Great Christmas gift ideas for knitters

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As Christmas quickly approaches (why does time seem to speed up as we get into November?), it is time to start thinking of what to buy as gifts or what to tell people you want for Christmas.  We have some great items that you can add to your list.

Knitter’s Pride has a great new interchangeable needle kit in the karbonz needles called “Box of Joy”.  There are 9 sizes of needle tips and 4 cords as well as end caps, keys and connectors and a bonus Azure Charm Shawl Pin.  The Karbonz needles are a made of a high tech carbon fibre and have nickel-plated brass tips.  They are warm to the touch and are light with nice tips Th Box of Joy comes in a beautiful box to store all the tips, cords and accessories. You will never be without the correct circular needle size and you can use them with other Knitter’s Pride interchangeable needle tips and cables.

From Hiya Hiya, we have a great knitter’s accessory kit.  They come with all the accessories you might need for knitting – stich holders, stitch markers, point protectors, needle gauge, puppy snips, measuring tape – and it comes with a small small project bag.

If you have ever had your project fall off of your double pointed needles while it was in your knitting bag, double pointed needles tubes are the answer.  They slide over the ends of your needles and keep your project from falling off the needles. They come in sets of 3 tubes, one for storing your double pointed needles and 2 for use with your works in progress.

The new Bergere de France Creations 13/14 has over 150 patterns from baby projects to women’s sweaters to items for the home.  It is a great value for under $20.

If you are still not sure what the knitter in your life might want, we have gift certificates so they can choose whatever they want.

Christmas Open House

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Well here we are again and it is time for our annual Christmas Open House.  If you haven’t ever been to our Christmas Open House, you have to come in and see the store at it’s finest – all decorated up for Christmas.  With all the twinkling lights and hundreds of ornaments all hung from the ceiling with care, it is a sight to behold. Christmas Open House is on Wednesday November 6, from 7 pm to 10 pm. Come in and see the full effect of the Christmas lights and get inspired to get those Christmas presents knit or pick a few ornaments or gifts.

In addition to being all gussied up for Christmas, we will be holding a draw for a basket of some lovely yarn.  What a great early Christmas present to start the season.  There will be select yarns on sale so come in and take advantage of our sale to pick up yarn for that special someone for Christmas (yourself maybe?).

We are working hard right now to get the store decorated and ready for the Open House and hope you will join us on Wednesday November 6 from 7 to 10 pm.

Almost September

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Can  you believe it is almost time for a new school year to start?  The summer seems to have flown by so quickly.  It is an exciting time of year – new books, new classes, new experiences, new yarn.  That’s right- time for all the new yarns to come out and we can try out all the new textures and colours.  We have had a few new yarns and books arrive in August, but September really is when all the new yarns should be available.  The new Creations 13/14 is in store already and I have already had a few customers come in to get yarn for projects from the design book.  We have some of the new Berroco Boboli Lace in stock but more will be coming.  We are expecting another shipment of Madeline Tosh any day now.   I have ordered some new sock yarns too from other companies as well.  The fall Debbie Bliss magazine should be in store sometime this week.  All these new things are so exciting!

September is a good time to start working on projects that you want to give as Christmas presents.  I know that seems like a long way away but how long ago does June seem?  Think how good you will feel if you have all your Christmas projects done so you can actually enjoy the Christmas season.  Every year I say I am going to start early so there isn’t the mad rush in December so maybe this will be the year I actually am prepared.  Let’s try and be good and stick to our plan.  Whether it is socks ( we will have the ready-made socks available again for those who want to cheat a little) or a sweater or a pretty shawl come in and see what we have for you project and let’s get knitting!

European Yarn Shopping

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I just got back from Europe with stops in Scotland, Germany and France.  While there, I tried to visit some local yarn shops and see what they have that is different from what we have here.

Our first stop was in Glasgow.  I was travelling with my choir, Chorus Niagara, and we were singing with the Bearsden Choir in the 850 year old Paisley Abbey.  So between sight seeing and choir rehearsals, I was able to get to The Yarn Cake.  My husband is also in the choir so he, along with another friend from the choir, made the trek out to see a local yarn store after a visit to the Botanical Gardens.  The Yarn Cake is a small shop but very friendly.  They had some yarn from a local mill called Lanark Mills which I bought in 5 different colours to make hats for everyone in the family.  It looks like a beautiful aran weight wool. I also picked up some Drops sock yarn in a pretty blue combo. Even our friend Chuck enjoyed the visit to the Yarn Cake.

Next stop was Inverness.  We only had a couple days in Inverness so most of it was choir related activites with a little bit of time to get a quick look around the city.  I wasn`t able to visit a yarn store but I did get to go to James Pringles Weavers of Inverness.  We picked up some beautiful scarves for our kids and for a friend.  My husband almost got a Harris tweed jacket but unfortunately they didn`t have his size in stock.

