Oakland TKCGA show.

Yeah, so it isn't Stitches, but you can go up and do it in half a day and get some stuff and have a good time. I went up with my best pal Teenuh, her MIL (in town visiting) and my mom. We parked for free out on the street. Strolled into the lobby about half an hour before opening, busted out our coupons and bought our tickets, only to be pleasantly surprised with GOODY bags!! Woo Hoo! They were apparently the goody bags for the people who preregistered for classes, which they had left over and were giving them out to all the early arrivals. We got a big bag from Red Heart that had an assortment of balls inside, (there was only 1 of these inside, but my mom gave me hers, citing that she would never use it.)There (and she traded me another ball not pictured for her matching ball of this washable wool) as well as a fabulous large black tote from Lion Brand Yarn that had 3 balls of hot pink Wool Ease and a pair of lion size 6 plastic needles inside, as well as a coordinating scarf pattern. Sweet! Everyone loves free, even if it isn't your favorite yarn on Earth, damnit! It's free!

So then we waited a bit, met some friendly ladies out in the lobby. Finally we got to go inside. The Village Knitting and Spinning Store was there from Solvang, CA they have the BEST selection of knitting books (never cheap!) with hard to find American selections as well as some really awesome German books. Of course I am such an idiot, I always buy books early on then have to carry them around until my shoulder feels as it will fall off. Well, actually my Mom came along and she bought them for me for Christmas so I had to carry them all day, but can't use them until after Christmas. We meandered around and I picked up some fabulous yarns.... Zephyr wool silk from Terylynn Needle arts
A beaded scarf kit, with Interlacements yarn and beads.
Then my very last purchase was this Silk Crack, as I have been referring to it. It is a soft, shiny beautiful, ultrafine silk yarn. It cost me an arm and a leg and some of my dignity, but I got it anyway. It is too marvelous for words, in my favorite peacock colors!! I could just sleep with this in my hands... Now this is something like 5,400+ yds. But I plan on holding 3 strands together at a time to accomplish what it is I want to accomplish, effectively cutting my yardage to 1/3 of that to 1,800 yards. Yippee. The booth people had made a beautiful sock out of this, with a size 000 needle, not in my future plans at all!!!

Still Alive.
Still knitting. I finished sock 1 of my Regia Designer Line Kaffe Fasset socks. They look quite nice. If I had made them a tad bit smaller they wouldn't have fit my feet. Whew! Close call on that. Sorry I haven't had time to take a picture yet. I just turned the heel on the second sock. So now I am in the home stretch. The good news is, they are a PERFECT match! Yahoo! This weekend it sounds like we will be rounding up quite the posse to go to the Oakland TKGA market place on Sunday. It is no where NEAR the size of Stitches, but it is always fun to shop a bunch of corralled yarn stores and feel like you can spend money... because I would NEVER walk into my LYS (any one of the 10 located around here) and dish out the dollars like I do at a yarn show... I know, sad case. I always feel like the thing I am looking at that I am liking, I will most certainly NEVER see it again so I had better buy it RIGHT now or regret it for the rest of my knitting life. Yeah, so the drama.

I am almost done with those socks, so I need to pick my next project. I am beginning to feel slightly panicked at not knowing what to knit next. Maybe some socks with that Panda Cotton picked up a couple of weeks ago. I am feeling slightly commitmentphobic about starting anything big that will take too long to finish because I just don't have a lot of time between soccer, Tae Kwon Do, and all the things I keep suckering myself into doing at the school. Anyone want to peel any box tops for me? We had a Bunco-tastic time on Tuesday with a theme bunco. It was hysterical fun. Looks like we are going to need to pick up at least 2 more players next year when we renew our year, anyone want to join?