Category: Business Announcements

New Pattern Shapely Mitts

Hey there, 👋

I know it’s been a little quiet on the blog lately. I am still plugging along on the afghan and making slow progress. I completed another color and have five more to go. That’s 30 hexagons for those of you keeping score.

Here’s the color I am working on currently.

I had a birthday 🎂 last week. Jerry took me out to our favorite place for pizza and local craft beer. I made one of my favorite desserts too, instead of cake, lemon meringue pie. Here’s my go to recipe for it. Works perfectly every time. You can thank me later.

You may recall last year that I was knitting a pair of fingerless mitts in my Classic Merino Superwash Sock yarn. I had a few requests for the pattern and I have finally gotten to writing and publishing it. I have it on Ravelry and on my website.

I am extending the special introductory offer that I ran last week from my social media. Beginning today and running through February 8, 2021, you can have the pattern for free with purchase of a skein of yarn to make it. I wrote the pattern for both fingering weight and sport weight yarn. I linked the fingering weight above and here’s the Classic Merino Superwash Sport yarn.

Lavender, Damson Plum,Midnight Blue, Sapphire, Winter Sky, Peacock, Robin Egg, Atlantic
Heather, Orchid, Quartzite, Pewter, Slate, Obsidian, Graphite, Earl Grey
Glacier, Ironstone, Emerald, Lichen, Jade, Honeydew, Fern, Marigold
Tea Rose, Cerise, Crimson, Garnet, Paprika, Sea Coral, Chamomile, Sea Oat

The special free pattern offer is good only on my website. Just pick your yarn and color and then add it and the Shapely Mitts pattern to the cart. Add the code SHAPELY when you begin the check out process for $5 discount. If you have any problems or questions please contact me at knittingnotions@gmail.com. Thanks for reading!

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Presenting…

Honeydew Lace Square all blocked and posing for the glamour shots.

This color is very hard to photograph because it really is a bit of a chameleon which changes due to light source. It is the Classic Merino Superwash Sock in Lavender. As I mentioned last time I used 4 skeins with 5g leftover using US4 needles.

Here is the original lace weight version along with the new version for fingering weight. I spent all of Saturday afternoon and into the evening editing and updating the pattern to include the new fingering weight instructions. I also made some corrections to the border charts and stitch counts for that section. The updated pattern is listed on the website and on Ravelry. If you already own the digital pattern, you will have gotten an update pushed to you. If you bought a print version at a festival and would like the update via email, please let me know and I am happy to send along the PDF. Contact me at knittingnotions@gmail.com.

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This Week’s Progress

I am getting sooooo close to the finish on this project. I am about halfway through with the final side. I got a fair bit of this knitting done last weekend when Jerry and I took a short overnight trip to visit my mother-in-law. It’s the most knitting time I have had in awhile, which explains the slow progress I guess.

On our trip home after an overnight in Evansville, we took a slight detour and spent about half a day checking out the Land Between the Lakes park. Jerry has wanted to try some off road trail driving in his truck and we discovered that they have some there. We tried that out and while it was a fun adventure we weren’t too impressed with their trail markings and didn’t want to get lost in there, so we didn’t go very far in. LOL! It was a fun experiment though. I got only one picture of the Bison. There are also Elk but we didn’t go on the drive where you can see them. I think it was still closed anyway.

Since we are on the subject of nature; here’s our yucca plant in full bloom this week. :-)

On the business side; I got all the Nostepinnes and Darning Eggs added to the website last week, and since I told you I would update you on that, consider yourself updated. :-)

  • Walnut Darning Eggs $25
  • Cherry Darning Eggs $25
  • Purple Heart Darning Eggs $35
  • Walnut Nostepinnes $25
  • Cherry Nostepinnes $25
  • Cherry Nostepinnes $25
  • Purple Heart Nostepinnes $35

We are working on a few ideas for new products at the moment that we are getting very excited about. More on that when I have something to show you. :-)

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The One About New Yarn

I have knit a little on my shawl but not enough to see a difference so I will talk about something else today. It involves yarn and a bit of history so if you are interested in either or both read on.

When we started Knitting Notions in 2005, we sold online only. We started with just Yarn Swifts and hand dyed yarn. We added Shawl Pins in 2006 and vended at our first fiber festival (SAFF) that fall. After that we decided that we wanted to expand and add lots of shows for 2007. We did about 10 or so that year and since 2008 we have regularly scheduled 16-20 festivals each year.

Jerry designed and built all our displays for that first full year (2007). This is the yarn displays he made. The size was pretty carefully determined based on average booth dimensions and to allow for room for shoppers while maximizing display space. The number of dowels for the yarn to hang on was based on even spacing along the bars. It happened to be a total of 26 so that has been my maximum color palette per yarn base for all these years.

