the girls are home

This marks the official end of a fabulous long weekend vacation. Vacation nearly always begins a day early as soon as the girls are dropped off, so naturally, now that Lilli Munster and Nola are home, vacation is officially over. That, and the fact that I will be at work at 2.

What a wonderful weekend we had. It began with the Radical Lace and Subversive Knitting Show at the Museum of Art and Design. On one of the knitting forums I frequent, someone had suggested not bringing a non-knitter. But when it comes down to it, this is an art show and in a prominent museum. I was so glad to see this, the evening gown knit out of one dollar bills, the miniature gloves(each one resting on a finger tip) and sweaters, the American flag knit using telephone and John Deere excavators. These and the lace forms that were not knit. All were awesome. Imagine delicate lace designs cut with an exacto knife in a large paper hanging. Need something more challenging to imagine? How about delicate lace cut in car parts with an oxyacetyline torch?

The point is, of course, that it was all art. And I am glad I got to see the exhibit.

As we were ending the museum tour, my cell rang and it was Kmae. Awesome, even if I did get chastised by the guards on the exhibit floor. Ok, so I moved off the floor and was waiting for the elevator to take me down. Chastised again. "No talking on the phone, Ma'am. My supervisor is on her way up the stairs and will take it from you."

So Kmae and Doris made it into the city and we joined them for dinner at Manitus. Burgers were good, but the company and conversation was way better. We had about an hour together and honestly, I could have sit and talk to them the entire weekend. They are really and truly a delight.

Kmae and Doris dropped us at our subway stop and we went to the drug store for toothpaste and deoderant. Not that we forgot to pack them, but we were nearly out of both items as we left home. Being less then fresh at the blogger gathering would habe been totally unacceptable.

We then caught the subway back to our hotel. The Barclay Intercontinental was a lovely night in NYC. Next time we travel we might better look at the ammenities available so we are better prepared to take advantage of saunas and steam rooms and such.

We left the Barclay quite early and went back to JFK to pick up our rental car. That was actually pathetically easy. We always hear, "No, don't fly into JFK..." but really it was a beautiful convergence of Goddess Time(tm) all weekend. The trip out to CT was smooth and without a blip.

We were able to check into our hotel, the Shelton Mariott early, dammit, a pool, and then it was on to Weese and MAW's(tm) place to meetup with them and Suzanne and Wendy as well as Suzanne's delicious, um, I mean delightful sister.

We sat and visited and had cocktails at Weese's house for a while before heading out to Sassyfemme's place for the bigger meetup. I liked having a small meetup on Friday and then a medium meetup on Saturday morning before the big meetup. It was a lovely layering of anticipation and gratification.

After cocktails at Casa Weese, we took two cars to Chez Sassy. Lots of fun was had by all. Before actually meeting Sassy and Fran, the door was cordially answered by Bent Fabric who said she was Sassy, but had been tanning. Funny, that one is. The afternoon ensued with a lot of reveling and continual laughter. I was floating around from here to there and finally took up residence in the corner of the kitchen at the table where I could knock back some beer and watch as well as participate in quieter conversations, all of which were quite enjoyable. The kitchen crowd would thin out a little and all would be rather serene, and just then, the crowd would refom in the kitchen to rounds of luscious laughter.

At one point, eb told me she was going to go outside and play in the snow. She was out front making some snow paintings for our hostesses when the graffiti artists showed up. I had enough sense to stay inside as I have played with enough snow for this lifetime.

All around, the weekend was a relaxing delight. I made scarves for our various hosts, and damn but you know I took pics of none of them. Five glorious queenmaxine originals out in the world hugging prayers and warmth around their recipients.

Off to work for a few days before I turn around and am off again to the snow, this time to the Mindful Knitting Retreat in VT with Tara Jon Manning. Just enough time to properly thaw and do laundry.