From there we travelled to Germany.  We stayed with friends in Ochsenburg.  We toured the Residenz, checked out some old churches and drank wine on the Alte Mainbrucke in nearby Wurzburg.  We went to a bratwurst festival with an oompah band for dinner and spent an afternoon in Rothenberg.  No yarn stores in that part of Germany but once we got to Munich we happened upon a beautiful modern yarn store near our hotel.  Everything was so well organized and on white shelving. It was called Wolle Rodel.  It is a chain of yarn stores found throughout Germany.  Most of the yarn is commercial brands, no hand dyed or indie yarns.  I really wanted something that I cannot get here.  Space in my suitcase was at a premium so no frivolous purchases.  After all I still had Paris to think about.

Fall Preview

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This weekend I got to go check out what is new for this fall.  I saw some really nice new things and some great new colours and a few things i am not sure what you would do with them.

King Cole has some great new colours in their Splash DK which some of you may have seen in the store.  I have a little rolled brim hat knit up in the store in purple.  They also have a great new tweed DK yarn called Country Tweed DK that is an acrylic and wool mix baby yarn with a great tweed look.  There is a polar fleese yarn that looks like strips of polar fleece and oh so soft that would be great for blankets

Baby Bunting  There is also a new big chunky yarn that is for baby blankets and the pattern comes on the back of the ball label.  More of my customers are looking for big chunky yarn for baby blankets so this will be great for that.  It is knit on 9 mm needles so it will go fast.

There are two British yarns that are now going to be available in Canada, Baa,Ram Ewe and West Yorkshire Spinners.  Both of these companies supply high quality wool yarns with Bluefaced Leicester being a large component.

Katia has some new unique yarns including one that looks like it could be used to make a pot scrubber or whisk.  They have a new sock yarn as well.  Diamond has come out with their own new sock yarn which is a bargain at $8.99 for a 100 gm ball.

Of course Debbie Bliss has some new colours as do Noro and Sirdar.  Some of the new colours are really bright.

On the needle front, Knitter’s Pride is coming out with larger sizes in their Carbonz needles.  Carbonz are made of a light weight carbon material with a nickel-plated brass tip.  The carbon fibre is very smooth so the yarn moves easily along the needle.  It is warm to the touch and has good flexiblity so it is easy on the hands. The Knitter’s Pride needles all have great tips on them so they are great for lace knitting as well as straight knitting..

We will have to wait until late summer, early fall for most of this to arrive but we do have a few of the Carbonz in 3.5mm 24″ circulars in stock if you wanted to try them out.  So knit up what you have in your stash and come in and get some cotton or linen blends to knit for the summer and then you can stock up on some of the great new yarn when it arrives!

Assorted Knitting Things I Love

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Why do I love knitting?

I love all the beautiful colours in which yarns come.  Sometimes when I am walking around the yarn warehouse surrounded by thousands of balls of yarn of various colours and fibres it is just the colours of the yarn that call out to me.  Diamond yarn has a 100% silk lace weight yarn that the first time I saw it sitting on the warehouse shelf I knew I had to have it just for the colour.  It was a multicoloured blue, yellow and black that was just so striking. I didn’t know what I would do with it but I needed to have that yarn.  Luckily many of my customers agreed with me but I bet most of them had an idea what they would do with  it when they bought it.  I don’t need to know what I am going to do with I just need to have that colour.

I love all the different fibres that you can get.  The Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk Aran (unfortunately now discontinued, but we still have some in the store) is just so soft that I had to make something out of it.  It was the one when people asked for the softest yarn that  I directed them to.  Right now the Madeline Tosh sock for it’s colours and softness is one of my favourite yarns. It is 100% merino with a nice twist.

I love that sock yarn knits up magically into a pattern.  Sometimes you just have to keep knitting to see what will come up next.  People who don’t knit think you are so talented when it is really the yarn dyers who are so talented.

I love the click and feel of the needles as the yarn slides along them. A great pair of needles is essential to my knitting enjoyment.  The yarn has to move quickly and smoothly, no pushing or bunching allowed.  My needle of choice at the moment are Hiya Hiya circulars even when I am not knitting  in the round.  I like the short needle length that you get with a circular and that you can scrunch everything up onto the cable when you  want to put your project in a bag and not worry about the stitches falling off.

I love working on a pattern and seeing it slowly take shape.  I usually am impatient to finish the project so I can see how it will look but  I often stop and just look and feel the item I am working on and think this all started as a ball of yarn and now look at it. It seems almost magical the way the yarn twists and turns to make all the stitches in a pattern.

I also love that knitting requires you to sit down and just be.