Vegas-Here we come

The bags are packed and our flight leaves at 9 tonight. We are flying back on the red eye Tuesday night arriving early Wednesday morning in Toronto.

Have a great long weekend!!!

Finally some pictures

Well, as I promised, here are some pictures of Bettna. The picture with 3 pieces is the bottom of the fronts and backs. The other picture is the sleeves.

I am almost done the one sleeve/front and the other sleeve is done, just have to finish that front part.

As I mentioned, Beth and I are off to Vegas on Friday. Because Saturday is a holiday I decided that I needed/wanted to go away. I am closing the store on Tuesday and we will be back in Toronto at 7am Wednesday morning meaning I will be tired but the store will be open on Wednesday.

The website is almost ready to launch. We have one more small problem (taxes) and then it is ready to go. In the US where these programs are made there is only one tax rate but we have 2 which causes problems. Once we have the solution, I will let you know.

Crazy Weekend

After the tent sale I thought that this was going to be a relaxing weekend.

The store was jammed on Saturday. I was in there helping Sarah most of the day. I went upstairs around 2 to rest and she called me to say that Nadine was here. I have never met Nadine (she lives in Montreal) but we have talked on the phone, emailed and I read her blog. She was visiting her mom who lives in Burlington so it was great of her to drop by.

Saturday night was a Stag and Doe in Brantford. We left at 12:30 and instead of going straight home like responsible people we went to a friends house. 3:30 was a little late (or early) to be getting into Ancaster.

Mom and dad have visitors from South Carolina so Sunday afternoon was dinner at their house.

To everyone who answered the meme on my blog, I have gone through this morning and answered on yours. Sorry for the delay.

I promise pictures tomorrow!!!

Tent Sale

Sorry but I didn't get pictures of the tent sale. It was totally crazy. By 12:15 on Wednesday there were over 50 women clawing through boxes of yarn. I heard afterwards that it was getting crazy-women were using their elbows to push other women out of the way so they could grab yarn.

I decided at 9 last night when we were putting the leftover yarn away in storage that I needed a holiday. (Indy wasn't a holiday-it was working) Beth and I are off to Vegas on Friday night for 4 days.

I have finished the front and back pieces of Bettna. I am almost done both sleeves and now just have the top of the body to finish. I will try and get pictures for you over the weekend.

The people from Namaste called me on Thursday and my shipment of bags is on the way. Hopefully they will arrived before Friday-the messenger bag will be great for the plane. I am also deciding on a new project. Bettna will be too much to carry if it isn't done by then. I know that many of you are saying socks but I get bored after the first one and never finish a pair.

Meme

This came from Cynthia's and Wannietta's blogs. Pass it along.

Please leave a one-word comment that you think best describes me — it can only be one word long. Then copy and paste this into your blog so that I may leave a word about you.

Quick Post

I am off to price the final yarns for the tent sale and realized that I hadn't written in a while. Here is the tent while empty. I will try and get pictures on Wednesday when it is full of yarn.







Bettna is coming along great. Got lots of knitting done yesterday while watching the Nascar race and golf. I have the stocking stitch part of both fronts done and the back over 1/2 way done. I hope to finish the back tonight during the hockey game-GO OILERS!! Now its just the sleeves. Here are the two fronts. Not a great picture-sorry. Took it quickly in the tent.

Back from Indy

The show was great but boy am I tired. During the day there is lots and lots of walking. In the evening we meet up with friends for dinner and drinks. The greatest thing about the show is seeing friends from England and New Zealand that we only get to see twice a year.

I didn't get much knitting done-there wasn't even time to sleep while away. There will be pictures later in the week of my progress so far.

This is just a sample of what I saw. There will be more information available in our store newsletter-hopefully this will be done in the next week. I am running around like a chicken with my head cut off getting ready for the tent sale.

Yarn news
I had already ordered most of the new yarns before going to the show. The show is great for seeing garments from all the new books knit up. They always look much better in person.
As for ordering, there were new colours of Bearfoot from Mountain Colors to be ordered along with colours that we were missing. I did find interesting sock yarns from a company called Claudia Hand Painted Yarns. These will be arriving before September.

Needle news
Everyone at the show was talking about Clover's new Knit Lite. These are plastic knitting needles that have a light in them. Enjoy knitting anywhere, anytime…day and night. Illuminates knitting with black, dark and fuzzy yarns. There was an article in the New York Times about these needles a couple of months ago.
I am hoping our shipment arrives mid July.


