The Girls Go Shopping

Wednesday nights, the knitting, crocheting, tatting, spinning, quilting etc girls & one brave guy, Steve, get together at the local Wired Monk to gossip, get rowdy & sometimes, knit. Three or four of the gang are now daring each other to embark on Outrageous Shawls! Karen even brought in a sampling of her "recycled" fibres as encouragement. You have to understand Karen - she retired a few years back to spend her 'Golden Years' with her hubby & commune with fibre. She is in love with lace. And spends a lot of time in Thrift Stores looking for sweaters made of luxury yarns that she can undo to knit lace shawls. Luxury yarns even in lace weight are expensive. This Shawl Thang  must be serious for Karen to bring out the Big Guns.


Several of our members like to shop as much as Karen does. Gladys knows where every discount fibrey sale is going on even when it's only advertised on Craig's List. We all got an emergency email about the Mother Lode of spinning fibre. She suggested we share a Red bag for $10 a pound. Of course we all jumped in and bought some!! Are you kidding??? No one misses out on Gladys' finds!! I bought 2 pounds myself! My pal Gail bought 2 pounds too - she needs it about as much as I do .  .  .  but what the heck, Gladys found it!! apparently some woman had a small mill & processed all this dyed merino into 10 pound bags. When she went out of business a couple years back, it went into her garage & she's been trying to sell it ever since. Gladys arrived out of curiosity & posted it to Ravelry. After we got our bag though. I'm now the proud owner of two pounds of bright cherry merino - slightly felted & a little neppy - NOT what you want to spin finely for lace but certainly great for felted slippers! I I intend to make DUFFERS!

Gail brought a

box to Wednesday night as well. She & I ordered some hand painted braids from the same vendor & to save a buck, we suggested it be mailed as one lot. I can tell no lies - I just wanted more Pink Elephant so the nice woman dyed some up for me!!! I'd bought a 4oz Polworth braid last year & fell in love when I spun it up. Pink Elephant is mostly light grey with a little smidge of dark, some shell pink & a little orange. Delicious when spun. 4oz was just not enough to DO anything with so she dyed up another 8 oz for me!!!  I also fell in love with a cowl that was in the Fall KNITTERS magazine. It was a turtle-neck that came down to the elbows in a short 
poncho. They made out of oranges & reds & hot pinks in lace, sock & dk weight yarns in garter & stockinette. I fell in love with it so she made a new colorway just for me for the project - she calls it RED HAT. I don't think I'll spin it in three weights but I'm not really sure right now either. I may spin it all up in one weight & then use textured stitches to make the cowl or I may use three different needle sizes. I love the braid color & I love the soft Polworth so it may have to just be petted for a while .  .  .