The Needle Bug

Posted on February 22, 2012 by cary

Last week Anne and I headed down to Montgomery, to the Needle Bug in Montgomery.  I don’t know if you are familiar with the Needle Bug, but if not - you should be!  It is located on Vaughn Road, not far from the interstate at all.  It is a wonderful, cozy shop that is full of gorgeous canvases, threads, notions, and more!  Even if you aren’t a needlepointer, the Needle Bug is a charming store with friendly faces and beauty all around.
…And, the BEST part: they are coming here this Saturday (Feb. 25)!  Leigh will be bringing lots of canvases, samples of stitched pieces,and will demonstrate basic needlepoint!  Please come by!!  The canvases are beautiful.  They plan to be here 10-3.

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Talented Friends

Posted on February 21, 2012 by cary

One of the many joys of my job is getting to see what all the creative people around me are making!  I love it when people are excited so show off their F.O.’s (finished objects), because we all inspire each other!

Here is an amazing hat Brandy just finished:

Isn’t it awesome?  (In case you’re wondering, the pattern is “Dual Cable Hat” by Marlaina Bird, for sale on Ravelry or here in the store!)  Here’s a quick close-up, because that two-colored cable is too great to not look at a bit more…

Recently, Anne taught a super fun needle felting class.  The couple who took it created these wonderful pals:

The sweater class just wrapped up last week, too, and five wonderful people have new sweaters!  All this knitting and productivity has made me completely crazy to knit, myself, so after finishing my sweater (to the right.  Pattern: Aidez.  Yarn: Peruvia Quick – available here at Yarnhouse Studio), I’ve been participating in the Great Cowl Knitalong.  This is my first multi-project knitalong, and I’ve been having a lot of fun!

Anyway, here’s hoping that you’re finding inspiration in your world.  Have a great day!

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Cupcakes and Art Shows

Posted on December 7, 2011 by cary

I have two topics I’ve been wanting to share about.  First, you will not believe the cuteness that came through our door a few weeks ago!  CHECK THESE OUT:

Knitting Cupcakes

These extremely creative and beautifully executed cupcakes were a surprise from the ladies over at Venable’s Sweet Shoppe – just around the block!  We were amazed and totally bowled over.  Martha and Malisa did a great, great job, and we loved them!!  I look forward to ordering some for an event one of these days.  For your viewing pleasure, here’s one more picture.  Isn’t the ‘knitting’ amazing?!?!

Ok, topic #2:  Art with Annie Greene!  We had a wonderful art show and reception last month with Mrs. Annie Greene.  She brought many of her ‘yarn paintings’, along with books and postcards.

Mrs. Greene gave a fascinating talk about her process, both of coming to this art form, and of how she actually accomplishes her work.  We highly appreciated everyone who attended, and we look forward to our next art show!

Well, for now, I’m off to finish a scarf I’m making!  :)

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Try, try again

Posted on September 21, 2011 by cary

Wowzers!  It’s been a long time since I have made a blog post.  Well, there’s been plenty going on here!  We had our August Spin-In, (pics of that yarn coming soon!), college football got started (this is big news in these parts), we’ve had lots of classes, and Anne went to Texas for a week!

I’ve been knitting lots of things.  I’ve recently started on a new hat for a store sample (here’s the picture from the pattern):

Whoo!  One of our customers made this and we loved it so much!  So, soon we’ll have it here for you to see yourself.

I also made a pattern called Strobilus from the Interweave Knits Fall 2011 Magazine.  Again, here’s the picture from the pattern:

I really need to take more pictures with my own camera.  :)  Actually, currently my camera battery is dead and I can’t find my charger.  That’s slowing me down a bit…

BUT, before it died, I did take some pictures of the shawl I started and then took out, and started again!  Here is the pattern picture:

Isn’t that a cool pattern?  You can’t see it perfectly, but the lines are small and close together on the left of that picture, and they go out and get further and further from each other as they go towards what ends up being the top of the shawl.  It’s called “Different Lines”, and it’s by Veera Valimaki.  Anyway, at first I picked out these two colors:

Now, I have seen these two colors knitted up together in highly successful ways.  Sometimes they are amazing!!  One is called “Turner”, and one is called “Eggplant”.  However, of course one of the things that makes Malabrigo yarns so special is that they are all hand-dyed.  So, there are variations!  And the skeins of Turner that I got have a good bit of darker hues, while the Eggplant is not as saturated as some other I’ve seen.  So, when I knit them up, there was just NOT enough contrast.  Here are two pictures:

Yeah… that wasn’t going to work.  So, I took it all out, and decided to try these colors:

It is going MUCH better.  This blue is so deep, and I love it so much.  In fact, while brainstorming about which yarns to combine on round 2, I found so many things I wanted to combine with this blue.

I’ll post some finished pics soon!

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The Finishing Days

Posted on August 17, 2011 by cary

You know how there are days (weeks? months?) where it feels like your projects just keep going and going and you feel like you never ‘finish’ anything?  Well, we’ve had plenty of those days around here.  But lately, we’ve had a spurt of finishing!  It’s so nice to balance out the Days of Discouragement with Finishing Days!  I thought I’d post some pictures to share what we’ve been up to.

