Stitches East 2006 Redux
I just got back home a couple of hours ago and went straight to bed to take a little nap. What a weekend! Between setting up the booth Thursday afternoon and breaking it down Sunday afternoon we saw tons of knitters, petted lots of projects and sold lots of yarn. The Koigu Cashmere was very well received (there were people who rushed into the booth saying, "We hear you have Koigu cashmere!" It was great to see everyone so excited!) and as you can probably imagine flew right out the door booth. Don't worry, we still have plenty in stock!
The crowd was significantly smaller on Sunday than on the other days (I suspect because there was a football game going on next door and traffic had to be a nightmare!) so I got to wander around and do a little shopping . . . here's the damage:
The photo's overdeveloped b/c of the flash but it's the best I could get (stupid daylight savings making it dark at 4:30!).
On top is a Strickwear kit which I had never seen in person before. I'd seen it in the Patternworks catalog but I wasn't willing to order it before feeling the yarn because I had no idea what kind of wool was in the kit. Turns out it's quite soft and the colors are just as amazing in person as I had hoped! This is a kit for a bolero in their Sunset colorway, you can see it shades from yellow to purple. I won't be knitting their pattern, I just wanted the cool yarn! I'm planning to knit a short-sleeved pullover with this.
On the bottom you see 6 skeins of Koigu . . . I really can't justify this purchase other than to say that I'm addicted! My boss laughed at me when I came back to the booth with them. But some of these are colors I've never seen before! And the rightmost one doesn't have a color number, it just says "NR" on the label, so I suspect it was a mistake. Too cool!
And leaving the best for last, on the left are two skeins of Tanglewood Fiber Creations' handspun Merino. I'd never heard of them before but I fell absolutely in love with the yarn. Trish (who blogs here), the spinner/owner has great colorways and this plied Merino is cushy and soft like good sock yarn but at a bigger gauge, and the barberpole color changes are to die for! The only problem with buying handspun stuff is there's never enough of any color to make a big project, these two skeins aren't exactly the same but I'm planning on doing a 2-row jog with them and filling in with a solid navy blue.
Speaking of which, I spent all weekend knitting a new project with the Koigu Cashmere in a navy blue sort of color. I think I'm in a blue period . . .
Oh, and before I forget, I got to meet a bunch of people IRL whom I only knew online! Several readers walked up to me and introduced themselves, thanks for saying Hi and thanks for reading! And at one point Cara came in and I recognized her immediately. She came in the booth while we were kind of packed and she was in a hurry but I insisted on giving her a hug and then instinctively looked down to check out her knee socks, which I bet is what everyone does when they first meet her! And Blue Moon had her blanket hanging in their booth and it's beautiful, but that awful lighting made the bright green GLOW, it was kind of spooky.
In comparison with Rhinebeck, there were not nearly as many bloggers around. At Rhinebeck it seemed that everywhere I turned someone was saying hi to me or I was recognizing someone. At Stitches, I met up with a bunch of people I know IRL but never see, but only met 3 or 4 virtual friends . . . there definitely seemed to be more bloggers at Rhinebeck. I wonder what that says about bloggers? Or about the events?
Either way, it was an exhausting, fun-filled weekend. Thanks to everyone who came by the booth to say hi, and if you couldn't make it be sure to check out the String blog for pictures of our booth! They should be up in the next day or two.
2 Responses
Laura in the VI
It was great to meet you at stitches! I’ve never seen someone knit so fast…
Jess
November 08, 2006
I’ve been eyeing the Strickwear kits in the Patternworks catalog too. I can’t wait to see what you do with it. Those colors are so beautiful.