Monday, October 06, 2008

What a great Retreat Weekend







We had a wonderful group of knitter's attend the Philosopher's Wool knitting retreat this weekend. Ann, Eugene and Susan did an amazing job teaching everything we needed to know to make a wonderful Philosopher's Wool sweater. The new designs are amazing and they will be shown soon on the Philosopher's Wool's new website, so watch for that.
Here is how the weekend went
Friday - people arrived and got settled in, then we had a great barbecue salmon and steak dinner. We met and introduced Ann, Eugene and Susan to all the knitters then we went to Fun Knits for a huge sale. We sold lots of yarn and sweater kits this weekend.
Sat - after a great breakfast we got to work on our sweaters. Everyone came with a cuff done and ready to start Fair Isle. I have been stumbling with the 2 handed technique for a while and it took me 2 minutes to see why. I was holding my yarn wrong in my right hand for it to easily flow.
I learned so much this weekend.
We worked on our sweaters all day, in the Afternoon Ann detail how to finish the sweaters and Sat evening we had a show and tell. This was amazing. Such talent. So many knitted items.
Sunday Susan showed us her finishing techniques, How to prepare and finish the sweater. A great way to pick up the button band etc..... By the way Susan has knit over 300 Philosopher's wool sweaters so she really knows this well. Most of the Philosopher Wool sweaters in the pictures are knit by Susan.
Here are some pictures of the weekend,
I am starting with what I knit this weekend because I think it is just great. I am going to love this sweater and I can't put it down so I hope to have a finished sweater to show you soon.
The next pictures are of Ann, Eugene and Susan teaching. Next pictures are from the show and tell.
Joan and Roger modelling Philosopher's wool sweaters and broke into impromptu dance. A very wild fun sweater knit by Leslie of Naniamo, Eugene's Nuclear sweater - great story attached to this sweater. Mary Tanti's winning socks (wish her luck).
Linda''s amazing socks - yes they match.
Roger's great hats
The Teddy's in their Fair Isle sweaters. Everyone got a Teddy bear and enough yarn to make sweaters for them.
The last pictures are Eugene and Gary ( Susan's husband) and Ann and Susan in the boat leaving the resort.
What a wonderful weekend and I can't thank Ann and Eugene and Susan and Gary enough for coming the Quadra and sharing their talent and warm kindness with us.

2 comments:

lingadoon said...

I just want to add my thanks to Shelley and Ann and Eugene and Susan. It was such a great weekend. I learned lots of tips and technics to help me complete my Philosopher's sweater(s) - I couldn't resist and bought 2 kits.
It was so great. I have never been to a FunKnit retreat but I know I won't ever miss another.
The bonus was meeting all the other great knitters and fun folks. I also learned about ravelry (waiting for my invite).
It was really great and I can't wait till the next retreat - soon I hope.
Thanks again to all.

Deb said...

Ilga Leja was getting all exciterd on her blog about the Kauni yarn- so I emailed her and told her that you sold it. She wants to design with it- maybe you should email her????