This week, I'm writing to you from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where I'm taking a leadership and development course alongside my husband.

His classes are all about preparing him for his next job.

The class I'm in is specifically designed for military spouses, to help inform and prepare us to be able to better support our spouses, ourselves, and our families—and the Soldiers and their families, too, in this next role.

It's... a lot! I'm a bit overwhelmed. Over-stimulated. Exhausted.

But it's also a lot of great information. I've learned about resources I had no idea existed. And we've been married for 16 years!

Not to mention that I was in the Army, myself, for a little while. Not active duty, but still. There's a lot of experience between the two of us. And yet, there is always more to learn.

I'm working on a post to share over on Patreon, not detailing my experience with the course or even lessons learned, I don't think, but more about the in between moments. About the wildflowers!

Okay, fine, they're not all wild. Many have been planted, even the black-eyed susans.

But I've so enjoyed seeing all these different flowers here! Even the ones that might have seemed common and unremarkable to me not so long ago.

Queen anne's lace? Coneflowers? Even clover! They have all been a delight to me. As have the birds.

Robins, barn swallows, killdeer, catbirds... and there's this heron who seems to live on the tiny lake we walk by every day, because I think I've seen him both morning and evening, nearly every day all week!

I've been doing a little crocheting, too, of course. Though not as much as I might have imagined! I'm up to ... 24? tiny granny squares? I've done a few in the room and a few during lectures or some of the more laid back presentations.

I still feel a bit... suspicious-looking maybe, lol? I'm not totally comfortable crocheting "in class" but sometimes, you know, it really does help keep me focused on listening! If my hands are busy then my mind doesn't wander so much. I know I'm not the only one.

Well.

I AM the only one crocheting in this class! At least I haven't seen anyone else doing any sort of needlework during the course so far. No one has come up and scolded me, either, thank goodness. That is my irrational fear, I suppose. That I'm going to "get in trouble," which is silly, right!?

So far so good, though, ha ha.

There's only one more day, though, so I'm not sure how many more I'll get done this week! Of course, there's always the plane ride....

Do you take your crocheting on planes with you?

I admit, sometimes I prefer to hide behind a good book instead. Sometimes I'm afraid that if I started crocheting the person next to me might never stop talking! That's terrible of me, right? I feel a little terrible. But I know especially on my next plane ride, after this 40+ hour week of pretending to be a sponge, I'm going to be utterly exhausted! So maybe I'll stick to reading. We'll see.

Okay, I better get going. Today's the last day of class!

Cheers!

-Connie

P.S. It is absolutely wrecking me that I don't have any pictures of my work in the gallery yet!!! I have, however, taken several dozen pictures of geese while in Kansas. 😆 Here's my favorite so far (they were all lined up in formation!):

P.P.S. In case you missed it, the written instructions as well as a video tutorial for my tiny granny squares is available over on Patreon. You can join me for as little as $2 a month to get access to it as well as over a dozen other unpublished patterns, or you can pay $5 for just that one post. If you're new to granny squares, though, I'd recommend trying them out with some worsted weight yarn so you can see what's going on a little better—there are tons of videos on YouTube! (Would you like me to do a traditional granny square class?? Hit reply and let me know!)