Saint David's day and a SWest recap

The subtitle should read yo bitch, blog already. I've been blogging in my head again and even the leave a trail of draft breadcrumbs is not working as planned.

Draft version left on Saint David's day (1 March for the not-in-the-know) but today's the 6th. For the really not in the know readers, David (Daffyd) is the patron saint of Wales.

Dreams of sashaying about Santa Clara in a completed pentagon sleeves project disappeared in a puff of oops when, after driving the 500-some miles North, I found that this little bag of sleeve had decided to hide and stay home in San Diego.

Fortunately, I had a few more things in my knitting bag of tricks or why multiple projects is a boon and not a burden.

Although I brought all the bits of the Milanese Lace mohair smoke ring in the hopes that I'd discover where I'd gone wrong (yet again) I'm enough of a Stitches veteran to know that troubleshooting lace gone wrong is not a good project for what can often be a sensory overload experience.

Most of my SWest knitting involved casting on and knitting a pink silk 5 petal flower that I had promised to try to deliver during the event. Which is to say, yes, I was the woman knitting the damned small pink thing on the tiny needles while walking around the event on Saturday. I finished it on Saturday night and delivered it to a proxy (aka Karen of Rug & Yarn Hut) on Sunday so no pictures on this blog. Recipient, yes, you have my permission to show or not on your blog. It was a gift and I don't control gifts after they leave my custody.

When the market opened, I made a beeline (well, as much of a beeline as I could given the congested market layout) for the air and the back of the hall. Fortunately for me, that back aisle row was home to the Lacy Knitter's Guild booth which was manned by the doubly delightful duo of Gene Beugler & Lew DeYong.

Karen's booth was just a few ticks over and I got the usual; heat for being so unobtrusive on the scene. After some of our usual, why don't you come North, how come you come visit South stuff, Karen directed me to Joan M-M's booth aka White Lies Designs where I showed sleeve and chattered not nearly long enough with darling Joan herself. As I mentioned before, her upcoming book is on my must have book -- two in fact one for me and one for gift.

The rest of the pre-class market run involved Habu and Carolina Homespun. At Habu I had a few moments to speak with Takako and Darlene (aka Hand Jive Knits) before I restocked pine paper yarn
which, despite her threats is not yet renamed heather, and I think is in a smaller put-up these days. I also couldn't resist the pineapple family fibre (yes, pineapple/Hawaii is a catch my attention thing) in lime green and turqoiuse
and the cotton tape that reminds me of the discontinued Ganpi Abaka without the wrap.
At Carolina Homespun, not only was I surprised and delighted to reconnect with former San Diego fibre junkie Maat, I scored my much lusted after GoKo swift which has already proven itself to be an excellant investment.

I would/could/should write more but if I don't finally publish I'll fritter away another day without an update.