We’ve entered all the sales from Stitches Midwest and the results are in! Benji and her friends were by far the most popular designs at the show. Everyone loved the way the doll could be customized to look just like the girl she was being knit for.
Our mini mittens and hats were a close second. EVERYONE bought the small balls that went along with the patterns, making Small Balls our best selling item overall. 
After Stitches, Sarah, Kathleen and I got the chance to explore Chicago a bit… what a great city!
We went to the top of the Sears Tower, which is where I took that picture of the gorgeous Chicago skyline! There was a room with a glass floor, where Sarah and I had some fun taking pictures:
Kathleen, on the other hand, was scared to death, even though she doesn’t look like it:
Here, Sarah and I are being “blown over” by the famous Chicago wind:
While driving around at 2 AM the night before our flight home, we came across Harpo Studios– completely by accident! Needless to say, it was a pleasant surprise.
After that, we decided to stay up all night, since we had to leave at 4 AM to catch our flight anyway. The trip was tons of fun, and a huge success!
At Stitches Midwest, we got the chance to take some pictures of our Tartlet hat on one of the cutest babies ever! Finally, a model who’s not a relative!
Thank you Jess Urwin for the adorable photo!
The girls and I had a blast at Stitches Midwest! Our booth was booming the whole time, sales were great, and we had the pleasure of meeting some amazing mid-western knitters. A lot goes into preparing for a setting up our booth, and it was quite a process! Kathleen, my mom, our interns and I were in a mad scramble in the days before Stitches to make sure everything was rolled, packaged, and packed. Needless to say, we were very happy when the van was packed and ready to go:
Sarah, Kathleen, and the packed van!
After arriving in the Windy City, the next step was to set up our booth. What we started out with looked something like this:
Is that a person peeking out from behind those giant boxes?
Look at all that stuff!
We also had a lot of polishing to do to:
I steam the wall hangings.
Finally, the booth looked something like this, and we were ready for business:
As you can see, business was great– our booth looked this way whole time! We were the busiest booth. We were all very excited:
My mom made us those all aprons to match the booth, and they were a huge hit! Everyone wanted to buy them, but they weren’t for sale.
Our dolls were an especially big hit– practically every kid that walked by wanted one.
Our littest fan looks at our dolls.
Packing up the booth was bittersweet. The girls and I were starving by the time we were done… and just look at the truck they sent for our boxes!
Stitches Midwest was a blast, and a huge success! One of the things the girls and I really enjoyed was getting the chance to explore Chicago– and we saw some really cool things! Seems like everything’s bigger in Chicago.
We could have really used that van in the moving process! I love the giant yarn balls.
This giant Weber grill really cracked me up!
Last but not least, the girls and I came across this gigantic McDonald’s. Those golden arches are at least three stories tall!
Here’s a sneak peek at Pick Up Sticks’ newest pattern, which is now in the works and will be released at Stitches Midwest in 3 sizes. It’s an adorable owl hat for babies done in our super-soft alpaca, plus a set of matching crib shoes. It’s a fun knit because it combines linen stitch and cabling.
I love the look of the owl. Owls really crack me up… plus, both babies and owls never sleep and are hooting away all night!
Before I even knew this hat was going to be an owl, I was really into designing something that combined so many different textures. Having the 3 textures in one hat gives it a fun, modern, sampler-y look. Plus, all of them are tried-and-true textures that are simple to complete but not often seen together. There are definitely more such patterns on the way!
Now the trick is patterning it… it’s not a hard knit, but it’s been difficult to pattern!
We got a great, avant-garde performance from the kids over here at Pick Up Sticks yesterday!
Over here at Pick Up Sticks our spinning machine has been running at high speeds all day in preparation for Stitches Midwest. It’s a pretty old machine, but it’s still going strong and does a great job of spinning our yarn candy into balls.
I thought it might be interesting to show you guys a few pictures of what exactly goes into designing a pattern like these skull mukluks.
As you can see, graph paper will be your best friend… it really helps to be organized.
The finished product sure was fun and cozy!
As we get our booth ready for Stitches Midwest 2010 (Aug 19-23), here’s a quick look at our creative process. Our booth began with the picture above. Kathleen found it, plus these other two fun vintage knitting pics below. We used all three as the organizing principle for our booth. The result: our booth resembles a vintage candy store, with the yarn standing in the for the sweets.
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