Monday, March 31, 2008

Updating March... a month of yarny goodness

March is almost gone, and having so many yummy yarn
adventures that I am almost sad to see March go...
however April has many exciting things happening...
so as my kids would say...bring it on...
March's one new yarn shop visit was quite nice.
This time I got photos of my yarn purchased...



Love the pretty raspberry shade of the 100% wool
Bartlett yarn...also since I did not have my notes
when posting last post...they also carry...
among others....Aslan Trends, Kertzer, Sheep Shop Yarn,
Misty Alpaca, Gran mohair, Sirdar, Cleckheaten,
several brands by Plymouth haven't spotted before,
and lots of lovely mohair...wasn't looking for sock yarn,
but they seemed to even have that too...as well as some
unusual knitting needles and a few knitting toys I
haven't seen before. Once again noted the prices
seemed more than reasonable to me, and even ran a
little less on some items than other stores.
One more shop visit for the month, which was really
a revisit, but haven't been there in quite a long time
was to Windsor Button (photo from their site online)
in Boston...located quite close to Boston Common...



They are still in the same old building as before, a bit run down,
but the yarn collection has grown enormously with some very
high end yarns there now...if you are looking for any kind of
craft book, that is probably not a place to miss...
they had everything...prices are fairly standard for
the yarn shops around the Boston area.

Also earlier this month attended a Knit-a-thon in our area...
Betty Christiansen of Knitting for Peace spoke...



Then Kristin Nicholas spoke to us and showed us
slides of her farm and talked about her colorful knitting,
current and future projects.




Up after this was Wren Ross of Changing Patterns:
Discovering the Pattern of your Creativity spoke
along with Andrea Price of Knitspeak.
Wren wore the most fantastic floor length knitted coat
which she knitted herself. ...Thank you to the posting
by Guido from It's a Purl Man...you can actually see
the exact coat Wren was wearing (as I forgot my camera that day)...
awesome huh!



There's quite a long story to go along with the coat
as to what all the symbols meant. She also sings, writes music,
and plays the guitar, all of which we were treated to,
she sang us a great song she wrote about knitting.
Andrea Price was another fabulous speaker,
and I would not miss either of these ladies if they
came to another function. Of course I snagged her new book,
which she autographed too. fits so nicely into my knitting bag,
as it's pocket sized, perfect for such a great resource tool.
All 4 women were available for questions and autographs.



Also this month, one of my knitting guilds had an author come...
Barbara Delinsky who wrote Family Tree, among many, many other books.



It was very relaxed, small group of women,
and we were able to ask her all sorts of questions
about writing and her own personal knitting projects...
what an interesting person. I really enjoyed this.
She also autographed books for people.

Well that probably is generous for one month...
but I also attended a knitter's breakfast
at a local fabric store, where Encore yarn presented a trunk show.
Did not win any raffles,
but came away with lots of lovely free things,
and even more ideas...Hooray! Yes March was really cool!

As for that guy in the fatigues without a head
from the last post...I feel like I've really lost
it this time in regards to strange knitting.
He is a revolutionary figure from Cuban named
Che Guevara and on Time Magazine's top 100 list.
He was actually a knitting request, and I thought
it would be a fun and different challenge...
anyway here are the photos...and because it's my way,
I did a couple of poses with him knitting,
which will certainly make him turn over in his grave...if he
could only see himself depicted that way!

...if only he didn't have to smoke that little cuban cigar
while knitting that expensive yarn!





Saturday, March 29, 2008

New yarn store review and a headless person, bet you can't guess who I will be...

