sorting embroidery threads

I'm finally done sorting embroidery threads

and I adore them. 

I dreamt of such a collection for years but at £0.99 per skein I simply couldn't afford anything of the sort. Then on my last holiday I saw them for sale at $0.40 per skein! (that's £0.25 each) and I pounced - how could I not?! I also picked up plastic bobbins and floss number stickers while at it.

I initially thought I'd buy embroidery floss as and when required but only did that twice before it dawned on me how unsatisfactory going about things that way would be. After my frenzied buying shopping experience I did wonder about something: DMC is French. Their floss is made in France. France is across the Channel, a mere swim away. So you'd forgive my confusion over why they are FOUR TIMES more expensive here! They look the same, feel the same, in fact I'd go as far as saying they are identical to what's available here except for this little detail on the wrapper

Surely it doesn't boil down to economies of scale and taxes alone? Someone please tell me there's more to it than that.

Ahem, rant over.

I could do with more purples.

My next blogpost will have more details (possibly pictures) of the give-away. At present, I am swamped and a little under the weather and so these things are taking longer than they should. But tonight is date night and that ALWAYS makes me happy. I'm about to get gussied up for dinner and a movie (thanks Orange Wednesdays!). I dunno what S and I are watching tonight; we tend to go with whatever starts when we get there provided it looks vaguely engaging. This has worked out for us so far; as a matter of fact, I can't recall the last crappy film I saw on the big screen. Hmmm, I'll have a think about that one.

stay tuned

I've been a busy little bee. I have finally made good on all that talk about much smaller needles. When I first attempted embroidery, just over 2 years ago (not counting school), I tried a random assortment of stitches without an actual project in mind. It began with me digging out some floss which I'd picked up from the charity shop I wander into while waiting for my prescription to be filled, and a hoop I got from heaven knows where. My initial attempts were unsatisfactory. and painful. 

But I wasn't to be so easily beaten. I decided what I needed was inspiration. And a plan. The first part of which was to brush up on the subject

Once I'd acquired and pored over my collection of books I was ready to dive in. 

So I did

Then yesterday I cracked French knots 

and now, I can't get enough of them. 

These little pieces are destined for simple project bags which, of course, I will show just as soon as they are ready. In the meantime, I'm almost ready for my first EVER blog giveaway! Yes folks, you read that right. 

a 

honking 

big

giveaway.

Just because! 

And the best thing is that you don't have to do a thing! All 53 members and 798 commenters are automatically entered - think of it as a thank you from me. I'm yet to iron out the details but stay tuned - it's gonna be lovely. 

soap felting revisited

Following comments on the felted soap post, I decided to give it another go. I'm still surprised by how easy it is to hand felt soap.

Below is everything I used

{a bowl with warm water, dishwashing soap, the soap you're felting, combed fleece and a hand towel}

I pulled several thin layers of wool from my fleece; the thinner the better.

Then wrapped these thin strips around my soap in all directions (north to south, east to west, northeast to southwest and so on)

I initially didn't wrap each layer as snug as I should have and ended up with "80's hair"

{what not to do}

So I took the layers off and re-wrapped the fleece around the bar snuggly. I did this to avoid too much movement of the layers while felting.

Next, I treated my bar of soap to a few drops of water

Then lathered up both hands with the washing up liquid

and began rubbing my fleeced bar in little circles, always in the same direction! 

Once the fleece stopped sliding about so much, I began rubbing more vigorously with both hands and in one direction. rubbing in many directions will "mess up" the smooth layers and you don't want that.

{just keep rubbing, just keep rubbing, just keep rubbing, rubbing, rubbing}

After a short while (honestly) I got my bar or felted soap.

Oh, if you find you're getting little knobbly bits, you've over-felted and if you've got movement between layers you're not there yet - keep on rubbing!

And there you have it, told you it was easy! 

I can't wait to try my hand at lots more, including:

•  lots of colours
• more streaking 
• needle felted soap 

 So, is this something you'd try?

anything yellowish

If asked, I'd tell you my favourite colours are turquoise, pinky-purple, grey, green (not grass nor British racing green but chartreuse, olive, lime etc.), I wouldn't say no to blue or black, wouldn't turn my nose up at red and I could go on. But I'd be lying.

