Whew!  What an exhausting weekend!

Nick’s parents came to visit us for the holiday weekend.  They arrived on Thursday and stayed till Monday morning.  We had a heck of a time — busy, busy, busy and FUN!

We checked out a lot of the bars and clubs on 2nd Avenue and Broadway in downtown Nashville.  (Even though we’ve lived here over a year and a half, I’d never gone!)  We got to hear lots of great music.  Nick and his dad shot some pool.  Just good times.

We also went golfing — or rather, Nick and his parents golfed, and I just went along for the ride.  (Heh.)  It was nice getting to spend some time in the fresh air, though it was really HOT.

There’s lots of pictures from their visit here.

As you’ve probably guessed, I’m back from my trip home to Pennsylvania now.  The week still wasn’t long enough, but it never really is.  I’ll post some more photos later, but here are a couple of my favorites from my visit:

I got to see so many of my friends and family members while I was home.  It was really great.  In particular, I got to spend a lot of time with my grandparents, which was the real reason for my trip — I just felt like I needed to see them.

As I’m typing this, my mom is on her way here to Nashville.  She left (driving) this morning and should be here around 9:30 p.m. tonight!  I’m so excited.  It made it much easier to say goodbye last weekend, knowing that she’d be here this week!  We’re going to the AQS quilt show tomorrow at the Opryland Hotel.  I’m also thinking if she’s interested that I might bring her in to my work and into the capitol building and stuff.  I think she might like that.

Next weekend Nick’s parents will be staying with us, and the weekend after that my friend Melanie may be flying in to stay with us too… so we have a steady stream of loved ones visiting over the next week, which is great.  The house isn’t exactly as orderly and neat as I’d like it to be for company, but oh well, they’re family.  They may as well know now that I’m no June Cleaver.  ;)  (Though I do try.)

Hopefully I’ll get my butt in gear and get some new pictures posted soon.  Really.  I promise!

I just printed my boarding passes online, so I guess there’s no turning back!  (Not that I’d want to anyway.)  I’m flying home to Erie, PA tomorrow!  I’m excited.

I’m also nervous — just about the flying part.  Up till yesterday, I was excited — picking out books and knitting projects to take with me to pass the time on the plane and during the layover in Detroit.  But now that I have boarding passes in-hand, the nervousness has hit and my stomach is in knots.  This will only be my second time flying, and though I did just fine the first time, it still freaks me out.  The only reason I’m flying at all is because I felt like I needed to go home for a little while, and Nick wasn’t able to come so I didn’t want to drive the 11+ hours alone.  Anywhere else though?  Forget it.  My need to go home just outweighed my dislike of flying.

I packed most of my things last night.  I’m flying Northwest and they allow for one checked bag for free, plus your carry on.  I’m just taking one suitcase, and even with a good amount of clothing packed, there’s still lots of room in case I do any shopping while I’m home.  Of course, I packed lots of yarn and knitting things in both my carry on and my checked luggage (I might need more knitting to do on the flight home, ya know!).  I think I packed enough yarn and patterns to knit 3 or 4 pairs of socks, which is highly unlikely — if I get through 2 pair, I’ll be surprised — but knitting is the one thing that calms my nerves.  Those security people at the airport better not try and take my knitting needles away or I’ll be a wreck… (I did pack a book in case, though.)

Anyway, tomorrow night I’ll be having dinner at my parents’ house.  My mom is making stuffed shells.  My mother- and father-in-law, and my grandparents will all be there.  It should be nice.  After spending the better part of the day in airports, I’m not entirely sure how coherent I’ll be, but I’m sure they’ll understand.  Oh!  And I’ll get to see my good old Kodi-dogger too.

I’m going to make an effort to take lots of pictures.  I’m just packing my little point-and-shoot camera, not my fancy dSLR.  But I’ll try to take enough pictures with family and friends so that I can post a nice little photo album of the trip in the photo gallery when I get back.

Wish me luck and think good thoughts for my flights tomorrow, please!  (No turbulence! *fingers crossed*)  See ya’ll soon!

For anyone who was wondering, my first experience teaching a knitting class went very well.  The picture (click to enlarge) is the baby socks I designed for the class, and I taught the students how to knit them two at a time (simultaneously) on two circular needles.

I was supposed to have four gals in my class, but only two made it.  (The other ones had family and health-related problems and couldn’t make the first class.)  My two students did very, very well and are both finishing up their socks.

Pat (the owner of my local yarn shop) already booked me to teach this class again.  She said that the girls who missed the first class want to take it, and she thinks there will be others also.  I’m also teaching other sock knitting classes, a shawl/wrap class, and a free workshop/Q&A session on using Ravelry.com (a popular knitting-related website).  So now I’m teaching classes almost every Monday evening and two classes (one in the morning, one in the afternoon) on Saturdays!

I almost feel guilty getting paid to do this.  I even told Pat as much.  I really enjoy knitting, and I enjoy helping people learn to knit.  It’s getting paid to do something I really love.  And even if I weren’t teaching, I’d probably be at the knit shop for sit-’n-knit anyway, so I might as well be helping out!

I’ve really met so many wonderful friends through the knit shop.  I don’t think I’d have ever gotten over my homesickness without them.  They’ve become my “Tennessee-family”.

Speaking of homesickness, I’m going home next month!  Actually, I’ll be leaving a month from today - on August 8th.  I’ll be flying from Nashville to Detroit, then into Erie.  Nick has to work, so I’ll be flying home by myself.  Hopefully we’ll be able to make another trip in the autumn so he can go too.

I’ll be spending the week visiting with family.  My grandparents have both recently had some health problems, and I just felt like I really need to be home right now with them.  Unfortunately, I can’t stay, but at least I can visit for a while and spend as much time as possible with them.

After an extremely rainy start to April, we had a beautiful sunshine-filled day yesterday, and today is looking to be the same.

Our trip home for Easter was lovely.  As always, it felt like it went by too fast and I didn’t get to see all the people that I wanted to visit with.  (That’s always the way when we make these quick weekend-trips to Erie.)

I spent a lot of time with my parents and grandparents.  I dyed Easter eggs, which is something I haven’t done in years.  Grandma Rita taught me how to crochet her “famous” dish scrubbers (which you can download the pattern for here if you like).  Sunday night we had a girls’ night — my mom, Erica, Melanie, Chrissy, and I hung out and had lots of laughs.  It was a heck of a good time.