Simply Socks Yarn Co. Blog

Dream in Color Smooshy & Smooshy Cashmere

I'm so pleased to share that we have a new batch of Smooshy and Smooshy Cashmere from Dream in Color! 

Retro Vibe

Madelinetosh bought out Dream in Color last January, and this is the first batch we've received of these two base yarns since Veronica (owner of DIC) trained the new dye team and they took over. We have received two shipments already of our exclusive Colossal Sock yarn (available here at a sale price when we have it), and the dyeing was fab. But this is the first we have gotten from the new dye studio in Smooshy and Smooshy Cashmere. All colors shown are on Smooshy, but also available on Smooshy Cashmere.

Charcoal Prismatic

They are the same base yarns as they have been, and the new owner says they are keeping these as well as maintaining a separate dye crew do specifically do the Dream in Color colors, since they dye method is so much different than than of Madelinetosh. And even though the two yarn lines are dyed at the same main studio, the operations are kept apart so that they still have their own methods and identities.

Mermaid Shoes

Smooshy Cashmere is one of our most popular yarns, and it's Dream in Colors most popular base yarn overall. Tt's soft and seems to glow with color. And who doesn't love a bit of luxury in their yarn? And I think you'll agree, these colors are on point as usual. I hope you find some things you love for a new pair of socks, perhaps these? Or a new scarfy-shawl. Because Smooshy Cashmere really deserves to be worn right on the skin.

Rose and Jack

Ask the Knitters

Dear Knitters,

Is there a way to identify hanks of yarn that are tangled and going to cause problems when I use my winder and swift?  I don't know how dyers wind the yarn into hanks but it seems I have the most problem with ones who are a smaller operation.  However, the latest one was from Manos Del Uruguay.  Also, do you have any suggestions for untangling them?  These troublesome ones can take up to an hour to attempt to pass the winder through the maze of twists.  

Any advice (perhaps videos you like on YouTube?) would be appreciated!

Gayle in Vale

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Help a knitter out and leave your advice in the comments section below.  Have a question you'd like to see answered here?  Simply title an e-mail Ask the Knitters and send it on to [email protected] . Your question could be chosen for this series.

Today's bounty!

Goodness, there is so much Colossal Sock to share today! Find it all here while it's in stock (I hope for our next restock in mid August). I don't recommend waiting too long if there's something you're looking at, as it sold out last month over a weekend. But I was able to order more this time, now that the Dream in Color studio is going full blast after bought out by Tosh. And the colors are just as fab as always because former owner Veronica had her hand in training the new coloristas.

Edited to add: Woah. Y'all really wanted this stuff! We're selling through it fast and it's really cool to see what colors you're choosing. We'll do our best to get these shipped out within 24 hours as usual, but it might take another day with the sheer number and just a couple of us! And if you requested winding, as usual that typically tacks on an extra day but in busy times like this it may be several days if winding is requested.

Sagrada and As a Bird

In addition to the Colossal Sock, I want to share this cute striping colorway that Night Owl Fibers sent to us - Sweet Land of Liberty. I have only a few dozen skeins in the Kits & Clubs section, but I can get more later in the summer for you. At least this way, those who want to cast on for the 4th can do so if you order today. 

And I think it's worth sharing that while the striping skein doesn't come with a solid for toes and heels, if you are like me and like a solid color for toes and heels, you could use Cascade Heritage for that. The base and twist feel similar, and while 5618-Snow is the only "match", we think that 5623-Navy and 5607-Red look really nice with the colors in the stripes.

I hope you all are keeping cool where you are! Here in the "heat dome" (Jeez. Another term to try and instill fear of the Midwest weather.....) we are trying to stay indoors and keep cool. This isn't helping me much, as my home's AC went out and we just got it going again. But it was a few days of a house that was even hotter than outside. Ugh.

Things on their way!

Thank you so much for the busy two weeks here at the shop! With our club subscriptions opening and closing, the weeklong shop party, and a busy free shipping week last week, you've really kept us busy and smiling. If you work in retail, you know that the past year hasn't been great for many types of shops. Sales in a lot of retail were down 20% last year, and thankfully your support has really kept us busy in what has been a hard time for many. I definitely feel a lot of appreciation for you right now!

