Stitches, Part 2 - Striving for Lucidity

While I knocked over the hurdle and didn't finish any Olympic Knitting this year, Stitches provided me with any number of events.

Friday. Relay - Driving down to Urbana and back with Marco to pick up Clare. Handing off the boys to the sitter, driving to the Loop to leave the car with Marc, getting on the Blue Line to the Far North, connecting with my sister and mother at the train station, waiting for my niece who was two trains after us and finally arriving at the Renaissance Schaumburg (that's a link to the hotel's photo page). Then staying up until 1 doing the homework for the class I wasn't even registered for that was meeting the next morning. On second thought, maybe Friday was the Marathon.

Saturday - Crack of dawn to get up so I could be human by 7:15 (the time the mirror in the bathroom said the Registration Desk opened) to try to get into Melissa Leapman's Pattern Drafting class, which was meeting that morning from 8:30 to 11:30. The Registration Desk didn't, in point of fact, open until 7:30 -a crucial 15 minutes when you haven't had coffee. I got into the class, though, so it was worth it. And you better believe I ingested some caffeine before I walked into The Perfection Parlor for the class. I think that may have been Gymnastics.

Which reminds me. The most hilarious thing -- after the computer screen in the bathroom mirror running the days events on a continuous loop -- was the naming system for the meeting rooms. You could go to Nirvana or Utopia. You could achieve Euphoria or Perfection. You could let your Imagination run wild. Strive for Knowledge, Innovation, Serenity and Prosperity. Make a Connection. Have an Epiphany. Forget the "Boardroom A" experience.

Next, Diving. Melissa Leapman walks in and informs us that this is her most boring class. It's all lecture. No knitting. She had a an over-sized pad on an easel and colored markers and everything. We spent three hours listening to her, asking questions and not taking notes because everything was in the handout. We even did Algebra. She had samples of the fabulous sweaters she's designed to illustrate her points, including the one featured on the cover of the new book. The time flew. Trust me. I don't think Melissa Leapman could find boring if she looked with both hands and a map for a month. She's fun and knowledgeable and, while I may not have knit a thing, I feel like I've come away with a whole new skill-set.

It was after that that I went to The Market, which, as I'm sure you could tell from yesterday's post, was an Olympian Event in a class by itself.