STITCHES!!!

And not the lousy kind you get after you get a nasty cut, either.  The BEST kind of Stitches where they put you in a room full of yarn and other yarn fanatics, and you all battle it out to get the best haul!


Note: I am tall - and this wall-o'-yarn extends higher than my eye level.

My husband and I got in the car on a rainy morning and made the hour and a half trip to Santa Clara, though there were people there that had traveled from all over the country - actually, all over the world!  The very first thing I bought was a ball of Australian cashmere from Belisa Cashmere, and the gentleman running the booth had come all the way from Australia to be at the show.  He left his Summer behind to be in rainy California, and share his cashmere with us!



Pigeonroof Silk Lace - Orbit



Before we left I had printed out a map of the layout of all the boothes, and circled the ones I absolutely could not miss.  My goal was to buy things that I couldn't easily get somewhere else, so I focused on the vendors that often sell out within minutes of updating their online shop. 

Now, instead of blindly dumping things in my cart and hitting "CHECKOUT!!1!" as fast as I could, I was able to stare at a wall of different colors, pick them up, mix and match with other colors, fondle, consider, put things down and pick them up again.  This was especially wonderful at the Pigeonroof and Sunshine Yarns booths. 



Sunshine - the name matches the bright colors AND their personalities!



I have friends that are too far away to make the trek to Stitches West, and in their attempt to live vicariously through me, they suggested a couple boothes that I didn't have marked that I had to visit.  The bright colors of Liza Souza and the variation at Miss Babs made those 2 of my favorite booths, and I easily spent a good 30 minutes just at the Miss Babs booth comparing colors and finding 2 perfectly complimentary colors to make a larger project - perhaps another Daybreak or something similar.



Sanguine Gryphon's booth, complete with period costumes!

It was very cool seeing all these amazing vendors put up their wonderfully creative booths, and I was so thrilled to be amongst like-minded people who all had a passion for the craft.  I suddenly understood why people got on planes to come all the way out here, and why those that weren't able to go kept telling me how jealous they were of me ("it's just a yarn show, what's the big deal?").  I get it now.  It's hard to explain, but the show, along with the energy that comes with it, is so distinctive and can't be duplicated.  We're a year out from Stitches 2012, but you had better believe that I'm already itching to go again!