Colour Me Happy

DH dragged me to Purl Soho at their new premises (it wasn't exactly hard to get me there, but it was nice to know that he wanted to go too).

Would you look at the wall of wool? Please can I have one at home?!

It was huge, perfect, my home from home. Fabrics were at the back, and though I flirted with the idea of getting some, I managed to concentrate on yarn alone.

The staff were great, very helpful and it was all over a truly inspiring experience.

MY HAUL

Of course I broke my yarn-buying ban, but as Toad has already pointed out, it doesn't count when you're abroad. I'll take that.

Here's 7 skeins of Manos Wool Clasica in Tomato, destined for the Hourglass Sweater in what else, Last Minute Hand-knitted Gifts (Purl Soho's owner's book).

I couldn't resist a ball of Knit Collage in Cherry Blossom. I've seen photos of and read about this, and just had to give in to the urge. I may make a small cushion and back it in a floral fabric.

Can you see the little crocheted and fabric flowers that are attached, and little strands of silver. It's very girly and pretty, hand-spun of course.

I also picked up two little kits, the Japanese one for me and the penguin for my Mum. They should be fun to do (apologies again for the rotating photos).

Last of all, some little heart stitch-markers: aren't they sweet?

In Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia, I spotted my first ever knit grafitti:

And at the Frick in New York, this beautiful La Greuze painting, "The Wool Winder".

Stitch Markers: The Agony and the Ecstasy.

Yes, fellow knitterly friends, this week I lost my all-time favourite stitch-markers. Having searched the entire house and stash I finally concluded that I must have thrown them out with the old newspapers.

Trying to handle the pain of the loss, I took myself off to Stash on Thursday for the new Thursday Knit Night (it has changed from Monday nights since the merger with Socktopus) and took the opportunity to replenish my stock. However, imagine my sadness when I arrived at the counter where they normally keep the same version of my beautiful stitch-markers, to find that not only did they not have the same ones, but they had a different version, which were HARD PLASTIC. Obviously I still bought them (I needed some for a project and was coming around to the new colour scheme).

Here are the new little guys:

*** I have now abbreviated stitch-marker to SM - takes too long to type ***

By this stage, I've got to admit, I was loving the peach against the pinks, oranges and reds (yes, it's another Umbilical Cord Hat - below). However, I digress. Not wanting to be unfaithful to my original SM's, they just didn't quite compare. My original SM's were in the best purple and green shades you could imagine, and were rubber, which crucially meant that they didn't fall off the needles, roll away or get snapped. The new ones are alright (OK, now I really like the colours) but they're just not the same.

So imagine my ecstasy when I came across these:


Yes, this is the original set. I found them in my needle case, where I'd clearly been hiding them in case I lost them. Yes, the irony, I know. I'm sooo happy: now I have my favourites plus some new little guys to play around with (which have the added bonus of being much bigger, so will fit around larger needles.


Bear in mind that these are bog-standard SM's, nothing fancy. Furthermore, until this week, I also only had one set; I am not a collector/horader of beautiful and different SM's, like a lot of knitters. Then you will see that this dilemma I faced for a grand total of two days was indeed completely ridiculous. However, I'm admitting that, and I think admission is the first step towards recovery. It's just that the colour of an SM is really important; the way it looks against your knitting can really make the difference between loving that huge sweater and giving up half-way through. Fellow knitters, I know you'll understand.