I also feel a lot of appreciation for our dyers. For those of us in the midwest, we are expecting temps near 100 all week. Which is A LOT for mid-June when we are typically enjoying more tolerable conditions. The phrase "Heat Dome" is being used a lot, as if that makes it any better/worse. It really makes me appreciate our dyers who consistently work in hot and humid conditions, all day, every day to make us all beautiful things that bring us joy. The dyers in Texas at Dream in Color spent last week in the mid-90's dyeing us up a huge amount of our Colossal Sock. 11 huge boxes. We got 7 boxes last month, and it sold out over a weekend, so I'm really pleased that they were able to dye us more. Now they've used up all the base yarn that they keep on hand for us, so I think it might be another 2 or so months before we can get more. Good thing they dyed us 50% more this time! We do have more Smooshy and Smooshy Cashmere coming in a few weeks too.

What else is coming? Jana and her Fleece Artist team in Nova Scotia, Canada are dyeing up a special base yarn just for us to celebrate our 19th birthday - kind of like their offshoot Mineville Wool Project used to do before they stopped dyeing a few years ago. They start dyeing up 60+ colors for us this week, and we're super grateful for them spending a significant amount of their month dyeing up special skeins just for us. The price is quite special too, like Mineville Wool Project used to be- think 30% off expected retail. Details to come on when it clears customs and can be shared.

We're adding a new dye studio to the shop in about a month, and I can't wait to any longer to share - it's French studio La Bien Aimée! We have A LOT of this yarn coming from Paris - a classic sock, cashmere sock and DK. They are in the midst of dyeing our order, but at least it's only 72 degrees there, so much better for dyeing yarn in a hot studio, for sure.

And finally, Opal Yarn is celebrating 20 years of their Rainforest collection by releasing some retired colors. Yes, this means that Tiger is coming back. Also Zebra, Flamingo, Ladybug and others. I think Tiger is THE MOST requested sock yarn - seriously, I get requests and emails about this yarn all the time. But since Opal typically releases a collection once, I haven't been able to get this yarn since 2007, and 15 years later I still get requests for this yarn. We'll definitely have them available for preorder so that you can make sure you can get what you want. I have a lot on order from Germany. So much that it won't all come at once, so if you want some from the first batch, the preorder I'll offer in a few weeks (or perhaps a month) will definitely be the way to go. Then you can order more if you like from the second batch that won't arrive too far after.

I hope you stay cool this week! I am testing out a few new yarns to add to this fall if they knit and wear well. I can't imagine knitting anything larger than a sock in this kind of heat. 

19th Birthday - Free US Shipping at SSYC!

This week Simply Socks Yarn Company starts our summer-long 19th birthday celebration! I'm so grateful that we have been able to serve you for nearly two decades now, and I'm going to make sure we show you some love and appreciation all summer long with sales, limited edition yarns, new dyers, contests (read to the bottom to enter the first one), and gifts! This week (through June 16) we're offering you free US shipping with your online purchases. Use coupon code FreeShipping19 to get your US shipping for free. Some fast-pay options like Paypal and ApplePay breeze you through so fast that you may miss adding the coupon code, so you might add it too your Cart while shopping. Or respond to your emailed receipt if you forget to use the code, and I'll add it for you.

We had a great party last week! Now we start celebrating online!

What might you like to have sent to you this week? We have some really special skeins and sock sets from our dyers to celebrate our birthday at our Kits & Clubs link! First off, we have Super Sock Sets (full sized skeins and two mini skeins) from Hue Loco's Farmer's Market color collection.  It's perfect for socks with contrasting toes and heels like this one. This pattern is also very popular for shawls using two mini skeins.

Aren't these beautiful?!

We also have the entire set of mini skeins of the Farmers Market colors.

Uschitita has dyed up for us a perfectly summery colorway named Americana. I love the melony-pink background with reds and blues throughout. I think it would be perfection in Joji's Amren shawl pattern or Summer Lee's Mermaid Avenue socks.

Those of you who participated in this winter's sock yarn club got first dibs on the limited edition Copper Canyon color from made exclusively for us by Malabrigo. We now have that on Rasta and Rios, as well as a few extra skeins from the club on Ultimate Sock. All at the Kits & Clubs link while available.

Love Wonderland Yarn? We have a big restock of the fun Confetti Sock (tweed AND sparkles!) and gradient Blossoms that I'm using to make the Herald Shawl. Mine is shown here.

