A great Saturday afternoon

The store was busy this morning but now everyone is outside enjoying the beautiful weather. A few more rows were knit on the neckband of my cardigan before starting a newsletter that I want to get out on Monday.

For the newsletter I was looking at Jane Thornley's website. Her work is amazing and I love looking at the pictures of her finished garments. She is a true fiber artist. This is from her new Feather and Fan Club Guide.

My computer just chimed to tell me that there was a new email message. It must be a full moon tonight because Jane's latest newsletter just came through.

Last night after I closed the store we had a family dinner before going to have our pictures taken. As I was leaving the restaurant to run home and change there was a torrential down pour. I was soaked!!! I got home and had to blow dry my hair and change all my clothes, not just my shirt. The rain slowed down as we were driving over and then as we arrived it started hard again. Luckily the water drops on my shirt dried up by the time the pictures were taken. It was one of those straight back, lean forward, head to the left and forward, etc, etc, etc. It's a good thing we love our mom.

My day is done in the store. I hope to get the neckband and both front bands done over the weekend. Maybe all the sewing as well-you never know. Enjoy the nice afternoon.

Jane Thornley

Here are some Jane Thornley patterns you can download. You will find lots at the tent sale to go with these patterns.

Noro cardigan and tent sale preview

My mom's surgery went well. She did come home from the hospital on Friday night. She is ordering us all around so she must be feeling better!!

Edie is a new pattern from KnitWhits. The copies to sell in the store should be arriving any day. The jacket is knit using Noro Kureyon Sock and the matching colour of Noro Kureyon. The sock is knit on 6mm needles and the Worsted uses 10mm needles.


I am using colour 188 for mine. I am about to start the armhole shaping. (When I am done this post I will sit down and watch Canadian Idol and do a few more rows.)
Cathy, Beth, Dad and I got all the yarn moved into St. John's Parish Hall today. It took a few trips but we got it all done.

The hall is huge so there will be lots of room for people to move around and look at yarn.
When going through the boxes and bags we found lots of ribbons and fancy yarns. These will work great with Jane Thornley's patterns. You can buy them on Patternfish (the pattern website I talked about a couple of weeks ago).

Knitting Catastrophe

I was happily crocheting around my Jane Thornley shawl yesterday and then all hell broke loose. I noticed some strands of yarn that were joined in two different spots. What was going on? Then all of a sudden I saw it-somehow I had dropped about 10 stitches. To do the shaping you are casting off 10 stitches at the beginning of every row. Somehow I had dropped a stitch while doing a cast off. Of course I am now many, many inches past the spot, completely done my knitting and almost done my crochet. I really, really wanted to yell, swear and cry but I had people in the store. I calmly used a crochet hook to pick up the stitches, recast them off and continued on with my crochet.

I finished it last night while watching American Idol. What a boring night-nobody stood out. Big Brother was great. Matt was not expecting to be back doored.

I have picked up the cardigan in Silk Garden Lite again. One sleeve is done and I am at the armhole shaping on the back. I will get lots of knitting done this weekend. Big Brother and Survivor tonight. Then March Madness over the weekend-this is the best sporting weekend of the year. College basketball all day Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Since I will be busy knitting and watching tv, I probably won't do another post before I leave for Chicago. Have a happy Easter weekend and I will check in late next week when I get home. How many pairs of shoes am I going to find there?

Knitting progress

I actually have some knitting to report. The knitting on my Jane Thornley shawl is done. I am now crocheting around it. I hope to get most of it done tonight-fingers crossed.

The past week in the store has been very busy-no complaining-but that takes away from knitting and blogging time.

I have exciting news-we are now carrying Classic Elite yarns. Right now we have three yarns in stock-Alpaca Sox, Premiere and Soft Linen. More yarns will be coming for fall (when I find more room in the store.) Lynda is knitting The Feather and Fan cardigan out of Soft Linen for a store sample.

