Saturday, March 31, 2012

New yarn shop opening in my block!

This week was the grand opening of a new yarn shop. It's located right next to the supermarket where I do all my daily shopping, and is at walking distance from my home. Yesterday I went to show my support and since it's a combined home decoration and yarn shop I looked a little at the decoration style. Sadly it's not all of my style, kind of shabby chic, country house but I did manage to find one bowl.

Along with my yarn addiction I also love breakfast bowls so here is a picture of the nice tings I found.The yarns are: Debbie Bliss Andes and Manos lace.

All and all it's a nice shop, it's a little confusing because they mixed up some of the yarns with the decoration and the bulk of the yarn is in two different places at the store. But it's a little homey and the owners are nice and friendly. Both of them are rather young too which is refreshing because they probably don't think you only know how to knit a scarf because you look a little young. I often have to prove myself at a new yarn store before they believe I can do more then a knit stitch.



Thursday, March 29, 2012

A knit for Teyla

A few weeks ago I ordered a lovely skein worsted weight yarn from knitsinclass. Knitsinclass is an eco friendly Etsy dyer who has really nice yarns and colors. The colorway I bought is called Grape Crush and I was completely baffled on what to make of it. Lately I have a feeling that most of the things I make is sock yarn shawls and handwarmers and since spring is creeping up on us I wanted to make something that did not have to wait for fall to be used. As I have joined both Nerd War and Starfleet Fiber Arts Corps on Ravelry I also wanted to make something that fit in to a challenge too so it was not an easy task. Since the yardage on worsted weight is rather... scarce. It was a challenge trying to find anything that was not either a shawl or handwarmer.




So instead I decided to design something myself...This is the first time I tried improvising a knit but I think I succeeded very nicely. First of all, since I knew there was only about 225 yards of the colorway I knew it had to be something quite smallish so I went for a top down bolero. Partly because its easily modified and because I'm somewhat familiar with top down designs. After a while the idea of adding black edges formed as I thought it would give the design a more classic look  These edges, except for the lower ribbing, was all picked up and knit after casting off.

This is the end result, I'm quite happy with it and since I'm almost always cold it's perfect for the inn between period of winter and spring. If there is interest I can make a "recipe" but I don't think anyone will be having trouble "designing" it them self.

I know the button looks a little wonky but sewing on buttons is my Achilles heel so play nice about it ;)

Etsy sellers and their buyers

Today I recieved my order from HeavenlyFiber, this is also a very nice seller as almost all of them are. That I have been in contact with that is. Later, today hopefully, I will post about my order, it's amazing as usual ;)

With my package I recieved a sample to the upcoming Phat fiber box, the theme for the box is tea party. If you have never heard of Phat fiber box here are some links to guide you. Ravelry page and http://www.phatfiber.com/

Anyway, this Christmas I found Phat fiber box by a coincidence. I was thinking about learning to spin my own yarn and was looking for information about the subject on Ravelry. And in the Phat fiber group a whole new world came to life. First of all, I love indie dyers. They are truly artists with a lot drive and soul. Most of the ones I have come across are really friendly and accommodating, they will do what's in their power to make you happy and give you what you want. The indie dyers have different kinds of talents in the same area and if you follow a few of their styles you can learn to recognize their work.

But the ting I was interested in talking about this time is the amount of "extras" you get in an order. This may not occur among all of the indie dyers but some of them will include something for you. My thought about this is not only do the indie sellers work hard for the money they earn from customers they also, sometimes, surprise you with a little gift. How many bigger, corporate companies does this? I dare to say almost none of them.

For example, I was in contact with one of my favorite dyers in the US, I will not mention names but her yarn will be featured in upcoming blog posts. In our contact I mentioned I've been having trouble reciveing her phat fiber contributions when snagging a box and her reply was: If you don't get one this time I'll send it because sometimes I have extras. Again with this super nice and friendly accommodation and to me this is truly amazing and the Etsy sellers deserves all the praise they can get.

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Long lost lover, err... yarn.

Yesterday I got my long awaited yarn package from Canada. It's been travelling for about a month or so I thought. Turns out it been sitting at my post office since the 11th of March but the package delivery slip had been either lost or never sent. It kind of makes me mad especially since the customs decided to add tax plus that the postal service takes about an extra $15 for the "delivery". It's amazing they even get to call themself the postal "service" anymore. Me and the seller from Etsy senses a conspiracy. The only packages that goes missing are the ones that contains yarn. My theory is that the postal "service" is a secret guild of knitters hoarding all the yarns to take it for a test drive before delivering it... Yes, that's my theory and I'm sticking too it.

Anyway, the package was amazing! I ordered from three little crows and she is wonderful. Not only is my yarn one of the most beautiful I own she also went to the trouble making a beautiful card with wishes and thanks AND included a hand sewn project bag with a penny in for good luck. Which I by the way really needed. Everything was separately packaged inside the package and there was a lot of squee going on during the opening of everything. The stitch markers was sent togheter with the yarn on the first picture as a yarn kit. It was a limited colorway named chocolate dipped cherries with four chocolate dipped cherrie stitch markers, clever don't you think? The yarn is really soft and smooth and would be perfect for something next to the skin.

The best of everything? I took pictures. Enjoy!