Tribeca! - WWKIP - The Yarn Store

Warning: this post can cause a yarn orgasm - I'm just saying!

Get something to drink. This will take a while.

I loves me the yarn! Y'all know I don't even have to have a reason to buy yarn, I just buy for the same reasons I buy CDs and books - I'm a little obsessive about those things that I am interested in.

One of the activities we had was a secret pal swap. We filled out a survey and it was sent to our swap partner so they could get us something from $20 -$25 and we were to exchange our gifts at dinner. My swap partner (Lynn) mentioned she wanted 'knit jewelry' - decorative stitch markers - so I headed over to Etsy and In Stitches and Sunnshine and purchased the following:

She got stitch marker bling! Maybe a dozen and a half stitch markers that could go on all sizes of needles. I was worried she wouldn't like them, but she did.
On my survey, I said the only thing I was really interested in was...come on, now, take a guess, YARN. I said I would probably like either sock yarn cuz I never buy it or perhaps a natural fiber like a bamboo, or chunky weight because I don't have enough of that. So I was imagining I would get one, maybe two, little skeins of yarn because it's supposed to be $20. We were sitting at dinner - this is Lynn sitting across from me. When the time came to exchange gifts, I pulled out this pitiful looking plastic bag. Lynn, on the other hand, pulls this out:
As I explained to Mr. Honey that evening on the phone - at no time did the words 'tote' or 'bag' enter my survey (I went back and checked) I mentioned yarn - and it was supposed to be just $20. This is the yarn tote (that's it's name!!) made of corn husks and purchased from Wal-Mart. Now, I would clean Lynn's car with my tongue just because she got me another tote bag - but
there was something inside it:Let's all say it together: YUUMMMMYYY! So, now not only would I clean the car - but I'd throw in the tires, too.

So, the night we arrived in St. Louis, we had an appointment to go to a LYS. I did not go. Yarn stores are not my thing-even as much as I love yarn - I tend not to want to spend a lot of money. I go t0 my LYS because I can get bamboo needles on the cheap. That first night, I spent the fours hours to myself finishing my hat, watching reruns of NCIS, and rolling around the king size bed in my hotel room.

But the next morning...the owner of Knitorius opened her shop early for us and she had some coffee (which I don't drink) juice (which I do and did) and some of the best pastry I ever had. She also had a 15% discount on all our yarn purchases. I thought to myself I would buy maybe one little skein of yarn just so I can say I was a good sport and while everyone else was downing acrylic I would stay above the snobbery and purchase a natural fiber.
So I put this in my cart:
The room in the back of the store has all the clearance yarns (they were nice enough to tell us that, but I have a feeling they may hide it from the general public unless forced.)

I don't know what you see: but I see a nice trim to a hat or pair of gloves or a shawl. It's ribbony and soft. So, there, I should have been done. But then I sat down in the back room to finish off my hat and talk to some of my peeps and there was this cute little basket of hand dyed yarn from a local fiber artist. Her label says - get this - dyeabolical yarn - isn't that cute? There was a color scheme that caught my eye and before you know it - my first ever potential purchase of sock yarn was in my basket. It made the cut and here it is:


I should now be done...officially finished. Not only did I buy yarn at a LYS, I purchased a skein of yarn (albeit 200 yard +) for $24 and it was sock yarn - every yarn commandment I have, broken in one luscious, colorful ball. I should have left the store and gotten in the van... and that's what I started to do - except on the way I passed these: 400+ yards of natural fiber for just $15 each. It was all I could do just walk away with these two cuz there were about 4 in the basket in some beautiful colors and I settled for these two - with no idea what I'm going to make with them, but I am almost certain it will involve a cable.

We're not quite done yet. On the way back to Chicago, we had a White Elephant yarn swap. You put a skein of the most hideous yarn you own in a bag and put it in the pile and you select another bag someone else thinks hold the most hideous yarn they own. I did not take a photo of my hideous yarn - and it was bad - but I did take a photo of what passes for hideous to someone else - and when you see it, you'll know right away why I am the most excited about getting it (no, it's not Caron by the Pound or I Love This Yarn - that would have been too good): Fun Fur - in a color I already own..and a really cute skein of some other eyelash yarn. This photo does not do it justice. It is black with sparkliness in it. Again, I see cuffs to a black pair of gloves and Fun Fur scarves sell like hotcakes at our craft sales.


