A Few of My Favorite Things–Now That’s a Market Bag

When summer comes, knitters sometimes put away the needles until fall, thinking that there’s not much fun to knit when it’s too hot for wool. Perish the thought! Summer is a great time to knit with cotton and it’s a great time for knitting accessories, particularly things like bags that can be used to tote things to and from the lake, cabin, or your favorite getaway.

This summer, I tried my hand at “Now That’s a Market Bag” from Knot Your Mama’s Knitting Patterns in Universal’s Cotton Supreme (100% cotton) Brown. The pattern is well-written and easy to follow. The most difficult thing to handle is the provisional cast-on at the beginning, but the explanation given in the pattern is very clear.

This was my first time using Universal’s Cotton Supreme and I was pleasantly surprised by how soft a hand it has. In fact, I think this yarn is probably better suited to garments than I had expected. Nonetheless, it made a lovely market bag.

 

A Few of My Favorite Things–Knit Noro Accessories and Debbie Macomber Gerbera Print Yarn

Debbie Macomber Blossom Street Gerbera Print Yarn from Universal Yarn has to be one of my favorite variegated yarns.  It is 100% wool, single plied, worsted yarn, but the colors are what make it stand out.  Each colorway has several rich colors that complement each other and give a beautiful effect when knitted.

The Knit Noro Accessories book is full of beautiful patterns originally knit in Noro yarn.  However, they work up beautifully in many other brands of variegated yarn, particularly Gerbera Print yarn.  There are a variety of types of accessories in the book and the patterns are well-written and easy to follow.

I chose to use Gerbera Print yarn in color 204 – Lazy River – and the pattern Riverbed Rib Hat.  I’m immensely pleased at how it looks.  The colors are bright and beautiful and the hat fits very well.

The next time you are looking for a book of patterns for accessories, particularly for variegated yarn, you really can’t go wrong with the Knit Noro Accessories yarn.  And I really love the Debbie Macomber Blossom Street Gerbera Print yarn and I think you will too.

Come check out both items at The Knitting Nest!!  We’d love to see you!!

A Few Of My Favorite Things–Bamboo Bloom

 

Bamboo Bloom yarn by Universal yarns is a blend of wool and viscose from bamboo.  What’s really interesting about it is that the two fibers aren’t evenly blended.  Instead, there are sections of bamboo viscose that are about worsted weight interspersed with sections of wool that are more lightly twisted and are bulky in weight.  The structure of the yarn means that it has very different looks depending on what size needle you choose.

This cowl (from CowlGirls – more on that book in another post) was made on size 13 needles with Bamboo Bloom.  The bamboo sections looks very open and lacy with the wool section having a more traditional ribbed texture.

This mobius cowl/scarf was made on size 8 needles.  In this case, the bamboo section looks like you’d expect worsted weight yarn to look while the wool sections kind of “bush out”.

The bamboo viscose part of the yarn is wonderfully silky and shiny while the wool section has the consistency you’d expect of lightly twisted wool.

Bamboo Bloom comes in some beautiful handpainted colorways along with coordinating solids.  In the examples above, I used Fallen Petals (the handpainted yarn) and Jasmine (the solid).  This yarn is great for cowls, scarves, shawls, hats, and more and is great to work with!

Stop by The Knitting Nest and check out this gorgeous yarn!

A Few of my Favorite Things–Poems sock yarn

One of my current projects is a modular triangular shawl made with Poems sock yarn.  This lovely yarn is a wool/nylon blend, perfect for socks (but, also good for other things, like shawls).  It has a lovely feel to it so I’m enjoying working with it.  This shawl will really show off the color variegation to the yarn.  I’m using the Aurora Borealis colorway, which consists of dark blues, greens, and purples that gently blend into each other.

The Poems yarn is from Wisdom Yarns, part of Universal Yarns.  The Knitting Nest will also carry the 100% wool worsted weight version of this yarn, which looks like it will knit up wonderfully into something warm and cozy for this fall.  Both weights of this yarn are available in several different colorways, so I’m sure you can find one to love!

We open August 23rd.  Put it on your calendar and come join us and check out our beautiful yarns!

 

Yarn, yarn, and more yarn!!

Our yarn started arriving last week and we’re sooooo excited!!  Patrick and Christopher unpacked all the Universal Yarn that came yesterday – 4 very large boxes!  (I’m kind of bummed that we didn’t get the pattern books yet, but, they are for the new season, so they haven’t shipped yet.)  Christopher has been putting together wire cubes and pricing yarn.  At the end of the day today, he said, “After using the price gun all day today, it’s now more of a tool and not so much a really cool thing.”  Yep, it’s a tool.  And my boy got a lot of work done today.

I spent the day today finalizing our needles and notions orders.  After that, though, I decided which models I want to make for the shop.  And that involved yarn!!  Lots of yummy, luscious yarn!  Can you tell that yarn makes me happy?!

So, here are some pictures of our yarn (hopefully, starting in 27 days, to become our customers’ yarn) along with Patrick and Christopher working on getting it all into inventory and priced.  And, of course, a picture of Christopher with a price gun.  He priced me today at $5.00 – which is much better than yesterday, when I was $0.50!

 

And the Cascade Yarn comes on Thursday!!

Our First Order!!

Today, we placed our first orders for yarn!! This is so exciting – and rather nerve-wracking!!

We are purchasing most of our yarn from Cascade and Universal. We will have a variety of fibers available – wool, wool blends, cotton, cotton blends, acrylic, silk, etc. And we've got an array of yarn weights coming, from cotton thread to bulky yarn.

And, don't forget the raw wool that we took to the mill last weekend. The local wool will be available in DK and worsted weights. We aren't having it dyed, so we'll have natural white, gray heather, and dark gray.

We've ordered a few books and patterns and will be sorting out needles and notions next week.

Consider this just a taste of things to come! As the yarn arrives and we start setting up displays, I'm sure I'll have much more to say on this topic!!