Without a doubt my favourite colour is yellow in all it's gaudy glory; golds, mustards, daffodils, sunflowers, browns,...Of course I've always been partial to the colour but was made aware of the degree of my partiality earlier this week by Sarah pointing out that I returned from my holidays with 5 very different yarns that are all the same colour!

Really? Surely not. 

To get to the bottom of this, I pulled out all remotely yellow skeins in my stash and took a picture. I'll let you be the judge.

Hmmm, the girl might have a point. 

But what am I to do? If I'm drawn to it, I'm drawn to it and there's nothing wrong with that. Or is there? Did I mention that I don't even wear these colours particularly well? Ah, I left out that little detail, didn't I? Yes, well there you have it. This discussion came about because I may or may not have declared I wouldn't return from my holidays with the usual suspects i.e. anything yellowish. So what did I return with? That would be 5 skeins which are pretty close on the colour spectrum! But I did get other yarns too.

I know I am not alone here. Some folks REALLY love grey (here's looking at you, mooncalf) others (like jenny) gravitate towards purple and believe it or not there's even some folks (o.k. maybe just one) that REALLY like orange (*coughs* nicola). 

Now I'm done pointing fingers, I ask: 

1. if your stash (and if you don't have a stash then your wardrobe/walls...) had to consist of just one colour, which would it be? 
2. What is the most frequently occurring (the mode) colour in your stash (your wardrobe/walls...) right now? 
3. if you do have a favourite colour, do you find you have to consciously decide to buy other colours or are you an equal opportunity colour lover that just happens to have one fave? (like me) 

saltaire makers' fair

Last weekend was a good one. On Saturday, S and I caught the train to 

I was very keen on the 

while S just wanted to check out the town and the reason for its world heritage status.

Saltaire is a Victorian model village in West Yorkshire which got its name by combining the founder's last name (Salt) and the name of the river that runs through it (Aire). Originally built as a textile mill, the buildings now house galleries, restaurants, shops and offices.

{back something or other road}

I thought it lovely, with houses of Yorkshire stone and rolling hills in the background, this (the bits near the station anyway) is a typically pretty Yorkshire setting.

The Saltaire Makers' Fair was packed with truly interesting artisans and their wares. There was jewellery, pottery, wood work, handmade books, letterpress prints and stationery, upcycled and recycled goods, lots of fibre arts - bags, blankets, brooches, stuffies...eye-candy galore! 

The first stand of the day was

{Dear Emma's chock full of hand made cuteness}

{Hugh Leishman woodturner had the most beautiful bowls and boards}

{Print for love of wood and founder Jacqui - who is a lot of fun.
I had a go on her  table top press and look forward to her workshops}

{Blueberry Park}

{Lindsay Thomas' pieces on offer}

{Kate Bowles' hand bound books}

{Tree Fall}

{Button Boudoir with the sweetest vintage purses}

{Debbie the illustrator}

{Ditsy Bird Designs}

There were a lot of other stalls including a handful I'd like to have shown you but felt the owners were uncomfortable with their wares and themselves being photographed, so I moved on. 

As a crafter of many vices (paper, fabric, yarn...), this sort of fair is of interest to me, I felt like a kid in a candy store. The whole day reminded me of craft fairs where I set up table to sell my handmade books and as my arsenal of hand-making grows, I hope to do this again. These fairs are the perfect place to buy handmade, one-of-a-kind Christmas (or any other) presents for your lovelies. The quality of goods was high. This was pleasantly surprising because the only other craft fairs I'd attended (in the UK) were run by and for college students where the quality left a lot to be desired. If the Saltaire Makers' Fair is anything to go by, I predict I'll be spending weekends buying unique, beautifully made things for myself and my home. 

British Wool Week

Last Saturday, Sarah and I headed over to The Great Yorkshire Showground in Harrogate to check out British Wool Weekend.