So here is the family portrait of my St. Louis yarn family:
Happy family - Nice Trip
12404

Ode to Billie Joe

I'm convinced if someone had shown this poncho to Billie Joe he never would have jumped off that bridge. Of course, I think the reason he jumped because his mama made him spell his name with Billie instead of Billy. Boy probably was teased something fierce.

(For those of you young folk, read here about Ode to Billie Joe. It's a great read)

This is a cute poncho, but you have to be a little adult to wear it. It's made for a littler woman so I can't wear it and doesn't even look good on Joe. But Kenya here can wear it just fine.

This is Hobby Lobby's Angel Fleece and it is a really soft polyester/acrylic blend. This wasn't the yarn I intended to use for this poncho but you know what they say about intentions...so I finished it anyway.

Thanks to everyone who sent me folks to interview. I just got word I need to have some of my interviews done by tomorrow! (gasp) So Susie - I'll be contacting your friend today to interview her for the magazine. Thank you for the intro!

Well, back to work!

Conviction of the Heart

Yes, the little voice inside my head won out. The little scarf voice that kept saying "Make me, make me!" and I was resistant because it isn't the right season for a scarf. It was very insistent and I finally gave in and put it one the needles.

Do you see the new fu-fu slubby yarn I got from Hobby Lobby? It's called Artistic and it's named after...artists - go figure. I have some Van Gogh and I have some Raphael. This is Mondrian. I must admit I love it! I would see it in the store and I would finger it and talk to it and tell it I would love to bring it home so it could live with the rest of my yarn. But then I would have to explain to it that my home would be different than what it was used to. My yarn stash consisted of little street urchins not upscale princes and princesses who were somehow displaced. And I would leave it on the shelf and sigh.

I would never have purchased it when it was $9.85 but all of it was in the clearance racks at $1.99. So here it is in my yarn stash - yes, I know it can feel humiliated but the other yarns have made it feel right at home. They know what is among them as do I. The Mondrian has no problem being seen with the Caron by the Pound and they (along with my beloved rosewood needles) are making a very lovely scarf.

If I say so myself.

Thanks to Susie for making a comment on my striped bag from yesterday saying it looks like it could hold a Kindle! I will have to put that suggestion in the shop description!

Amazing Grace

Thursday I went to Cora's Life Celebration. And what a celebration it was. The chapel in the funeral home was packed with people of all different ages and races and everyone had nothing but the kindest words to say about a woman I called my Mom. (For the record, she wasn't really old enough to be my Mom unless she was really naughty at a really young age.)

I remember giving Cora knitting lessons. I spent a few hours with her and we knew it wasn't something she would pick up, but she had a lot of fun trying and that was the material point. That's one of the things about this knitting thing: it's not the easiest thing in the world to master. We are part of a unique group. Not only am I missing Cora today; I am missing my Mom and my mother-in-law. However, it is gratifying to know the three of them have probably met up briefly in Heaven just to look down and agree that I am in need of constant prayer.

Yesterday was StitchCraft and we had a great time. We met a new member named Jen who brought a baby blanket to work on. There were varied projects going on and Elissa brought cookies - be proud of me, I did not have any!

Last night, was our Good Friday service, The Dubois Seven Last Words of Christ. It's very dramatic. We had a combined choir and three professional soloists. We've done it three years in a row. Frankly - ready for a change and we can go back to the Service of Darkness and start alternating the two. Just to mix it up a bit.

But here's the highlight of the day. StitchCraft went from noon to 3 and I had to be back at church at 5:30 for rehearsal for the cantata. It made no sense to me to go back home and then just drive back. It was a perfect opportunity for me to go Hobby Lobby...you know...just to look around. There was nothing in particular I wanted. I had gone to the one in Westmont recently (looking for my sequins) so I decided to go to the one in Lombard.

They must be doing something to their yarn section because, like the other store, they had a whole big section of clearance yarn. I got some eyelash, and gilt, and I wiped them out of eight skeins of slubby yarn that normally costs $9.84. Total 18 skeins of yarn for less than $40.
I also ordered 12 gold bracelets off of eBay. 12 of them for about $15. I will use them as purse handles when I make little purses with the eyelash and gilt yarn I bought.

