Sarah's Day: Return of the Blog:Vacation Part One

Let me just say, I had two weeks of time away from home. And two weeks is a lot of adventure.

So, I have to do this in parts, and part one is our arrival and our time at Sock Summit, 2011

Blane and I left Minneapolis at almost the same time, but on different airlines. He flew Frontier and stopped in Denver. I flew Sun Country and went straight through.

There we go.

When I got on the plane I, of course, made the people already seated ahead of me get up so I could sit by the window. A standing ovation of sorts. When we all got settled the girl next to me pulled out her knitting. I said “What are you knitting” as knitterly folk will do, and she said “I am knitting a bee design wash cloth.

But actually, I am flying to Seattle and then going to Portland. I am going to this thing, you’ve probably never heard of, called Sock Summit”

To which I replied “Oh, but I have……”

So we had a nice conversation about knitting and Sock Summit which made the flight go by quickly.

And once I saw this, I knew I was close

Actually, you could see all down the line, Rainier, Adams, St. Helen’s. But alas, the crap camera and all. But I did get Mt. Rainier so I knew we were minutes from getting there.

Debbie picked me up, we had breakfast, then found Blane, and off to Gramma’s we went. She loaned me one of her cars to drive, which was really nice and incredibly helpful.

I am not, however, used to 20 mpg. But I’d take that over the price of rental anyday.

We hung around for a day, went to Safeway (and why don’t I have a picture of Safeway?) and Thursday, early AM, Martha came and off we went to SS11.

There was a huge accident on I-5 that AM, so we had to take a big detour, but we navigated with the help of an ailing Garmin, and we got to Columbia River Bridge, and into Oregon.

We were pretty early so we found a seat and worked on untangling my sock yarn. We also admired the pendulum.

And snuck into the seating area of the market place and sucked in the ambiance.

Yes, there was a sock museum.

At 1:30 or so we went to our classes. Martha had photography, and I had Spindle Spinning Basics with Denny McMillan, who, I swear, could teach an ape to spin. She was that good.

You often see her referred to in the Yarn Harlot blog. Yes, that Denny!

After our classes, which we LOVED, we went into the MarketPlace, which was packed, and staked out the things we wanted. Martha got a pottery yarn holder and some books. I got some needles to replace some of the lost needles. We decided we would return tomorrow after classes and went off to our hotel, a little dinner, and then to the opening ceremonies.

(Note the people at the next table have knitted Viking hats on. At least I think that’s what they are…..)

We met up with Nancy, Julie, Cat (from Mpls who I knew from last years knitting retreat) and some of their friends.

Julie, Nancy, Me, and Martha (I was sooo tired from travelling and lack of sleep and jet lag-I think it might show!)

Stephanie Pearl-McPhee and Tina Newton gave the speech, which was hilarious.

And don’t forget the ST-2 team.

We practiced for the flash mob, which was Saturday. Martha and I weren’t there for that, but you can see it here. (As the comments say-ha ha-GO SOCK PEOPLE.

The next day I had a Mad for Plaid class (making plaid socks with Lorilee Beltman-totally fab may I say-link to her blog) and Martha had a beaded baby bootie class with Sivia Harding, who is a beaded wonder. Back to the Market (we could have spent hours and hours and dollars and dollars there). We got some yarn, books, a very swank purse, and souvenirs, then we took our pictures in the Stargate portal.

(OK the ST team are total Stargate Geeks! I have never watched it but I liked getting my picture taken in the center of SockGate)