This year, since I have been wanting to add some more colors and we had time to do it, we decided the time had come to increase the hanging space. We expanded the number of dowels from 26 to 32. All we needed to do was make eight new central bars where the dowels are attached with 16 holes on each rather than 13. I have those 6 new colors I formulated and dyed, and they are now listed on the website.

While I was getting this all loaded in the trailer this week, I decided to work out the placements on the new displays so I could box them appropriately for quick booth set up when we get to do that again. While I had all the yarn out anyway, I set up a yarn display rack on the patio near my trailer and the work shop.

Here’s the line up with the new colors worked in. I am pleased with it, but it took a bit of experimenting to get it where I liked it. It was good to do the head scratching when I wasn’t pressed for time during a real booth set up.

This shows both sides of a single display; 16 colors on each side.

My trailer is pretty full now with the extra yarn. I am going to have to pack carefully to get the other new Bowls, Darning Eggs, and Nostepinnes in there. :-)

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This Week’s Progress

I am finally nearing the finish line on my fingering weight re-knit and re-write of my Honeydew Lace Square pattern. It has been a long haul but it has been quicker than the first time when I was knitting the original in lace weight yarn. I have reached the third corner of the border which means I have knit 3/4 of the edging! I hope the yarn holds out and I don’t need to start a fifth skein when I am this close to the end.

I received and dyed a big order of alpaca from New Era Fiber last week. I needed to get my yarn labeled that I dyed last week (those six new colors I told you about; more on this next time) before I started work on the mill order. I got the fiber dyed the first half of this week. This was 45 lbs. of a huge lot. There will be eight colors in all and this was the first three.

So after that was out of the way I had a couple days free to get the Nostepinnes and Darning Eggs finished. This is not all of them. There are a lot more eggs that Jerry was still sanding while I did this. I do now have them all done.

I spent the afternoon with my photo equipment and new products so I can get all this stuff loaded on the website. I photographed all the new yarn plus the Nostepinnes and Darning Eggs. I have the yarn listed but the color pictures are not up yet. I need to do some editing. The tools will be listed as soon as I can.

It’s looking like my sub-contract work and our website sales may have to get us through this year so I am trying to make sure there is plenty on there. :-) I am sad so many festivals are still canceling. Sigh. I am trying to not let it discourage me too much. Things have to start improving at some point right? As my precious great grandmother Mamie was fond of saying “all things come to an end…both the good and the bad”. Well, it’s high time for the bad to move along, right? :-)

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Wood Bowls Now Instock

Small sampling of the available wood bowls on the website

I spent a couple days last week getting the wood bowls added to the website. We have a lot of different sizes at the moment. They range from larger ones at the $55 price point which are big enough for holding a full ball of yarn down to some mini bowls ($20) which are perfect for holding small items like beads, stitch markers, coins, etc.

We will soon be bringing back some other wood tools we have not had in stock for quite a few years. Jerry had some big logs of walnut and cherry that he hadn’t had time to process. Well we have time now, so he started working on that this week after we returned from a little trip to the Smokies for Mother’s Day weekend. I’ll tell you more about that next post. :-)

After trimming up to turn-able size pieces
Nostepinnes in progress

He is making some Nostepinnes at the moment and some of this will also be Darning Eggs.

So while this is keeping Jerry busy, I am planning some new yarn colors for 2020. I have decided to add six new colors to my palette. Here is a sneak preview.

I have made some more progress on the Honeydew Lace Square in Superwash Sock Yarn.

I have added the 4th skein and hope it will be enough to finish. I am almost to the halfway point on the edging.

See the stitch markers in the top right corner? That is the half way point. When did I start this thing anyway? Oh, wow. Ravelry says Jan. 06, 2020. Sigh. Perseverance is a virtue right? :-)

Okay more on our mini vacation next time. :-)

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Wood Bowls are Making a Comeback

It’s about time for another blog post, don’t you think? So, what’s up at your house? Hope spring is in full force and you are well. We are fine here and ready for some changes. Are you with me?

For the time being, and maybe permanently for all we know, my husband is home and working on the business full time with me. His job in the food distribution industry, serving restaurants, schools, hotels, etc. took a double whammy when the Nashville tornado and then the quarantine caused him to be laid off for at least a year or more. So, when you have lemons you might as well make lemonade right? He is keeping busy making product.

Once upon a time, a few years ago anyway, we used to make wood bowls. They are fine for plopping your yarn in but also great for lots of other uses. We had a lot of blanks glued up already that he hadn’t gotten around to when we started making the bowls in 2017. It seemed like the time was right to put them on the lathe and make some more.

