Friday, October 29, 2010

Stitches East 2010, Day 1 (for me)

Just home from day 1 of Stitches East at the Hartford CT Convention Center. A BIG knitting & crochet show. It was a mixed bag today for me, some good, some bad, some in between, but all in all, I had a good time, and learned some new things.

I got on the road to Hartford around 7:25am, to allow plenty of time to get there before my 9:30am class. After I arrived and parked, I stood in a short line to get my registration materials, and read the class room assignments on the scrolling board. I saw my morning class go by, and noticed the room number.

BUT WAIT! Why does my class say it starts at 8:30am?? What time is it now! Oh no, 8:25am!! This was totally my fault, for some reason I just thought the class started at 9:30, completely ignoring the 8:30 start time printing on EVERYTHING I'd gotten from the organizers - some kind of total brain short-circuit!

BUT WAIT AGAIN!! There's a sign that says if you have Melissa Leapman's Friday classes, to see the registration person - oh crap, I'm already late instead of being an hour early like I planned, and now I need to figure out what the deal is with my afternoon class!!

I got my registration materials, but was directed to a different line to talk about Melissa's class. Though they did tell me that Melissa had to cancel her Friday classes, because her mother passed away suddenly. I feel badly for Melissa, I wish her all the best, and hope she is OK!!

So Melissa not being able to come for class meant I had the entire afternoon for shopping, and they let me into a Market Session (1 hour class) that I had really wanted to take, but couldn't because of the afternoon class I'd signed up for - so things came out pretty even for me.

I got to my first class (at 8:35 for an 8:30 class, so not too late), I was the last one to arrive. This class was Double Knitting with Marianne Isager. She makes and designs some very nice things, and I was eager to learn Double knitting.

On my way to the classroom there's a long and very wide corridor that's windows on 1 side, classrooms on the other side. And the huge windows overlooked the river in Hartford. It was just beautiful, the tree were all yellow (and brown), the river flowing - it felt very peaceful just to walk to class. VERY NICE!!

However, I did have a problem with this Marianne Isager class even before I got to Stitches. A month or so ago, I received the materials list and home work for my classes, and this class said to bring your basic generic knitting supplies, but didn't say to bring any yarn. Nor was there any materials fee for this class. What?? Are we going to be knitting in the class, and if so, how, without any yarn??

So I emailed the Stitches organizers about this, and asked if we needed to bring yarn, and if so, what kind/size/fiber content? Knitting teachers are usually VERY specific about what kind of yarn you bring to any class. They contacted the teacher, and forwarded me her response, which was essentially "Students don't need to bring any yarn, I will be bringing my fingering weight yarn from my yarn line, if they want, students can bring something similar." These are not her exact words, but the gist of what she said.

I thought this was strange, there's no materials fee for this class, and I couldn't imagine anyone giving away yarn or other materials for free. I was a bit suspicious about this, especially as this teacher's yarn line is VERY expensive. So I brought 2 colors of sock yarn with me to the class.

Turns out I was right to be suspicious. Yes, the teacher brought her yarn with her - but it was NOT free with the class, even though there was no materials fee. You had to PURCHASE her VERY expensive yarn if you didn't bring any - and you had to get 2 skeins, since the class needed you to have 2 different colors!

I consider this VERY SLEAZY business practices - and I wrote those exact words on the evaluation form that I turned in at the registration desk (and did not leave it with the instructor for her to turn in). I specifically asked about this, and was assured that I did NOT need to bring yarn because the teacher was bringing yarn - nothing was said about another $40 of her yarn on top of paying for the class!

This is strike 1 for this teacher for me.

Once this class actually got started, the teacher passed out hand-outs. They went around the room, and since I was the last person to arrive to the class, I was the last to get a hand-out. BUT WAIT! They ran OUT of hand outs with the person before me. There were no more hand-outs, and the teach had absolutely no idea what to do. She couldn't get me a hand-out, they were printed by the event organizers, she said - I can't give you one, I don't have any more! So I was basically out of luck - though the wonderful woman next to me offered to share her handout so I could still take the class.

This is strike 2.

Then she started "teaching" this class on double knitting - but she was simply talking to some of the people at the other end of the room, she didn't say what or how she was going to organize/structure the class, it looked like she was just visiting/talking with a few people on the other side of the room. People on my side of the room were looking around, wondering what to do. Finally our side asked the teacher What are we supposed to be doing, just reading the hand-out and teaching ourselves? So THEN Marianne said to the whole room what to do, how to start, and then to wait for her to come around and show us what to do.

We did as instructed, no problems, then she came to our side to teach. Unfortunately, her "teaching" was just holding up her hands and doing the technique. While Marianne's conversational English is great, when it comes to talking about what she is doing in knitting, she definitely struggles with English. She is easy to understand, it's not an accent problem, but she literally doesn't seem to have the English words for knitting terminology, and is just not able to explain what to do (strange, since she's supposed to be a knitting teacher). When you question her about something, she just goes back to holding up her hands, saying,"Do it this way," and demonstrating.

