One of the biggest movements in the knitting, crochet and the fibre arts online world right now is something that seemed so out of step with the crafts themselves to me that I almost didn't believe it when I first heard of it: podcasts. Podcasts strictly about knitting, or crochet, or fibre arts - and in some cases all three together. Now I had been relatively new to podcasts in general at that point, my experience had been limited to Le Show, Harry Shearer's podcast. In fact, I had never actually downloaded a podcast myself, I had simply had a friend play it for me, so when I heard that there were shows that only talked about my chosen favourite crafts I was dumbfounded, and I thought how could this be? Would it be boring to hear somebody talk about knitting, or would it be exciting to hear about other people's stories? Being the curious cat that I am, I had to search out and listen to these podcasts for myself.
Now, here I must say there are podcasts other than the knitting variety, but for the sake of argument I will limit this (and future) articles to knitting podcasts, as these are by far in the majority of the fibre arts podcasts.
The first podcast that I sought out was a very well known knitting podcast done by a wonderfully talented woman by the name of Brenda Dayne. I believe when I first downloaded her show she was on episode five (or was it six?) and I was astounded. For one hour I listened to her stories and knit. I was in love from the get go and I started seeking out more and more of these podcasts. It became a ritual for me to download all the shows I could and save them for my days off so I could sit on my couch while listening and knitting.
I would be lying if I said that these podcasts hadn't inspired me. Not only have they inspired me to branch out in my knitting, but also they've inspired me to think upon my knitting in a new light, one that I hadn't necessarily done before, or in the very least, not consciously.
Within the next few weeks we'll be looking more closely at knitting, and other fibre arts, podcasts. There'll be interviews, and coming up on Friday there'll be a comprehensive list of all of the knitting and crochet podcasts. Please stay tuned, the interviews coming up are with Pixie of Pixie Purls, Lisa of Musings of a Peaceful Knitter and Brenda Dayne of Cast On. There will also be information on how to listen to the podcasts yourself, and tips on if you want to start up your own fibre arts podcast.
© Kelly Gilliam, text and images. Reproduction without permission is prohibited.