What else might you want to add to your cart? You can pick up some Opal Yarn and join our informal Opal Along KAL! We also have restocks of the addictive Sock Kits from Urth Yarn that feature two 50g balls of striping yarn so you get two matching socks. Want sweater quantities of Malabrigo Rios? We have a huge new restock (afterall, we offer all weights of easy care wool blends at the shop). 

We received new colors and restocks of Noro! We offered this over a decade ago and recently starting carrying many lines again. This includes the popular Silk Garden and Silk Garden Sock as well as the huge 200g "dragon eggs". Take a look!

Laines du Nord sock yarn has been super popular in the shop this spring. You get two matching socks out of this, and there are really cute options for colors.

Regia is known for self patterning colorways, but they also make a stunner of a Merino Yak yarn in solids and now gradients!

Want to try a hand dyed yarn that you might not see outside of a fiber fair? For US dyers, take a look at The Sheepy Shire, Frog It Yarn & Six and Seven Fibers. Want to try an imported yarn? How about Life in the Long Grass (from Ireland), Uschitita (the Netherlands), and John Arbon Textiles (UK).

We have some really super deals in our Sale Yarn section right now. And yes, you can use the coupon code on sale items!

I've been able to add some more spots to our upcoming Sock Yarn Club, so I've opened sign ups back up for you for one more day (or til they sell out). Please order the club on an order by itself, and place a separate order for other items if you want. Thanks!

If you made it all the way through this, you deserve the chance at a treat! I put together this cute mug set of a sheepy mug and two skeins of Qing Fibres for one lucky winner. All you have to do is comment here on the blog telling me what you're knitting this week and I'll randomly select one commenter to win this cute gift.

Free Shipping & Limited Edition Yarns Next Week!

Now that our in person, week long party is over (and, boy, was it a busy and fun time!) we're starting our online summer-long celebration! Monday, June 10 through Friday June 14 we'll be offering you free US shipping with your online orders. We'll share the coupon code you'll need on Monday when it starts. Here's a bit of a preview of the awesome limited edition yarns we will have to share to start our first big week of the summer celebration! All will be available at the Kits & Clubs link.

Our dyers have knocked it out of the park with these special offerings to commemorate our 19th birthday. First off, Hue Loco has released their Farmers Market color series in some special sock sets for us. I've expressed how obsessed I am with their colors on Tweed Sock, so they really went all out in combining colors for me. Each features a full sized skein of Tweed Sock and two minis in Merino Sock (merino and nylon). It's perfect for socks with contrasting toes and heels like this one. This pattern is also very popular for shawls using two mini skeins.

We also have the entire set of mini skeins of the Farmers Market colors.

Uschitita has dyed up for us a perfectly summery colorway we've named Americana. I love the melony-pink background with reds and blues throughout. I think it would be perfection in Joji's Amren shawl pattern or Summer Lee's Mermaid Avenue socks.

Those of you who participated in this winter's sock yarn club got first dibs on some limited edition colors from Malabrigo and our own test kitchen series. We now have that Copper Canyon color from Malabrigo (dyed just for us) on Rasta and Rios, as well as a few extra skeins from the club on Ultimate Sock.

Then we have paired the few SSYC Test Kitchen Sock Sets we previewed in the club with some of our Blooming Prairie bags. We don't have very many of these, and they are offered at the special price of $41. Since a hand dyed sock yarn set retails around that amount already, you're getting a super birthday deal for the yarn and bag. Again, quantities are quite limited.

There might be something else I'm forgetting to share, but it's been a wonderfully busy week here at the shop, so you'll forgive me if I'm spacing out a bit. Please do check back on Monday to see the code and all these beauties go live at the Kits & Clubs link.

Picture Post - Party Time!!

Just sharing a few pics of our awesome party week- the decorating and set up (featuring Henry and my Mom). It’s such a wonderful, busy time and I am loving seeing you all! Did you miss the party? Here are out other open days for the summer. For those that are not partying with us in person, we'll start our online summer-long celebration next week with some specially created sock sets from Hue Loco and Uschitita and a FREE SHIPPING week! Details Monday.... after I recover from all the partying LOL.

Henry and my mom helping out with set up.

Above, my mom brings me flowers the first day of our parties. Below, me smiling but TIRED!

Thank you for your part in helping us make it well beyond what my original 5 year business plan projected. I LOVE my job, and the fact that I've been able to do it for nearly two decades makes me very grateful. I have met so many wonderful people in the past two decades... people who have enriched my life, taught me so much, and helped me and my business grow. Without all of you, SSYC wouldn't be what it is.