Here’s the ‘store sample’ sock, knitted with Berroco Sox!  Isn’t it happy?

Here we have Cary’s bag.  It has a very simple construction, and I’m very happy with it because I love the fabric so much!  I’m carrying it around with me everywhere.

One of our wonderful customers, Pat, knitted this gorgeous hat after taking our Entelac Knitting class a couple of weeks ago!  She did a wonderful job, and picture doesn’t quite capture the richness of the colors of the hat. Here’s a close up:

I knitted this hat with handspun alpaca/silk roving.  I love it!!

…And lastly, Anne sewed this gorgeous bag with some of the fabrics from the store.  Isn’t it great??  This is another store sample. Take a look at the matching inside lining fabric:

So cute!  Well, I’ve started a new project from Interweave Knits Fall 11 – a shell/sleeveless shirt that I’m curiously obsessed with knitting.  I hope it will go quickly so I can post some pictures of it, soon!  Also, Anne is just about done with her gorgeous woven shawl.  It’s off the loom, as of this morning!!  New pictures will be posted soon, I’m sure…

I hope some of you have some finishing of your own to celebrate!  We’d love to see what you’ve done.  Maybe you can post it to our group on Ravelry? Or bring it in and show us in person!!  See you soon ~ Cary

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Wet Felting Fun

Posted on July 20, 2011 by cary

I’m sitting here on rainy day while Anne is out of town and I’m reflecting on what I want this store to be.  My primary goal is that it be a place for people to feel welcome and where people want to be.  I hope this is a friendly, safe, comfortable place where people can be themselves and express themselves through fiber (or just conversation, if you aren’t fiber-inclined!).  The Wet Felting class we had here last Thursday seemed to encompass a lot of my goals for the store; it seemed like the participants had a great time and were really happy with their bowls.  Each one was so different and beautiful.  I put a few pictures from the class in our newsletter, but I have so many more good ones!  So, I’m going to put many of the pictures here.

The Worktable

Anne had all the supplies ready to go, so after the participants arrived and after introductions, they got to it!  First everyone layered the fibers to be felted together.  This part of the process looked so wild!

Layering fibers prior to felting

We had some visitors come to the store during this part of the process and I don’t think they quite knew what to think when they saw this…Then came the agitation part of the process.

Workin' it.

Getting very close!

And after a different level of agitation (I missed pictures of this phase)… The bowls were formed!  Look at these beauties:Aren’t they amazing!!  Good job to all who came.  If you missed out on this fun and wish you hadn’t, let us know and we’ll schedule another class!  Last week we also hosted our first private party one night after we closed.  If you ever want to get a group of just your friends to get together for a ‘girl’s night’ or a specific celebration during which we have a class like this or something else, just let us know!  We’d love to host you.  We have a kitchen, so a BYOB (yes, including wine!) and food event is entirely do-able!

Well, regardless of all that, I hope you enjoyed the pictures!   And I hope we’ll see you soon.  We’ve really been enjoying getting to know those of you who we’ve been able to get to know a bit.

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Weaving at Yarnhouse Studio

Posted on June 28, 2011 by cary

There has been a lot of activity over at Yarnhouse Studio lately.  This last Saturday was a beehive of creating, and I have pictures to share!  Amusingly, I did not get pictures of our first Spin-In!  That’s what I was doing.  We had a great day of spinning, with people dropping by and spinning between 10 and 4, solid!  I was tired, but very, very happily so.  We’ll be having a Spin-In every 4th Saturday, so mark your calendars for July 23rd!

While we were spinning away in the front, the weavers were working away in the back.  That’s where my camera lens focused, once it was inspired by Penny finishing her first woven masterpiece!  Look how beautiful it is.

Here are a couple more pictures:

Penny really did a great job.  Can you believe that was her first weaving??

The other weavers were busy too!  Here is Anne helping Penny tie off the fringe.

Anne was working on her own piece also.  I haven’t taken pictures of it yet, but man, oh, man!  It’s going to be gorgeous.

And here’s Tom, working on his amazing twill!

Check out this detail!!

W-O-W.

Well, that’s the update for today!   I hope everyone’s week is off to a great start!

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Action!

Posted on June 21, 2011 by cary

Hello, hello!  I had a wonderful Monday yesterday.  I went in to work for awhile and was super productive in the no-one-is-around-quiet.  I love being super productive!  This was good, because with all of the events lately (Fiberpalooza in Montgomery and Summer Nights Art walk in Auburn, in addition to classes and out of town visitors), I’d been feeling swamped!

Here are some interesting happenings at the store:

1.  I’m carrying Mama Mocha’s Coffee!  This is available by the pound, and is roasted just a few miles away in Auburn.  Sarah (Mama Mocha herself) roasts out of the Gnu’s Room bookstore and coffeeshop.  I am a big fan of coffee, and I am trying this out because I love drinking freshly roasted coffee from someone so local!  At the store we have a new ‘brew-through’ station set up.  This looks like this:

You can brew this wonderful coffee, by the cup, anytime (for free!).  So come get some!!