Hold the applause.
It was my pleasure.

OOO Baby, Baby

Sometimes you just have to take a moment to sit in a small amount of awe:
Not because you did something particularly great, but because something really lovely came out of something so simple.
This is a very simple garter stitch shawl and the yarn does all of the work with the vertical and horizontal shading.

Someone knows how to blend some yarn.

The shawl was made with two different colors of yarn. The second color is sandwiched in the middle between the first color on either end.
Now, I know this particular yarn company is not very nice when dealing with charitable groups, especially when you consider how much money those groups spend making shawls for their groups - but there is nothing else like it for the money. It is an incredibly soft yarn with those variations that just seem to appear. I didn't expect to see the colors there when I turned Kenya (the model) around. I also didn't expect to see vertical stripes though it does make sense. And the colors just pop and are even better in person.
Sometimes we are too close to something to see the true spectrum of colors that exist within it.
Thank goodness Mr. Eastman and Mr. Kodak changed all that.

Sigh!

You see that blue thing in the middle of the second picture? That is an actual City of Chicago Department of Streets and Sanitation Snow Truck. While we saw a lot of them last year, this is probably the second time I've seen them this winter - the winter that is already the snowiest winter of record.

Our mayor decided we didn't need to have our streets plowed as much as last year. He said it was a way to save money. Saving money is a good thing. And what was the reason to save this particular money? So the city could have services when it needed them. You know, like snow removal.

Snow did in Mayor Bilandic a couple of decades back when he didn't send the snow plows out after a storm. Yep, we shoveled his happy little a$$ right out with the rest of the flakes. Mayor Daley (who had been anointed mayor for life) overstepped a little bit. The snow combined with the pot craters (none of them are small enough to be merely holes) has gotten Chicagoans just a little cranky. It seems the mayor has revisited that whole 'you all don't need the street cleaned just because it snowed' edict.

We canceled our StitchCraft meeting today because the snow looked a lot worse this morning. I was going to bring the blanket that I'm working on. The one that didn't want to be made (see 'The Road to Hell') I'm going to be about a skein short of what I need so yesterday I took a trip to Hobby Lobby to get the needed skein of 'I Love This Yarn' in grape.

I do love that yarn. So much so that I will travel to the closest Hobby Lobby which is 25 miles away. I went at rush hour - that wasn't so bad. They've moved into a more spacious store and the yarn department is way bigger and it was my first visit there and I was quite thrilled until I got to where the grape yarn should have been...

and there was none.

Zip. Zero. Nada. Rien.

Not even a spare skein sticking the back. Not even a misplaced one in the bins on either side. Who the hell buys out all the grape yarn except me? I stared at the hole where the yarn should have been. And the hole stared back.

The very nice lady checked all the bins and then asked me to wait while she went to check the stocking list to see when it would come in. She came back to me with the list in her hand and pointed to 'I Love This Yarn' 'Grape' and then the letters T.O. "Do you know what that means?" she asked.
"Terrell Owens has all the grape yarn?"
"Temporarily out. There's none to be had. Can't even order it. We ordered last week and didn't get it either."
Sigh.
"Why don't you call us next Thursday to see if it came in?"
I thanked her for her kindness and did not add: Because next Thursday this blanket would have been totally reworked and I won't need that yarn; that's why.

I obviously could not travel 25 miles for nothing. So I did get some yummy bulky weight yarns that will make beautiful shawls and throws - yes, I know - but it's bulky weight. I need that.

Cute Little Boatneck Sweater

Yes, it's really that little. This is the cutest little infant sweater! Let me tell you, I had the front, back done and finished the sleeves t'other day so all I really had to do yesterday was to sew this puppy up.

Am I really smarter than a fifth grader? Because I didn't get the instructions on how they wanted this thing assembled. Now, this is not my first nor my second sweater so why I just didn't assemble it the way I had the others is beyond me. But I wanted to follow the designer's instruction but they didn't make any sense to me. So I did what I should have done..

I called Marilyn to read the instructions out loud to her to see if I was really as dense as I thought.

I wasn't. "Why do they want that sewn first? Just do it the way you think."
So I did. And about eleven last night I was doing the happy song:

"I have a sweater! I have a sweater! I have...one sleeve upside down!"

