Beehive Excursion: Knitter's Frolic

For the past 14 years, the Downtown Knit Collective have been hosting an annual Knitter's Frolic - a two day knitter's marketplace with over 50 vendors selling the finest yarns and fibre art supplies.

I attended the event last year for the first time, and was blown away at the sheer volume of yarn to be had. It was incredible. Needless to say, when I caught wind of the dates for the Frolic this year, I was super excited!

Fellow Bee Courtney and I decided to check out this year's market together, and it did not disappoint.

The Knitter's Frolic was held at the Japanese Cultural Center, and we arrived right at 9am to quite the impressive line up! Obviously we weren't the only ones excited for some yarn shopping that morning.

Right away the Centre was buzzing with excited knitters, crocheters, and fibre artists; fun!



In addition to the marketplace, the Knitter's Frolic also hosted a wide array of workshops, ranging from crochet for beginners, to entrelac on the round, and pattern drafting. Courtney and I decided to start off the day with an introduction to fair isle, taught by Gloria Williams.

I've always had trouble wrapping my head (and fingers) around knitting with both my left and right hands, but thanks to this workshop, I've got my continental knitting skills down pat. Neither Courtney nor I have ever had formal lessons in knitting, and we both found it very helpful to have a instructor to follow, rather than trying to figure it out ourselves.

After all our hard work in class and a quick snack to boost our energy, it was time to indulge in some yummy yarn!

Beautiful display by Manos Del Uruguay.

Viola Fibers!

We had the pleasure to make acquaintance with Emily Folden, the beauty and brains behind Viola Fibers. Isn't she adorable? Her yarn and colourways are to dye for (pardon the pun)!

Mmm, sock yarn! Sock yarn is my preferred yarn to knit with. Courtney took home several skeins in this curry colourway. We thought it was particularly Beehive-ish! Very pretty. I took home a really pretty robins egg blue skein; the one pictured below.



Now the question is: what to make from our newly acquired stash! That will have to be another post altogether.

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A quick thank you to all that applied to our Beehive Summer Craft Fair! We will be reviewing the applications this week, and will let applicants know of our decisions by May 12th.

Happy Wednesday!