Knitting Bag news
I found a great company called Namaste. There was so many different styles of bags in so many colours that I dragged Beth and Cathy over to help me order. They make a fabulous Messenger bag out of corduroy which I ordered in 4 different colours.




The Everday bag is a great handbag that you can take anywhere. We have it coming in 5 different colours.







The Needle Binder is a cool way to store your all your needles-straight and circular.

Off to Indy

Beth, Bev, Cathy (who reps for our company and sometimes works in the store as well as being one of my students) and I are off to Indianapolis early tomorrow morning. We aren't going for fun-this is a trade show to see the new yarns for fall. Okay, the show is Saturday-Monday which gives us time to shop and sightsee.

I needed knitting to take and have been dreaming of knitting Bettna so I got one front cast on today. I am using colour 244 of Silk Garden. Here is the picture again so you don't have to scroll down to see it. Jane just finished knitting it for the store (in colour 245) and it is fabulous.

I know there won't be time to write while I am away. We are home late Tuesday night so Wednesday I should be able to give you a preview of fall.

Finished x 5

I have the Daisy cardigan totally finished-all ends sewn in and crocheted around the neck. It hangs much better on a human body than on the mannequin.








This is Vero knit up in the Cabin Fever pattern. My bag is over felted-on the Cabin Fever pattern the picture of the finished bag is much bigger. Who would of thought that 10 minutes was too long? The bag almost looks like I knit it out of a boucle yarns.




Here are the felted bags. The 3 bags are knit using the same pattern using just one ball of yarn for each. The bag in front is the Vero Tweed and the Noro Kureyon bags are in back. The pattern calls for making straps with yarn. I am thinking of leather or possibly a beaded handle.


The bag on the left was felted for 25 minutes and the bag on the right for 35. They started out exactly the same size.

Tent Sale

While working on Saturday I starting going through the store and looking at the shelves. I am starting to get worried about fall-there is absolutely no where to put any more yarn. Because of this, there are a number of yarns that I have decided will be cleared out during the tent sale. Here is the start of the list

• discontinued colours of Noro-Silk Garden, Iro, Kochoran, Transitions
• Rowan Plaid
• Rowan Ribbon Twist
• Rowan Big Wool
• Rowan Biggy Print
• discontinued Rowan colours
• Debbie Bliss Cotton Angora
• Debbie Bliss Aran Tweed
• Debbie Bliss Wool/Cotton
• Jaeger Fur
• Jaeger Natural Fleece
• Jamieson's yarns
• select Colinette yarns
• Eros
• some mohairs
• discontinued colours of sock yarn
• lots of yarn for scarves and felting
• pattern books galore
  

Felting 101

I finished my Cabin Fever bag (Naturally Vero) plus 3 of the small bags that need only 1 ball of yarn. Two were knit in Noro Kureyon and the other was knit in Naturally Vero Tweeds. They are currently drying in the bathtub. I will try and get pictures tomorrow.

I have done a lot of felting so I thought I knew alot about it. Well, I learned a few things today.

Here are some observations

1. The tweeds don't show up in the felting.
   
2. The Vero felted in 10 minutes.
3. The Vero felted much smaller than the Kureyon
   
4. One colour of Kureyon felted in 25 minutes and the other took 35 minutes. The 35 minute bag should have been felted a little more-it is bigger than the other bag.
   

Conclusion

1. The softer the wool, the quicker it felts.
2. You can't assume that different colours of the same yarn will felt the same.

The rest of my Kaffe Fassett fabric arrived (thanks Glorious Color) on Thursday. My quilt is almost done and I am getting ready to start another. When these 2 are done I will be ready to start on my Fassett.

I've been reprimanded

I just finished my last knitting class until September. It was brought to my attention that I hadn't posted on my blog for a few days and that I had better get to it.

I don't have much knitting to report. The small felted bag from on ball of Noro Kureyon is finished and I have another almost done. It is a great way to show the new colours. The second Cabin Fever bag is knit and waiting to be felted.

The store has been surprisingly busy. There have been lots of customers as well as sales reps every day showing the new yarns for fall. Today I ordered Rowan, Debbie Bliss, Noro and RYC. A quick note about Noro. Many of last years colours have been discontinued-if you were looking at a yarn and thinking that you would wait until fall-be careful, the colour you wanted might not be available.

Yesterday I ordered the new Vero Tweeds from Naturally. I am in love with this yarn!! I am hoping that they will be in the store at the beginning of September.

