Home from Sock Summit!

Well, Sock Summit is over. Nina and I drove back from Portland on Monday, and I still feel like I'm recovering. Tired as I still am, I think I'm also suffering from a bit of Sock Summit withdrawal. For 4 days, I was a part of this huge, amazing THING, where thousands of knitters gathered in one place for a single purpose: to knit. We knit socks, we talked about knitting socks, we fondled sock yarn, we broke a world record, we bonded over the funny looks we got when we told people we were going to Portland to talk about knitting socks.

It was amazing. AMAZING, I tell you. As a woman from a small town in the midwest who doesn't have a lot of knitting friends said to me, "I feel like I'm with my people."



It was seriously the most exhausting, fun experience ever. Even when I thought I was going to fall down, I was so tired, I was still having a blast. Since neither Nina nor Marilee are as much of a knitter as me, and neither has knit socks, I'm not sure if they'd agree, but they were such troopers. I couldn't have done it without them!.



I didn't take as many pictures as I thought hoped I would, but I got a few! Nina got some great shots of our Voodoo Doughnuts, so I'll post those when she's done processing them (someday...).

Mare couldn't make the road trip with us -- she flew up on Wednesday night-- (which, though we missed her terribly, was kind of a blessing because it meant that the Pile fit in the car. It otherwise would not have), but Nina and I drove out of Santa Clara at 7:30 am last Wednesday. I-5 is the most boring road ever, so no pictures really. Though I did get a good shot of Gorilla Monster* and my sock-in-progress.



When we got near Mount Shasta, the air was all weird and hazy and smoky because of a forest fire someplace, and Shasta looked like it was floating in the air. You could barely see it, off in the distance.



We set up the booth on Thursday morning. Jocelyn, who I know from Nine Rubies in San Mateo, and her awesome daughter Amanda helped us, and boy did we need them! My mom built these really nice wooden displays, but they were a little too lightweight to carry all the weight of over 100  skeins of yarn each, so Jocelyn had the brilliant idea of weighing them down with rice or beans. So after a quick trip to Safeway for Nina and Marilee (while I struggled to move tables and boxes and set up lamps), we were in business!



I love how the booth turned out -- it was exactly I pictured it in my head! It was a tiny booth -- 5x10 -- so I wanted it to be as spacious and welcoming and open as possible.



I think we got it right! We had nice, incandescent lamps to combat the horrible green flourscence of the convention center, and dishes of candy for people to keep their shopping strength up. I had a cushy wool rug down on the concrete to help sooth the tired tootsies. Oh, and YARN. Lots of yarn, and lots of fiber.



It was a great show-- I sold bunches of yarn, but better than that, I met so many really sweet, wonderful, friendly knitters! I loved talking to everyone who came through the booth. I made a few contacts with shops, both online and local, which I really hope will turn into some wider exposure for my yarns (I'll keep you posted! Fingers crossed!).

I sold quite a bit, but I also came home with A LOT of yarn. I'm going to do shop updates over the next few days. Lots of colorways of Lollipop BFL Sock, Meringue Merino Sock and Marzipan. I also have several new colors of Souffle Lace that will go up as well. Keep your eyes peeled! I'll post here to let you know when the updates happen.

I really want to thank everyone for their well wishes and kind words both leading up to and following Sock Summit. It meant so much to me to receive comments and emails and messages on Ravelry. I so, so, SO appreciate all of your support -- Knitters are the BEST! Thank you!!!

*A few years ago, Nina and I took a road trip up to Ashland, OR. I got her this creepy-weird gorilla monster postcard as a present (because she's the monkeygirl) and we took him on our road trip with us. He was in almost ALL of our pictures. It seemed only fitting, since we were roadtripping up to Oregon again, that Gorilla Monster come with us again too!

I'm Home!

Okay, well, I've been home for a few days. We flew home last Thursday. But I honestly don't remember jet lag being this... unpleasant. Or of this long duration. I spent the better part of the weekend napping and whining.

I feel mostly back to normal now. Mostly.

We had such a fantastic time in Japan. We spent the majority of the 2 weeks in Tokyo, but took an overnight trip to Nikko, a state park 2 hours from Tokyo in the mountains. We wandered around, shopped, ate WAY too much delicious food -- it was the perfect honeymoon, even though it was belated almost a year!

A couple of Fridays ago, Tobin and I split up to have our own respective "nerd" day. He went to the electronics district, Akihabara, to look at video games and arcades and cell phones and wires the beeping, blinking things. I went to Kamata, only 15 minutes away from where we were staying, and spent the day at Yuzawaya, the craft department store. How could I possibly spend a whole day in one store? Well, it's easy when the store has ELEVEN BUILDINGS scattered throughout the neighborhood.

