Recovery…

The joys of the Knit and Crochet Show…

Let me start off by saying that I am completely exhausted. I was there for three days – those of you who did all five must be close to requiring hospitalization. I know this is considered a small show as compared to TNNA or Stitches, but I certainly found plenty to do.

Friday was my first attempt to sell some crochet designs. I am deliriously happy to report that I sold every design I had with me, picked up a commission, and have been asked to submit more as soon as I can do it. Can’t go into details until contracts are signed and samples are finished, but I am very excited. VERY excited.

There was shopping –

The pink and purple fuzzy stuff with silver sparkles is for the kid, of course. She didn’t attend the show this year as I was trying to accomplish some serious shmoozing as well as shopping (and a little bit of drinking, but I digress), but when presented with a list of choices Saturday night – this is what she went for! She thinks it might want to be a shawl.

Next to that are some additions to the sock yarn stash – Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock in the bright colorway, and Regia Bamboo beneath it. I was so taken by the idea of bamboo sock yarn that I couldn’t resist.

On the right, some hand-dyed merino silk in pinks and grays from Maple Wood Farms. They don’t have a web site yet, but believe me, as soon as they do I will put up a link. Their yarns are gorgeous and feel great. Not sure what that wants to be, but after petting it for most of the weekend, I succumbed to temptation and bought it right before the market closed on Sunday.

There were classes – I only got to go to one but it was great. Fully Fashioned and Fabulous with Melissa Leapman. The focus of the class was on different ways to place increases and decreases in your knitted garments for better fit and to add visual interest. I learned a lot, and Melissa Leapman was a wonderful teacher – we got a lot of work done, but she has a great sense of humor so we had a good time too.

Sadly, there was a bit of marinara sauce on my class homework swatches, but that was because I met up with some Knittyheads for lunch and was knitting and eating at Bertolini’s at the same time! Greetings to Bina and her friend, and AKknitter – I made my class in the nick of time!

There was a fashion show and a dinner – I didn’t get any show photos because I wound up being in the show modelling one of my crochet designs – but look who my dinner date was –

The Crochet Dude himself, Drew Emborsky. I met him about thirty seconds after I got the show on Friday and he was gracious enough to help me track down a few people I was looking for, but had no idea what they looked like. He had a busy weekend too – not only doing business but greeting the claques of blog stalkers that were following him around! Crocheters love them some Dude!

I managed to stagger into the show on Sunday, did a bit of shopping, and fulfilled my volunteer commitment as a time trial judge. As reported elsewhere, there are some wonderful sales on Sunday. Then it was off to pick up the kid at Grandma’s and the long trek home.

So it was a great deal of fun, but thankfully it was also very productive – I lined up a lot of work both writing and designing, learned some new techniques, lined up a bunch of new products for my annual holiday gifts for knitters article at the web site, set up interviews with store owners for my Yarn Market News articles, and met some truly amazing people.

Off to write some patterns…