I get emails periodically from Berroco about new yarns and patterns. The fall line looks amazing. I have ordered in a bit of the new Ultra Alpaca to try. If you have a few minutes, take a look at the Berroco website. They have the most amazing library of free patterns for all their yarns. You can also sign up to receive newsletters from them. They come out once a week and there is always at least one free pattern.

My website has hit a snag. The software for the new storefront keeps giving us an error so we are now waiting for the software company to find a solution.

The Sabres just won the hockey game. I am hoping for an Edmonton-Buffalo Stanley Cup. Now basketball is on the tv. Gotta love the playoffs.

New noro, felted bag, cute felted bag pattern and quilt

Just got in a box of the new Noro Silk Garden (7 colours-#241 and up) and Kureyon (10 colours-#172 and up). In true Noro fashion they are amazing.
Last night in knitting class Susan was wearing her finished Bettna from Cornelia Tuttle Hamilton's Noro Book 3. Everyone tried it on and they are going to be happy with the new selection of colours. The jacket fits great and is easy to knit. The bottom is stocking stitch-quick and easy. You then start at the bottom of the sleeve and knit to the center back and repeat for the other sleeve. In the center back you do a 3 needle bind off to join and finish off by doing the neck band.

I finished my Cabin Fever bag this afternoon. The picture looks funny because there is one bag ready to be felted and another just waiting to be cast off. Last week I was playing with the Vero and used 6 balls so I rewound the balls and made 2 bags.

While reading some blogs this morning I came across a pattern for the cutest bag using one ball of Noro Kureyon. I am going to try it using 184. The picture isn't the greatest but it is a mixture of fuchsia, green, orange and teal.

My quilt is coming along. Sarah wanted to see it at class last night so I laid out the squares so far for her to see. The picture is 4 squares across and 4 squares down. The finished quilt will be 2 rows of squares longer.

I have learned alot while doing this. I also came to the conclusion that I better make one more quilt before starting on my Kaffe Fassett. Like knitting there are lots of little tricks that make everything go together better.

Quilting

On Saturday a customer, Amy, was in the store talking about the quilt shop that she works in. I decided to take mom for a drive this morning to Guelph to visit Greenwood Quiltery. My mom bought me the fabrice to make a Kaffe Fassett quilt called Pastel Gridlock from his book Caravan of Quilts. Unfortunately my sewing machine is in terrible shape so we continued up the road for a new machine. This is my new Janome Quilter's Companion.

Sarah who works Saturday in the store decided that she wanted to start sewing and quilting while visiting the Creative Sewing and Needlework Festival a couple of weeks ago. We now have matching sewing machines.

This is the fabric that I got but unfortunately I couldn't get all the colours I wanted so I just placed an order online with Glorious Color.

I decided that I should polish up my sewing, it's been a while, so I pulled out some quilt fabric from my stash and started an easy quilt of squares. I have been working for the last 7 hours and it is half done. I didn't get pictures of the quilt so far-the batteries in the camera died on me so I will get some pictures for you tomorrow.

It is a small world

At lunch today I decided to run and get a piece of pizza down the street. Sitting out front was Vickey (Samantha's sister). She was talking with Samantha's husband, Michael, who happens to work for a family friend.

May is usually one of our slower months in the store which is giving me a bit of knitting time. I have the shrug increased to the proper number of stitches and am now working on one sleeve. I have decided to slow down the rate of sleeve decreases to get a wider sleeve. The final decision will be the edging to use at the bottom.

I am in the mood for some really easy knitting so tonight I am going to knit a new pattern (#707) from Cabin Fever. I am using Naturally's Vero in colour 15 (beige tones).

I was accepted

Got notification today that I have been accepted into the GTA Knitblogs Web Ring. At the bottom right of my page you can click on the 'next' and read what other knitters in the Greater Toronto Area are writing about. I am waiting to hear from Knitting Blogs but I understand that this can take a long time to be accepted there.

I have gone back to working on my shrug. I haven't accomplished much-about halfway to the point of dividing the back from the sleeves. (You can download the pattern for free from Elann.)

Great hockey game last night!! Go Sabres!!!

Did anyone watch the Apprentice last night? Can you believe those guys? They were so confident. How long before Lee goes home?

Why do we have to block?

My Trendsetter cardigan is done. Well almost. The knitting is finished and I started to sew in one sleeve. The fronts aren't sitting flat and it really does need blocking. I hate blocking!!! It takes time and I want to wear it. Now that I am done ranting I will go into knitting teacher mode-it is important to block your finished garments.

