I finished Fetching yesterday and started some fingerless mitts for Curtis with the brown variegated handpaintedyarn.com merino. I’ve used a stitch pattern I saw for a sweater in The Natural Knitter for the cuff and have modified it for the ‘body’ of the mitten. I also want to make a similar pair for Dave.
I finally visited our new local yarn store Twist and it’s amazing. I can’t remember if I saw an ad or mention on Ravelry, or just googled and found it on a search, or saw an ad in our local weekly paper (and somehow I have a vague memory of the latter) but I’d first heard of it a month or two ago and had never made it over til yesterday.
The owner, Cathy, is extremely friendly and obviously passionate about fiber and color. She expressly wants to support small suppliers, especially woman-owned companies, and suppliers of natural/organically produced fibers. She’s made an effort to stock unusual or hard to find yarns (Habu, Handmaiden, and Be Sweet, for example) as well as her own line of yarn from exotic or luxury fibers.
Yarn is mostly arranged by color in cubbies along the walls or baskets on the table in the center of the store, though she has a special section for her ‘yarns of conscious’ — those yarns whose sales result in some of the profit returning the communities of manufacture.
She has a small variety of handpainted roving as well as some undyed fiber (including camel, merino and silk blends) for sale.
The shop is tiny but enjoyable to browse. She also has a small area for fabric dyeing.
I bought some Merino/silk handpainted roving and 2 skeins of Malabrigo in Frost Grey (a nice soft grey with a hint of lavender) for some mittens. I was tempted by some lovely cashmere and some beautiful camel/silk but didn’t want to splurge yet.