Texas Trip, Part One: Maker Faire in Austin! October 31
I could go on and on about how I adore Maker Faire. I love the idea of being a “maker”, I am grateful Make and Craft give their own angle on what it can mean to be a person who makes stuff. But before I get too gushy I’ll just say how awesome it is to meet the people at Maker Faire. Both times that I’ve worked in the Lion Brand booth we’ve seen a nice variety of people wanting to know more. Know more about crochet or knitting or yarn or simply wanting to know what we’re doing in our corner of the Faire. I love that! I find people with no interest in things boring and since this is an event where everyone is encouraged to be interested, it’s certainly not a boring time!
I lost count at how many hands I helped crochet, but I can tell you it was a lot. And more folks wanted to learn about crochet than knitting! Then there were the familiar faces! It was great to see and work with Liz and Karen from Lion Brand again. And several folks I met at the last Maker Faire stopped by and hung out with us too. I’ve always loved the summer camp reunion sort of vibe a bunch of us have going at TNNA and now I’m starting to feel the same thing with Maker Faire. It’s truly wonderful that we can all meet up and bond over these things we love to make!
New faces:
Karli taught knitting in the booth and brushed up on her own crochet skills too. Her new yarn store Gauge will be a very crochet friendly place if I have anything to say about it! She has the kind of Texan dialect I’ve always envied. When I start speaking in my native dialect I sound brusk and staccato, but Karli has this sweet ladylike Texan lilt. She was kind enough to drive me in to the fairgrounds both days and she even brought me a cappuccino! I look forward to returning to Austin and checking out her store in the not too distant future.
I also finally got to know and hang out with Jenny Ryan, a fellow Angelino. That’s the way things just go sometimes, I hide out in the crochet hermitage so much that I have to meet other Angelinos in far off places like Austin! Having dinner with Jenny, Natalie, and Faythe Levine was one of the highlights of my whole Texas trip. Bonding over the odd behaviors of the work at home creative life included the dark secret that we’ve all been following Britney’s exploits a bit closer than we’d like to admit. It was also funny that when searching for a restaurant, we sat in Nat’s hotel room searching for a place on the hotel’s list of suggestions that actually had a good website. Just one of the many little quirks I enjoyed learning I share with all these awesome crafty girls. I have to note here that there was a long drought in my life (late teens/ early 20’s) where there seemed to be no one around who was like me, so now in my adulthood I am still so thankful to find even more kindred spirits.
And I got to get Faythe started with crochet! It was so awesome to meet her and get to know more about her film.
All this said, I never even made it into the bigger hall(s) full of robot fun. I just didn’t have the time or energy! There are several things I’m bummed to have missed, but there’s always the next Maker Faire right? I didn’t get to see much of Austin itself either, but I had enough great company to not have been too bothered by missing robots or seeing any of Austin’s famed cool spots. On Monday morning I boarded another flight and headed to my home town Lubbock, Texas… more on that tomorrow.
