[Nfb-krafters-korner] Yarn Humor: Vacation Anyone?

[Blindhands at aol.com]

This was the first time in my travels that I did not take any yarn or  
project work with me to Convention.  I took just my Victor Reader stream  with a 
good book I had started.  I am just about finished with it  now.
 
Thank God we had some projects to work on at the craft show in  Orlando.  I 
had plenty of time to visit with everyone from Krafters Korner,  too
 
Joyce  Kane
_www.KraftersKorner.org_ (http://www.krafterskorner.org/) 
Blindhands at AOL.com   

 
In a message dated 7/14/2013 8:17:45 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
dogwoodfarm at verizon.net writes:

Writer,  illustrator, and knitter Franklin Habit joins us for his monthly 
column  featuring humor and insights into a yarncrafter's life.

It's July. My  grand friends have gone to France, my less grand friends 
have gone to  Michigan, my flat broke friends (the majority) have walked over 
to the
lake  for the afternoon. There is a general desire to get out of here, get 
lost,  leave it all behind.

All of it except yarn.

The friends who went  to France packed passports and hiking gear. The 
friends who went to Michigan  packed swimsuits and mosquito repellent. The 
friends over
at the lake took  snacks and water bottles.

They all packed yarn.

That is, to me,  perhaps the surest sign that a person has crossed the line 
between fancier and  fanatic-when it suddenly takes longer to decide which 
needlework
projects  to pack than which shoes to pack.

The longer the trip, the more  complicated the packing becomes. You find 
yourself asking questions  like:

How close are these current projects to finished? If you're  within an hour 
or so of completing a piece, you can't bring it along as your  sole project 
if
the trip is going to last more than an hour. You'll need  backup.

Can I work on this while chatting? Vacations often involve  proximity to 
other people who will insist on engaging you in conversation  whether you like 
it
or not.

Can I work on this at the beach, on the  trail, in an airplane, in a moving 
car, while seasick, while waiting in line  for Space Mountain? Vacations 
often
require that you spend time in settings  that are less than optimal for 
chart reading, or counting, or toting pieces of  intarsia that require 22 
separate
balls of color. You will need projects  that travel light.

So you stand there in front of the open suitcases,  trying to make 
decisions.

I really want to finish up the sock, but it's  a second sock and it's 
almost finished, and I can never remember how to turn a  heel or graft the toe 
without
instructions, so I'll need to make sure I  bring the pattern and my 
Kitchener stitch cheat sheet. I'll probably finish  the sock by the time we land, so
for the beach.let's see.I'd love to finish  the afghan but I'm not going to 
knit that in the sun by the water.I could get  a jump on the Christmas 
presents.
Four pairs of mittens and four matching  hats, all in colorwork, so that's 
sixteen balls of yarn.and two sets of  needles.and stitch markers.and 
scissors.and
tapestry needle.and another  tapestry needle for when I lose the first 
tapestry needle.and stitch  holders.and the patterns.which are charted, so I 
can't
bring those to  dinner or on the tour bus.so I suppose I could knock out 
some plain  dishcloths, just to keep my hands busy.so another set of 
needles.and
let's  say four balls of cotton.and lace is always nice in hot weather, 
what about  that shawl that's been in my Ravelry queue for a year.the yarn is  
here
somewhere.

You go on like this until you find you've packed  half your stash and 
there's no space for underwear.

And you ask  yourself, Does a person really need underwear? Really? Is 
anybody going to  check to see if I'm wearing it?

The worst case scenario, of course, is  finding that you've run through 
whatever you brought with you and have no way  of getting more.

It happened to a friend of mine, who set off for the  getaway of a 
lifetime-a week on a at a friend's home on a private island off  the coast of New 
England.
Upon arrival at the airport, he realized he'd  brought the wrong piece of 
hand luggage. Instead of a bag full of yarn, he had  a similar bag full of 
dirty
gym clothes.

After taking a few deep,  calming breaths, he decided to approach the 
situation as an exercise in  self-discipline. He would set knitting aside for the 
week.
He would fill  the gap with meditation, swimming, sunning, hiking, bird 
watching, and all the  other delights of his temporary island home.

By the morning of the  second day in the island house, he had begun to 
collect the sheddings of the  resident shaggy dog.

By that afternoon, he had fashioned a crude  spindle with a borrowed CD as 
the whorl.

By the following day, he was  spinning the dog fur into yarn. Which he then 
began to knit with a pair of  sharpened pencils.

If that sounds perfectly reasonable to you.we should  go on vacation 
together.

Having a Ball, Wish You Were Here | Franklin  Habit for the Lion Brand 
Notebook

-

If you'd like to vacation  with Franklin, check out his
'Nautical Knitting' Cruise
with Melissa  Leapman, now booking for December 2013.

-

Writer, illustrator,  and photographer Franklin Habit is the author of It 
Itches: A Stash of  Knitting Cartoons (Interweave Press, 2008-now in its 
third printing)
and  proprietor of The Panopticon (
the-panopticon.blogspot.com),
one of the  most popular knitting blogs on Internet. On an average day, 
upwards of 2,500  readers worldwide drop in for a mix of essays, cartoons, and 
the
continuing  adventures of Dolores the Sheep.

Franklin's other publishing experience  in the fiber world includes 
contributions to Vogue Knitting, Yarn Market News,  Interweave Knits, Interweave 
Crochet,
PieceWork, Cast On: A Podcast for  Knitters, Twist Collective, and a 
regular column on historic knitting patterns  for Knitty.com.

These days, Franklin knits and spins in Chicago,  Illinois, sharing a small 
city apartment with an Ashford spinning wheel and  colony of sock yarn that 
multiplies
alarmingly whenever his back is  turned.
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