Went to yet another... new to me...yarn store today.
I live in Massachusetts where we have more lovely
yarn stores than one could ever imagine, many of
which are fairly close to my home...unbelievably
lucky and blessed!
So goals for 2008, is to visit at least one new
store monthly...today I trekked over to Milford, Mass.
to a lovely, but small shop called Knitting Pointers.
I think it may have been one of the smallest yarn stores,
However they did have the new Malabrigo lace weight yarn in
some really yummy colors...they also had quite a few
unusual brands of yarns, some of which ...were from both Australia
and the UK....I bought some absolutely lovely Bartlett yarn
100% wool, it was a yummy shade of raspberry, and as all yarn
does in most yarn stores, it called out to me like that puppy
in the shop,
please take me home, so of course I did.
I also scored some Galway, so lovely for felting in a color
that was sold out in other stores in the area...
I felt the prices were more than reasonable,
the lighting was excellent to see all the colors well,
the store hours were better than most, as
this shop unlike most Mass stores is actually open on Mondays.
and although the shop was tiny, the selection was very good,
and she had some very high end yarns such as Blue Heron.
One more important note at least for me, staff was
very friendly and helpful and new the product well.
I will definitely go back there again. This one is a keeper!

On another note...I am making a doll, and am at the sewing up stages...



and sometimes, if you're the doll, just sitting there, headless
you have to take things into your own hands and just finish
sewing yourself together, or at least it looks that way.
...headless man with needle and thread in hand....



on the other hand, great says the headless doll, so she made
me a shirt....Wheeee.




Oh great so now I have pants but where's my head?
Stay tuned....should be sewn up by tomorrow.

Saturday, March 22, 2008

How the Easter Bunny really delivers those eggs



Today managed to photo Easter Bunny
evidently out delivering eggs.
So now I know, he uses a backpack.
Rabbit is a Debbie Bliss pattern
Woven look (actually knitted) backpack
is from Alan Dart, latest Simply Knitting Mag.
Eggs pattern-also Alan Dart...note Alan Dart
does not decorate his eggs with crazy colored
embroidery, however I was sitting in a class
by Kristin Nicholas attempting to sew up my eggs,
and I would say her wild colors/embroidery just
rubbed off on me.





Happy Easter from da....Bunny

Friday, March 21, 2008

"Say cheese" for the camera and Flower Show #2 (BOSTON)

More photos than I can post,
and lots of new yarny adventures
to share as well, so will spread them out
over a few days, or would be just too many photos
to take in....





B e e n k n i t t i n g ,

s e w i n g , crocheting, needle felting,
yarn dying, bead making, jewelery making...
and just started rug hooking...
so lots of varied things to share...

Work continues on my d'oeuvre plate project...
& was able to come up with a fairly good
knitted, felted swiss cheese which goes pretty well wrapped
and skewered with knitted felted olive.







Then I made some felted beads from wool roving,
which I did as a needle felting project,
not a soap and water version of beading,
made project into a necklace, was going to use chain,
but had some fine silver thread like yarn
(believe it was Berroco)in stash,
so just incorporated that into the project...
made several beads, so used two of tiny ones
for matching earrings, however photo each time
was still blurry...but you get the idea.







Final note for this blog entry...went to Boston Flower Show
The theme this year was Rhapsody in Green so will post a few
of my favorite pics here: the first two were artistic expression category













Just gotta love it, still cold outside,
even a few patches of snow left...
ground is bare otherwise and these lovely smells
and all the beautiful colors of the flower show.
~ can't wait for Spring!

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Quick update

unable to upload photos on camera at moment
due to technical difficulties
but lots of fun March yarny adventures to share.
will try again on Wednesday...so check back.

Saturday, March 8, 2008

More Cat Capers

Hey it's finally March...and it's that time again...more cat capers.

So Top O' The Morning To You from Mc' Tic Toc




Mc' Crespo





and Mc' Piper...





and yes Mc' Crespo does look like he indeed
had too much Irish special in his cat bowl
and is sleeping it off in his little party hat.

As for what's on my needles,
still struggling with the sweater,
and it's now time to consult the sweater gods
(my local knitting guild, wiser souls than me)
to check this pattern for me, as there seems to be
some errata, however cannot find any posted anywhere.

Also still working on a rather strange purse project...
scrumbling, loads of fun...but not so portable,
as it uses so many different yarns,
and now has grown rather out of hand...
but a few work in progress photos to post for now...







As always lots of fun little projects up my sleeve, stay tuned...
~And as you can see only Piper would agree to wear the Irish beard.
Beard is crocheted as is shamrock on hat.