New Page Added

You may or may not have noticed a new page showing up in the top menu. It’s the Stitches Library Page. I have decided to copy the instructions from some of the posts I wrote back in 2010 on various stitch patterns into downloadable pdf files and make them available in my new stitch library. So far there are only four: Elfin Lace, Trinity Stitch, Waffle Check, and Zig-Zag Eyelet.

I plan to add a new stitch pattern about once a month going forward. I will start with a couple from 2009, but after that I will be swatching new patterns. Please check back from time to time to see what is new. 🙂

Related Post

New Local Yarn ShopsNew Local Yarn Shops

I recently visited two new yarn shops that opened in my area.  They are both lovely shops and filled with some lovely yarns – some of which aren’t carried by the local yarn shop that has been the only shop in the city for a number of years. Each shop offers a different variety of yarns than the other, so I am hoping that both of them can be successful.  We certainly have a growing number of knitters in our community, so having new yarn shops is quite appealing.

ImagiKnit Yarn Shop is located in the Bel-Air Plaza at 120th and West Center Road, Suite 602, Omaha, NE. This shop does not have a website, but does have a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/ImagiKnit-Yarn-Shop/263171999129. The owner of this shop moved her business to Omaha from Hastings, NE.

Wooly Mammoth Yarn Shop is located in Rockbrook Shopping Center at 108th and West Center Rd, Omaha, NE. This shop also does not have a website, but does have a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Wooly-Mammoth-Yarn-Shop/150211221662670. The owners of this shop recently moved from Kearney, NE.

I’m sure the knitters in Hastings and Kearney miss having the shops in their towns, because they are both wonderful yarn shops and we are very lucky to have them here in Omaha.

Appealing, as well, are the yarns I purchased from both shops. (I couldn’t resist).

From Imagiknit, I purchased a skein of Smooshy fingering weight yarn from Dream in Color. The colorway is 2014 September and it just spoke to me of autumn.  It has this delightful mix of fall colors: reds, purples, golds, greens in various shades. See the swatch below

.Swatch with yarns

I also bought a skein of Fabjous Fibers Cheshire Cat in the colorway Off with Her Red – which blends perfectly with the Smooshy colors. I am using these yarns to knit a shawl using the Merlot pattern, which I purchased at Ravelry. This will be the topic of another post.

From Wooly Mammouth, I purchased 4 skeins of Addiction yarn by Claudia Hand Painted Yarns – also fingering weight yarn. I bought 2 skeins in the colorway Teal and 2 skeins in the colorway Prussian Soldiers. I plan to knit another two color shawl using these yarns, but I haven’t decided on a pattern yet. I like the Merlot pattern, so I may choose to do that again – but there are so, so many lovely shawl patterns in my queue…

If you are in Omaha: check out our new local yarn shops.  🙂

Update on SFSUpdate on SFS

SFS_HeelFlap2
I have finished the legs on my SFS regulation socks and knitted the heel flap.

Then I did the heel turn – which required some juggling. I slipped one sock heel onto a another circular needle while I knit the heel turn and then repeated the process for the second sock. This seemed easier than trying to knit the two heel turns with the same circular needle at the same time.

SFS_HeelTurn3

The real challenge was to pick up the gusset stitches and at one point I had 4 circular needles in use. But I was successful in picking up the gusset stitches on both sides of the heel.

Now on to knitting the gusset and switching back to larger needles about halfway through.