What? Why are the stripes on one sleeve closer to the neck and on the other sleeve they're closer to the bottom? Somewhere a fifth grader is feeling quite vindicated.
Can I pass it off as a design feature? Should I just place it in the donate pile? Should I take the offending sleeve out and flip it over and reattach? I'll just donate it. No one will notice. I noticed and I don't notice anything. Ok, I'll take it out and redo it. Done.

"I have a sweater! I have a sweater! It's a cute sweater! Duke, let's take a walk to celebrate! I know it's midnight, but let's take a walk anyway." Duke is always up for a walk and so we did a midnight walk - it was only ten minutes, but it was a nice ten minutes.

And it's a sweater!!

The Upstairs Stash

I've been working away on my wip's. (I started the cutest little baby sweater last night and it's almost done already. It's for a newborn and it's adorable!) I needed to go through the stash to see if I could find some more of the blue yarn I need for another project - and since we're in the midst of our yarn giveaway and I've been talking about the stash, I thought it might be interesting to show it.

This is the upstairs stash - most of it. That's right, there's an upstairs stash, a stash on the main floor and a stash in the basement. What you don't see are the drawers in the dresser in the bedroom that have yarn in them. The yarn on the top are some of the skeins going into the second box of yarn I'll be giving away. There's nine skeins there and more to be added from the other stash points. This mix of yarn can be best described as vintage cuz there are some oldies in there but there's also some Lion brand cupcake, some bernat softee chunky and lion brand jiffy. I don't know what else will make it in there, but something will by the 28th. So keep those comments coming and tell your friends about it - you may not win it, but they could and then you can guilt them into sharing.

What A Wonderful (Knitting) World

Who knew there was so much out there in the blogosphere that has a knitting theme?
In addition to my giveaway; there one for a book on Stephanie's Written Word. You can name a colorway on Knit Lunabud Knit and you can find out about all kinds of contests on WiKnit.

When Marilyn and I started StitchCraft, we thought we would just get together with some other knitters/crafters at church and gab while knitting. Now, we are well on our way to making $2000 for the mission...the mission we didn't have any idea we would get into.

And I've met all you wonderful folks....that's the great thing. Who knew it would be one of those things where you get more than you give? Wow, what a great community to belong to.

So listen, hubby-bubby wasn't too keen on the box of yarn. He looked at it and said: "It's pretty small and it doesn't make a dent." I decided to ignore that comment until I looked into another storage bin that was just sitting in my office. I thought it had office supplies. It is full of...sigh....yarn. Man, when he's right, he's not gonna be around to hear me admit it.

I will be giving away two boxes of yarn to two different winners.

Drat that man.

Announcing the Great Yarn Give Away!!

Ok, maybe not great...but certainly not bad yarn give away.
Here's the deal. I have 13 boxes of yarn and I don't mean small boxes. I mean storage boxes, the kind you have to get a guy at K-Mart to pull down off the shelves. I have nearly 100lbs of yarn. It has taken over the house. So the box you see here is full of yarn from top to the bottom and this is the actual box with the actual yarn that can and will go to one of you.

To let you know: I don't do expensive yarn see The Great Yarn Debate so this is garden fare yarn some of it is sport weight, some chunky, most is worsted. Colors are all over the map: black, white, blue, different wines and red, pink, green, variegated.

There's Paton's Classic merino, Paton's Canadiana, Red Heart, Lion Brand Wool-Ease and Jiffy, Sensations boucle and mohair, Bernat's Softee Chunky and some that I don't remember the brand names.

There's at least a dozen skeins. There's enough for booties, hats, even a scarf or two.

So How Do You Get It?
Simple: you have to do 2 comments. One on any post in the blog and the other on this post to let me know which post your comment is on. In others words; say I am Anita Purl (get it, I need a purl? Oh, I crack me up.) I make a comment on 'The Head 2 Toe Project" (December 2007) and I come back to this post and say: Anita Purl: The Head 2 Toe Project.

That's it - I would be entered in my own contest. Wouldn't it be a hoot if I won?

Next, every one who comments will have their names placed in a hat and the hubby-bubby will select the winner. The winner will be selected and announced on November 28, 2008 (which happens to be my birthday.) The winner will give me an address to send the goods and off they go. Now my h-b would prefer I keep this box and give away the rest, but that's not gonna happen.

