Simply Socks Yarn Co. Blog

Flock Fibre Sock Sets

Happy Wednesday, all!

I've been adding special sock sets to the shop at your request. These full sized skeins paired with mini skeins are great for those of use who want to have contrasting toes and heels on our socks, or want to add a stripe or border of interest to a single-color shawlette. Last week, we introduced the four sets that Hedgehog Fibres made for us (at the end of this page), and today I have for you a selection of sets from Flock Fibre.

Happy Camper set

Kim dyes her yarn in her studio at the edge of the Canadian Rockies, and the Patina set is featured in the popular Coffee Talk sock pattern. Grocery Girls podcaster Tracie designed the pattern and it's a super way to use the Patina set or one of the 12 other color sets I have for you.

I also think a Sockhead Cowl or Hat would be fab with one of these sets, making thin (three row) stripes with the mini skein every three or so inches.

Photo courtesy of Tracie Millar

If you'd like to get full sized skeins with no minis, we have all those with even more colors in both Take a Hike sock yarn and Lone Pine singles. And, dang, are they all pretty. New color Wavelength especially speaks to me. Of course it does, as I'm constantly obsessed with aquas.

If you'd like the Derby Divas pattern that Casapinka designed to go with our 14th Anniversary summer sock sets, just e-mail me after your sock set purchase and I'll e-mail back the coupon code to use on Ravelry. It does expire in about a month, so once you get the code I recommend redeeming it.

More Stephen West Starflake KAL color ideas

In case you didn't get enough color inspiration for the Starflake KAL last Tuesday when I blogged about it, Rachael and I came up with more color ideas. Sometimes you fall down the rabbit hole and there's no escaping until you've exhausted every morsel of creativity that you have! Or at least until you have a day off and someone else puts away the 30-some skeins you have sitting around...

Hedgehog Fibres Sock in Plume and Kelp

Malabrigo Sock in Dis Fraz and Abril

Hedgehog Fibres Sock in Liebling and Pheasant

Malabrigo Sock in Fortaleza and Polar Morn above and Mask and Frank Ochre below

Hedgehog Fibres Sock in Echo and Cedar

Swift Yarns just sent us a new batch of Tweed Sock, so of course I couldn't resist putting together a few color combos in those. And if you aren't into tweed (Come on! Join in the craze with me!) then we do have these in Tender Sock or Bliss Sock (with cashmere).

Now, maybe you're not a mystery knitalong type of person. I have a hard enough time finishing a project before I lose interest (it's why I do small projects like socks) and I'm not one who likes to choose a project without knowing what's coming. But Stephen West has a great history with these types of KALs and I know that many of you find it invigorating to get hint after hint and see what's next. If you're in the mood for something unexpected and perhaps an increase in your knitting mojo, this might be for you. Plus you can do it along with others and meet new people. Do give it a try! And if this isn't a good time for you to start a new project, you can always join another mystery knitalong at another time. Joji Locatelli does them sometimes too, and they produce awesome patterns like this one.

Friday the 13th - Extra 13% off Sale Yarn!

Wow, what a busy week in the shop! You've all shown us great support with the Hedgehog Fibres Sock Sets, the Fall Knit Kit (I just added back a couple kits that were duplicate orders if you missed out and want to grab one!) and all the great yarn we've gotten in. We've been shipping as fast as possible so that you get your packages in a few short days and greatly appreciate this busy time. Thanks so much for an epic week!

Just for fun, I decided to offer 13% off on our already nicely discounted Sale Yarn section, just today, Friday the 13th.  To take advantage of this discount, simply enter Friday13 in the coupon code field on your cart page or the Check Out page. It will show the discount right away once you have something from the sale section in your cart. Cart page is best, right after adding your first item so you don't forget at the end. Again, you do have to enter the code to get the discount, and it's just on items in the Sale Yarn section and just for today. I think we've offered a discount on our online sale section just once before.... so it's a rare treat to get a discount on top of a discount.

