My first impressions of Manchester, New Hampshire, earlier this month were: the wonderful smell of pine mulch, red brick buildings, street names that reminded me of American History class, and pretty little red peppers growing into the fences along the sidewalk. Oh, and an unusually large number of ladies wearing crocheted clothing.
The Knit and Crochet Show was in town! It started on Wednesday morning with the Crochet Guild of America Professional Development Day. I enjoyed listening to Kristen Ohmdahl and Lily Chin speak about their lives and careers as authors and teachers.
The same afternoon, I went to work, conducting three consecutive round-table discussions of “A Book’s Journey, from Idea to Book-Signings.” Our table was full and overflowing for all three sessions, so I’m expecting to see a bunch of new authors publishing their crochet books in the next couple of years.
When they could get a word in edgewise, people asked great questions. I was pleased to note a healthy interest in publicity. Nowadays it’s very, very important that authors be involved in the publicity for their own books.
But it wasn’t all work for me. The next day I took a class for the first time in ages. Yay! Here’s my class sample. I wrote more about the workshop and my teacher, Máire Treanor, at Clones Knots with Máire.
The convention hotel was in downtown Manchester, so we could walk to all kinds of shops and restaurants. My favorite was Lala’s Hungarian pastry shop and cafe. Their most unusual item was sour cherry soup, which was cherries in a sweet-tart yogurty sauce, served cold. The stuffed kohlrabi leaves in dill sauce were mouth-wateringly good. I’ll go back just for the pastry and coffee.
I hope the Knit and Crochet Show will be in Manchester again someday.