Your Yarn Shop is All Around You!!!

Even though I run a knit shop where I sell nice yarn...I LOVE when people get creative with materials they use as yarn. Recycling is such a loving thing to do for our planet. Besides that, it's such a high to discover materials you may have never expected to turn into a cool fabric! I know "plarn" has been around for years. So has cutting up tee shirts and weaving, knitting or crocheting them into items. But, the world is a fiber opportunity. What unusual objects can you use to create fabric???

High Tech or Old School?

I spent a month rehashing my bookbinding skills. I haven't bound a book in about five years. It's amazing how skills disappear when you haven't used them in a while. It's also interesting how they return after some trial and error of trying to remember. I have a graphic artist friend who says that if graphic artists don't keep up with the latest software they can end up in the dark ages as far as catching up. I also see how on Project Runway they have the coolest high tech methods they didn't have when I went to fashion design school. Did you see that episode where designers designed their own fabric on the computer???? I was drooling!!!!
I bet there are some bookbinding skills and materials that have evolved since I've last bound a book. Knitting amazes me, too, how new trends, inventions and ways of doing things evolve when you're not looking. The decision to create with what you already have or keep up with the latest trends is as diverse as humans are. I kind of prefer a balance of both. I guess whatever keeps us creating is what's best.

Forever Leaving Us In Shock

What a shock to hear that Alexander McQueen took his life! "Shock" and "McQueen" have always been two words that weren't unusual to hear in the same sentence. His designs and shows were such a surprise-filled expression of the creative genius he was.
I've long been a fan of his sculptural, surreal creations....always at the edge of my seat waiting to see what he'd come up with to top himself.
A self-proclaimed "pink sheep of the family," McQueen strived to design with this philosophy:
"Clothes and jewelry should be startling, individual. When you see a woman in my clothes, you want to know more about them. To me, that is what distinguishes good designers from bad designers."
He left us wanting to know more about him as well. It was amazing to me how he usually dressed very plain at his shows and let his designs command all the attention. It seemed he even felt uncomfortable taking in the applause at the end of his shows. I am grateful that he followed his path and did such a brilliant body of work to keep designers inspired for lifetimes to come.

Thank you, Mrs. Chamberlain!

My first memory of intentionally making a gift to give to someone was when I was 3 years old. I got two pieces of that cardboard that came in my dad's shirts when they were dry cleaned, I jiggled 5 pennies out of my piggy bank (all "wheaties" because it was the 50s,) I took some Saran wrap from Mom's kitchen (they didn't have the stick-to-itself kind yet,) and I used that yellowing scotch tape (they hadn't yet invented what they called "magic tape" that you could write on, that also wouldn't yellow.) My big discovery at age 3...if you fold scotch tape over into a loop, it holds one item to another! ( I still, to this day, love the discoveries we make while working on projects...those creative ephiphanies that we only find while in the process of creating!)


I don't exactly know what this gift item was that I made, but I know the feeling it gave me. Pennies, to me, at age 3 were exciting because they meant the opportunity to buy candy at the candy store in town. Cutting the windows in the cardboard and covering them with plastic was my first architectural attempt, as I had watched my dad, the architect, design windows many a time. I also liked windows because they protected, yet revealed the exciting pennies. The whole project was held together with tape.

When the project was complete, I skipped over next door to Mrs. Chamberlain's house. She was 93 and lived alone. I rang her doorbell and said, "This is for you!"

You would've thought I gave her a million dollars! She was so grateful and complimentary of the work I had just given her. I will never forget the glowing feeling that gave me to design and make a gift and watch how it made its recipient feel! I am in deep gratitude to Mrs. Chamberlain for starting that spark in my life at age 3 because designing gifts is one of my most favorite things to do. Creating gifts has especially returned to my life in this economically challenging time. I also learned that not everyone appreciates an original gift. Not everyone thinks about the process of making an idea manifest and the love that goes into creating it. So, we have to be discerning and have no expectations of the reaction they get.

Do you remember your first gift creation experience? Is there someone who gave you such a touching reaction to something you created that it sparked a flame for life? Do tell.

A True Test of Passion

There is a test that cat owners know well. Whenever we are in the flow of a creative passion...a kitty will come along and lie right in the middle of it to test how much we love what we're doing. Here are two examples of this test captured in photos. The first, I was giving a wool sweater a new life by unraveling it to create a new knit item to felt. The kitty test was measuring how passionate I was about turning that sweater back into new yarn to play with. I failed the test. That sweater is still in the "to do" pile.


The next test caught on camera....is the "how much do you want to do research on your computer?" test. That one is a tough test as kitties are experts at making you not able to see what you're researching. Kitty tests are the new "pop ups" of the marketing world. I think kitties can teach us a ton about marketing. They certainly know how to grab our attention with cuteness.

Have you been tested by your pet for how passionate you are about what you're doing? Please share your story!

Inspiration hides in the most common everyday places

I love stories of how designers and creatives become inspired to try things. So here's mine.


I was minding my own business...knitting a pair of black and white striped socks to give to my sweety daughter....when one day in Walmart, I stumbled across a pair of socks that looked just like them! Okay...they did have a reindeer on them and were factory made...and not of bamboo and silk, but still....who wants to invest all that time and energy into knitting socks you can find cheaper in Walmart?

Going sock-otic ....I asked my inner Muse what to do. It took a long time to knit those socks and several glasses of wine to make it through weaving the multitude of ends in! The Muse told me to add some flowers since I always wanted to try knitting some. So, out came the flower picture books and playtime began.

I've only started this sock knitting addiction this year. There's a story about why I started knitting socks again after the last pair I tried was in 1967! But later for that. I must admit that back in 1967 we sure didn't have the cool templates to play around with or the cool yarn that survives foot usage like there is today. Sock knitting has become so creatively cool! Does anyone else have a confession about their sock knitting addiction to share ?

Booty (re)-Call

In school we study history. The point of studying history is to learn and honor and never forget where we came from. I can't forget the Ruth Benedicts, the Elizabeth Cady Stantons, the Elizabeth Blackwells who struggled to allow women to go to college. Before their efforts, women weren't allowed to have higher education...they had a uterus http://knitty.com/ISSUEwinter04/PATTwomb.html and that deemed them too hysterical to be in a learning environment!

I think of Elizabeth Zimmerman and how she used her passion for knitting to explain knitting techniques in such a knit-friendly way that it opened doors to future knitters and still does.
Besides honoring the pioneers who made things easier for us today....I have to also look back on my very first knit project. I learned to knit in a time when you had to stand up to change one of the 3-4 TV channels. TV was still only black and white then. And we had to walk miles in the deep snow to the local LYS to get the limited types of yarn to make whatever project we could find a pattern for.
My very first project was a pair of adult booties. I would never be caught wearing such a thing today. But that first project started my creativity on a knit journey for my whole life!
It's important to stop every once in a while and remember how things were when we first started...not only as a knitter. It's easy to forget how far we've come as an individual and as a world.
What was your first project? How old were you when you made it? How did the whole experience feel? Did it inspire the knitter you are today? Or was it a bumpier road than that?