Primrose Yarn's Sophia MCN in Martian Cupcake

If you're local and want to take advantage of this deal and you want to pick up in the store when we are open tomorrow, please do! Simply choose "in store pickup" as your shipping method and we'll hold your paid-for items in the shop as usual. We are not offering the discount tomorrow in the shop, so please order online today.

Thanks again for such a wonderfully busy week in the shop. It's just me and Lauren filling orders for you today- she's your shopper and I'm your shipper. I ship orders just few times a year (eight years ago I did it all, but thankfully I wised up and got a crew behind me now), so I have a feeling I set myself up here for a heck of a day, but I'm looking forward to the challenge! And I'm not leaving until I get all these ready for you. Woo hoo! Game on! Keep us busy! I may update you on our frenzied day on Insta....

SSYC's Fickle Fall Knit Kit is now available!

It's time to grab one of our Fickle Fall Knit Kits! Why "fickle fall?" Well, here in the Midwest the weather can't decide if it's summer or fall and the colors in this kit are equally undecided! There's rainbows on the bag, a host of colors on the skein.... and it's all so great together than my staff couldn't resist it either. Rachael and Heather both succumbed, and Lauren is the only hold out. And that's probably because she's been knitting these out of this fab new stuff. Skimmer Sock pattern free on Ravelry.

The inspiration for this kit is this amazing fabric. It features bikes with baskets full of yarn, rainbow socks hanging from yarn-bombed trees, and cursive knit and purl. It really couldn't be any more awesome.

Layla at Qing Fibre created this awesome Fickle colorway to go with the kit and we even have a handful of extra skeins for those that want more than one with their kit. Our kits with Qing Fibre always sell out the fastest, so please don't hesitate if you want the kit and extra skeins. We also have an amazing selection of Qing Fibre right now in the shop.

Want other goodies with it? How about these beautiful little scissors and a selection of locking stitch markers?

Get yours now. Adding one more Fickle skeins to your order will qualify you for free US shipping. Or you might want to check out all the Tosh we just received with color ideas for Stephen West's newest pattern.

Want something else that's spankin' new? We have Nettle Sock Yarn from Denmark and it replaces the nylon in sock yarn with a specially milled nettle fiber. It's soft and durable and the nettle fiber doesn't take the dye so it has a really nice heathered look. And it's all natural for those who want that instead of plastic/nylon.

I knit shorty socks and I did go down one needle size to get a dense fabric that will hold up to wear. Instead of the US 1.5 that I'm using for my Opal socks, I used a US 1. The yarn just seemed a bit thinner or perhaps just plied tighter, so I needed to go down a needle size to ensure tight fabric that will wear well. 

Manic Monday + Madelinetosh Starflake Shawl color ideas

This is definitely going to be a busy week here as have some marvelous things going out. First off, if you signed up for the Unlucky 13 Halloween Mini Sets, those are expected to arrive here late this week from Stitch Together (and we'll ship them right out to those who ordered them). And I may have a couple extra sets next week for those who missed out -listed later in the Kits & Clubs link. This week we'll also be shipping out the first batch of preorders of our advent with Hedgehog Fibres, the 12 Days of Sock Yarn Minis. I do believe we'll be opening up the second batch of orders next week and a possible third batch sometime before Thanksgiving. These advent sets are quite labor intensive and offering them in batches allows us to make it work on this scale. And tomorrow I'll be offering our Fickle Fall Knit Kit! You'll be able to find that at the Kits & Clubs link, midmorning EST on Sept. 10.

Want more yarn? We have that! Not only do we have more Madelinetosh than ever before (which I'll share more about below) we have some super cool things from Hedgehog Fibres. First, Beata is designing a sweater pattern and the draft is available here. You can choose your own colors, or take a look at the 5-skein Fades she just assembled for us in Sock and Skinny. These would be perfect for your sweater, and each one is unique!

For the first time, we have Hedgehog Fibres Sock Sets. These are potluck (one batch) colors from Hedgehog Fibres on their sock yarn paired with a mini skein. These are perfect for the Derby Diva pattern - if you want a free copy after your purchase, just e-mail a response to your e-mailed receipt asking for the code (it expires shortly). I have four color options for these sock sets. Stillwater and Perfectly Messy shown above and Hello Gourd-geous and Clever Sprite shown below. Oooooh, this pattern would be fab too!

