Stitches West 2010

The prior year reviews:

2007 -- look somewhere in the middle
2008 -- that was a fun year with Ravelry new in the community, doing the passport thing and all
2009 -- haven't made anything from last year's loot, don't ask

This year I signed up to help an Indie Dyer from East Bay, Snicklefritz Yarns. Janelle is a scientist by day, and fiber artist (and long distance cyclist) by other parts of the day. She looked for booth help during Stitches on Ravelry, and offered to pay with yarn (!!!), so I gladly raised my hand. Hey, I got time, right?

I was so happy to see the inner working of Stitches Market. On Wednesday I went in to help Janelle set up the booth. It's my first time to see the vendors without all the gloss and makeup.

Webs was all boxes and empty shelves.

Brooks Farm, the only thing recognizable was the metal sign.

By the time I left the show floor Wednesday afternoon, Webs was in decent shape. Amazing how much work they had done in a few hours.

But this booth was all pretty and well protected by early afternoon.

I took Double Knitting with Colors by Karen Frisa on Friday afternoon. It's a very good challenging class, requires some thinking, not just "doing". As for shopping, Isager is new to US and first time to appear at Stitches West. Marianne Isager is from Denmark and has a few books published in English. Someone on Ravelry referred to the booth as "the beautiful booth". I was completely drawn to their Alpaca 2 yarn (50/50 alpaca and merino) during Thursday night's market preview, but I liked every color and couldn't decide what to do.

By the time I made it to their booth Sunday afternoon some of the colors were sold out. Oh well, I hope they come back next year. I said goodbye to the booth on my way out.

It's even more amazing how fast booths were taken apart and packed. This is Webs 45 minutes after market officially closed. The big sign came down about 30 seconds after I took the picture.

The ladies were stripped bare.

So was the guy.

Will they ride the forklift all the way home?

The loot:

-- Ellen’s 1/2 pint farm, Falkland Wool, color Purple Mountain Majesty. Ellen is my weakness. Once I make peace with that I'm fine collecting the yarns in every color and fiber.

-- 2 skeins Heather Prime Alpaca (total 1lb) in purple
-- 10 skeins Lambs Pride worsted (at $5 a piece!) in red (apparently I was on a red and purple kick)

And the best part, I shopped to my heart's content in the Snicklefritz booth. Couple of days work earned me this delicious lot:

-- 1 skein of sock yarn in Little Caymen Gnome (blue/green)
-- 1 skein of natural dyed cashmere/silk in New England Mussel Shell (pink). I tried to talk everybody into buying this yarn. It's simply heavenly.

-- 3 skeins of Bishop (100% blue-faced leicester), 1 of them in Blueberry Pie and 2 Purplelicious
-- 2 skeins of silk/merino in Lady Gnome (yellow/green)

Till next year.