in which there is an ivory tower, and Sgt. Pepper's namesake group returns

I was excited to come to Stitch n' Bitch this week, because I was unable to go last week, due to the nature professors seem to have to make everything due in all classes on the same day (this has occurred twice this semester. I believe it is slated to occur once more. Maybe I can prevent it by working harder now...)
Imagine my surprise when I was the first one there, 10 minutes late! Lauren came, after 15 minutes or so, and Katherine came 15 minutes or so after that, for half an hour. We were Sargent Pepper's lonely knitters club, once again. I do suppose everyone's stressed and busy, like I was last week. Madeline was sick, with an unusually unforgiving case of strep throat, and Mary had a migraine (I bet you could make a really morbid children's rhyme out of that... except the syllables aren't quite right).

I took the time to work on some beaded shank buttons for the communion purses I made for my cousin's kids:

Rose pink seemed like an appropriate color, but I really have no idea, it just matched nicely. I got 1.5 buttons done during our unusually quiet Stitch n' Bitch!

Lauren is making pretty wonderful progress on the Flounder socks:

Check it! That's a second sock with opposite-colored toe! How cool! It's like, the same- but different!

Sorry. I get excited about socks.

Katherine was there too, I promise- I was just a little engrossed in my button while she was working on her pokemon critter, and I...forgot.... to take a picture. But she was there! The critter looked excellent, as usual.

A few days later, I ran in to Madeline, who was feeling much better- and she had a surprise for me! An article in a scholarly magazine about- what else? Knitting! It's called "Ivory Tower Fiber Freak Comes Clean" (Jennifer Burek Pierce)- it chronicles the thoughts and events that led her to end up researching the history of knitting (gasp!), the way it has changed to accommodate electronic media (whee!), and the way knitters 'now' are different than knitters 'then' (whoot!). It's pretty cool. I bet she's even cooler in person. Wouldn't it be fun to do graduate level research in knitting? She is a professor at the University of Iowa, for any interested parties. That's the sort of thing I love about all this, the social history of our art form, and how we adapt it to suit the needs of our changing world. It's all just so darn cool!

Also, I finished some things:

Whoot! bamboo, purple, and big enough that it doesn't fall off my shoulders!

thickest socks known to man. My feet would be sweating in subzero temperatures. Not going to wear them until next winter... But still awesome socks, from my first handspun yarn!

...We're Sargent Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, we hope that you enjoyed the show!...