For those who love Tosh, we have more than we've ever had before. And that's saying a lot! Madelinetosh takes up a large portion of the shop. As soon as you walk in the door, you walk into the largest selection of Tosh that you're likely to ever see in one place at one time. It's quite stunning to see over three hundred colors in seven different bases- wools, silk, cashmere, glitter... it's all there (come see it in person this Saturday!). And this time of year is the best because Madelinetosh sends us their limited edition Tosh Merino Light + Copper, a soft single ply yarn with just the right amount of copper sparkle. You can combine this in a project with Tosh Merino Light if you want just some sparkle and some parts without.

Are you considering knitting along with the newest Stephen West mystery shawl design? You have a month to grab your colors before the crazy popular yearly KAL begins, and we have the color sets you need to make a stunner of a project. For this Starflake Shawl, you need two colors of fingering weight yarn, two skeins of each color. Colors of high contrast are recommended so that the lines of the shawl show up well. We have put together some color ideas for you, and many of you have already started grabbing up your skeins. 

Some of these photos show Tosh Merino Light and some show Tosh Merino Light + (silver) Glitter. You can definitely combine those two bases if perhaps you want your Dark Ivy to have sparkle and your Bittersweet to be plain TML. You can also choose the Copper sparkle too.

Do you want to knit this with a plied yarn? Tosh Sock is 100% superwash merino and is two plies and is also the right weight for the KAL pattern.

I'll be sharing more color ideas for this KAL on Instagram later, as Rachael has gone a bit yarn-fume crazy assembling color ideas in Hedgehog Fibres and others. I don't blame her. If you want us to assemble you a special combo for this pattern and you like a particular color but don't know what to use as a contrast, just e-mail me at service@simplysockyarn.com and tell me what color ideas or skein you like and we can help you choose something to go with it.

Not into the idea of a mystery KAL? There are a lot of two-color patterns available Stripe Study and Phi are two of my faves. Kallara is also quite awesome and I just added Lovetta to my queue (shown below). Am thinking of using these. Or these. Darn it, I'm falling down a rabbit hole of my own creation....

Photo courtesy of Ambah O'Brien

Happy Monday, all! Please send good vibes our way and perhaps caffeine and thoughts of patience! I'm pretty sure we'll need it.

Fickle Fall Knit Kit, a preview

It's time to share the details of a kit I've been hinting at for awhile now. I've had a lot of feedback from just sharing the fabric for the bag, because DANG it's cute! It's a specially printed knitter's fabric that features cursive knit and purl as well as bikes and yarn bombed trees. I mean, this is just perfect inspiration for one of our Knit Kits, isn't it?

And the dyer to make the yarn for this is none other than Qing Fibre of London. Yep, Layla made the limited edition Fickle color just for us and this occasion and I was even able to get extra skeins should you want to add to your kit order and get two more skeins.

To top it off, I found a beautiful pair of small scissors to include and a handful of stitch markers. Just some little goodies to make your kit even more special.

This kit will go up for sale on Tuesday, September 10 and will list for right around $70. This is for the hand made bag that fits a 3-4 skein project, imported yarn, a set of scissors and markers. A super good deal.

Want to start getting your cart ready to get over the $100 free shipping mark? Well, adding a second skein of Fickle will get you there. Or consider one of the awesome new Madelinetosh skeins we have in stock. We got nearly a ton of their yarn in over the past week. I'll likely blog more about that on Monday, but it includes many discontinued colors that I asked them to dye again PLUS the limited edition Tosh Merino Light + Copper Glitter. This yarn debuted last fall, is available in limited quantities just this time of year, and then no more. And I have it specially priced below any of their other yarn.

Oh..... and these little beauties will be available soon. Four limited edition sock set options from Hedgehog Fibres. Yep.

