Stitches West: Day 2

We're back at Stitches West in rainy Santa Clara, California. Good thing we get to spend most of Friday inside playing with yarn, right? Check out this nifty machine!

During a break from the Interlacements booth, I got to crank the Addi Express King Size Knitting Machine a couple aisles away. I've toyed with the children's toy version of these before and I was much more impressed with this one. It was well-built and the yarn fed in smoothly. You do need to pull on the project to get even tension as you crank it out. You can use stoppers to knit flat. This one has 46 needles for hats while a smaller one has 24 for smaller projects.

Then Tracey led me to an awesome find on the other side of the exhibit hall. 

Ellen crafts these loom and knitting boards in 3/4, 3/8 and 1/4 gauges. She knit sock yarn on the 1/4-gauge 56-peg loom above and it creates an adult sock for a narrow foot. She recommended DK/baby weight for a larger sock on the same loom. The loom costs $25 and I'm sleeping on it. I do like the idea of loom-knitting a sock in between chunky and fine-yarn. 

Ellen's Wooly Wonders doesn't have the looms posted online but you can contact her for more information. She will handcraft custom sizes. And check out the furry critter (needleknit) patterns while you're there.

Before the market opened, I snuck over to Purrfectly Catchy Designs. I bought another handy sock blocker — Lambsy Diva the sheep — to live with my bunny blocker at home. Zoe adopted Max the dog.

And then the market opened its doors for one of our busiest days! The yarny crowds were much more civilized than those Black Friday mobs though. 

Later in the afternoon when these crowds died down, Zoe directed me to another market gem. A long woven banner made from 24-karat gold thread hangs high. It was made to honor a man 150 years ago. 

The booth guy sells this thread and a slightly thicker thread that can be combined with another yarn while you knit, weave, crochet, etc.

At the Interlacements booth, it isn't gold but the Mamboo Bamboo yarn shines, too, on shelf and in sales.

I've been remiss in posting a photo of these pretty button badges, too. I made up a limited number for prizes and they have been quite popular. They feature Interlacements yarn and the Celtic-esque logo. Tracey plans to borrow a real button maker after the show and we're going to "mass-produce" these babies.

The market closed at 6 and after getting some food, it was time to put up our slipper feet at the pajama party.

We modeled for the contests and then did our own little photoshoot to cap off the day.

 

We're up again and getting ready for Day 3. And it looks like the blue skies are trying to overpower those gray clouds!