A new shipment came in today of Lorna's Laces Shepherd Socks. Unpacking all these amazing colours is starting to get to me. I might have to take some and knit it while away in Chicago next week. In skeins we received
-Edgewater
-Pilsen
-Apple Hill
-Huron
-Fresh Stipe
-Irving Park

In kits we received
-Newtown
-Neon
-Pine
-Cranberry
-Pink Blossom
-Turquoise
-Edgewater
-Butterscotch
-Hawaii
-Lilac
-Bittersweet
-Tuscany
-Cool
-Sandridge
-Irving Park
-Charcoal
-Iris Garden
-Watercolor
-Forest

A shipment of Dream in Color Baby arrived Friday afternoon. Unfortunately they are out of the yarn until May so we couldn't get all the colours we wanted. We have about 12 different colours in stock with about 15 more coming in May. Jane finished the shawl and brought it to work today. It is beautiful but I am having her block it once more to make it a bit longer. She was afraid to overblock it but I think the bigger the better.

I have set up an assembly line in the basement for making kits for the Tulip Cardigan. We roll the skein into a ball and then measure off the smaller amounts needed and roll into a smaller ball. We know there must be a better way but can't think of one. We have tried some different things but ended up wasting yarn. The dogs and I are off to roll more yarn.

Snow

Every day I tell myself that I need to do a blog post and then it is bed time. Korey and I are working on getting new products up on the website. All the Rowan yarns and books should be up now. We still need to get up the Lorna's Laces Shepherd Socks and Dream in Colour yarns. We also have lots of patterns to add.

The snow over the weekend was incredible. I didn't open the store on Saturday. I could have gone to work but would have sat knitting. Instead I spent the day winding balls of yarn for Tulip kits.

Alexis knit a Tulip Cardigan for the store. I searched some of the finished projects on Ravelry and saw some in darker colours. When I handed the kit to Alexis, she was very doubtful but when it was done she loved the colours.
This is my Jane Thornley wrap. All of a sudden I realized that I need to get it finished. I am going to Chicago on March 23 for a conference and want to take it with me. I am now decreasing so the rows are going faster (not quite fast enough though). When the knitting is done I will crochet around the edge to make it neat.

This is my baby sweater out of Blue Sky Alpacas Dyed Cotton. The back is done and the front is a couple of rows from the neck shaping.
The parking lot at my store isn't very happy. The back has piles and piles of snow filling at least four parking spots.

I stepped away to help some customers and just read through this-it sounds like something a 7 year old would write-sorry. My mind is spinning in too many directions!!

Wrap

Here is the wrap that I talked about yesterday from Jane Thornley. I think this might become an obsession-we will see when it is done. Putting the colours together might be more fun than knitting it. I have so many combinations put together in my head.

I am using

• Colinette Mohair
• Colinetter Giotto
• Trendsetter Dune
• Trendsetter Tonalita
• Trendsetter Checkmate
• Berroco Suede
• Rowan Kid Silk Haze

This is a great way to use up some of the balls you have in your stash!!

Pictures

Some days it is really hard to come up with a title for a post.

What is with the weather? Snow storm on Friday. Beautiful, warm and sunny yesterday. Freezing rain today and snow tonight.

We had a guild meeting last night. Mandi and Jocelyn taught crochet edgings. Many of the ladies were afraid of crochet but came away with a much better understanding.

I haven't had much time to knit but here is the progress on my baby sweater.

I have been unpacking more boxes. This is Baby Boom from Fiesta yarns. Two skeins will knit a pair of socks. They hand dye yarns in New Mexico and the colours are fabulous.

A box from Handmaiden arrived today as well. It was filled with kits for the Storm Water Shawl. The yarn is Sea Silk (70% Silk, 30% Seacell) and the colours are amazing. Each kit has 800m of yarn that can be used for this shawl or any other shawl you want to knit.

While playing on Ravelry I found this amazing wrap from Jane Thornley. Of course I had to purchase the pattern. Jane loves 'free form' knitting meaning the pattern is not written as a standard pattern. For many of us it is a bit of a challenge because we are used to the pattern telling us to do A, then B, then C. The great thing about the shawl is that it really doesn't matter. Of course I had to start it. I am using browns and purples. I hope to bring to work tomorrow and get a picture.