So we were reduced to reading through the handout to try to understand what she was doing. Remember, I don't have a hand-out, and have to share with my neighbor. As we read through it, Marianne is tell us to do something, but it's the EXACT opposite of what the hand-out says to do! When questioned, she said something like, "Yes, but do it this way instead." WTF!?!?!?!

Strike 3.

Needless to say, I will NOT be taking another class with this instructor, nor will I support her in any way by purchasing yarn or patterns from her - bad teaching and sleazy business practices - I can get a lot better elsewhere!!

So that was most of the BAD part of my day, now on to the good!!

There was a lot of good stuff today, first of which was my neighbor in my class - she shared her hand-out, admired my shawl, ADORED my needle organization system, and in general made a bad class fun. We talked about a lot of things, and in general laughed more than not. i gave her one of my Ravelry business cards with my name, Ravetar and email address, and she's going to email me, plus scan and send me her copy of the class hand-out so I have something from the class to remind me. We had great fun with each other!

And I DID learn how to do double knitting in the class, I have an approx. 4" X 4" sample that I knit.

More good things - SHOPPING!!

Wow, the vendor floor was huge - 11 aisles of vendors, though not all aisles were completely full. I started in aisle 100 and was working to aisle 1100 when after about 2 hours, I totally ran out of steam! So tomorrow when I go back with Judy, I'll be starting in aisle 700 (I'm about half done) while I suspect Judy will be starting at 100.

I had a lot of time available between my morning class (ended at 11:30) and the Market Session that I booked into (starts at 3:30), so I checked out the food offerings at the Covention Center (not great), and walked next door to the Marriott to eat in their restaurant. I was able to be seated right away, because a lovely woman offered to share her 2-top, because she was also by herself. She was also attending Stitches, and we had a nice talk while we ordered and ate.

The restaurant food was good, but service, while friendly, was not great - while things started good, with refilling of water glasses and such, but it took quite a long time for the food to arrive. My table mate was anxious, because she had a class in the afternoon - it didn't actually bother me, because I knew I had no firm commitments until 3:30 (the Beaded Fobs class). Food did come and it was not how I'd ordered it (plain cheeseburger with American cheese). I received a hamburger patty (no bun) with cheddar cheese instead. Waitress took it back to get what I'd ordered, and that's when I think she was getting embarrassed by the mistake, and perhaps started avoiding our table because of it? And my 2nd order of food took at least as long as the first (guess they were cooking another burger?). And I think this also embarrassed the waitress, maybe she was thinking we'd blame her? I don't know.

But we didn't see her again until she brought my food - water glasses not filled, and we had to wave her down to get the check (my table mate needed to get to her class). Still no water refills (my glass was still empty). So I did still leave a tip, but not my usual generous 20% or better - I left 10% instead. Not a huge issue, but a minor annoyance.

Back to Stitches - I took my time at the vendors, went into each booth, took a really good look around at things, chatted with other knitters, vendors, etc. Admired other's knitting projects, and had mine admired in return. But after about 2 hours of this, I was TIRED and wanted to sit down for a while.

Outside of the vendor floor, is the multi-storied lobby. It has several groupings of COMFORTABLE chairs and tables, good light. I found a comfy chair, put my feet up, pulled out the double knitting swatch from the morning and knit until it was time to go back in for my Beaded Knitted fobs class.

This class was just OK - expensive for what it was, and I could have easily learned this on my own. But the beads/materials were pretty, I had not been able to figure out how it was done on my own (I had looked online too). I finished mine up in class and walked away with a pretty thing. And also talked with several women in class, in general had a very nice time!

Final annoyance for the day was the parking situation. Nice parking garage, I easily found parking, but it was EXPENSIVE! I'd expected to have to pay $19 for the day. But on my way back to my car (toting my VERY large and heavy bag), I noticed some women that had parking coupons. I asked about them and was told that they got them at the Check-In/Registration desk when they got their materials. They give them to everyone, I was told.

Well, I didn't get them, of course, I did double check everything (4 pieces of paper and my name badge). So I went back to the Registration desk, and got the coupons. Made parking only $11 for the day, still a lot, but more reasonable than $19.

Again, a minor annoyance, but having it happen at the end of the day tends to color things a bit. But I'm putting it behind me, and trying to find only the good now. The parking coupons I received, there was 1 for each day - so I know I don't have to worry about it tomorrow.

Judy is coming by tomorrow morning at 8:30 or so - we don't have a morning class, but we're going up early for the shopping. It's Judy's only chance to shop, before her afternoon class, and I still need to finish the rest of the vendor aisles. So I can sleep in a bit tomorrow morning, and have a leisurely breakfast if I want.

Need to make sure I bring an actual knitting project tomorrow - I didn't have anything today other than the double knitting sampler I was doing. That's fine, but if I have down time, I'd like to be knitting on a real project. Just need to decide what to bring with me.

Oh well, that's all for now - have to eat some dinner, then fall asleep watching TV!

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