Candace Melville Ledbetter was the guest today on the Yarn Thing podcast with Marly Bird. If that names sounds to formal, you may recognize that she is Caddy Melville. (Pronounce that like the Cadillac “Caddy”.)
Caddy and her mom, Sally Melville, have told the story many times, that Sally tried to teach Caddy to knit MANY times. It wasn’t until Sally was teaching Caddy’s boyfriend that Caddy realized she could do this, too, as an adult. (He’s still around, Caddy says she taught him again when she was prepping for her new Craftsy Class.) She says because of their history, Sally didn’t POUNCE on teaching Caddy this time, but they took it slow and without expectations. [Read more…]
Kara says she began knitting at about age 12, it was her grandmother that taught her. She lost interest as kids do, until about early 20’s. Kara worked in the garment industry of New York City and found a yarn shop that drew her like Mecca. ‘Her peeps’ welcomed her, and she realized she wanted to learn more about knitting and design. Later on, she attended a TNNA and met Michele Fortune, Executive Vice President of 
We’re being redundant but it’s not an exaggeration. Married at 19, having 5 kids before age 30 (2 while hubby was in Law School) she says she got to a point where she just needed to get out of the house. She went to her local yarn store and begged to be allowed to help and became a Saturday Shop Girl at The Weaver’s Place. They noticed that she was great at helping customers with their tricky problems and had her start teaching. One of those at the shop sent her info to XRX Books to help at Stitches Expos, and in 2005 when it was in Atlantic City, which began her career teaching across the country. 