These are waiting a new outboard tool rest which will make it much easier to carve out the inside. It arrived yesterday and it is installed and ready to go so they should be finished soon.

And here it is in action. Who knows, there may even be some darning eggs and nostepinnes coming up? Would there be any interest in us bringing those back? We would love some feedback on that.

See you soon with some other knitting and pattern news!

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Yarn Boxes and Other Updates

We are keeping production going in the hopes that we can get back out there soon vending at festivals. So far we have lost 7 festivals from the first half of the year. Two more that are in late May and mid June in Ohio are holding off until next month to decide on whether they may hold the events. I am trying to remain hopeful that they will be able to happen. We do have our online sales, but that is such a small percentage of our income in comparison to festivals that it is not making up our losses. Maybe the second half of the year will rebound us all?

Finishing Yarn Boxes

Anyway, so we have finished up a large batch of Yarn Boxes, as you can see above. The finish is curing for a few days before we apply the final wax and labels. We have plenty on the website ready to ship if you had been planning to pick one up at a festival that cancelled this spring. :-)

At least spring didn’t forget to arrive in Tennessee. It’s one consolation to be able to walk around our property and see evidence that life does go on even in the midst of many upheavals. I have always appreciated the wild flowers on our lawns. I don’t mind a bit that it’s not all just grass. I think it’s much more interesting. Here’s one of my favorites that are usually blooming by mid March or early April in these parts. I love violets because I am a big fan of purple.

I wish you could smell these Mountain Laurels that we planted when we bought this house 22 years ago.

In other news, I have progressed on my Honeydew Lace Square in fingering weight yarn. I have begun the knitted on edging now. I am only on the first side, so quite a ways to go.

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Summer Dyeing

Since my last post I have been working through my summer to-do-list while I am home. I talked a bit about my dyeing goals and I am pleased to say it is all done. The new colors are all dyed, the others colors are all restocked, and it is all labeled and boxed in the trailer for the upcoming shows. Whew!

This is just a sampling of all that I got done. I didn’t get any pictures of the labeling and packing but I do have some finished prettier shots of the new colors.

The new colors are all available to order on the website in the yarns above and they will be making their debut at the Natural Fiber Extravaganza in a couple of weeks.

I am hoping to have my Firenze pullover finished in time for Stitches Midwest. I only have about an inch or maybe less to go on the body stockinette section and then the ribbing. After that it’s only the 3/4 length sleeves, and they won’t take too long, right?

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New Pattern and More

I have a few things today. First I finally got that pattern written up and published for the little Cables and Lace Baby Blanket.  I included a couple additional sizes as suggestions to the one I knit up, with the caveat that they are estimates as to actual finished sizes and yardage requirements.  It is a charted only pattern since when I wrote up the stitch pattern itself, I made it as a hand written chart on graph paper and I didn’t want to take the time to write it out. The chart is pretty straight forward and easy to follow and since there isn’t even any shaping, I think that even a knitter new to charts should be able to use it and hopefully realize that charts are your friend. ;-) I have it listed on Ravelry and my website for $5 and the yarns can be found on my website as well. I used the Organic Cotton Sport but the Classic Merino Superwash Sport would be perfect too.

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The next thing is that I am very close to finishing Tendrilly. I finished the last body section row last night and since I have some free time today after getting most of my booth set up done yesterday, I hope to get the edging done today. It’s only 13 rows. I love how it is coming out and it’s possible I could get it steam blocked to bring in the booth for the weekend’s event, Southeastern Animal Fiber Fair (SAFF) .

Tendrilly-wip (2)

You may remember that I said I may modify the size, and I did decide to do that. The main reason for that was because I needed a 3rd skein of the Classic Merino DK to complete even the smaller version but I would have only used about a fourth of it. I hate to waste yarn so I thought a altered version would probably use up most of the third skein. Now I am just hoping it is plenty for the 13 rows remaining and the bind off. I think I have plenty so I am not too worried. All my modification notes are in the Ravelry link above for my project page if you are interested in that. I won’t bore you with it here for those who aren’t. :-)

Tendrilly-wip (1)

The last thing newsworthy is that, as mentioned above I am in Asheville, NC for my 13th year (!) at SAFF. This show is special to me and one of my favorites for many reasons. This was the first show I attended as a vendor back in 2006, and it changed many things about our business model. It’s also such a nice area to visit, although I don’t get much time for sight seeing. I do have some time to myself today but I will probably just use it to knit and maybe take a break about lunch time for a stroll and some food in a mall near my hotel. Cheers!

 

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