Here's a view of the street housing buildings 10 and 11:

Each floor of each building specializes in a different craft. I spent the most time in building 6:

There's one whole floor with leatherworking tools and materials, and purse-making supplies, including this whole wall of bag handles in any color you could want:

The same floor had shelves and shelves of colored glass for stained glass and mosaics:

My favorite floor (besides the yarn floor, of course) was the sewing and quilting floor. They had the most amazing kits! Kits for EVERYTHING. I think this is what impressed me the most. This shop sold raw materials for every single craft you could ever want to do, but then also made it easy to try new things. You could walk in thinking, "I want to be creative today, but I don't know what to try." And walk out with an adorable measuring tape kit:

Functional, and cute! And you'd learn to sew! Or you could try felt crafts and make a cute little felt puppy keychain:

Less functional, but come on -- you'd have an adorable pal to carry around. :) I spent a lot of time perusing the aisles and aisles of quilt squares. They had quarter yards in little drawers. This is only one of about 8 aisles:

Each square was between $1.50 and $3, depending on the fabric. I spent a bundle, believe you me, but got the sweetest fabrics. I love Japanese fabrics so much. The designs are cute, often modern -- not as fuddy duddy as so many you can find here. I'm going to make drawstring project pouches and tool pouches with them -- I promise I'll show you! I'm getting to work today!

And then, of course, there was the YARN. An entire floor of yarn, as far as the eye can see. There was a fantastic display of basic worsted weight wool:

There were tweeds of every description, cottons, organics, lots of novelty yarns:

I honestly didn't think I'd buy that much yarn. I don't need any... I have a riDONKULOUS stash of yarn already. I wandered for like 2 hours and looked for some gifts for my knitting friends (found some cuties!) and all of a sudden I had a huge pile of yarn in my basket!

Here's a crappy, jetlagged picture of what I bought:

I got about 700 yards of this silvery-grey linen/cotton blend. It's about a dk weight, and I'm thinking a simple cropped cardigan. Maybe a whisper cardy, but maybe Liesl, by Ysolda (Ravelry). And I got 5 balls each of this cute, cute cotton tweed! The pink and green you see in the photo, on the left. This is going to be two cardigans, one for each of my nieces Lily and New-Baby-McBroom, due in June. I also bought a skein of Noro Kureyon Sock, because it was on sale for $9! What a steal. I couldn't let it go, despite the mixed reviews and the fact that I have no need for more sock yarn.

Yuzawaya is amazing. If you're ever in Tokyo, GO THERE. It's totally inspiring and so fun to wander around in. Kamata is on the JR Kehin-Tohoku line. It's a pretty bustling area, right around the station. There's a mall with a Muji store (LOVE THEM!) and plenty of tasty food to eat (we went to a restaurant on another day that specializes in Omu-rice --tasty!). It's easy to spend a whole day!

Shop Update & Etsy Store Grand Opening

Here's an unscheduled shop update, friends!

I've opened an Etsy shop, as a supplement to my shop here at woolcandy.com. You can find me on etsy here at woolcandy.etsy.com. I love the idea of Etsy, and have bought a few things from some wonderful sellers there.

I also figured that, since I'm new to this whole online biz thing, it's hard for some to assess my "cred," know what I mean? I have a long background in B & M retail -- as a bookseller at the fantastic and famous DIESEL, A Bookstore in Oakland for five years, in addition to a summer at Yarn Dogs in Los Gatos, and those experiences, as well as my own work ethic, have instilled a deep commitment to customer service. Still, this is my first venture into online selling. To the world, I'm a small fish in a big, big sea. Etsy is an established marketplace, with set rules and a large community. It's exciting to become part of that community, and hope that it'll give you some confidence about shopping with me! Yarn is my heart and soul, the fiber of my being (yuk yuk!), and I want nothing more than to share my love for color and yarn with the world. (End sappy sales speech. Thanks for listening. Hope I didn't come off too... too).

I'll be adding items to the woolcandy.etsy.com shop frequently. I have several skeins waiting in the wings, and will likely move some stock from my shop to the etsy shop to keep things fresh and see if I can't get a few more eyes on my wares (nudge nudge, wink wink!). Check here and on etsy often -- you never know where your dream skein will appear!

The first few items in the etsy shop introduce two new bases: Souffle Alpaca/Silk/Cashmere laceweight and Treacle BFL Sportweight.

