Sip Sip Hooray

Saturday's mail included some good stuff:

• two big swatch collections from Spoonflower (more about those later this week) and
• the Surface Design Association's 2011 conference catalog.

This is more than enough reason to get out china teacup. Normally, I'm a teabag-and-mug girl. I might pour the hot water, get engrossed in something, and find my tea stone cold a good long while later. I drink it anyway.

But when I'm feeling celebratory (or want to warn the world not to butt in), I get out the china cup and saucer. I brew a pot of the good stuff, pour it hot hot hot into that delicate vessel, blow on it to cool, and hold my pinkie out while I drink and read.

Saturday I sipped as I savored the SDA conference catalog. The conference will be in Minneapolis, which is practically next door. Some of the pre- and post-conference workshops will be held at The Textile Center, which is one of my favorite places in the world.

I started making plans to go last summer, when class proposals were due for another event scheduled to overlap SDA. I tried to figure out how to be in two states at the same time. My husband listened patiently as I outlined elaborate schemes that could have permanently damaged the space-time continuum. Then he congratulated me on my good sense when decided I could do one or the other but not both. Smart man.

And now, I have the conference book in my hot little hands and planning moves into the reality phase.

Soon, it'll be time to start watching the mailbox for the catalog from the 2011 Midwest Weavers Conference. I must remember to get more loose earl gray tea.