What a whirlwind week...end!
It seems the long catch-up blog is going around (see Lolly's). Today's my first day in China...so let's roll back to Friday, March 18th and catch up, shall we?

Mad as a Hatter
Friday I hopped an early train to Philly and had a great time doing my Trunk Show at Strawbridge's Department Store. Such fun!
When looking for ladies having fun, head to your nearest hat department. I always love the looks on peoples faces when they try on a hat. Especially the fancy millinery hats. It's as though they transport themselves into a new suit/dress and to an amazing party...all by simply donning a hat!
After the show, I hopped a return train to NYC and dashed home to pack for the weekend!

Weekend Hooplah!

I took Dmitri to The Bernards Inn in Bernardsville, NJ for a 2-night (Sat-Mon) getaway for his birthday!
It was GREAT! Once again...I reccomend you all to look at the LuxuryLink auctions for luxury vacation (or in my case so far - weekend) packages!
I'll do a post about the meal and the wine (we had the 6-course tasting menu - OMG!!!) when I return to the states in 3 weeks...why wait? Because I left my notes on my bedside table! Hmph. But you do see a photo of Dmitri in his new blazer all decked out for his birthday dinner (that's his dessert platter in front of him!)
Besides eatting & drinking amazing things...we shopped - went to one yarn shop (new to us) The Knitting Basket near the Delaware Water Gap. It was the ONLY ONE on the list of 8 (carefully researched by my dear BF) that wasn't closed on Sunday AND Monday! It was a nice, small shop - - but beware - the sign is small and if it's raining, you're likely to drive right past. I splurged on 2 Rowan books, the new Vogue Knitting International and some Artful Yarns "Candy" in two colorways. (More on that later!) Treated Dmitri to a Chantico (see photo)...a new evil chocolate concoction from Starbucks. Then we dashed to see a matinee (only $7.00pp WOW!) of Be Cool. It was OK. It's a rental.
It was a lovely slow and easy weekend!

Then we dashed back to NYC Monday so that I could further clean and pack for my trip. Dmitri jumped in to help and vaccumed a cat's worth of hair up! (How does one cat shed so fast??) Here see said cat, Loco, showing his appreciation for Dmitri's hard work!
His help enabled us to have time to head to midtown to go to Carolines...

Laughing the Night Away
My friend Kerry had invited us to join her at Caroline's (Comedy Club) (50th & Broadway) to see an old roommate of her's, Reeny McGuinness, do her thang on Monday night. Thankfully she was quite funny! She was one of the few that had both the men and women laughing! If you hear of her playing a comedy club near you, go see her!
There were about 8 folks that each did an act - about 65% were funny -- 3 were painfully awful!

Take Off - Knitting time
Arriving at the airport I'm greeted by around 75 running, jumping, squeeking pre-teens who will all be on my flight - in my coach cabin to Asia. Yippee!
So I was more than happy when I was authorized to take the airlines deal of a cheap upgrade to Business class. (The flight was very overbooked!)
What's a girl to do? Knit more!
I'd packed the dress I'm knitting for my niece (see last weeks entry below) as well as a few other projects (to get my mind off the mind-numbing stockinette section of the dress) projects into the bag!
So on the flight I started in on the Lace Wrap Pattern (#13) from Spring/Summer 2005 Vogue Knitting International.
Yarn: Italian made, Artful Yarns - Candy
Content: 64% Cotton, 32% Acrylic, 3% Nylon, 1% elastic
Color: 9359 (lot 81) in blue/turq/green/white
(Machine wash delicate cycle.)

Close-up of the color!

The photo here shows about 1.5 balls -- project should be 3 balls. It's to match my new yummy Turquoise trench coat for spring.
It was just what I needed for the 18 hours of actual flying time. (The direct flights were full...so I had to layover for 2 hours in Tokyo.) I arrived at my hotel in China around 1am this morning (noon NYC time.)

Back to Asia again!
So that brings me to today and work. It's good to be here to get things done - and there are many things to be done! Thankfully I have the car rides (at night when it's too dark to knit) where I can email myself the text for my blog...otherwise I fear that I wouldn't get any blogging done on this trip!