2.  New yarn!!  We just got in some delicious, hand-dyed fingering weight yarn from Fiberphile.  This is a small company based in Maine.  I love them!  Come see it!

3.  Are y’all familiar with the Tour de Fleece?  Here’s the description of this event which mirrors the Tour de France (from the Ravelry group):

“The concept is simple, They spin, we spin. A real spinning themed spin-along!

This year the Tour de Fleece starts Saturday July 2nd and runs until Sunday July 24th, 2011.

Guidelines (NOT RULES):

Spin every day the Tour rides, if possible. Saturday July 2nd through Sunday July 24th. Days of rest: Monday July 11th, Monday July 18th. (Just like the actual tour)

Spin something challenging Wednesday July 20th. (The Tour’s densest mountain stage with 5 mountain passes)

Take a button if you want one. Then we can use the button on our blogs in show of solidarity. Take it from here or grab a clean one from the flickr pool. Come join the flickr pool!

Wear yellow on Sunday July 24th to announce victory. Why not wear yellow on any day you feel particularly successful? (Yellow is the color of the race leader in the Tour – but here we are all ‘race leaders’)”

Well, I’ve been in a big ol’ spinning mood lately, and in that spirit, this sounds kind of fun!  This Saturday Yarnhouse Studio is having its first ‘Spin-In’, so if any of you are coming, think about whether you’re interested!  We could have a little local team, if you are interested.  Or, if not, I’ll join one of the ‘at large’ teams, and I’ll keep you posted!  :)

4.  Well, that’s all for today.  Yarnhouse Studio has all sorts of social media pages, so if you’re interested in keeping up with us that way, find us here: Facebook, Twitter, Ravelry, or joining our email newsletter (at the bottom of that page)!

~More soon!  -Cary

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Classes Galore

Posted on May 27, 2011 by cary

Wow.  Getting Yarnhouse Studio up and going has been such a fulfilling experience!  I have loved meeting all of you who’ve come in.  It’s my favorite part of the job!  My second favorite part of the job is making things.  I haven’t had a super large amount of time for that, but I’ve had some.  I made a cowl out of Malabrigo Rasta yarn which I LOVE.  Currently I’m working on a very, very sweet baby sweater also as a sample for the store.  I’m knitting it with Comfort Baby yarn and am so pleased with how great it’s knitting up!  I can’t wait for it to be done so I can hang it up for you to see.

If you would like to make something fun, we have a whole bunch of classes coming up!  I love it when other people can teach things, since I’m all kinds of busy these days.  So, being that my sister is coming to town and really wants to help out at the store… we’ve put a variety of classes on the calendar for her to teach!  This is a great chance to learn to make some of these cute projects while our guest teacher is in town!  Rebecca currently lives in Denver, CO, where she is working towards a graduate degree in Architecture.  With her background in graphic design, she has a wonderful eye for beauty and design.  Rebecca has been knitting and making jewelry since 2007, and she also stays busy designing the various papers, invitations and programs used by wedding planners.  Her newest hobby is sewing, and she will sell her needle cases and accessories through Yarnhouse Studio.

Here are some of the classes we have coming up:  Introduction to Crochet (taught by our very own Anne Sockwell, Saturday May 28 from 2-4 pm), Sock Knitting (Also taught by Anne, Tuesday May 31 from 6-8 PM), Potato Chip Scarf (taught by Rebecca, Wed. June 1 from 4-6 pm), Knitted Bangles (taught by Rebecca, Thurs. June 2 from 6-8 pm), Knitted Headbands (taught by Rebecca, Sat. June 4 from 1-3 pm), Market Bag (taught by Rebecca, Tues, June 7 from 10 am -12 pm).  Whew!  I’m sure you can find something you’d like to learn in there!  Each of the class pages linked here has additional information, such as skills to be taught in each class, fees, and often pictures.  Here’s a picture of the Knitted Bangles: Ooooh!  Aren’t they pretty?  Just think about the gifts you’d be able to go home able to make after the class!

In addition to the classes, we also have free regular knitting groups (really, these are not for knitting only!  All fiber arts welcome).  These are Thursday night, Friday morning, and Saturday morning.  All of these classes and events are visible on our calendar.

I have so many other things I could write about: Fiberpalooza coming up in Montgomery, the great people we’ve met at local fiber guilds, or the inkle loom weaving I’ve been experimenting with, but these will have to wait for another day!  For now, I just want to say that we’d love to see you Saturday either at our Sit & Knit group in the morning or learning to crochet in the afternoon!  Be there or be square.

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Opening Day!!

Posted on May 17, 2011 by cary

Hey y’all!  We had such a lovely, lovely opening day at Yarnhouse Studio.  It was full of visitors and friends, and we had a great time!  Thank you all for your support.

My wonderful friend came to take some pictures, and thanks to her I have some to share!  If you weren’t able to be there, take a little look-see and enjoy.  And if you were there: thanks again.  You made our day.

(You can click on the images to move to the next one if you’d like the slideshow to move a bit faster…)

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