Apres Stitches South

If you've ever been to a Stitches event, you know how much fun it is, and also, how much walking you have to do.  Therefore, come prepared:

That would be yours truly on the left, Mooflower on the left.  In the Market on Day One.  The last time we saw each other was also in Atlanta, about four years ago.  She is truly awesome, and it was great to see her again.  And to meet her friend, Jane.

Day One shopping filled one of my Chico bags.  I'd written down amounts of yarn I needed for specific projects, and stuck to buying those.  For the most part.

How cute is that little guy?  Shame I can't crochet --- Briton's girlfriend loves otters.

Treated myself to room service the first night, having taken a long nap that afternoon and missed dinnertime.

Fruit and cheese basket.  Followed the next morning by

my standard hotel/room service Eggs Benedict breakfast.  With tiny bottles of Tabasco again.

Bought fewer things on Day Two, as I had walked the whole market twice Friday, and had very specific vendors to visit Saturday.  And didn't take a nap, which meant I could go to dinner with Moo and Jane:

Boots are made for shopping and eating.

Got home on Sunday in time to watch Adam Scott win the Masters:

One of my favorite golfers, and definitely the cutest.

Today, I'm working on a cowl with yarn I bought Friday:

 

Oh, and fighting Con Crud.  It was inevitable.

But sort of worth it.

Stitches South

This is my second trip to Stitches South;  Hannah and I came a couple of years ago.  The hotel has redecorated its rooms, going from warm woods with real character to black and white modular which is plain tacky.

The market, which is all I came for, remains the same.  Lots of women wearing lots of handknits.  Mostly shawls.  Don't know how many were wearing handmade socks, but shawls have definitely been the project of choice for, I'd say, 85% of the attendees.

Met up with friend Mooflower once I arrived.  She and her friend Jane have been delightful company these couple of days, despite our difference in style:

The market did have a surprise or two:

This booth was empty yesterday, but there were men sitting and knitting today.  

There was also a handsome man in a kilt strolling around.  Wanted to take a picture of him, but that would have been just creepy.

Got my standard room service breakfast this morning:

Love my Eggs Benedict, and love the tiny Tabasco bottles even more.

So

Following the lead of my twinster and knitting a Color Affection shawl.  I'm always late to the game on stuff like this Hot-Pattern-of-the-Moment.  But elann.com is selling yarn packs for Color Affection, and I thought I'd dive in.  I went with Night Flower, if you're interested.

Heading off to Stitches South tomorrow.  Can't leave until after 4, which will most likely put me 1) in Atlanta 5 o'clock traffic and 2) driving into some strong thunderstorms.  But once I'm there, I'm there, and Friday, Saturday and Sunday stretch out before me.

It's possible I won't spend that much time at the actual Stitches events.  I couldn't sign up for any classes --- too expensive.  So the only place for me to go, really, is the marketplace.  Not that I'm complaining.

Hopefully, these few days away will help me mentally.  My therapist called my trip to Folly Beach last year (last YEAR?) "as good as ElectroShock."  I am in desperate need of a Reset.  Because I am perilously close to hitting the Permanently Off switch.

Well. . .

Riley is now at our vet, and will be until at least Friday.  She is showing signs of improvement: she's noticeably less jaundiced, has gained a couple of ounces, has less bilirubin in her urine.  They're still having to feed her with a syringe, but that is SO much better than a feeding tube.  We miss her, but would prefer she stay with them until she is completely stable.

In addition to calling off all my travel plans for the rest of the year, I've also cancelled acupuncture for the time being.  I wasn't having the best luck with it anyway, but that's another weekly cost that     would have eaten away at the money I have.

And I'm still looking high and low for a job.  Without any luck.  Wonder if I qualify for unemployment again?

Just bought this bead from my friend Shannon.  Not so clear in the photo, but the "sky" is swirly purple, like a storm.  Just gorgeous, and so me.  The plan is to make it into a pendant.

I've talked before about how impressed I am with Deborah Norville's sock yarn.  For skeins that are marked as containing 230 yards, I can usually make a full pair of socks out of one skein.  With these socks, I went a little longer on the body, and this is how much I got done before I had to tie in the second skein.  It's just remarkable.  And the colors are nice, and there's no reason to pay over $20 for sock yarn when you can get a pair out of a $5 skein.

Klunk misses his big sister.  They share Hannah's room.  And he loves to play with her swishing tail.  Without her, he's had to turn to

Finn for his amusement.  Sometimes Finn is willing to play along, sometimes not.  We'll all be glad when Riley is back with us.

A Monday

Finn has the oddest habit of grabbing shoes when someone comes in the house.  Not when someone is leaving, and needs to put shoes on, but when they're coming in.

When you adopt a rescued pet, you wonder (or at least I do) what kind of life they had before.  Finn was definitely trained to "stand up" and have his leash put on.  I wonder if this shoe thing was part of his training, too.

Sort of a quiet weekend.  Hannah worked both days.  I got a good amount of knitting done.  Briton  came over last night to watch "The Walking Dead."  Obligatory Daryl photo now:

I spent a whole lot of time looking up and printing out patterns.  I've got a sock and a scarf on the needles right now: the scarf courtesy of Roxanne.  A while back, she sent me two skeins of Chunky Mochi (color 817), and one of the patterns I came across was a scarf pattern calling for --- you guessed it --- two skeins of Chunky Mochi.

Got a follow-up appointment with the acupuncturist on Wednesday.  I'm anxious to hear her thoughts on the three-day-long headache I had after our first session.

March used to be a fairly busy month for me, events-wise.  My wedding anniversary is/was March 10th.  Mama's birthday is/was March 24th.  Dale's is/was March 31st.  Now, it's down to my best friends' birthdays.  Shari celebrates hers on March 1st, though she was actually born February 29th.  Tomorrow is Lisa's.  Hard to believe we're all fifty-flippin'-three years old.

Insert Needle A Into Body K

Going to an acupuncturist in the morning.  (Why isn't that spelled "accupuncture"?  Seems more accurate.)  Decided to try some other possible remedies for my anxiety/stress/depression and my headaches.  I've no fear of needles, so that isn't a problem.  I do wonder, though, what the feeling will be like as the energy begins to move around.  There's a whole lot of bad stuff stored up in this body, and I just wonder what it's going to feel like when someone tries to take it out.

I just have to do something.  Spinning in place has gotten old.  And Briton is convinced I'm suicidal again.  All I want to do is stay in bed and sleep, which has always been, as I'm sure I've said dozens of times here already, my Worrisome Sign.

So, we'll give that a whirl tomorrow.  'Til then, Rifftrax and Noro silk:

Dear. . .

. . .  Every Bag I Saw at TJMaxx That Would Have Made a Great Knitting Bag: Why were you all $129.99?  I mean, every single one of you.

. . . Little Knits:  Even though I don't have a cool new bag to put any of it in, thank you for all the great yarn in my latest shipment.  I'm already working with the organic wool:

. . . Stitches South, I made my reservation for you today.  My plan for this year is to take myself on a little "vacation" each month.  Stitches fits that bill for April.  AND I get to see some friends!

. . .   Hugh Laurie, I still love you.  This was a wonderful book, and it looks like you've helped make it a wonderful movie.

. . .  Girls who were in Barnes and Noble studying for a French test: the terms are not "bone-a-partay" and "coop duh tatt."  Neither of you, I suspect, has a prayer on the exam.  And I would love to know who asked whom to help her study.