After lunch on the Thursday I went to my first class of the event. Each class is 3 hours although there are also some double classes which are 6 hours long. There are 7 slots for classes (one on Thursday, and two each on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday) so a maximum of 21 hours of classes. I signed up for all 21 hours since it is a long way to travel and a great opportunity to take classes from so many different teachers.

My first class was Collar Obedience Training with Maureen Mason-Jamieson (she is in the pink below).

We learnt about the different sections that make up a collar and the properties and functions of each section. In the class we knitted a shirt style collar for a round neck cardigan, but Maureen’s notes had a lot of information on how you could adapt this for other situations. The collars we knit did, sit, stand, and roll over on command as advertised!

Good fun and the instructions were well written and contained a lot of information. I haven’t really knitted collars much but really enjoyed this one. I think also it will be an interesting alternative for a neckline. I have a rather short neck so polo necks and high rolls don’t look good (and also prevent me turning my head around which is a little irritating – you may have noticed I am not into suffering for fashion 🙂 ), but I like the way this collar adds interest while also lying flat at the front.

Also on the right hand side of the sample you can see where we had a go at a double pick up. This is a technique where you pick up stitches on both sides of your edge, so enclosing the edge of the knitting – good for an edge where both sides will be seen. I will definitely be using this edging on cardigan bands in the future.

After the first workshop I went to a talk given by Kaffe Fassett.

Apologies that the photo is a little blury. Flash wasn’t allowed, and Kaffe moved a bit fast for my camera in that light.

This was the first time I had ever heard Kaffe talk, he is very engaging and an entertaining speaker. He talked about his new book Kaffe Knits Again, but also more generally about designing in various media and about his life as an artist and designer. He has an exhibition coming up in Bath that he mentioned but he didn’t say where, I think it was going to be some time in the new year so I will try and find out more information. He has a totally different approach to knitting to me, he isn’t really at all interested in the technical side (which I find fascinating), but it was really interesting to hear him talk and to see his slide show of his work and inspiration, a totally different perspective on knitting for me.

After the talk it was time to make a beeline for the opening of the market. The market opened for 3 hours on Thursday night just for people who were registered for classes. Then was open generally Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. This is the snaking queue of knitters waiting for the doors to open.

Every one was very well behaved and queued nicely, and there was no utilisation of sharp elbows, although there was a bit of a stampede to the Blue Moon Fiber Arts stand. Photos weren’t allowed inside the market but suffice it to say while it wasn’t as big as Ally Pally, there were certainly a nice lot of stands to visit selling a good variety of bits and pieces. More on the stash aquisition in a later part.

There was a KnitU meeting in the market later on that I had really hoped to go to, but was unfortunately too wiped out to manage. So I crawled off to bed at an appallingly early hour, so as to be prepared for the delights of Friday.

This message has also become rather epic, so I will save Friday for the next post, and go and sort out some more of my pictures. I am hoping to put them all in a flickr set when I get my act together, but it may take some time.

I’m back and still rather jet-lagged. I had a fantastic time, learned loads and met lots of lovely people. My brain still feels rather full from all the new information and things to think about and process. Meeting so many knitters and seeing what they are working on and have made is incredibly inspiring too, I have come home with so many ideas, and things I want to try out. I will attempt to write about the whole thing in a vaguely coherent manner, but apologies if I don’t manage it 🙂

We flew into Baltimore airport on Monday afternoon to give ourselves enough time for a spot of sight-seeing and time to adjust to the new time zone before Stitches itself. We were so lucky that although it had been rather cloudy as we flew over the Atlantic it had mostly cleared by the time we came down the east coast of Canada and the US. I love the perspective you get when flying (this is marred only slightly by the fact that I get travel sick on almost every mode of travel I have tried – walking is ok 🙂 ). Flying is, to me, still rather a novelty and I love to look out the window at all the scenery. It really brought home to me the contrast between the UK (particularly the South-East of England where I live) and the bits of the US and Canada that we flew over. Everything is on a much large scale over there, and is so spread out. It was also fascinating to see the difference in colours. Here at home autumn is just starting, the leaves are yellowish, just starting to turn a pale brown. When we took off it was overcast and the area around Heathrow is largely shades of grey with all the roads and houses, with greenish yellows and yellowish browns of the trees. Canada in contrast seemed to be mostly rich dark brown, dark red and dark purple. It reminded me rather of the heather (the plant that is, not me 🙂 ) on the North York Moors at this time of year. As we got further south the land became progressively greener, but still with a wide variety of rich variations. You could make some great colourwork garments inspired by landscape colours.

When we first landed I got my first shock of the trip, it was so hot! I had been reading the weather forecast for a few days before we set off to see what kind of thing we needed to pack (thereby perpetuating the assumption that the British are obsessed by the weather 🙂 ), but I had been convinced I was reading it wrong. On Monday afternoon when we arrived it was 31 degrees C and humid, and stayed that way for the first couple of days. I was very glad I packed my shorts and sandals 🙂

On Tuesday and Wednesday we did the tourist thing in Washington, D.C. and saw some of the famous sights.

If you are in the area I can really recommend the National Museum of Natural History (one of the Smithsonian museums, and free to go into). Then on Thursday to Sunday I went to Stiches while Paul continued with the touristing.

Registration for Stitches started at 8am on Thursday but I wasn’t up quite that early. I went to sign up shortly after 9am, and the queues were not too bad at that point although growing.

At 10am there was the Opening Day Presentation, entitled A Yarn’s Life with Barry Klein, Fontelle Jones and Dana Hurt. This was a very interesting presentation on yarn from the perspectives of a manufacturer, yarn shop owner, and knitwear designer. I found the technicalilties of how they make the yarn particularly fascinating, Barry showed a slide-show including pictures of several of the machines used in creating his yarns (Trendsetter Yarns). It was great to see the huge cylinders with dye-soaked shaped sponges around them that they use to dye space-dyed yarn. I had always assumed that was roughly how it worked but it was great to see it in action. I would love to go to a factory one of these days and see it all in real life.

After the presentation there was a lunch which included a wall of yarn provided by the yarn companies which sponsor Stitches. The idea was that each of the skeins had been cut into approx. 3 foot lengths, so that each attendee could take a length of the yarns they liked and create their own Ultimate Stash Guide (we were given a little booklet which had details of the yarn, and selotape was available for people to stick their yarns next to the right description). It was a great idea but a bit of a scrum! The lunch was my first opportunity to really see how many knitters there were, and the answer is a lot! I had arrived for the opening presentation about half an hour early and sat near the front so I didn’t really see quite how full the room got.

Thursday afternoon was my first workshop, but more of that later. This has turned into rather an epic post so I think now is a good moment to pause. Workshop reviews coming soon.