However, the past month has not been without fibery goodness! The first week of June, I attended "Knitters Connection" in Columbus, where I took three classes and met some of the illuminati of the knitting world.
My first class was with Candace Eisner Strick and was called "25 Tricks of the Trade." It was an all day class and we learned a lot of helpful tricks for doing things like knitting backwards, making buttonholes, some two color knitting. We had a great time.The second class I took was "Changing Numbers" with Maureen Mason Jamieson. The idea was to learn to adapt patterns to fit you perfectly. I'm not sure I got a lot out of it. The part that was most useful was common sense and, as a designer, Maureen took the attitude that there are "normal" sizes and "abnornal" sizes. Easy for her to say in her size 8 perfection.
My last class was a LOT of fun and memorable, but, again, I'm not sure how much it helped me. It was called "Color Challenges" with Judy Ditmore. Judy was a blast and her class can be summed up very simply: You can put any colors together -- ANY colors -- as long as you use them in Fibonacci ratios. 
She had us prove it to ourselves by putting yarn of various colors on index cards and then by knitting swatches with three colors we like, randomly selected, plus two colors we don't like, randomly selected. Strangely, her theory seemed to work. I made my swatch into a bracelet and I've been wearing it all the time.One evening Cat Bordhi gave a lecture on sock architecture and also showed us a bunch of her moebius things. I've got to buy one of her moebius books now. She was wonderful and SO creative.
In addition to the classes, and one of the highlights of the event for me, Lime and Violet did a live podcast from Columbus.
Although Miss V had a mysterious illness and spent part of her time in the hospital, she was able to attend part of the time and we got to meet her and side-show husband (who is incidentally a hunk!). 
Miss Lime was charming and hysterically funny. Miss Lime is shown here autographing Gerald's leg. Gerald works for Knitting Merchantile and was hilarious. I really enjoyed hanging out with them. 
I don't know what they'll cut, but they interviewed me for the podcast so I may be on the show!The last night I was there, I attended the Author's Reception, where I got a chance to meet Shannon Okey and Gwen Bortner and hang out with Lime and Violet some more. Shannon was a hoot!
I introduced myself to Gwen and showed her my progress on the SSK knitalong I'm doing with her. She was so sweet -- she ran up to her hotel room and brought down the original Sample Stitch Kimono so I could see it.All in all it was a great time and, considering all the home repair stuff I've been doing, I really needed the break.
