What. A. Day. Twice.

This last month has been insane. Work-wise, I’ve been buried. I think this last month and a half I’ve had at best three non-working days. bitch, bitch, bitch... Family stuff is wearing me down too. Three weeks ago my brother suffered a series of seizures that kept him in intensive care for four days. He is still hospitalized, and yesterday it became pretty clear that he isn’t going to return to anything near “normal” for a long time, if ever. As his nearest next-of-kin I’ve begun to look into getting power of attorney so I can try to help him as best I can. Our father is currently out of the country and I’m waiting for him to call me so I can fill him in on the sad details. The saddest part is that his condition is directly attributed to drugs and alcohol and something that he could have avoided if he could have found a way to ask for and accept help. Heartbreaking.

Today we took our son Matt to San Francisco for his dental work to be done. Because of Matt’s disability he needs to be under a full general anesthetic for any dental work to be done, so the doctors take care of anything and everything that needs attention. Unfortunately for poor Matty this also turned out to be having all four wisdom teeth extracted. It’s been a long day for us since the doctors wanted us in SF before 6:00 am which meant getting up at, oh, 4:15 this morning. Unfortunately for me I almost never ever fall asleep before midnight unless Ambien is involved, so I’m staggeringly tired right now and still trying to scrub from my brain the conversation about just how big that bladder tumor was... what's that... that's your pee... no really, that's your pee... yes, it'll be pink for a while because of your surgery... yes, blood... in your pee... no, it's okay, really... that was conducted on the other side of the recovery room. Gaahhhhh. But on the upside I did get some knitting done:

These are the Waving Lace Socks from Favorite Socks using the Malabrigo Sock Yarn test sample I got at Stitches West. There is teensy little problem with the yarn however – I’m enjoying it so much I’ll be really sad when I can’t immediately get my hands on more!

And I got almost all the way through the last row of clue 3 of the Mystic Light Mystery Shawl when the nurse told us that Matt was in the recovery room, so in this photo it is more of a lacy amoeba than a lacy shawl. The yarn is Plymouth Happy Feet, a very reasonably priced sock yarn.

And because I just don’t have enough projects on my needles I signed up for the Goddess Knits Anniversary Mystery Shawl. This one is supposed to be a round (pi) shawl and the really intriguing part is that the designer is offering different lace motifs for the expanding circle, making it more of a mandala. It means that potentially everyone could have a unique design – a totally cool idea.

The designer has chosen Jojoland Harmony, a laceweight with really long runs of color. This rang a bell in my mind and I rummaged out of the stash a purchase from Stitches West -

This is “Graceful”, 1800 yards of deep rich laceweight. I think this is going to be something really beautiful.




And a P.S. for Bets:
I was getting spam postings so I changed my post comments settings and this somehow disabled comments altogether. Another charming Blogger eccentricity, I 'spose.

Sort of like Burning Man, but without the misery *

*overheard at the Maker Faire.

Today my husband and I actually attended a crafty kind of event together. That alone makes it an event. The Maker Faire is a total hoot, heavily populated with geeks, freaks and full on nerds. I was so at home - with my people. I had been sort of on the fence about going this year, but hearing that the Yarn Harlot would make an appearance sold me. What sold my husband were two phrases: The Eepy Bird guys and "power tool races". With a little planning and a bit of freakish good luck we actually arrived early - a very good thing as it turned out, because I heard horror stories of traffic jams and limited parking. This put me in the extraordinary position of being one of the very first people to arrive for the Yarn Harlot, and I got front and center seats - one for me and three for a few of my fellow SnB members. I was pretty stunned. Stephanie, as always, was hilarious and utterly charming.






I even got a picture of me and the traveling sock (woo hoo!) and Stephanie holding my in-progress Malabrigo socks. Why I'm squinting like that I haven't a clue. This is why I hate pictures of myself!





I scored some beautiful yarn from Ceallach Dyes . Silly me, I kept pronouncing it like “sell-ack” – when it is actually Gaelic and pronounced as “Kelly” – the name the dyer goes by. Her work is beautiful and I think this will be perfect for the Spring Mystery Shawl . Yes, I am a total sucker for those mystery lace things. Kelly is even local to the Bay Area and I predict she’ll see more business soon. Her stuff is beautiful – “solar” dyed too, which even impressed my husband.





There were so many amazing things to see that I found myself wishing I’d purchased the two-day ticket. Perhaps next year. Here are a few random samples:







The Eepy Bird Diet Coke + Mentos Show. Yes, we got wet.

Odd bicycles.

Really odd.

Man-made lightning. Very cool.

And very large… things.

And courtesy of the MCY thread on Ravelry I saw this tonight – and can’t quit giggling.