There were a number of stalls of which my favourites were

who sold the prettiest buttons including some made out of Liberty Tana Lawn fabric

and the other stall with wares that tempted me was 

{Oliver Twists}

And their sacks of beautifully dyed silks

To be honest, I was not impressed with the wool side of things. 

Well, except maybe this

{woollen coffin by Natural Legacy} 

Yeah, that was novel.

And morbid. 

Fortunately, The Great Northern Needlecraft/Quilt Show was on next door so I tootled over and was rather pleasantly surprised, not just by the quality but also the quantity and variety of quilts on display. 

And in the marketplace I found Oliver Twists again. 

{can you tell I really like their stuff? must be the colours}

Though tempted by a lot of things for sale, I walked away with nothing but a handful of buttons which I bought at the Textile Garden. 

What I did do was ask other stall owners whose wares I was interested in whether they would be at the Knitting and Stitching show later in the year. They all said yes which is excellent as this should give me enough time to sort through my fabric stash and decide on colours I want to build on - purple comes to mind.

While out with Lou in York yesterday, I was pleased to see high street stores supporting Wool Week.

To celebrate Wool Week I've jump started my Christmas hat-knitting-marathon. How are you celebrating wool week?

The Purple Purl

The final stop on our tour of yarn stores on Toronto's Queen Street is

The Purple Purl, a yarn shop and cafe which carries knitting and crochet notions, books & patterns and of course yarns "with lots of Canadian content". 

"But how do you know which yarns are Canadian?", you ask.

Oh, you can't miss them, beside relevant skeins are tiny Canadian flags. 

This I thought was cute.

{Jennifer at work}

On my visit, I chatted with Jennifer (one of two owners) who told me about the Knitty Yarn Roundtable, a monthly event organised by Amy Singer (editor of Knitty) which is held at The Purl (as it's known to regulars).

The idea behind Knitty Yarn Roundtable is to give knitters more information than is given on the ball band. On Roundtable evenings, 5 tables of up to 6 people are set up and each knitter spends 15 minutes knitting with 5 different yarns. Their overall impressions of these yarns are tallied and the results published in Knitty. Only those yarns with positive reviews make the cut so if you see a yarn on Knitty,  know that 30 knitters have deemed it Knitty worthy. Jennifer also mentioned that this event is held once a month for 9-10 months of the year and is always a full house at The Purl. Though I have it on good authority that their knit nights are pretty packed too.

I thoroughly enjoyed chatting with Jennifer and my visit to The Purl, another lovely yarn store in Toronto. 

I hope you've enjoyed the mini adventure too.  

Lettuce Knit

Taking a brief detour a few blocks north of Queen Street is

Lettuce Knit, a yarn store in the Kensington Market neighbourhood of Toronto, stocks notions, magazines, books, spinning wheels and a fine selection of yarns including Socks that Rock, Sweet Georgia, Viola and Indigodragonfly.

It so happened that the Wednesday on which I called by was the evening a surprise baby shower was thrown for Jen, a regular.

{Jen and her baby blanket, Megan (owner of Lettuce Knit)
and Stephanie Pearl McPhee (the yarn harlot)}

Hands down, knitters throw the best baby showers. In addition to lovely hand knitted gifts for Jen there were lots of yummy brownies, cake and buttons/pins (thanks Kim!) for everyone else.

In my opinion, the funnest gift of the night was the mermaid pants Natalie knit. All because when the baby-to-be's older sister was asked what she thought the baby would be she replied, "mermaid". And as Natalie isn't one to disappoint the little 'uns...

Oh, and I met Keri, a fellow "blog hubber" (among other magnificent things)

{a slightly overexposed harleagh (sorry. bad, bad camera)}

she was a lot of fun. As was everyone else I met and chatted with that evening. 

That Wednesday was also the night of a BIG thunderstorm that trapped me in Lettuce Knit with innocents unaware of my...aversion (? let's go with aversion) to lightning and thunder. I screamed like a banshee all the while putting off dreading my walk back to my bed. Thankfully, Elisabeth (who was also responsible for the yummy brownies) gave me a lift, otherwise I might've had to camp in the store, which, let's face it, isn't the worst place to spend a night.

{knitting outdoors before the thunderstorm drove us all in}