I spent the day at my suppliers seeing the new fall yarns. AMAZING. There is so much to tell but I am going to give you just a taste.

• From Noro there are 2 new yarns and new colours in the existing yarns. Kureyon and Silk Garden will be arriving by the end of the month.
• The Rowan/RY/Jaeger is fabulous. Enough said.
• Great new sock program from Lang. There will be new colours introduced every 6 weeks. These are limited quantity-once they are gone we can't get them again.
• New colours in Lana Grossa sock yarns.
• Lang has done a great self-striping yarn in a wool/acrylic blend. It won't felt which means it will knit up a great pair of socks.
• Debbie Bliss is re-introducing her Aran tweed and there is supposed to be a new book for it. The good news is that the price is being reduced.
• New yarns from Sirdar with great patterns.
• Sirdar is also bringing out a new 'tool' that lets you use yarn to make cool, loopy scarves without knitting.
  
• New yarns from Louisa Harding.
• 10 new yarns from Trendsetter including an chunky weight self-striping yarn called Granito that I really, really need.
  

I decided to write another newsletter to email out and was talking about the new Noro. Jane Ellison is doing another book for the yarn so I decided to see if she has a website and the answer is yes. You can read her blog, see pictures and find out what is coming.

Gotta go. Busy watching the Sabres winning the hockey game-just barely, the score is 2-1 right now. Beth and I have been Sabres fans since we were very young. Much to the displeasure of our dad who is a dye hard Leaf fan.

Oh, I also went shoe shopping. Enough said about that as well.

Knitting update

I couldn't stand looking at the ginger ale soaked yarn anymore so I gave it to my knitter Rhonda to clean up and knit something for her daughter. There is no way that I would skein the yarn, wash it and then reknit. I would throw it in the corner and it would sit there until the end of time. This is payment for all the times I give Rhonda a sweater of mine to finish.

Spent the morning at the hospital for an appointment with an Ear, Nose and Throat doctor. How can she be 45 minutes late for a 9:15 appointment. Glad it wasn't for 3-how late would she be then? The doctor thinks that I might have allergies, now must wait 6 weeks for that appointment. I have been told by Beth that if I am allergic to Melo, I go, not the dog!

I have one sleeve and one front done on my Daisy cardigan. The back is past the armholes and should be done during class tonight. Unfortunately I didn't completely read the pattern. I was supposed to do one knit row before starting the pattern to make a small border that would prevent the bottom from rolling. OOPS! I will have to decide when done if I like the roll and if I don't I might add a row of crochet to the bottom.

I just taught Beth how to crochet. Well, not really crochet but just chain. She is making a scarf-will show pictures when done. There have been a couple of bad words and the concentration on her face is hilarious.

Off to knitting class. It is our last one until fall. I can guarantee it will be more gossiping than knitting tonight and Kris is bringing treats-homemade butter tarts.

Fiona Ellis

Fiona taught last night for our guild meeting. If you have a guild and are looking for an instructor, I would highly recommend her. She put everyone at ease while they were playing with their cables.

We did morphing cables. Fiona is famous for her morphing cables…cables that change and become other patterns. In this workshop she will show you the basic principles of how to get started designing your own cables. Even if you are not an advanced cable knitter, give it a try. Simple patterns can morph and create unique ideas. If you love cables but find working vertical patterns too repetitive and want to heighten the challenge, this workshop is a must! Because this is normally a 3 hour workshop and we only had 2 there was homework to do in advance. This worked out great because everyone could start right away into playing.

She also brought garments from her new book Inspired Cable Knits. It is always fun to see the garments in person.

Girls Day Out

Thanks to everyone who posted comments about my ginger ale soaked yarn. Right now it is sitting on the floor in my truck-just can't look at it.

Fiona Ellis will be at our guild meeting tomorrow night teaching cables. Hopefully she will bring garments from her new book for everyone to see!!

I needed something to do yesterday while watching tv so I started my Trendsetter cardigan. One sleeve done and one front is started. Should get lots of knitting done tonight-2 hockey games and The Apprentice.

Beth is flying in tonight from LA. She spent the weekend there seeing the new Trendsetter yarns for fall. I was given a brief review but don't know all the details. I know that there are at least 2 self striping yarns (she is bringing home a bag of each). You will be seeing lots of these yarns this fall (even from Rowan-but I didn't tell you that!)

Today was spent having a manicure and pedicure with my very good friend from university. Eveline and I met during first year (almost 20 years ago) and have stayed close since then. We even have the same birthday which makes it very easy to remember.