That's the whole deal. Trust me, if this goes well, there's more than enough yarn for me to do this again in May (to celebrate my wedding anniversary!)

Happy posting!

No, it doesn't count if you've commented before - you have to do a fresh one!

The Great Yarn Debate

I picked up knitting again after decades of not thinking about it because a friend and I decided we 'needed' to have a knitting group at church. There was no mission component or selling component; we were just knitting.

Then we had all this stuff and had to decide what to do with it - so the selling and the mission parts came in. This, of course, required the need to purchase more yarn.

I cannot wrap my mind around paying $12 for a skein of yarn. I've seen it. I've even touched it. I have trouble getting my mind around $10 for a skein of yarn. It could be because most of the knitting I do is for sale or to give away and the more expensive the yarn, the more care it requires. The items we give away need to have a wash and wear care tag because a lot of them are given to the homeless, who don't carry Wool-Lite with them and may not be able to launder it for a while.

Or they are given to people who are shut in who also don't have the inclination to 'lay it flat to dry'.

We price our items according to the yarn we use. (I have the task of pricing items for our sales) and we do not charge for the labor because that's the fun part and the reason we come together. The gathering is the mission - the items we create are an extension and the fruits of the mission. So we don't charge for the coming together or knitting when we're alone because we are connected through the group. So, I charge by finding out what yarn people have used and calculating from there the cost to make another blanket, hat, etc. plus and additional cost to help pay it forward and donate items to others.

A couple of things happen: some really labor intensive item can sell for a really inexpensive price because though the pattern was complicated, the knitter used yarn that was only $2.50 a skein. (Believe me, I've had this discussion with knitters who've said: "But it was a complicated pattern!" to which I have responded: "And that's your reward!")

We also get some rather expensive items. Use 12 skeins of Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick and Quick and the lowest price charged for an afghan is $110. We have items like that and they are beautiful and we can display them as high end items. Whether they will sell at the last show of the year remains to be seen. If they do not sell, we will have to reduce the price, of course, so someone will want to walk away with it by the end of the week. You can see the $110 afghan here.

I was in Hobby Lobby the other day and was looking for a yarn that had slubs and bumps and I found one. It was so soft and so pretty and had about 90 yarns to the skein and I figured I would need maybe 8 or so to do a shawl. I looked at the price -$11.95. Put it back. Sigh.

Is there something wrong with me? I just can't see it.

When Is An Afghan Not An Afghan - con't

Remember a while back I knit all these squares to make an afghan and when I started to pull it together, it didn't work? I made two of those squares into a pillow, but I still have plenty of squares left and now some of them have become this kiddie scarf! There are still enough squares to make a matching hat and possibly mittens.

But here is the Take A Ribbing scarf from "Getting Started Knitting" I couldn't tell you how many colors are in it, but it's made from the Herschnerr's Chunky weight yarn which is really yummy to me. (I wouldn't know what to do with yarn that actually cost more than $7 a skein!) It's a nice yarn with lots of colors (obviously) and very lush. It's the shipping charges that kills the buzz for me. I wait until they have free shipping which they do a couple of times a year and then I buy a bunch of it.

If I get the chance, I will try and whip up a hat or mittens to go with it but the scarf will go on sale at the bazaar next month.

Knitter's Restaurant - Big, Soft Afghan

Information on the Sit & Knit is here.
OK, this afghan is soooooo soft and sooooo warm. It's really cool to make because it's nothing but garter stitch, but you let the yarn do all the work for you.

The original pattern came from Knit Picks. But, of course, I changed the pattern to suit what I wanted to do. First, I did do the same number of strips as the pattern called for and even did the same number of stitches. But the pattern calls for three colors of the same brand of yarn. I used twelve colors of several different yarns. As you know, I have a ton of yarn and I need to use it. So, there are six different colors of Lion Brand Homespun. 1 skein of Phentex (no longer made) 3 different kinds of Bernat Softee Chunky, and 2 skeins of Herrschners Chunky. It came out really nice and soft and because i put all the balls of yarn in a bag and just pulled them out at random, even if i make it again, it won't exactly be the same. Neat! And then I fringed it!

This afghan will be on sale at the November sale or perhaps it will be given to one of the high school graduate before they go to college this summer.

or i might not be able to part with it at all....oh, selfish me.