It beats spraying

It is difficult to talk about the last week.  These retreats are a blast and a half, and I wouldn’t trade this work for anything else in the world, but without whining or complaining in the slightest, the 17 hour workdays associated with them does knock the energy right out of a knitter.  My apologies for the absence.  First I was busy, then unconscious.

What have we been up to?  As last time, there was silk.  Lots of silk.  Dyeing it, spinning it, knitting it, and as last time, the Inn at Port Ludlow couldn’t have been awesomer.  Tina and I started a little thing the last few times we were here. Like cats marking their territory, we began to leave a few things behind every time we left.  Mostly we expressed ourselves here as in life, leaving wee balls of yarn behind where we thought they would surprise the staff.  Colour co-ordinated and tucked into pleasant corners, vases, drawers and shelves… little balls of yarn. Once the staff caught on that we were hiding them, it became an elaborate game.  Us hiding, them finding. (Or not.)

This time, when Tina and I rolled into town, the staff had returned the favour, setting up a crazy hunt for Tina and I – beginning with (since the Blue Footed Boobie was our mascot at the last sock camp)  boobie feet leading us to the fridge where there were boobie glasses and boobie drinks and a card that began (in rhyming prose) sending us on a hunt all over the house from card to card, hunting them far and wide, and ending with a prize.  (They adopted two blue footed boobies from the World Wildlife Fund.  Great idea.)


This we thought, couldn’t have been better or funnier or more perfect for us, until the next day when we asked for a little milk for our tea.  The doorbell rang, and when we answered,  there was only this guy and the sound of a car screeching off.

(You realize don’t you, what it is if a Blue Footed Boobie delivers your milk?  Boobie milk, naturally.)

Clearly, a game was afoot – and who would we be if we didn’t retaliate find a way to pay back the favour?  We thought and thought about what we could do, and a day later when we were walking through the lobby and saw that some intrepid knitter had given a wooden duck a scarf…

it totally came to us.  A full scale yarn bombing.  We invited our students to help – encouraging them to help us mark our territory, and well.  You can imagine what sorts of things happened next.  Since every room in the hotel was occupied by us knitters, it was like an all access pass.  All over the hotel- things started happening.  A little yarn left here, a silken cocoon left there… The longer we were here the more things started to turn up, and as always, the knitters did us proud.  A sampling?

Knitters tagged statues, taps, handles, beds, cupboards, candleholders… it was a sight to behold, and Tina and I did our best to keep up. 
Look up…

There’s a candle cozy.

A knitted flower came somehow to be tucked amongst real ones…

There was a peppergrinder cozy.

These little hats….

Ended up here.  Can’t see them?


And somehow a little sock ended up as a tip.

We’ve done a bunch in the house too.. but we don’t want to blow the surprise for the staff by blogging it here.  More tomorrow as I journey home.