Stitch & Pitch 2025. She Said, He Said.
Keeley Richardson
Founder and Chief Fiber Officer
It is a fact that there are not many events that combine my love of the fiber arts and my husband’s enjoyment of sport. When I suggested we go to the ballgame a couple of weeks ago his chin nearly hit the floor – this was the first time I had invited him to any sporting event in our thirty-year relationship (this is not a joke). It is true to say that the annual Mariners Stitch and Pitch event is probably the only sporting event that truly has something for both of us. So, the tickets were booked, and on a very warm, sunny Sunday afternoon in August we headed to T Mobile Park full of excitement for the game/yarn. Here is our review of Stitch and Pitch 2025.
She said. . .
Stitch and Pitch is always a great opportunity to sit back, enjoy the game and make some progress on your latest WIP. It provides wonderful guilt free knitting time especially if your significant other is a baseball fan! Coming from England baseball feels like the most accessible American sport to me. I love the friendly atmosphere in the stadium and it’s great to see multi-generational families coming together to enjoy the game, but to be honest, I was mainly at Stitch and Pitch for the yarn. As soon as he was engrossed in the game I hot footed it to the fiber market!
Photos: Sam from Jadawoo Designs and Kasteyl from Seattle Sky Dyeworks.
This year’s marketplace had moved from the covered walkway out into the sun, and I have nothing but admiration for the vendors who braved the heat to provide a fabulous array of yarns for us fiber lovers. It was a treat to be greeted with huge smiles, beautiful hand dyes and specially dyed Mariners color ways to celebrate the event. Sam from Jadawoo, Kasteyl from Seattle Sky Dyeworks and Tara from Stranded by the Sea were a few of the people I was lucky enough to catch up with. Purly Shell, Row House Yarns and Makers Mercantile were also there bringing the fiber happiness.
Photos: Stranded by the Sea’s Stall and Serial Knitters Skellies.
It feels to me that Stitch and Pitch is all about friendship and community – two communities coming together, sporty and creative proving that they are not mutually exclusive. My baseball fan was welcomed by my fiber friends as he watched while I shopped, and they found they had more in common with each other than just me. It’s also about meeting up with your fiber besties to take our beautiful craft out into the world. Knitters and crocheters swapped pattern ideas and tips all around us. We swooned at each others’ WIPs and hopefully inspired others to give our gentle arts a try.
There was so much to enjoy about the afternoon but one of my favorite moments was watching a young boy, possibly eleven or twelve years old with two people who may have been his mother and grandmother, proudly knitting a stunning color work cowl with a dinosaur design whilst cheering when Cal Raleigh hit a home run. His knitting skills were exemplary, and the results were something many of us knitters dream of. To me he embodied the spirit of Stitch & Pitch – a celebration of family, community, sport and of course this fabulous yarny world that we love being a part of.
Photos: With Caitlin, Woolpack YTK tester extraordinaire (must improve our selfie game), and this month’s Fiber Hero Designer – Kristen.
He Said:
It’s all a question of priorities. In the business world, where most of my trips to events come via, corporate sport entertainment means the most prestigious seats close to the front in the prime spot. For Stitch and Pitch and these yarny folk the priority was to be close as possible to the wool marketplace high up on the third-tier boardwalk. Consequently, I have never sat as far back at a sporting event as I did that day. Slowly it started to make sense. The near aerial view didn’t matter if you were spending a lot of your time looking at your needles. The small food queues at that rarefied altitude meant minimum time spent away from stitches.
I have little to offer in terms of wool chat especially to this hardened group of yarn afficionados, so I was left to watch the game, and what a game! A frisson of excitement always goes through the crowd this season when Cal Raleigh steps up to the plate, but second batter in first inning, surely the man must need time to get is eye in? – nope. Bang, sailing over the wall his first of two home runs. The man is a machine, and the big dumper rolls on surpassing records in this stand out season for the catcher. Logan Gilbert was in lethal form striking out 13 batters on the way to establishing a personal best day from the mound. All in all, you could have called the game over at the end of the third innings with score standing at 11-1
Stunning performance from the Mariners available to see from wherever you were in the ballpark.
Photos: The view from the third tier and Cal scores.
Stitch and Pitch is an annual event. If it looks like your idea of fun, signing up to receive newsletters from this year’s yarn vendors is a great way to keep you in the loop, so you don’t miss out on tickets for next year’s baseball/fiber celebrations. See you there next August!
