Back from .....

Stitches East..... I am back from a successful trip to Maryland to Stitches East. It was quite a bit of fun to meet many readers of this blog although I am sure I missed many of you. I was booked to teach classes for the majority of the time I was there. I had a lovely group of students in each class and I hope they took something home from what I was jabbering on about.

The market was a buzz of excitement. I don't get off the farm much -- so to see what is out there for sale was quite interesting. I didn't have time to visit each booth so I just skimmed through the aisles. I did a couple of booksignings and then ran away to teach a class or two. I did get to go to the Fashion Show on Friday night as a guest of Westminster Fibers. The garments that go into the show are supplied by the vendors of the market. It gave me an overview of what these folks thought was hot and knittable. There were a lot of lovely things.

On the way home in the plane, I was thinking the whole trip over and I focused on the Fashion Show. I must say - I don't think there was one garment that was knit in my favorite Fair Isle (or stranded) knitting technique. What's up with that? Is everyone afraid of knitting two colors in one row. The other really evident trend - and perhaps it has been done to death by now - was the multi-color hand-dyed yarn trend. Booth after booth of hand-dyed yarn lined the aisles. Is that the only kind of yarn people knit with these days?

And socks - wow - is that the only thing anyone knits? There were gobs and gobs of different hand dyed sock yarns too. I may have been extra sensitive to this trend since I had to prepare an opening day speech on Thinking beyond the Sock. Five designers were asked to tell the crowd what else you can do with sock yarn. Maybe I will report on what I came up with one day here on my blog, once I find out what the Knitters' people are going to want from me for publication. I did see a lot of sock yarn knit into lacy shawls which were quite stunning.

Me? I don't have a lot of interest in knitting a bunch of multi-colored socks. I must be the only one though. But oh well - you gotta do what you wanna do. Let me stick to my multi-color knitting in a worsted weight yarn and I'll see what that kaleidoscope that swirls around in my head can dream up.

I did discover these lovely leather handles and purchased a few of them for upcoming projects. Lovely colors and styles and very nice quality leather. Check it out!

I must say, I was quite happy to get home to my little family. We took a lovely walk on Sunday up to the top of our world to look for the sheep who had escaped the electro-net fencing. There they were with their new buddy way up on the top of a hill. What a beautiful day it was.


And isn't Eeyore the funniest. Someone must have taken a lot of photos of him. Every time I point the lens towards him, he poses or acts silly. He's been paid for now -- so I guess he's staying.