Madelinetosh Pashmina + a contest

One of my jobs at my shop is photographing the yarn. My staff and I sort through the hand dyed skeins that arrive, choosing the two or three that best represent the skeins we received in that color, compare pictures with the previous one (most of the time solid blues just don't need new photos, you know?) and set them aside for photos. I then take all the pictures myself in indirect, natural light so that they are the truest I know how to produce. Sometimes there's a little color correction or fixing of shadows, then I add a watermark so that other shops are less likely to steal the photo I took- large and small stores alike steal our photos- one large online yarn shop and one new/small did do just that in the past few months (the small one closed before being open even a month). The larger shop simply just cut around our simplysockyarn.com watermark, and the smaller shop just posted the photo WITH our watermark. The gall, right? Thankfully, our loyal customers e-mail us when they see something shady going on, and I pass it along to my attorney. Your work and property is only worth something if you're willing to defend it.

Pashmina in Gosia

All this is to say that photographing yarn is a big job, but I really do like it. Especially when it's Madelinetosh's Pashmina. There's just something about the way the light bounces off the silk in the yarn that makes it glow. And if you think these pictures glow, then just imagine what it looks like in your project in person!

Pashmina in Ceremony

What kind of project would you make? What about a sweater like Vitamin D, Let it Fall or I See Spring? Or maybe a one-skein project like Zuzus Petals or Shaelyn? Maybe you're in the mood for a Stephen West design with three colors like Cafe Knitting? I'm considering putting together colors for a Celadon Shawl- I've already bought the pattern and you can even get 30% off the pattern from Ambah until Sept 8 by entering the coupon code "knitaugust" into your Ravelry cart (without quotes).

Celadon Shawl photo used with permission of Ambah

Want to win two skeins of Pashmina of your own? Just tell me in the comments below which color or two colors (one of each) you'd like from our current selection, and I'll randomly choose one winner who posts by noon EST on Sept 12. Perhaps you want two skeins that would work in your own Celadon, or maybe you want to knit a couple smaller projects. And please know that if you like one or two colors a lot and want us to build a Celadon in colors just for you, just email service@simplysockyarn.com. We help knitters every day come up with special color combos. We love being your personal shoppers!

End of Summer

Labor Day weekend typically marks the end of summer here in the Midwest. I took this long weekend to grill out and connect with friends and family, to knit and to work very little. It's was pretty near perfect.

I test knit a bit of the new line we'll have in the shop for you in a week. My crew also knit some up and I'll share photos of that soon too. The yarn is a really special blend of nettle fiber and merino wool imported from Onion Yarn of Denmark. We're still waiting on our order to clear Customs, but when it does, I'll get the yarn ready for you asap next week. It's really nice stuff, the nettle fiber gives it a heathered look, it has great stitch definition and seems soft yet durable. Thank you, Martha, for your recommendation on this stuff! It's definitely something new and fun.

Every couple years I try and get family photos taken and I wanted to share them with you again. Around this time two years ago, I posted those pictures and this year I marked off a bucket list item- having photos taken in a sunflower field by a local photographer. Oh my, how time flies. The last time we did family photos, Henry was still at home with me, James wasn't a preteen, and I was wondering what it would be like once both kids were in school. But a few things remain the same- we still can't keep a straight face, the boys wrestle wherever/whenever, and we really enjoy life together. We have a lot of love here.

I have an amazing partner, healthy and happy kids, and a busy life that may be hectic and sometimes nearly unmanageable, but I wouldn't change a thing. I'm in the sweet spot of life and I really appreciate it.

SSYC's 22nd Sock Yarn Club - Now Open!

Sign ups for our 22nd Sock Yarn Club are now open, and woah the response in one day is stunning! In just one day we've sold over 1/3 the spots. (Shipping is half price on the club through Friday, so order now to save $9!) Below are the details and if you have questions, please do feel free to leave those in the comments or e-mail me.

Back by popular demand is the Super Speckle Surprise Club, a combination of speckles and mini Knit Kits each month - only we've added one more dimension. This one is themed Wanderlust Edition - exotic travel, experiencing new places and things, and enjoying the unique contribution that artisans around the world will make just for you in this club.

