Update From Hartford

I am happy to report that I made it safely to Hartford by midday on Tuesday. I had left at 4:15 am on Monday morning from Madison, WI, with reassurance that the predicted snow was no longer in the forecast for my destination for that night. Upon arrival I was surprised and concerned that snow was back on for the following day beginning late morning/noon, where I was (Clarion, PA). So, in order to get well ahead of it should it decide to arrive early, I again lit out of there at 4:15 am on Tuesday and was quite grateful to go the whole way with no snow flying, although I could see evidence of prior snowfall in the hilly parts of PA and NY.

So here I was in Hartford with 5-8″ of snow predicted on Wednesday, which was when I planned to set up my Stitches United booth. The snow was predicted to begin around 8 am so I figured there would be no setting up on Wednesday but I did still have 8 am – 4 pm on Thursday to get that done if I had to so that was the plan. The hotel staff assured me that if the snow arrived as predicted on Wednesday that roads would be cleared by Thursday morning. After checking in at the hotel, which is about 8-9 miles from the venue, I ran up to the Walmart to get some stuff for lunches, etc. and in case food delivery was a problem. Hey, I am from the south, 5-8″ of snow is a major deal to me, LOL! Who knew what could happen. My motto is think ahead and be prepared. If I was gonna be snowed in I was not planning to be hungry.

So, Wednesday morning no snow. Okay, weather is showing tons of snow all over the place and it’s still imminent here, what to do? The set up times for Wednesday were 3 pm – 7 pm, so I decided if nothing was happening by 2:30 pm, I would head in with the trailer and at the very least unload and get my trailer parked. That would save me time if I had to do most of the set up on Thursday after the roads cleared, since it was still definitely supposed to snow, right? I called my husband to see what he thought of that plan and he agreed it was the way to go.

I got that done since it was still all clear at 2:30. After the trailer was parked it still looked good so I headed back to the exhibit hall to get as much done as I could before the snow started. I got the booth about 80% done by 6:30 and it had begun snowing, but streets were still fine, so I headed back to the hotel. I was feeling much better at this point since I didn’t need to be heading back in to the venue until around 1-2 pm, which would give me plenty of time to finish setting up, and the roads should be fine by then since the high is supposed to be in the mid 40’s. Plus I was told they clear the streets quickly around here. :-)

Well here is what we got overnight.

LOL! That’s my blue truck in the top left. I left up my wipers but the windshield is already clear. Guess I won’t need the ice scraper I made a point to buy on the drive up, since I didn’t have one, but that is NOT a problem. LOL! So the big bad Nor’easter pretty much passed Hartford by after all. I did snow a lot during the night with gusty winds but you can hardly tell from what’s out there. I took this about 9 am.

Remember the broken needle situation? Well I had a new one delivered and it arrived here on the day I arrived, so I got back to work on my project on Tuesday night and yesterday while hanging out waiting for the snow to start.

While I was still in Wisconsin though and couldn’t work on this, I ended up starting a new sample in my Classic Merino Superwash Sock yarn in one of my new colors (Chamomile).  It is another of my friend Dee O’Keefe’s beautiful designs called Carolan.

Well that is it for now. I am going to knit for a bit and then head out for the booth. See you soon!