I Knit Day, part 1

Well, the day was amazing. The Royal Horticultural Halls are spectacular (and I'm slightly outraged with myself that I didn't take more pictures of the architecture of this one which was pure 1930s); and there were knitters everywhere... There were people from all over the country, some of which I hadn't seen for a couple of years (since SkipNorth 2007 in several cases), and a lot of people I'd been at I Knit nights with last week, and about a dozen of us from Cambridge all told. We were delayed on the train (although thankfully they were still running - people coming down from Yorkshire and points north had less luck because of the flooding) so by the time we arrived the place was heaving; shopping was done a little later in the day because the crowds round the stands were several eager shoppers thick! The pic above was taken during the fashion show for Jane Waller's A Stitch in Time, which was wonderfully and humorously presented...

The Lindley Hall was also very beautiful when we all filed into it for the Yarn Harlot's talk; I didn't realise when I took this general photo of people arriving that I know virtually everyone in this particular shot, from several different places!

Two more of the Cambridge contingent, blogless Sue [bigrainbow] and E-J [roseanglaise], waiting in eager expectation...

Gerard did the introductions...

Stephanie took the customary photos - I've seen so many of these on her blog in the past, and it was very funny a) watching it being done b) watching half the audience photographing Stephanie and the sock photographing half the audience. (Annie Mole had a great rant on her blog last week about the stereotypical image of bloggers and their sad and lonely lives, which came back to me while all this was happening).

The talk was wonderful - funny, witty, observational - which I'd sort of expected; and also packed with scientific fact, which for some reason I hadn't expected quite as much, despite the amount of care and research which goes into Stephanie's books... Cambridge didn't come out very well in the talk, due to an MRC study (I think probably this one) which used people tapping keyboards as their repetitive activity rather than actually knitting... Anyway; I came out feeling very happy (and healthy) to be a knitter...

Afterwards, Anne (MrsNiddyNoddy) and I went and queued with Katie [daisydaisydaisy], to get books signed and meet Stephanie in person... Anne had made a Great Britain washcloth, and we felt obliged to confirm the existence of Cambridge knitters!

We had a little chat, aware of the hundreds of people queuing behind us; I handed over some yarn I'd dyed as a 'thanks-for-the-blog' present - I've been reading since this post and in my old job, often reading the blog was the brightest point of the day; Stephanie signed and chatted and we moved on... it was really lovely to meet her.

At that point my camera batteries died, but Anne got this great picture on her phone

and I got batteries back into it in time to take one of Katie's book being signed...

Shopping was then done. I haven't photographed the shopping yet, so that'll be part 2. Fashion shows were watched (Gerard was the first model on the Erika Knight catwalk).

Socks were finished (more on these later), and wine was drunk in the downstairs bar.

Getting to King's Cross and finding nothing was moving due to a problem at Finsbury Park was a bit of a dent to the good mood; but E-J and I picked up gin and tonic at Cambridge station and consumed it in contravention of many railway by-laws while waiting for the next train.... Where I met Susie [susieknits] again, also on her way back from the day!

The last time we met was also on a train, in April, with Susie's friend, also called Susie, who kinneared me... One of these days we'll actually get to meet in ways not engineered by First Capital Connect!