Ugh, knitting and summer. I don’t know how people do it. Already, I live in the Vancouver where the climate is beautifully cool most days. If the temperature gets above 26 degrees, I start to want to wear a bikini top to work. Totally inappropriate work wear, I know. But once the weather gets warm, I find it hard to knit wool without wanting to go rinse my hands under cold water every ten minutes. So, I have two solutions. One: new yarn. Two: hide in the shade.

Enter this SeaCell-based laceweight yarn. For some time now, people have been asking me if I have non-wool yarns because they are either allergic or just want to avoid animal fibres. And outside of often pricey 100% silk, I haven’t had much opportunity to dye non-wool blends. But I did get my hands on a batch of this lovely laceweight and it’s available exclusively on the website as a limited run, called SeaSilk Lace.

It’s a 60% SeaCell and 40% tussah silk blend in a 2-ply laceweight. SeaCell® is a cellulose-based fibre (like Tencel®) derived from seaweed. I had dyed and tried some SeaCell/silk yarn a while back and even blogged about the differences between SeaCell skeins and 100% silk skeins. Being a cellulose-based fibre, the SeaCell doesn’t take up the dye the same way as the silk, so this resulting yarn is at the same time glossy and shiny but also heathered looking. It’s an odd combination to describe, but it’s like having shiny and tweedy in the same yarn.

Here’s hiding in the shade. For those of you who have visited the studio, you’ll know that two sides of the studio (north and west) are actually floor-to-ceiling double-high windows… which means, being in the studio is basically like being in the outdoors. When it’s dark outside, it’s dark at the studio. When it’s hot outside, the heat is magnified by the windows and it’s invariably roasting inside the studio. So, on non-dye days, I have been hiding out at my mini home office.

It’s a little corner I carved out to surround myself with yarn and knitting books. In the daytime, there’s plenty of natural light but it’s stays cool and I can see out into the garden and courtyard space. The hydrangeas are in full bloom and are so unabashedly rich in colour. Violet and mauve. I keep my spinning wheel nearby as well as my guitar and music things. Kind of a grown-up craft girl’s romper room, I guess.

This is where I’m working today. Emails. Bookkeeping. Writing. And keeping cool.

I would never in a million years consider myself a crocheter. I have so far always been totally inept at reading crochet instructions. dc tr ch dc ch tr. There are just too many “c”s and my eyesight starts to fail me. Even after a lesson with the queens of crochet, themselves, I still need more experience under my belt before I’ll feel good doing this.

But, I have, as a child, made a number of basic granny squares and feel pretty confident about that. And so, I happened upon Lucy’s instructions for a granny square blanket and broke out my box of scraps. Alexa at Urban Yarns can attest to this… she’s seen my big box of Superwash Worsted and Sport in sooo many colours. I’d been saving them to make colour cards (hello pipe dream) but felt it was finally time to do something with them.

The squares are so far quick to make and super portable. In fact, I made four squares on the morning of a Saturday wedding while waiting for the event to start… and then made a handful more in the hot sun while watching the Vancouver Symphony play at Deer Lake Park yesterday. I’m doing three rounds of crochet so far and then going to do the fourth round of all the squares in a unifying colour… and then sew them all together. Don’t know what it will be in the end… but it’s been mindless fun making these little boxes out of scrap yarn… making them them all look just the same.

It goes without saying that in the past few years Ravelry has changed the face of the knitting world. And now they want to make things even better.

The hardworking folks at Ravelry have been working on creating an improved search function so that we can find patterns more easily based on more detailed criteria. For instance, you are specifically looking for a hexagonal-shaped shawl that employs twisted stitches, entrelac and estonian lace patterns… well, this new search feature will be able to do that for you… with your help. Basically, over 166,000 patterns will need to be reclassified in order to best work with the search feature. So for every pattern you reclassify (that is not your own design), you will be entered for a chance to win one of the 17 amazing prizes that have been donated. Our collection of yarns (above) is one of said prizes.

If you want the full scoop about the Ravelry Search Party, check it out »

There is a soft spot for Oranje in our household, and it’s become much more acutely pronounced as the World Cup Final draws closer. Starting in January of last year, I knit these socks as a gift for my Holland-loving, stroopwafel-eating, “beautiful game”-watching guy. They were finished just a couple days before the start of the World Cup and I’m proud to say he’s worn the socks while watching nearly every game with the Netherlands. The only time he forgot the socks was during the last game with Uruguay when Holland was down at the beginning (I blame that on the lack of orange socks) but ended up winning 3-2. These days, quiet moments are broken with the exclamation, “Big game on Sunday!”. Maybe you can catch us on Commercial Drive on Sunday… I’ll be with the guy bedecked in orange… right down to the socks.

