There are now lots of wonderful exhibitions and craft shows all over the UK.
Here's a list of the upcoming events for this year:
Coming in 2009
The Knitting and Stitching Show
Alexandra Palace
8th to 11th October 2009
Stitch and Craft Show
Olympia II, Kensington, London
19th to 22nd March 2009
National Knitting Week 2009
Events nationally
11th to 18th October 2009
Tickets for the exhibitions are available to book in advance at Twisted Threads
Well - that's what Jonathan Ross said on a recent episode of his "Friday Night With..." show. So it seemed like a good title for the Swampy Ewe-Knitted exhibition at Sheerness Library. The display includes some information on the history of knitting and its importance during the two World Wars as well as examples of hand-knitted and machine knitted items, celebrity knitters, patterns, knitting magazines and our 'Knit a Square for the Clock Tower Scarf' appeal.
We are also holding our fortnightly meetings in the library for the duration of the exhibition which means that anyone interested in joining but not sure what goes on within the group can come along and sit in or just see what we get up to! Unfortunately we can't provide refreshments while meeting at the library but there are drinks and nibbles available at the usual venue of Rowena's house in Alma Street!
At our last meeting on 23rd October, we had a crochet demonstration from Debi Birkin of Jiffyknits. A lot of SEK members are proficient knitters but have no idea how to crochet so Debi was very busy showing everyone the basics. We were also visited by a photographer from the Sheerness Times Guardian who have been very supportive of our group. Their article on the group and our plans to knit a scarf for the Clock Tower in Sheerness Town Centre appeared in today's copy of the newspaper and is shown below. The next meeting of the SEK group will also be held at the library on 6th November from 12pm to 2pm. We don't have a demonstration planned for that week but everyone is welcome to come along and we'll be happy to show you the basics if you've never knitted before.
If you would like to join us in knitting squares for the Clock Tower Scarf, you can download the pattern here or pick a copy up from Sheerness Library. We intend to get the scarf completed in time to wrap around the clock on Saturday 13th December. More news about the unveiling will be posted in the News section nearer the time.
Click the image to see a larger version.
STG Article 29.10.08
This year's World Wide Knit in Public Day was held on 14th June - a sunny Saturday, thankfully! The girls from Swampy Ewe-Knitted had decided at our previous meeting that we would meet at the Sheerness Clock Tower in the centre of town at midday on WWKIP day and just do our knitting and show off some of the things you can do with needles and yarn when you put your mind to it. It was also a good opportunity to show off the group and what we get up to.
We were there for 2 hours and had a lot of people coming up and asking us what we were up to and why. I had a big board up with details of how WWKIP day came about and about Swampy Ewe-Knitted and we also had a board with some of our smaller finished items on it and a couple of Noni (Nora Bellows) bag patterns on display to show the kind of wonderful things available to knit now. We did get quite a lot of interest and people took flyers and asked about weekend meetings and so on, which is why I set up the monthly Saturday evening meetings. We were even given a huge bag of baby wool by a kind gentleman who's wife could no longer knit but had one hell of a stash! Some of this wool has since been donated to a charity knitting items for premature babies.
We were also photographed for a local paper and have even featured in two national knitting magazines now (Let's Knit and Simply Knitting - September issues). The group is still small, however, and we need more members. With National Knitting Week coming up from 12th to 19th October, we are hoping to organise some other knitting events in order to raise further awareness of the craft and also money for charity. Here's hoping we can do it!
Here's what we got up to! Click the images to see a larger version.
The Swampy Ewe-Knitted girls!
Our display
Val teaches a young girl to knit
Fame (part 1) Sheerness Times Guardian
Fame (part 2) - Let's Knit Magazine
