Last weekend I was in West Yorkshire at the invitation of Stylecraft. The occasion was the inaugural meeting of their ‘Blogstars‘ programme, in which a dozen of us yarny bloggers/designers get the chance to work closely with Stylecraft and hear whispers about new yarns that are on their way. (Clue: there are some very interesting and unexpected developments afoot.)
They kindly asked me to take part. ‘Would you like to come up to the picturesque valleys of West Yorkshire, tour our old woollen mill, stay in a luxurious hotel with fabulous food/wine, talk yarn with fellow designer-bloggers, and attend a meeting that’s all about yarn and at which you’re allowed, nay encouraged to knit throughout, at the end of which we’ll give you a giant sack of Stylecraft and KnitPro freebies?’
“Hmm,” I said, frowning. “I’ll need to take some time to think about that.”
Approximately one fortieth of a nanosecond later, I squealed “YES PLEASE!”
So I set off in the grimy ol’ Stinkwagon, its ancient axels grumbling under the weight of enough knits-in-progress to keep me going if I accidentally got stranded in Yorkshire for three months… even though I was heading for a woollen mill which could reasonably be expected to supply some knitting materials if Armageddon happened and we had a lock-in. The journey was slow. I suspect that knitters and crocheters are the only people who like traffic jams (proper ones where you have to completely stop and you may as well turn off your engine for the next half hour), but sadly there were no traffic jams, so I didn’t get to knit en route.
Four hours later, I was in Slaithwaite. The first treat was the mill tour that I described in my last post, and then there was a muchly fun evening with some of my fellow Blogstars and a couple of Stylecraft folk at the hotel. When I came down to the bar and saw one of the group knitting, I knew that I’d found my people. See these folk? They’re all thoroughly lovely (except me):-
The views from the hotel weren’t too shabby. I took this shot from the hotel’s helipad: fortunately I managed not to get squished by any incoming helicopters.
The views were charming, especially as the day faded…
…to near-darkness:-
Anyway, back to the yarn. The main event was scheduled for the following day, back at the Stylecraft mill in Slaithwaite. This was where we got to meet up not just with folk from the previous night, but also with the rest of the Blogstars (excluding a couple of people who couldn’t make it this time). Here we are:-
I’d met Lucy (Attic 24) before when we co-judged the Stylecraft yarn competition at the mill last year, but I’d never met the other bloggers, so it was fabulous to chat to fellow people who like to do stuff with yarn and then talk about it online. There was frustratingly little time, though, so I hardly got to speak to some of them at all.
So we got down to the heady business of yarn. There really are some very exciting developments coming soon from this ‘ere mill, so I’ll devote a whole post to telling you about them next time. Trust me, you’ll like them. 🙂
What an exciting yarny adventure! You are so right about being able to take advantage of things that would drive normal (if we can call non-knitters by such a name) people insane. For instance, I love it when our internet’s being flaky, because I can pick up my knitting while I’m waiting for the interwebs to come back to me. This falls under the category of ‘Winning at Life’.
I’m looking forward to reading the next instalment of this adventure and I rather like the way you’ve split it up into sections. In my imagination, I’ve decided this is how it felt when people were waiting for the next bit of a Dickens story to be released, except with a lot of more knitting.
Not “normal” but the yarn equivalent of muggle. Lol
There’s really nothing like a good convo with people who like the same things you do and have all sorts of ideas to exchange. Sounds like a great time. I’m going to have to check out the other bloggers!
The next best thing to getting to do something like that myself is getting to do it virtually! Thank you so much for sharing your experience!
I love how you’ve divided this up too, it’s a great way to process it all. I get more envious with every post! Thank you for sharing all of it with us. xoxox
I’m surprised you took as long as a fortieth of a nanosecond to say yes.
Thats a very good attempt at being normal Ms T. I think you got away with it 😉
It was lovely to meet you, thank you for the mention. Enjoyed reading about the mill visit in your previous post and in this post about how you found your knitting people at the hotel. The landscape shots are great. Best regards Julia
WOW! What a trip! So great to see you found your tribe. Looking forward to the next part 🙂