Socks Alive! A Day at Sock Summit 2011

Hoorah, it's Sock Summit II! If I had not been teaching a summer course and had unlimited funds, I'd have spent all four days up there taking classes and shopping the marketplace. As it was, one exciting day was all I could afford in time and funds, and one day I could do since -- hoorah again! -- I live within easy driving distance. I had my wad of cash for yarn (my best way to budget at these events), and after collecting Nanci and Janita to drive up with, off we went.

We found the registration desk and spotted the first celebrity sighting of the day: Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, a.k.a. the Yarn Harlot.

I signed up for one class, "Making the Next Monkey" with Knitty editor Amy Singer, all about designing the next sock as great and popular as Cookie A's "Monkey."

Just to show what total geeks knitters can be, we have SockGate leading into the Marketplace:

Celebrity sighting repeat: the Yarn Harlot at the speed knitting contest.

The Worlds Largest Sock gets additional work:

Rosie and Janita at Newton's Yarn Country, where merino yarn was being sold by the pound - a sweater's worth in one skein.

And it was half price too!

But reading the fine print, I found the command "Keep Refrigerated." (So it was a meat label -- eh, it works.)

 

Another celebrity sighting: Anna Zilboorg (on the left), author of Knitting for Anarchists, at lunch:

Janita and I ran into Jen (a.k.a. Cap'n Jenny - can I count that as a celebrity sighting?) and Lacey at the Sock Museum:

There were several winding stations for people who want to wind their skeins into balls, either because they don't have a ball winder and swift at home, or because the yarn is calling out, "Knit meee! Knit me NOW!" I took advantage of this swift maker's booth that had a gigantic ball winder for my pound 'o merino because my own ordinary ball winder wouldn't handle something that size and I didn't want to have to cut it into smaller balls.

I fell in love with this cardigan, Clarissa by White Lies Designs. I found this model at the Sanguine Gryphon booth, done up in their silk/wool Codex. They were out of this color, but I went shopping for other possibilities after I dashed over to the White Lies Designs booth for the pattern.

To the thrill and delight of our knitting group, our own Stephania of Three Fates Yarns was a vendor this year:

Me 'n Steph. I'm definitely calling this another celebrity sighting.

I got so many pictures from the Sock Museum that I'll post those later. For now, here's a recreation of an 11th century Moorish sock.

Whee, my very first flash mob! Those in the know practiced the flash mob dance ahead of time, and a few hundred of us gathered oh, so casually in front of the convention center, listened for the music to start, fumbled through the dance, and cheered afterwards:

(ETA: If I can get this to embed -- the flash mob, courtesy of someone called knittinglikecrazy on YouTube:)

This was the loot I came home with: An official Sock Summit logo notions bag and tiny notions case, two autographed Knit Princess comic collections, two pocketed little Sock-aholic tote bags from Knitters Brewing Co., my giganto skein of merino, two skeins of plum-colored merino DK yarn from Fly Designs for my Clarissa cardigan, a skein of Dream in Color Smooshy sock yarn in a vibrant black/purple colorway, the Clarissa pattern, and my Sock Summit program. Not visible because I had them safely tucked in a pocket in my purse were two teeny antique steel crochet hooks, small enough for putting beads onto yarn for some beaded knitting projects that I have planned.

Wow, I shopped all of Sock Summit and came home with only one skein of sock yarn? That's okay -- I know a really good place to get all the sock yarn I want whenever I want, right Stephania?