Each "surprise" dyer is inspired by a landscape in her own country and uses a 100g skein of sock yarn as her canvas. Each skein comes with curated surprises as well. What are the surprises? Could be knitable, edible, adorable... who knows til you open your box? I will share that one of the surprises is a hand made, medium zippered project bag that fits a 2-3 skein project.
And as a token of my appreciation for your loyalty in supporting our creative endeavors, the cost of this club includes half price shipping for the first five days. This club is currently priced at $156, but will go back to the regular price of $165 on August 31.

I hope you'll join us on this journey around the world in three mini Knit Kits. It's a wonderful way to experience a bit of each dyer's home without leaving your own. You'll also enjoy getting three of our Knit Kits delivered automatically to your doorstep without stalking our website for their release and hoping to be able to snag one. Here's a hint- we have our Fall Knit Kit available in a couple weeks!

While we ask that you order clubs in a cart by themselves (you CAN add the Yarn Only option to your Club cart), if you do want to place a second order today for something else, perhaps take a look at the two new Opal Yarn Collections we have in stock: Rainforest 15 and Beautiful World. I'm starting on this color tonight!

You might also want to grab some Madelinetosh before the new prices go into effect as soon as a few days from now. Tosh raised their prices earlier this year, and we held off as long as we could before increasing the 5-10% on most of their lines. New fall colors will drop soon too, but at the new prices.

Joji's new Storm pattern and contest!

Joji Locatelli has released her newest pattern, Storm, which is a lovely one-skein pattern that will look great with any of those single, hand dyed skeins you've amassed, so we're celebrating with a contest!

Shawl photos used with permission of Joji Locatelli

Tell me in the comments below which color of Life in the Long Grass Silk/Merino or Malabrigo Mechita you'd choose to make this pattern and I'll give three lucky winners with their choice of color! 

LITLG Silk Merino in Harbour

We have nearly every color of Mechita right now, and the new Silk Merino from LITLG is just so amazing that even though it's not the Mechita called for in the pattern, I just can't imagine why you wouldn't want to use it. I mean, it's 50% silk! The drape and texture would be ah-maze-ing. If you do want to knit the exact shawl Joji did, we quickly sold out of the Storm color she used, but Malabrigo already has some on its way to us. You can preorder your skein now for it to ship in a week. If you order other items, they all ship at the same time in a week.

Storm makes great use of a skein as it uses a combo of dropped stitches (which are like knitting magic) and yarn overs to achieve a larger shawl than one would typically get out of one skein of yarn.

LITLG Silk Merino in Amethyst

Leave me one comment by noon EST on August 25 and I'll randomly choose three winners and e-mail them. Thanks for playing!

Free Back-to-School treats w/ purchase!

Yep, that's right! Free treats with your purchase!

Can I get a collective Yay! that our kids are all going back to school? I mean, I love hanging with my little dudes, but we've pretty much reached the point in the summer where they have officially had enough of each other and aren't being their best selves any more. And even if your kids are grown, you don't yet have any, or simply have no interest in little humans at all, I think you deserve a little back-to-school treat. So I've had Katrinkles design this little simplysockyarn.com ruler stitch marker to celebrate. These are not only cute, but are super useful in measuring your stitches per inch.

Purchases made online today through August 24 will see a little bag of stitch markers tucked inside their package. This will include one of these little ruler markers plus a smattering of these colorful hanging ones. Just my small way of saying thank you for helping us celebrate our 14th anniversary summer and generally just being super awesome people to me and my crew. And if you're a parent like me who tries to juggle all the things at once and sometimes just needs a little treat of her own, well, I see you and I hear you and I know what you're feeling. Sometimes just a little something extra is enough to bring a smile, am I right?

So go ahead and treat yourself to one of the new awesome things we have in the shop and get a little token to make you smile. You don't have to have a special code, or ask for it- just know that we will automatically tuck your stitch markers in your package before they leave here, as long as the order is placed August 20-24. Look closely in your shipment b/c the little package is just 2 inches. And if you want to mark your order as pickup in store, please do and then come see us to get it on one of our open days.

