Bitches Get Stitches

one of the most challenging things about maintaining a blog is managing content flow. one requires enough content to write about and it must be portioned out in regular intervals so as to avoid large gaps or backlog. going away to a big fibery event poses an interesting problem because, while providing excellent content for the blog, it’s really too much for one post. and posting every day at a retreat is, well, unrealistic.

this is the difficulty i face whenever i go to a knitting thing.

instead of giving you a blow by blow,
which, frankly, seems exhausting and rather boring,
instead, i’m going to take a different approach.
we’ll see if it works.
bear with me.
it’s a long one.

a very nice lady who reads my blog asked me at the retreat why i started blogging and i was hard pressed to answer her. i kinda copped out and told her i’d have to go back to the first post to remember why i started this whole thing. but the question stayed in the back of my mind for the rest of the weekend. why did i start the blog? and, more importantly, why do i continue? it’s not my job or anything. in fact, it’s probably cost me money. and yet i continue. why?

the answer came to me during the last night of the retreat at show and tell. at this point in my life, i’m pretty good at getting up in front of people and talking, but for some reason i was particularly nervous. as i was introducing my first item to share, a little unintentional clause slipped from my lips:

“since i moved, i don’t have any fiber people in my life”

and it made me realize that i’ve become a bit isolated when it comes to knitting. when i learned to knit in chicago, i quickly started a knitting group in my neighborhood (which continues till this day, i’m happy to report). we were mostly new to the craft, but in that little group, our identities as knitters were solidified. when i moved from chicago to pittsburgh, i was soon hired at natural stitches and for the next two years, i was immersed in a thriving fiber community. knitting has always been an extremely social activity for me, and the blog has been an extension of that. reading stephanie’s blog as i was getting started was an important part of why i got hooked on knitting. she’s someone i really admire, and i’m sure it was one of the reasons i started blogging. she’s my elizabeth zimmerman, if you will.

but like i told that room full of knitters, i don’t have fiber people in my life here. for the first time in my life, knitting has been a solitary activity for me and i think it’s taken a bit of a toll. it isn’t as if there aren’t people who knit here; i just haven’t had the time to find my niche. right now, the blog is my only connection to the fiber world. i write because people read and make me feel like i’m still part of the knitterverse.

which is why i went on this retreat. god knows i couldn’t afford it (a tax return well and thoroughly spent) but i think i was kinda lonely for knitters. i needed to be in a space where i could talk seriously about things like yarn choice, and needle size, and whether or not knitting a reinforced heal and grafting the toe on a mini sock for a yarn bomb was taking it too seriously. i needed to be with people who didn’t make me feel stupid for getting misty when the skein of laceweight i dyed so carefully to achieve a greyscale color gradient was ruined by a few drops of neon pink dye that leaked from someone else’s dye package. more than anything, i needed to sit and knit for hours with people.

i don’t know if this next year will be another year of knitting alone,
but even if it is, i’ll still have the blog.
so thanks for reading, bitches.

as for the retreat, itself,
you’ll have to settle for the highlight reel this time.
a big thank you to tamara who let me steal some of her photos.
any photo of me you see where i actually look good, she took.
(except the one over there)

knitter shuttle with jen, janice, rebecca, and michelle’s shoulder
our captain, sam (she designed her sweater)
risotto prep
pippin of finnriver farm/cidery
sam and i made the risotto! we were very proud
i look crazy in this photo so you know tamara didn’t take it.
stephen did.
freshy. who is both one of the nicest and most beautiful women i have ever met. also, very short.
no idea what i’m looking at so intently
socks that fit
i have no words
this is sarah. she unvented magic loop. she’s a better knitter than you.
my favorite yarn bomb

a big thanks to stephanie and tina for making it happen.
i really needed it.

what’s that?
you want to know what’s up with this post’s title?
fair enough.

on our first night, stephanie and tina warned us that if we heard an ungodly noise outside in the middle of the night that we should not go investigating. one night, they went to find out what the source of the horrific noise was and what they discovered was . . . disquieting. it was otter sex, which they explained is not something the lady otter is into at all. rather, it is an activity in which she is forced to participate. often times, she doesn’t survive. even if she doesn’t, the male otter . . . leaves satisfied.

you asked.
goodnight moon!