Well, I've come and gone and another Men's Spring Knitting Retreat is complete. I love this event. I love seeing the guys at these events and the amazing creations that have been knit over the year. One of the things I love most about this retreat is the locale. A quiet spot in the country filled with trees and hills!

This spot was lovely until the geese attacked the rental car. The horn didn't even slow them down. Protecting the young is serious business

They were everywhere and all over the grounds.
Although I love the locale, the venue itself has lost some of its appeal for me. Granted, the meeting space is spectacular! It has amazing light and an openness to the outside world that can't be beat but the sleeping quarters are well, I don't know how to dress it up, they're, well, not my speed.

I didn't join in the fray nearly as much as I have in the past. I very purposely did not take any classes and when I ripped my shawl to the lifeline for the second time on day two, I never picked it up again. Instead, my fantastic roomie, MDV, taught me to properly crochet and I even made a very rough version of the granny square that my intended crochet blanket is based on. Here's the blanket and here's the square!

granny blanket photo copyright the designer Lucy at www.attic24.typpad.com

I had wheels this year and if I return, I will always have them. I escaped to town and had breakfast at this really quaint, little eatery, found real coffee (I never thought I'd be so happy to see a Dunkin' Donuts), took a few long drives through the country and snapped some photos along the way.

the lake at Easton

A Drive in the Country

Breakfast is served
A great trip overall and a great getaway; just what the doctor ordered! Not that doctor silly. ;-)

Edit: Kystal, I swear I'm going to send you the Tosh yarn....soon!

In the infamous words of Doctor Who....

It's a bit "wibbly wobbly timey wimey". Yes, the wine glass has come home from the kiln. I can't get a good photo of it, just my luck, the day I get it back from the studio, "Florida, the Sunshine State" decides to go cloudy on me. The stem is clearly a little bit off-center and the middle of the stem ended up a bit over-twisted and it's not exactly straight up and down ... but I love it! It twisted so much that I'm afraid to wash it fearing the stem will just crack in two but there's wine in my future and yes, it's going from this glass to my lips! Since I can't get a good photo of it today, here are a few birthday present photos...



Yes, I'm obsessed with Doctor Who, can't get enough of it so a Doctor Who inspired phone case was just the ticket! My very own Tardis! If you have no idea what I'm talking about, get over to Netflix and queue the series. If you like science fiction that's a tad ridiculous, you'll adore Doctor Who.



And my new knitting bag! It came all the way from Kuala Lumpur and it's fantastic! I adore the hardware and its overall design. It's really cleverly made, you have to love Etsy! Half the fun was tracking it on DHL as it made its way across the planet. Believe it or not, it got to Cincinnati (via Hong Kong) in 2 days and then proceeded to take 5 days to get to Florida, go figure? Welcome to America!

And since it's my new knitting bag, that's knitting content! Golden!

Happy Mother's Day Ladies!

Bonus, I still have Eyebrows!

Had a blast today! My cousin and I had a little outing to a local glass blowing studio. We took an introductory class to make wine goblets. Well, we didn't actually make the goblets but instead, just the stems. I'm rather proud of my very, misshapen glass stem but alas, it's still in the kiln (so no photos yet). Instead, here's a video from another customer of the studio highlighting our amazing instructor Josh! This is something I definitely want to learn more about.

Thanks for the gift L!