knitting school dropout

*crickets*

has it seriously been this long?

sorry for the extended absence. life has been crazy 'round these parts. and by crazy i mean that the better part of the last 6 months has been spent sitting on my backside, knitting or writing patterns.

when it all started, the book looked a little like this:

and this:

and now, i am on my 13th sweater since january, which i once thought completely impossible. it's possible, peeps. painfully possible. as the final deadline for the book creeps up, i'm actually not stressed out. i'm excited, relieved, and looking forward to having more free time to visit friends and family again.

i cannot wait to share what i've been up to. i've managed to document most of it in pictures, so when the time comes, i'll have lots to show you.

although i spend the majority of my time at home alone these days, i did manage to get out of the house and have a little fun last month.

ysolda came to hub mills in lowell, ma and i made a trip there to meet her, and to hang out with cecily and cirilia. she had lots of beautiful samples on display (i'm particularly in love with the little shawlette she had just finished). not only is ysolda a talented and successful designer, i'm pretty sure that she possesses the most envied shoe collection the knitting world has ever seen.

i managed to have my camera hanging around my neck, and still forget to take photos. so here, i'm stealing cecily's pictures, because i know she will forgive me.

the next day i picked up my friend melissa and we headed to boston to meet cecily and see peaches! while stuck in mass pike traffic, we made up a game where we guess which other cars were headed to the peaches show. cranky looking folks and line cutters were definitely NOT going to peaches, happy, laughing, and singing folks were DEFINITELY going to peaches. it was such a fun show, with costume changes, good friends and hilarious music, how could it not be?

on the ride home, we listened to riot grrrl bands and talked about how fun it was seeing bands like bikini kill and team dresch when we were younger. i love my friends. i'm looking forward to more time with them this summer.

but now i must get packed. i'm heading to ohio on friday with cecily for TNNA. we'll be taping an episode of knitting daily tv about our book on sunday. stop by and take a peek. i'm bringing a few of the sweaters for the taping.

after tnna, i'll be back here with a contest to celebrate my 3 years at knittingschooldropout.com. i'll be giving away some of my favorite yarns and notions. i'll also be updating you with the amount being donated to www.pancan.org from sales of my pattern bea.

*for the last 11 years i've worked as a 1:1 for adults with developmental disabilities, most of whom are/were elderly. one of the women i worked with years ago would always end our time together each day by saying " good times. we had good times today." she passed away several years ago, but her little saying always pops into my head at the end of a good day.

good times.