Teach

When I agreed to teach at the Pittsburgh Creative Arts Festival, not much was going on - easy easy. As of about a month ago my battle cry has been I Just Want To Live Through April - not that it's bad, just wildly busy. I did manage to calm down at some points and found that preparing a little at at time helped so when the day finally arrived I was more or less prepared. So I didn't think this was a bad idea until I was halfway here, then had one of those wonderful What The Hell Was I Thinking moments followed by How Can I Get Out Of This as I was driving around the block for the fourth time desperately looking for the front of the hotel. But I'm tougher than that and in I went - and I was not alone. Some of my knitting friends signed up for my classes since they knew it was my first time (ever) teaching and they could help if it got overwhelming.

When we were looking for the classroom someone asked me if I was scared - and I said yes I was - but life is pretty boring if you don't scare yourself once in awhile, isn't it?

My classes, thankfully were small - the first one was 8 people, the second one only 3 but I was fine with it. And it went fine! I only needed a little help and all of my evaluations were good - no one threw anything at me which I always consider a bonus and I managed to get through a total of 6 hours of teaching without throwing up or crying - all in all a good day! Two of my friends are also here and we went out to dinner last night and then will be going to the festival to shop. I stayed overnight since by the time I got done it was 7:30 so I'm glad I didn't have to drive home. What I get paid for teaching will cover part of this - depending on how much I buy today. Over all - I'm glad I did it - when I first decided to take on this challenge a local yarn shop owner gave me a 5 minute speech on how I SHOULDN'T do this - pretty much told me I had no business trying to teach and I would fall on my face, etc.....it was pretty scathing and to tell you the truth I no longer frequent that shop. The whole thing was mean spirited and that's putting it lightly. But there were many more people on my side - my knitting group with all of their advice and experience and Kathy from Kathy's Kreations who gave me an hour class on how to give a class - and I'm glad I went ahead and took the chance because now I can say I did it!!