Knitting Camp, the other

I'm finally getting around to blogging our knitting camp from last weekend. I'm not sure quite how the idea got started. I know what we were talking about, but I'm not sure who decided we needed an informal camp. I blame Elizabeth from the Knitty Coffeeshop. J'accuse! Elizabeth is also the one who really got the ball rolling in reserving a convenient site, with excellent consulting from Seiding. Thank you, both.

The following Knittyheads made up our corps: Celtic Coyote, from DeKalb, Illinois, Pumpkinseed and Criosa from Minneapolis, Minnesota, Elizabeth from Madison, Seiding from West Bend, and me, your next American Idol, from Milwaukee. We camped at Lake Geneva, WI in Bigfoot Beach State Park. The campground wasn't the best, but it worked for convenience. We all agreed that we'd like to do this again, but start earlier in order to be able to reserve a better campground. Apparently, many state parks have less crowded grounds. This one was too close to Chicago apparently. Not that there's anything wrong with that. It was quiet and that was nice. Sue brought a nifty tent. We both had our own door and there was a wall in the middle. I basically just threw all my crap in my side and didn't have to make it neat or organized. Thumbs up for that. Elizabeth dragged her camper from Madison and everybody else slept there.

Elizabeth was the hero of our trip. She bought all the food, hauled it over, cooked it, kept it cold, and provided the plates, pots & pans, stove, and utensils for it. She provided the means for and did most of the dish washing. The woman is a dynamo, I tell you. From her screen presence and having met her briefly at one Last Saturday Knitting in Madison, I thought she would be more formal. I'm not surprised she has developed so many needle arts talents as she has the wonderful ability to go from thing to thing very quickly and still achieve deep focus. Yay! Of course I felt a little guilty (but pampered)about not helping much, but I think I stayed out of everyone's way pretty well. She made a terrific fire and kept it ablaze. She's a campfire whisperer.

I brought a lot of stuff along including my swift and winder, my box of beading stuff, and yarn to trade. The trading was fun. I managed to resist everything except for some vintage worsted wool that Elizabeth had brought. Sort of a light mulberry/rosy color. It's interesting that Elizabeth took the vintage worsted wool that I had brought. We probably could have saved each other the trouble of bringing it.

I was very careful to make sure the battery in the camera was fully charged and to bring the freshly charged spare, carefully wrapped in Saran Wrap. You may be wondering where is a picture of everybody. (There's one on Elizabeth's blog, that's here. ) Well, I only took 3 pictures. Why did I only take 3 pictures? I can't show you more of the fun that we had or of the site, or of our knitting, or even of the big rain. My middle age--can't live with it, can't remember s**t. But here is a very nice picture of PumpkinSeed and Seiding who've just finished successfully hanging the water on the big, giant maple tree (take my word for it. It was big.) I like the look of accomplishment on their faces and in their body language. Well done, campers. By the way, if you can think of a good name for our knitting camp, come on out with it. It might be worth it's weight in yarn. Nothing with the word Knitty, though. We don't want to imply any sponsorship.