Once upon a time (have I told you this story before?) I ran a community site about books and I was on the mailing list of every publishing company on the planet, whether I wanted to be or not. Every day books landed on my doorstep unsolicited — most of them wildly inappropriate for my site (kids books, self-help, pulp fiction …). People always think it sounds like a ridiculous thing to complain about — who doesn’t love free books! — but try getting hundreds of books out of your house on a weekly basis and tell me what a blessing it is. So I’m now incredibly cautious about people who seek to send me yarn. I really don’t want a lot of yarn in the house, generally speaking — especially single skeins — so am frequently in the awkward position of turning down offers of yarn, no matter how luscious it may be. Every once in a blue moon, though, I cave. And then there’s the fact that I have a lot of good acquaintances and close friends in the yarn business, and sometimes they send me yarn without my knowing anything about it. So things find their way in.
Lately my mail has been pret-ty amazing, and I thought I’d tell you about some of these beauties:
1) I don’t have any friends at luxury yarn company Jones & Vandermeer, but after I posted about trying to find the perfect camel-colored yarn for my upcoming Channel cardigan, I got a nice note from them asking if I wouldn’t like to swatch with their 100% camel-fiber yarn, Clever Camel. And obviously the answer was yes, I really would. Swatching will commence this weekend.
2) My friend Kristin Ford of Woolfolk sent me a hilarious email recently about some random colors of Far she had from the mill, wondering if she could share some of it with me. I asked her for a pic, and a few days later I got a box. My favorites are the few skeins of this blue-and-white marl. No idea what I might do with it (or if it will be going into production), but it will be heavily petted in the near term.
3) I mentioned before that my friends at Purl Soho sent me a box of their Linen Quill before I had a chance to complete my order. Knowing me as they do, they sent skeins of the black and the grey-natural marl, both so incredibly stunning. I’ve already wound two skeins of the black and started playing with it last night.
4) A dear friend in the biz sent me these two incredible skeins of aran-weight tweed yarn that I’m pretty sure I’m not allowed to talk about just yet. But ooh la la … coming this fall, I think.
So for me, this weekend is for swatching and seaming, seaming and swatching. And maybe drowning my tax sorrows in a nice glass of rosé. What are you up to?
IN SHOP NEWS: The spring/summer issue of Amirisu arrived this week, packed full of great little sweater patterns and three shawls. And you’ll also once again find all three shapes of brass hangers and both sizes of brass-and-steel scissors on the virtual shelves waiting for you. Among the Field Bags and all the other lovely things at Fringe Supply Co.!