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And my dignity seems to be intact. The signing went well yesterday, thanks to all who came out to support me! And thanks for all the good-luck wishes in comments and email, too.

Charlene‚ embroidered this for me to keep me from freaking out during the reading. How amazing is this? She made it based on a Simpsons episode where Lisa’s substitute teacher gives her an inspirational note that says “You are Lisa Simpson”. Awwww. So Sweeet! I put it on the table with me when I was signing books. It definitely helped.

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And with Dot’s kind help, the Traveling Trunk Show (lovingly nicknamed “The Bin of Uglies”) was a hit!

Very early Saturday morning, a group of us caravanned out to Webs to start the day with a little yarn party. In attendance were:

Kellee, Elisa, Kristen, Cynthia, Wendy, Maryse, Marcy, and‚ Cate.

Yarn was bought and bargains were had. I scored a sweater’s worth of Elizabeth Lavold Silky Tweed in color number 08 for just $4.49 a skein! I know I should have branched out with a different color, but I can’t. I’m powerless against a tweedy, flecky green. I also got some Trekking XXL in a lovely brown for Jon. Well, for socks for Jon. I haven’t got him knitting yet, but we still have the rest of our lives.

After yarn and a number of escape attempts, I was shuttled off for a drink before the reading. During the entire trip, I went through a range of emotions including but not limited to: denial, rage, fear, anger, panic, despair, . . . is wanting to bite people an emotion? I also lashed out at Kellee, who was driving at the time. I thought she was my friend, so why was she making me do this? How could she be driving in the direction of the book store? It felt like she was taking me to the vet to be neutered. I felt betrayed. She probably would have been better off putting me into a pet carrier at that point.

We had some bar food and I had a generously proportioned gin and tonic at Chilis, which all really hit the spot perfectly at that point and we were on our way. After a couple more attempts at bolting out the door, resulting in my being physically restrained by at least three people (I was only half kidding that time), I made my way to the back of the store where I was greeted by lots of cool things.

My husband and my friends/downstairs neighbors Charlene and Laura made the trek from Boston for the signing. Here is Laura with something I never in my life thought I’d see. Seriously, if you had shown me this poster a couple of years ago, I would have fallen on the floor laughing and the very idea.

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I was also greeted by the lovely and charming Sara aka togbean, who books events at the store.‚ Oh man, is she awesome. She has been invaluable during this whole process. She answered all of my questions about what is expected of someone doing a book signing. Turns out that my instinct to bring cookies for everyone was unfounded. That was a relief! She was so accommodating and even had a chai latte waiting for me when I got there. ~sigh~ And, she lent the MOKS an heirloom poncho for the Traveling Trunk Show!

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And here are the customers just clamoring for the book. Note the Wall o’ Kitschy Stitches?

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The whole thing is now kind of a blur, but I think I managed to stay the same color through the whole presentation, I didn’t break out into a sweat and I didn’t just dissolve into a puddle. It helped that I either live with or had just been at a bar with 90% of the people that showed up. There were a few other attendees who I’ve never met, but I could just tell they shared out love/hate relationship with the granny square. I feel like each event will be better than the last. I now have two weeks to prepare for the October 6th signing in Brooklyn and I think I’m going to be ok at this. Not Harlot-brilliant, but Stitchy-good.

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