Yes I do own a yarn shop, but for those of you that know me, you’re probably more than just a little aware of my inner geek and where my inner geek finishes, both of my sons continues (and then some). I share my office with both of them, Durahn has his sewing machine in there and Kye has his XBox One and PC in there too.  It does mean it can be a little noisy at times -Cut to Kye talking to friends on XBox Live, loudly because he has headphones on, whilst listening to Dubstep at full volume, because of the afore mentioned headphones and the sewing machine or overlocker could be going too. On reflection, yes it can be a lot noisy at times, but it’s lovely (most of the time) and at least I can keep an eye on what Kye is getting up to on the internet. It does mean though, that I’m far more aware of characters in games, what’s hot on Youtube and loads of other useless bits of information that I won’t bore you with.  I didn’t need to read the list of top Youtube Stars to hear about the likes of Ray William Johnson (now retired), Smosh or Ireland’s very own Jack Septic Eye as I am literally, bombarded with them on a daily basis. Dare I say it….. I actually enjoy most of it.  Often, I find I’ve completely forgotten what I’m meant to be doing and instead have tuned into something Kye or Du are watching. So it will probably come as no surprise to hear that Kye and I went to  MCM Comicon in London a couple of weeks ago.  Comicon is a massive convention for all things comics, games, sci-fi, fantasy, Youtube, anime, etc. Held in the Excel Centre for three days, it was vast.  There were cult stars from film and the telly, like Sylvester McCoy, Felicia Day and John Noble to name but a few.  Animators, from comics and the screen and just about anything and everything you can think of to purchase, from key rings to a full Stormtrooper outfit at a whopping £500, or gaming computer at the ‘Special Comicon Price’ of £2795. One of the best and in our case, the thing we looked forward to the most, is the Cosplay.  The number of Cosplayers dressed up as their favourite characters was amazing and the sheer work some people put into making their costumes is incredible. All of the Cosplayers were great people, more than happy to ‘strike a pose’ for a photograph or two.  You could just see the confidence wearing a costume gave to everyone and that sense of ‘belonging’ was fantastic to see. I don’t doubt that if we go again we’ll be dressing up, there were whole families and groups of friends, dressed as characters from their favourite shows and films. As you might expect Kye (and I) were blown away and to be honest there was far too much to see in one day.  If we go again we’ll be sure to make a weekend of it. As he loves all things Transformers, Kye was really happy to have the opportunity to meet UK based illustrator Lee Bradley and Joana Lafuente from Portugal. When I asked him what his favourite thing about the day was there was no hesitation =  Meeting Tomska whose a film and video creator, best known for internet creations such as asdfmovie.  The worst was not being able to watch the Mortal Kombat X tournament as he’s too young. We did manage to squeeze a few more things into our whirlwind London trip, but not much after spending the day at Comicon.  We took a trip on the cable cars and then a boat trip up the Thames, before popping up Regent’s Street to pop into Hamley’s and Liberty’s.  On our second day, Bank Holiday Monday, we visited Spitafields Market and stopped off for Rainbow Cake in The Hummingbird Bakery, before heading to The Imperial Warm Museum.  After the museum we jumped on a bus to Sloane Square for a speedy visit to Peter Jones to cast my eye over the yarn, before catching another bus to buy ice cream at Scoop in South Kensington. There was knitting, of course there was, but as our visit was really only for Sunday and Bank Holiday Monday, there were no ‘proper’ yarn shops open.  Despite managing to call into Liberty of London, I didn’t make a purchase because the haberdashery department has shrunk and whilst still full of lovely goodies, there was nothing to tempt me.  I’d really only called in to buy a replacement 4mm circular needle after breaking mine on the journey over and was really dissapointed to find they only had metal ones.  I bought them and did try to continue with my latest shawl on them, but gave up after a couple of rows, they’re just not for me anymore. My flying visit to Peter Jones was much more fruitful both for Kye and for me.  He enjoyed the 40 minute bus journey as it gave him a chance to rest and look at all the ‘cool cars’ and me because I found some suitably Comicon inspired sock yarn. I also managed to finish the pair of socks I’d been making whilst sitting on the trains and buses travelling around London.  You might remember I was using the new Cotton Premium sock yarn from Opal?  The socks themselves are lovely and comfy to wear, but I was a little concerned that the cotton in them would make them fall down easily.  To avoid this, I knitted five or six rows of the rib using the yarn and a strand of thin knitting elastic.  It does make the knitting a little more difficult as the thread is rubbery and doesn’t want to slip over your needles easily, but it’s definitely done the trick. As the picture above shows the yarn is fluorescent and will make some rather funky socks.sockscompletely reminiscent of our trip. Happy Knitting!

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