What is this all about? And yes, as a yoga bean, I regularly get the question “so what do you do on this retreat, like, do you knit and do yoga?”
And then I get such perplexed looks when I nod and say “Yup, that’s exactly what we do!”
Knit and Breathe was born because I, (obviously), love Yoga, Gina, (for those who know Gina, obviously), loves anything to do with yarn and Beth is this crazy awesome, (I mean CRAZY AWESOME), pattern designer. So one day I get a call from my good friend Gina to say “hey, why don’t we do a yoga and knitting retreat together?”.
I love travelling and getting involved in new projects, so it didn’t take me long to say, YES!
Sometimes you’re not sure if something is going to work out, but if you have a gut feel that says, “hell yes”, then it’s usually a pretty good idea to listen to it. You never know, it might just turn into something unimaginably amazing. And this is how knit and breathe was formed.
We held our first ever “prototype” retreat in Velddrif, it went well, we got great feedback from those who attended and were motivated to follow up and do another. The only snag we hit was that we couldn’t find a big enough venue for the dates we had set aside. So we came up with the idea of hosting a one day event instead – The Shambhala Yoga and Knitting Day retreat. Again, a massive success, (apart from being the hottest day ever in CT that year – knitting and hot weather are not really the best combo).
From there a luxury knitting day event at Cellars-Hohenort was hosted and then our 2 night Forest Encounter at Hearth and Soul. Once more, a sold out retreat where we got to spend a weekend with such a wonderfully diverse group of participants, from pure beginner Yoga beans to pure knitters, two yoga enthusiasts who, when booking, wanted to book for “that sewing and yoga retreat”. They had to be kindly informed that it wasn’t a sewing retreat, but a knitting retreat and that knitting and sewing are a little different!
Beth is amazing. She is able to cater to pure beginners, (with Gina’s assistance), and super experienced knitters all in the same workshop. Everyone who joined the workshops gained so much from the organised and well planned knitting content, the quiet and gentle Yoga, the delicious meals and obviously the amazing and secret Forest encounter led by Gina.
Participants joined, some as strangers, some as friends, but each one left as a close friend, with whom we had deep meaningful interactions.
We’ve received rave reviews for all our events to date. That means booking and planning for 2018 is well under way and if you haven’t yet looked to see what’s on offer, (because we’re now also hosting our first ever retreat in Magaliesburg), you better get cracking. If there is one thing I know for sure – all our events for 2018 WILL be booked out.
We look forward to seeing you with your needles and yoga mat!
Namaste.
Nina, (and Beth and Gina)!