I Knit Day 2008

I had an absolutely wonderful time in London! Great food, good company, my anniversary celebration, and to top it all off: the I Knit Day on Saturday. Not even the bad weather could put a damper on things.

What struck me the most about the whole I Knit Day event was how friendly everybody was. I met the first smiling face at the tube station, when a nice lady named Catherine (and I hope I spelled that right) spotted my yellow I Knit Day flyer and joined me on the walk to the hall where the event was being held.

I started my day with a browse through the stands, leaving a bit of money behind and taking pictures of the amazing knitted/crocheted objects on display:

Knitted teatime

It's all knitted, even the furniture!

Potatoes & fire extinguisher

Adorable knitted aliens

Shortly after noon I met up with Cassandra, a fellow American ex-pat who lives in Amsterdam and who I know through Ravelry. We went out for coffee, had another browse through the main hall, then braved the weather to wait for the Yarn Harlot reading, which took place across the street.

Waiting for the Yarn Harlot...in the rain

Luckily the organizers had mercy on our rather soggy souls, because they quickly opened up the doors and the hall began to fill up. I’ve never seen so many knitters in one spot, and it was a lovely sight to see.

The hall is filling up...

After a short wait, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee came out to thunderous applause, and after the usual audience pictures with sock and a short battle with the microphone, gave a great talk that lasted a good 90 minutes, followed by a question and answer session. She was eloquent, funny, and charming and I really enjoyed myself.

And it starts (with a scary microphone)

The obligatory "taking a picture of you taking a picture of me" photo

 After her talk was over, it was back to the main hall to line up for her book signing.

Busy signing books

She literally signed books for HOURS and missed any chance she might have had to do a little shopping herself, but she was incredibly nice and friendly to everyone she talked to. And even though the line was long, it wasn’t a problem to wait, because all the people waiting were chatting, showing each other their projects, knitting, and generally having a good time. It was also fun watching people show her their first socks and give her presents. (I admit it: I gave her a skein of Tausendschön sock yarn in the “Goldener Oktober” colorway, and she was very gracious about it.)

There were also a lot of presentations, fashion shows, and general “happenings” going on during the day as well. For example, this charity project which included knitting on some very large knitting needles indeed:

humongous knitting needles

(It looked like really hard work.)

And if anybody knows what this sheep was all about, I’d love it if you’d tell me. I was going to check back on it, but forgot:

Wooden sheep with knitted....things

All in all I had a truly great day, ending with a good meal at a Japanese restaurant with R. and some folks he knows through his job. He had spent the day record shopping and at the British Museum and we were both totally exhausted but happy by the time we got back to our bed-n-breakfast that night.

We had a somewhat nervewracking trip home, caused by the fact that the trains going out to Stansted Airport weren’t running due to “engineering work” – with no warning, either. Luckily we found out about it because we were walking through Liverpool Street train station on our way to the tube and saw an insanely long line and people holding the same Airport Express tickets we had. We asked, found out there was no train service, grabbed our bags that we had left earlier at the left luggage counter, and got into line. Several hours later we were on our way to the airport, and if we hadn’t noticed and had gone to the Maritime Museum as we were planning then we absolutely would have missed our flight home. A bit of a stressful end to a great weekend, but well worth it anyway.

And I have every intention of going back next year for I Knit Day 2009.

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