Update

Well, due to my extremely sporadic posting to the blog, I’d be surprised if I still have any loyal readers left. I hope I do, but regardless, I’ve never kept a diary, so even if this turns out to be just for me, it’s okay. (But if you’re still reading, could you leave me a comment just to say hi or something so I know you’re out there? Thanks!)
What’s been going on? Well, for starters, I spent another week at Notre Dame finishing up my 3rd year of training in Cannon Financial’s Fiduciary and Investment Risk Management class. Last Saturday I sat for the CFIRS exam (Compliance Fiduciary and Investment Risk Specialist designation), and although I haven’t received my results yet, I’m fairly confident I passed.

But conveniently, the dates of my class coincided with the Midwest Fiber & Folk Art Fair, which was the weekend before in Crystal Lake, Illinois, a little north of Chicago. Since it’s only a couple of hours from Chicago to South Bend, I flew into O’Hare and accepted Adrienne’s gracious offer to stay with her for the weekend. (She has an absolutely lovely home, with an amazing sunroom!)
We met up with her friend Kris (now also my friend Kris) and headed to the Fair where we ran into to other Loopy Groupie Spring Fling friends, and had a fabulous day. We headed first to Toni’s booth from The Fold, where I purchased my first Socks that Rock! (Note: these were the first skeins I’d purchased; Kate had given me a skein a while back.) I got the Fred Flinstone and Beached colorways, and really wanted this semi-solid orange, but Adrienne beat me to it. No worries, there’s always Rhinebeck, or I can order them online.


Next was Gale’s Art, where I kept coming back to. I think I made 3 separate purchases there, including this lovely top for spinning, a silk hanky to try my hand at, and a trindle. I had a really hard time deciding which one to get, and Gale said that she thought the trindle picked its owner, which I likened to the first Harry Potter book when Harry’s wand chose him. (Speaking of which, have you seen HP & the Half-Blood Prince? It was awesome!)
I flew into Chicago on Friday before the fair and spent the day on the hop-on, hop-off trolley while Adrienne was at work. I got back to her office around 4:30, and while waiting for her to finish, she showed me her gorgeous Clapotis made from Brooks Farm Primero. I immediately added Primero to my shopping list for the fair, but when we got to the Brooks Farm booth, they said they didn’t have room to bring any Primero. I did buy some other BF yarn, but Adrienne came to my rescue when she destashed this gorgeous blue-purple Primero for me. It’s so amazingly soft and snuggly; I can’t wait to cast on yet another Clapotis.

I also picked up some Pattern Tamers, and some other miscellaneous roving. It was a very nice Fair, and I hope to get to visit it again sometime.
Since I was spending 9 days away from home, I had to have travel knitting with me, especially since I was going to be spending 5 of those days in a classroom. I pay much better attention when my hands are occupied, and since I don’t take a lot of notes, I decided to forego sock knitting for the moment and work on some dishcloths for Christmas gifts. I ended up making 9 during the week, although I think I’m keeping 3 of them. I finally made my first ball band dishcloths – what a fun pattern! I can’t believe it took me this long to try it.

So that’s what’s been going on. With my family situation, I can’t promise regular updates, but I’ll do my best. And I really appreciate everyone’s thoughts and prayers for my mom.