 in Black, 3 in Natural Mix).
  • Size D crochet hook
  • one stitch marker
  • one 2-inch dual adjustable side-squeeze buckle (optional, for strap)
• pattern
  • The basic pattern for this bag is the tube shape often used in tapestry crochet projects (such as this beaded hat)
  • The details of the pattern I'm not going to publish, yet. I'm thinking about submitting the pattern to a magazine, so I don't want to break any of their rules about the pattern being previously published. I doubt it will get accepted, but I think it will be fun to try.

My tapestry crochet yoga mat bag.

Detailed look at the bag closure.

The strap and buckle of the bag.

The big stump we dug out of the garden

This time last year I was working on building Cairns in my garden. A year later, Mendra and I finally got to the planter on the other side of our stair case.

Most of Saturday was taken up with removing a MASSIVE stump from the corner of the planter. It took us a few hours to dig it out. Ugh. What a pain. But -- it was well worth it -- having that stump in the corner of my garden would have bothered the hell out of me, and if we'd tried to remove it next year -- we would have trampled all the plants around it. So -- yay us for taking the time to get the damn thing out. That being said -- I think we'll pay someone to grind out the other 3 stumps we have in the yard. Cause damn that was a lot of work.

Sunday was more fun. I placed the brick border to match the planter on the left. Then we mixed a bunch of top soil with our home-made compost and filled in the planter. We bought a bunch of shade-loving plants to live in our freshly turned dirt. Hopefully the like their new home. The two sides of the house look a little unbalanced now... with the more-established plants from last year's planter project on the left and the new garden on the right -- but I'm sure it will catch up soon enough.

The planter to the left of the stairs that we planted last year

The planter on the right of the stairs that we finished this weekend.

I had fun making cairns again this year. But this time -- my garden is now guarded by a genuine Garden Fairy who lives in her very own little castle. Isn't she cute?

Di made me a GREAT broken tile mosaic house number (luckily she checked to make sure what house number we lived at before she made it). Thanks to Bernie for hanging it for us. I also had the boys install my rooster plant hangers (see them next to the mosaic). Its so neat to see the front yard come together.... The back yard will be a project for another year (or three).

The garden fairy who guards our garden, Di's tile mosaic in the background.