E-Newsletter: July 3, 2008

Dear Reader,

We had a lovely time in North Carolina last week. We visited with our daughter, ate way too much good food, enjoyed some incredible music and came back refreshed and ready for a new week. Oh yeah, and I bought some yarn. You think yarn shop owners never buy yarn from other shops? Hah! I took a small, easy project with me, complete with the wrong size needles. When we got to Asheville, I made a beeline for my friend Renee’s shop (Yarn Paradise in Old Biltmore Village — go see it, it’s fabulous — tell her Meg sent you), to get proper needles. She had them, I stood at the check-out counter and as I was getting ready to pay for my needles, I spied with my little eye some yarn that I simply could not live without. Many balls of it jumped right into the bag and came home with me. So you see, not even I am immune to the lure of lovely yarn.

Many people have inquired about our holiday hours this week. We’ll be open regular hours Thursday (11:00 - 7:00) and Saturday (11:00 - 4:00) and closed on Friday to celebrate Independence Day.

What’s New in the Store

What’s In That Box?
Quite a few new boxes showed up last week while I was gone. This week we’re busy putting out new goodies from Mountain Colors, including their newest yarn, Winter Lace, new shades of Bearfoot and a few hanks of Wool Crepe that I ordered to go with a lace pattern that is in the final printing stages.

This week also brought a box of Opal sock yarn. We haven’t carried this in ages, but the new Opal Blues 6 ply series caught my attention when the sales rep was here a few weeks ago, so I bought it. These are big 150 gram skeins of yarn, great for socks but also wonderful for wee sweaters for wee people. Also in the box were a couple of shades of Opal Cotton for us to try. I had ordered others, but they were already sold out. I guess that tells us how popular this yarn has become.

What We’re Working On

Donna’s Darling Duet
Donna is probably the quickest knitter of our group — I’m pretty sure she’s #1 on the finished items list. Here’s sock one of the Duet kit from the Lorna’s Laces/Mountain Colors collaboration. Designed by Cat Bordhi, this is no ordinary sock, but it’s not difficult. We still have a few kits left in stock. The perfect project for Summer travel.

What You’re Working On

An Intriguing Proposition
We didn’t receive any pictures this week, so instead I’m going to tell you about the International Fiber Collaborative. Their website describes the project:

The goal of the International Fiber Collaborative is to provide an opportunity for people who enjoy working with fiber arts, whether professional artists, hobbyists or students, to come together from all over the world to express their concern about the worlds extreme dependency on oil. This year’s project is called the World Reclamation Art Project (W.R.A.P.). Participants have crocheted, knitted, stitched, patched, or collaged 3 foot square fiber panels that expresses each participants concern about this topic. Simply by designing and creating these panels and participating in this project they are, in the larger picture, expressing their concern about this important subject to the rest of the world. All the panels have been sewn together to completely cover an abandoned gas station in central New York State.

A friend forwarded their newsletter to me the other day, and I was excited to see that the moving force behind this project, Jennifer Marsh, is moving to Huntsville, to teach at UAH! I have written to her and am hoping that she’ll be interested in giving a presentation at Yarn Expressions and beginning a new art project here in the Tennessee Valley.

^* Be sure to click on the link to see pictures of the abandoned gas station covered in swatches

What’s Going On Around Here

Spinning Group Gets Started
I had no idea there were so many spinners and potential spinners in the area. The e-mails piling up in my inbox tell me there’s a real need for this group. The first spinning group get-together will be Monday July 7, 2008 from 4:00 to 8:00 pm. Bring your wheel, your spindle, your interest, your questions, and we’ll all have a great time.

 

That’s it for this week. I hope you have a safe and enjoyable holiday weekend.

Sincerely,

and all the crew at Yarn Expressions