What might you like to purchase today? We have a really nicely stocked Sale Section right now with new colors of those Halo Bundles I blogged about. I've wound the Ruby set for myself. Perhaps you want to grab some Madelinetosh before their price increase? They have raised their prices 10-15% across the board a few months ago, so grab your stuff before you see that finally increase in our shop. I held of as long as I could. Want an import? Life in the Long Grass of Ireland has sent us amazing skeins including a new Silk Merino blend that is perfect for a luxurious shawl.

Are your kids going back to school? Or perhaps you are yourself? Please do share in the comments what this means for you and your life. For me, I've really enjoyed all the water time we've had this summer. As my kids get older, they are more adventurous and sure of themselves in water, and it means a lot more fun for pools and lakes and boating. Saying goodbye to that means more knitting time for me as the kids start sports and I get to sit in the bleachers "watching" soccer or basketball as I tink away with my latest sock. I hope to also have a time for a much needed pedicure. But that will have to wait, as (of course) I volunteered in the lunch room the first week back at school. I have to say, it's kind of fun being a lunch lady at school and seeing the kids and their friends for a few hours a month.

How about you? What does this time of year mean for your life?

Hand Maiden Halo Bundles

We are nearing the end of our 14th anniversary summer celebration.... but it's still not over! Not only will be doing a few more free gifts with purchases, we have a new batch of the Fleece Artist/Hand Maiden Halo Bundles that we offered last month in the Sale Section! 

Several of you purchased one or two for accessories, then realized how great this would be for sweaters and wanted more. But since the colors sold fast, you couldn't get more. Well, many of the colors are back and we have new colors making their way through Customs now. 

We will be getting one more batch of this in September, but after that we can't get it at the special price we were offered for our anniversary celebration. After this summer I can always special order it for you at regular price (slightly below $50 instead of $31.50) or see about offering it once in awhile. 

I do have a special sweater pattern to offer you for this yarn as well. I didn't have it earlier, so if you ordered this yarn with the first batch and want them now, just e-mail service@simplysockyarn.com and ask for the free pattern that goes with the Halo Bundles. You do need three bundles to make the sweater, so if you do want it, make sure to grab three. Or you could make a fuzzy pair of socks with the North of 49 socks. Or the Cheri Chevron pattern like I intend to.

Another special yarn to look out for soon? Madelinetosh's Tosh Merino Light + Copper. Once a year Tosh offers their sparkly Merino Light but with copper colored sparkles instead of the normal silver. This will arrive in early fall in dozens of colors.

We just received a stunner of a batch of Wonderland Yarns. I started carrying this line just a few years ago and each time I order the amount gets larger and larger.... and larger. I just can't help myself. They have such a great array of solids and multicolors, and their mini skein batches range from gradients to WILD. I love them all.

 

Something I think you'll appreciate as much as I do- new dyelots typically look the same as previous dyelots. As a yarn shop owner, this means that I don't have to retake new photos of everything that arrives, just things that look different. That's a HUGE time saver for me. For you, this is great because you may like something on Ravelry or something that a friend knit up in Mint Chocolate, shown above, but you know that with hand dyed yarn the skein you find might not look like the color someone else knit up. But in this case, it's very likely that if you saw the color somewhere, you can find a skein that looks nearly exact. OR, if you didn't purchase enough for your pattern, you can find another skein that looks similar enough that you can buy another one from me a year later or even from another yarn shop, and they are quite likely to go together very well. This is rare in the hand dyed yarn industry. 

Of course, there are exceptions to this rule. Chalice of Poetry (shown above on Cheshire Cat which is 100% superwash merino) is a color that has so many hues in it that they way they melt together really does change from batch to batch, and this matters to the overall look of the skein. So you do need to order enough at one time to make a larger project. But most of the colors, like Happy Summer Days (shown below on Mary Ann which has a bit of nylon) really do seem to look the same each time we receive it.

