Planning…

For the past few days, I’ve been juggling a couple of very important spreadsheets.

First, Sock Summit registration is this Wednesday, May 4, at noon Pacific (which I think is 3 pm Eastern – someone PLEASE correct me if I’m wrong!).  The registration two years ago was very stressful but I ended up with some good classes, anyway.  This year, Steph and Tina promise that the servers won’t crash – and there are twice as many classes – so I’m cautiously optimistic.  But part of my cautious optimism involves ridiculously thorough planning. 

Clearly I’m not the only knitter out there like this, because Cailyn at The Daily Skein prepared a fabulous downloadable spreadsheet that helped me get organized. Thanks, Cailyn!  Here was my process:

1. Read all class descriptions and mark the ones in which I was VERY interested and SOMEWHAT interested.
2. Delete from spreadsheet all the classes in which I had no interest.  Mark the “very interesteds” in bold and the “somewhats” in italics.
3. Organize each section by interest category, then prioritize classes within each category.
4. Print.
5. Trade my reference desk shift (3-5 on Wednesday) so I can be at my desk at 3:00.
6. Hold breath.

I will keep you posted.

My next spate of planning has to do with the venerable Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival, which is this weekend!  I have another spreadsheet for that, with booths marked that I must (re)visit and some information about project requirements.  I’ll be shopping for yarn for the Pamuya shawl for my mom (she requested sage green with hints of lavender and/or blue – I think I’ll check the Brooks Farm booth first), the Kalajoki socks for me (they require solid or semi-solid sportweight yarn, which I don’t have in stash), and maybe a couple of other things.  I have a few coupons printed and info about the Juniper Moon Farm lunchtime meetup.  I have my Knitter’s Handy Guide to Yarn Requirements, which is, well, HANDY to have at a festival.  I have plans to leave town at 7:30 am on Saturday with Kris and Jess.  And I have plans to eat a lot of kettle corn.

If just reading all of this planning detail is stressing you out, I do apologize.  My inner librarian really comes out in situations like these.  When faced with massive amounts of data and uncertainty, I ORGANIZE!  It is both a personal and a professional trait.  :)

There has been some knitting.  I finished my Sugared Violets shawl yesterday and even blocked it before going to bed…but I haven’t photographed it yet.  Soon…