Stitches Midwest Recap: Part 1

Thursday, Sept. 10 - When we signed up for our Stitches Midwest events months ago, we decided that we wanted to be there for the Thursday night Market Preview to take advantage of the shopping time before the market opened to the public. So, we all scheduled time off for both Thursday and Friday and booked the hotel for all three nights. Then, just days before our trip, a series of unexpected events forced a change of plans for Sariebeth and our trio for the trip sadly became a duo.

So, Xandermommy and I arranged to leave in the early afternoon and I made sure to print directions for an alternate route mentioned on the Ravelry forums that would skirt around Chicago and save us the hassle of wading through the O'Hare area traffic. And then we stopped at an oasis along the toll road and switched drivers and I was driving and chatting and Xandermommy was knitting and suddenly we were looking at the Chicago skyline and wondering why we weren't seeing signs for the alternate route and the exit numbers seemed off. Yep, we drove right past our alternate route and ended up sitting in the mob of traffic anyway. Fortunately, traffic was thick but still moving on a Thursday night around rush hour, so although we didn't make it to the convention center right when the Market Preview opened, we did still get there around 5:30pm or so, which left us plenty of time to do some damage to the budget.

one of my Market Preview purchases (Creatively Dyed Yarn - Steele, in Ixia)

one of Xandermommy's Market Preview purchases (Miss Babs - Mulberry Silk, in Iris)

We parked at the convention center and opted to check in to the hotel after the market closed around 8pm. We started our shopping (at the Miss Babs booth first!) and proceeded to spend way more of our budget that first night than we expected and stayed until the last minute when the voice over the speakers announced that the market was closing and we should be leaving. We headed over to the hotel, checked in, called home to say we made it, and headed to the Gather Bar in the lobby for a late dinner. The Gather Bar was bustling with other knitters in various groups, but we managed to snag one of the remaining tables for 2 on the outskirts of the lounge area. We had some knitting time while sipping drinks and waiting on our food from the very busy kitchen, enjoyed our dinner, then headed up to the room to call it a night.

Photo tour of the Hotel & Convention Center here

We were a little worried about just how fast money flew from our fingers on the market floor, but reassured ourselves that we had surely made most of our impulse purchases the first night - after all, the market should look very much the same for the rest of our stay.