Home Again!

First, let me give a shout out to our newest follower: Substance Designs. She wanted to know about the Craft Cafe - Click the link for more info! We're just starting and I'm working on building the audience - come be a part of the ground floor!

Now, Mr. Honey and I are back from our first vacation in more than a year! We headed out to Pittsburgh for two of the Cubs games (sigh, they lost both after leading in the late innings) but there did come some good stuff out of the trip. Mr. Honey and I were not alone on our sojourn we were accompanied by the Happy Hook!

Happy was thrilled to take the trip with us as her previous travels were done encased in plastic in a dark box on her way to the shelf at Hobby Lobby. She was liberated on the 28th and joined us on the 30th. She enjoyed the sights of Chicago.
She had her first glimpse of Willis Tower. She wasn't even thrown off that Willis Tower used to be called Sears Tower. (You know, the protest over Sears Tower being renamed wasn't nearly as big as the brouhaha caused when Marshall Fields became Macy's. Don't know why - both are renamed stores. But there you have it.)

And Happy wasn't alone. She made the trip with friends: there were others of her kind and a set of friends just different enough to be unique but still alike:
Hooks in the City . Let me tell you something, Happy not only traveled well, she was very productive while on the way to Pittsburgh, in Pittsburgh and on the way home. I will show some of what she did later on. I want to also say I did remember my new year's resolution to clear away the yarn stash - but I was in a city I had never visited before. And Mr. Honey was nice enough to map out the four yarn stores in the area. Alas, I visited two of them and Happy purchased six skeins of yarn. Four of one and two of another. The four I have not seen in this area and the two are regional hand dyed yarn. I figured those six skeins weren't going to really do any damage considering I am using twice as many in the two projects I am working on and besides, here's the best news coming out of Pittsburgh and the highlight of the trip - are you ready?

THERE'S NO SALES TAX ON YARN!!!

Can you stand it? No one was able to explain it to me - heck, I didn't ask cuz I didn't want to know. But both folks checking Happy's purchase made a point of saying there was no sales tax on yarn.

You know the girls were thrilled with that bit of news. There are pictures of the outside of the yarn shops - I was too busy touching and feeling to take a lot of shots inside - though one of the shops is featured in this month's Vogue Knitting and there are shots with Happy and the girls enjoying their purchase. That shall also be showed at a later date when I do a review of the shops - you want a teaser? Oh, all right.

I got enough of this to do a throw. Don't have any idea of what the throw will look like or when I get to it - but that's not really the point is it? The other one I have enough to make a nice hat and scarf set and one day that will get done, too. Just like one day I will knit up the yarn that came from St. Louis.

See, as long as I have a plan - I have something to look forward to!

More on the yarn and the trip to Pittsburgh later!