This is a great thing to know if you're a new knitter or unsure if you are purchasing enough, and may need the next place you purchase from to look like the last skeins you purchased. Or if you are designer who is designing a pair of socks and the color you're using you want other people to be able to purchase and have it look the same. Afte rall, we've all been burned when we want to order a color only to find that it now looks completely different or isn't even available at all.

It takes a lot of attention to detail to create such dynamic colors that look so similar time after time, and it's greatly appreciated by those of us who really want a predictable experience. 

And in case you didn't notice, Wonderland Yarns still puts up its skeins in 4 ounces when most companies have moved down to 100g (which is 3.5 ounces). That means that a skein of Cheshire Cat in Rainy Day Rainbow shown above (100% superwash merino) is over 500 yards for $26! This is a fab deal when many other comparable yarns cost $29 for 400 yards. More amazing yarn for less money is always a good thing.

Summer ending already?

I'm shocked that most of the kids in my area go back to school this week. It's not even mid-August yet! My kids still have another week or so to go before going back, which means we pretty much get the local Y pool to ourselves and we can still get a bit more relaxing in before the first crazy few weeks of school get underway.

This past week we went up to Michigan for one last family hurrah of the summer. We climbed the Sleeping Bear Dunes for the first time, celebrated a special wedding, visited with lots of friends, and pretty much had the best family vacation ever. We didn't do anything crazy or over the top, but we got to spend a lot of time in and on the water, ate really great food, and did several new things in a place that we've been visiting for many years now. I love when you discover new gems in a place that you are familiar with. If you haven't been to Traverse City or any of the towns along M22, I highly recommend it. It's our special place.

Now that I'm getting back to the swing of things, you'll see more new yarn added to the shop. Life in the Long Grass has sent us some beautiful skeins from Ireland, including a new 50% silk/ 50% merino yarn that is to die for. Wonderland Yarn has sent us some gorgeous things too. We also have a special deal from Dream in Color to help us celebrate the last bit of our 14th anniversary summer. I do believe we even have a new batch from Wooly Wonka Fibers. I'll share all of this soon, and of course you can always check the NEW section of the website to see the 25 newest items (not restocks, as those aren't new) added to the shop.

I do believe this is the last week to get in on the first batch of our 12 Days of Sock Yarn advent preorder. I do plan on offering one or two more sessions to order this advent, so if you miss out or haven't yet decided, you still will have at least one opportunity. Releasing these in batches allows us time to prepare and get these all together. It takes a lot of time to make up these sets, you can read more about it in this blog post.

We will also be offering our newest sock yarn club before the end of this month. It will be a three month subscription as usual, but other than that I'm not going to share any details yet. We continue to see the numbers in our clubs grow and grow and I'm so proud that so many of you sign up again and again.

What we're up to

I've been doing some test knitting lately. Above is a sock yarn that we'll be offering from a dyer that I met at TNNA earlier this summer. TNNA is the organization that hosts our national tradeshow, and walking the show floor is one way to see what's new an what's coming from dyers and fiber companies who want to come and show their wares. I'll share more details soon.

Below is a test knit, a new base from someone we already carry. I was asked to give it a try and give my feedback and I'll let you know if this is one that is widely produced. Both of these are great, both four ply fingering weight. I used the same pattern, Pebble Socks. Both are outside my normal color choices, but I really like them. I think it's good to knit outside your box sometimes. Are these inside your normal color range? Which do you prefer?

Rachael is knitting up a Close to You. It's a great free pattern to use to show off those single skeins of hand dyed yarn that you buy but haven't an idea yet of what to knit. Rachael chose a skein of Bespeckled Sock from Knitterly Things.

Her color is Pop Rocks from a previous batch/shipment and is no longer available, but she thinks that both Happy Accident and Vintage Kitchen would produce a similar effect.

Rachael also recently finished some awesome sweaters, both using Mineville Wool Project's DK weight yarn from the Sale Section. First is the Soldotna Crop using the DK Singles we currently have in stock.

The Fern & Feather sweater is gorgeous, isn't it? She used in the 4ply DK weight from MWP that we are currently out of, but you could definitely use something awesome like Tosh DK or Swift Cozy DK if you wanted.

What are you knitting this week? Do share!