Souffle Laceweight is the most sumptuously soft blend of 70% Alpaca, 20% silk and 10% cashmere. This stuff is obscene, how soft and tantalizing it is. I can't seem to stop petting it and rubbing it against my face. I dyed up a couple of skeins in Fresh Herb, one for me and one for the shop, and I'm going to cast on for the Whisper Cardigan from this spring's Interweave Knits as soon as it's dry. I'll list the second skein at the same time!

The first color available is Spanish Moss:

Celery green, golden yellow, tree-bark browns and soft, creamy caramels blend into an earthy hue. As always, this colorway is randomly dyed so that it will not pool or stripe. There are 1300 yards per 100g/3.5 ounce skein -- plenty of yarn for a beautiful, good-sized shawl.

Just listed as well is Orange Blossom Honey:

OMG-I-super-ultra-mega-looooooove-lurve-love this yarn! Picture sunlight pouring through a jar of golden-orange honey and you'll find this glowing blend of golds, caramels and deep orange-red. This color glows -- it just glows.

The other new base, Treacle BFL , is fluffy-soft sport-weight wool, perfect for a scarf or a sweater for a special little one. Each skein is 3.5 oz/100g 399 yards/365 m and knits up at 5-6 stitches per inch on size 4-6 (3.5mm-4.0mm) needles.

The first colorway offered at the shop is Vineyard:

A vibrant mix of wine reds, deep burgundy, plum and leafy greens. The greens blend with the reds to make branch-y browns. This yarn absorbs dye into this beautiful, watercolor wash. Each color blends softly into the next with no harsh edges or weird smudging or mixing. It's lovely!

I hope you enjoy this second outlet for Wool Candy!

Wheeee!!!

I'm still here, I promise. Sorry to disappear on you like that... My mom always said (when I was a whiny teenager who hated everything and couldn't wait to be finished with high school) that time starts to fly past you faster and faster as you get older.

Well, my mom has never been wrong yet, not once.

I can't believe it's been two weeks since I opened the shop. TWO WEEKS!!!  I've still been working away, dyeing up some pretty yarns -- really I have! --  and to prove it, here's a shop update!

I've added two yummy new colors of BonBon Bamboo Merino:

Here's Cerises:



Every girl needs a good red, don't you think? This red is deep and sassy and French. I don't know. Something about her reminds me of the perfect red lipstick. Can't you just picture lacy knee-highs?  OOOH! OR a clapotis to toss around your neck and pout as you sip your coffee?

Here's Brulee, Cerises' more demure cousin. Rich chocolate and caramel browns are only a bit more subdued. She's still shimmery.



I've also added two skeins of handspun. Here's Hey There, Cupcake!



They are approximately worsted weight -- the front skein is 147 yards and has reds and pinks dominating, and the back skein is 152 yards, with more browns and blues. This is spun from Brown Sheep Superwash wool roving, and I really think would make the most splendid cabled hat and scarf set. OR a sweet BSJ for a toddler.

Enjoy!

Happy (Belated) Thanksgiving!

I'm spending today recovering from a two day Thanksgiving cooking marathon. Don't get me wrong -- I love to cook, and cooking for fourteen people for my favorite holiday was a blast. Still, cooking for fourteen people for two days straight is exhausting. But dinner was delicious, the company was delightful, and now we have days and days of leftovers to enjoy.

Since I disappeared for two days, I have lots of yarn and fiber to share! First up is the Spumone superwash top, now spun into a bulky-ish 2-ply.

I knew this top just needed to be spun to show its ice-creamy, fluffy texture. This yarn is so soft and lofty. AND, since it's superwash, it's perfect for baby things!

I also dyed some Columbia-Dorset blend top. This top is reasonably soft, but not as next-to-the-skin soft feeling as, say, BFL, or even the superwash. I'm going to spin her up tonight and see how she feels.

This is Lily -- a soft, pretty blend of yellows and turquoise and oranges. She's named for sister's daughter, my niece, Lily Ryan McBroom who, despite being a quarter Japanese on her mom's side, has white blonde hair and the biggest blues you've ever seen.

See?

I also photographed two 8-ounce lots of fiber that I dyed at Yarn School back in April.

This is Ice Cream. Handpainted Corriedale top. See why I named this blog Wool Candy? I've been obsessed with turning my favorite sweets and snacks into yarn and fiber for ages. Mmm... Ice cream... We used Jacquard Acid Dyes at yarn school, and I now use Sabraset Acid Dyes... I think it's going to take some doing to try and recreate this. There won't ever be another quite like her. Soft and fluffy, I think she'll make a lovely hat or scarf.