Creative Festival 2015 Stash

What's a trip to the Creative Festival if I didn't bring back something. I will say that there were less booths this year. It seems that some vendors decided to forgo this year because of the festival's location. This year the festival was held in the North building of the Metro Toronto Convention Center and as far as the teachers and students (myself included) were concerned, it was much more convenient. The North building is much closer to the hotels we were staying in and the lighting in the classrooms were much better. I didn't even have to break out my daylight lamp even once. But, it seems that the vendors thought it was very inconvenient (apparently the South building has a loading dock). So next year we go back to a long trek to our classrooms and bad lighting.

My haul this year

Onto the stash, I went back to Wool Gathering for more of the same wool I bought last year. I started the fox I promised my sister and ran out of the orange. I had a slight panic until I contacted Jo-Anne who luckily had some left. I also made sure to get more of the brown for the kangaroo (just in case).

One of the things we were looking for was fur to crochet a collar for my sister's coat. She ended up getting something else to make the collar, but I got something for myself. These are from Paula Lishman and it's dyed beaver fur-yarn. I was a little hesitant to buy it, but I had a talk with the owner who explained their process to me. All their fur come from Canada, is legally trapped and sustainable. You can read more here on their process.

While having dinner with some of the guild ladies, Sue Thomas showed us some of what she bought and I really loved the colors. The kits are by Jamie North of Glitz n' Kitz. I'm not much of a necklace person so I only got Kumihimo bracelets.

In order to make them I needed a Kumihimo disc. Luckily there were several booths carrying them. This kit even comes with some cord for me to practice with. It's not like I needed more things to try, but I couldn't resist.

There was also a booth offering 3D "embroidery" kits. Those of you who follow Heather at the Stitching Lotus probably remember her post on it. I ended up getting two small kits. They weren't very expensive and super cute. My sister sat down to try it out and I had a hard time getting her to get up and leave the booth.

However... like Heather warns in her post there is possible copy right infringement. See those kitties, they're called Choo Choo Cats. It's a very popular brand in South Korea and I did also notice a pattern from SODA stitch.

Onto the more stitchy related stash. I got a few things from the EAC booth where some of our instructors were selling their designs. I got two patterns from Carol Storie of Heartfelt Designs. She has some really cute ornament designs. Her Christmas stockings are adorable, so check out her store on etsy.

I also bought some patterns from Katherine Drummond. Her Undersea Fantasy needle book that you saw here and another pattern that she sold out of and will mail out to me later.

But the pièce de résistance were the punto antico books she was selling at her booth. I spent the bulk of my money at her booth getting them, but they are so worth it. She had a third book but sadly I had to forgo :( Maybe next year if she still has it I will pick it up, but I will have to be satisfied with these.

More books because you can never have enough of these. I think after the EAC booth, Grantham Books is my favorite. I'm always able to buy some books from my wishlist at a cheaper price. This year I was able to snag a copy of Schwalm Embroidery by Christine Bishop and when I went back the second day to make sure I didn't miss anything I found a copy of RSN's Goldwork.

Oh! I almost forgot. This year's gift for Gold pass delegates was from Swarovski again, but it's kind of meh! compared to last years. Not sure what I will do with it.

And that's the end of my posts on Creative Festival 2015. So now while stitching my 18th century sampler, I'll have to make some time to finish some of those class kits. And I can't forget my amigurumi fox. He's so near done, it's a shame to leave him missing parts as he is.