I broke through the barrier and had an IRL extra-blog experience with Two Purls Jen on Friday. We met up in Grand Central and then made our way downtown to visit Purl Soho. They have a nice bright shop that is really friendly and has an interesting selection of yarns, some that I haven't seen before though perhaps I just missed them in the Seattle LYSs. I loved the feel of the bamboo yarns, and there were some really interesting linen and hemp yarns which probably would turn into something amazing given the chance. I picked up some yummy Classic Elite Lush in a rich red and soft yellow and it just seems the perfect thing for a hat and scarf combo. We were lucky to have a chance to meet Joelle Hoverson, Purl Soho owner and author of Last Minute Knitted Gifts, a recent addition to my knitting library.
Jen picked up a copy of a brand new book by Elizabeth Zimmerman, The Opinionated Knitter, that was compiled by her daughter. I had heard of Elizabeth Zimmerman, but perhaps only in passing, probably online mentions here and there. Jen filled me in on some of the intrigue as we took the subway down to our next destination, Seaport Yarn.
I didn't know the story about Seaport Yarn, that it was in an office space and not a shop at street level or anything. Jen and some of my other online knitting buddies had visited before though and Jen thought I should see it as well. Imagine an office space with multiple rooms and corridors, not a large office space but one where 20 people might work. Now imagine that there are only a few desks in there, reception and maybe another room or so. Imagine the corridors lined with shelves spilling over with yarn and the walls of a couple rooms likewise, a kaleidoscope of colors and textures. There were books and patterns and sale yarns and needles and lots of really amazing yarns. I contemplated all of the things I might make, and again there was linen yarn that was nudging me, but in the end I decided to get a few skeins of Silky Wool. The color of the Silky Wool I selected reminds me of the sea, not the Long Island Sound that I was out sailing on today but like the deep blue green of the Puget Sound. I look forward to playing with it. I just found this review of the yarn if you are interested to learn more about it...Knitter's Review: Yarn Profile:
Elsebeth Lavold Designer's Choice Silky Wool.
I grew up in the suburbs of New York, up north of the city so this visit was just for family and friends. I'm here until Monday evening and of course I brought knitting to work on. I cast on for a little fairisle cardigan of my own pattern while on the plane Wednesday night and I've been making reasonable progress on it.
I could have done stripes (if you look in my past projects you will see a fair number of stripes in my portfolio, but no this time it will be the fussier fairisle. I'm knitting using Lion Brand Microspun which is inexpensive, soft, and easy to care for. It was a quickie splurge when I was at the fabric store last week, just to keep my fingers working while on the road.
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