(and here’s another pair of amazing Dutch orange socks… not mine, but I love them all the same.)

The Simple Things shawlette here was knit by my mother, intrepid new-ish knitter. She’s always excited to show me her new projects and, seriously, she knits so fast. She’ll leave the studio with yarn one afternoon and three days later, she’ll show up with a new scarf. But she can also be a little timid about new things… like this whole top-down triangular shawl technique. But MH’s Simple Things pattern really makes things quite easy and I think my mom’s got the hang of it now. She’s knit another one in Merino Silk DK in Violet Hill… but I think she took that to London with her.

What I found quite eye-opening was that variegated ‘lace’ wasn’t as horrid as I thought it might be. In fact, I quite like it here in this case where the pattern features mostly stockinette rather than complex lace. I’m also really pleased with how the golden yellow bits are spread out quite evenly and not pooly or blotchy.

Simple things like writing these blog posts or my email newsletter take me forever (okay, like 4 hours). I don’t know why they take me so long, honestly. If someone can answer me that, I’d love to know. It’s not even that I don’t have things to share. It’s just that I think I make everything so massive and unmanageable in my mind that it becomes a mountain. Oh, wait, there’s a saying for that… making a mountain out of a molehill. Ohh, I see… that means Wiki says I have cognitive distortion. In any case, I need to stop saying things like “can’t” or “that’s too hard” and just believe that everything is easy, manageable and doable.

By Sunday afternoon, it had started raining and I headed out for lunch, bringing my current project… the Geodesic Cardigan. I have been feeling pretty lucky that I managed to get a copy of the Knitscene magazine that this pattern is in. It seems to be sold out everywhere, but on one visit to a yarn shop, the staff didn’t have it but helped me call around to other yarn stores to locate it for me. It was like a scene out of Miracle on 34th Street. And yes, they found a copy of the magazine for me at another yarn shop who promised to hold it for me. So, now, even though I really want to make this cardi, I feel a little obligated to enjoy this gift.

Well, I’ve had a lot of time to knit on this… We attempted to leave Nanaimo on Sunday afternoon around 3:30 pm but missed the 5 pm ferry and ended up on the 7 pm ferry. Then the 7 pm ferry was delayed by 30 minutes in departing. Mid-way through the trip, the captain says they were directed to go retrieve a boat that had flipped over, so we had to turn the ferry around (is that even possible?) and go back to get that boat. Turns out the “boat” was a little walmart tub that looked like a baby’s washing basin. That delayed us by another 45 minutes. It was pretty much 10 pm by the time we set foot in Horseshoe Bay. Six and a half hours spent waiting and sitting. We could have flown to Toronto in less time… I honestly don’t know how people commute back and forth from the Island for work. It’s such an unreliable form of transporation. But I guess if you have the luxury of time like we did, then no matter.

So, about two months ago, I rented a guitar, sort of out of the blue (ok, it was after I saw Sam Roberts play live recently), and started to learn to play. The guitar I happened to rent was a Taylor 114ce which is an acoustic guitar in Taylor’s Grand Auditorium shape (it has a slimmer waist) with a cutaway (“c”) and electronics (“e”). I played it for about a month and decided to buy one — but the 312ce model, which is their Grand Concert shape (slimmer waist and smaller “bout”) to fit my small arms a bit better. It’s still got the cutaway and the electronics (in case it ever needs to be amplified), and it’s all built out of solid wood. But my guitar is on backorder right now as Taylor is still making it. In the meantime, I’m borrowing a friend’s big dreadnought-shaped guitar and still playing away happily. It’s the perfect feeling to be able to play in the evenings after work and let my brain sort of melt.

It’s so interesting to me to observe in myself what I’m like at the beginning of a love affair with a new hobby. How rabid I can be in searching for information. How obsessed I can become with understanding the difference between different kinds of strings, tone woods, and even picks. How I can easily lose an hour playing the same four bars over and over again. I even feel motivated to somehow blog or record my thoughts about it.

Funny, how I can’t find time to collect my thoughts for this blog, but I can easily spend that time playing the guitar. I think that’s all because I get so caught up in “presenting” on this blog rather than simply documenting and expressing. Relaying and remembering. It’s all very ironic, since I’ve been asked to participate on a discussion panel at Northern Voice this coming Saturday, May 8th, specifically about how blogging and this whole social media/Ravelry world have changed how I craft. I think a lot of us knit-type bloggers have gone through a phase where we feel like we are only knitting so that we have things to show on our blogs. Where, we feel insecure or inadequate if we don’t constantly have finished objects to show. And then when you create these obstacles for yourself, you mute your own voice. You stop being able to share your thoughts about this thing that you love.

Come have a listen this weekend. Northern Voice is a local conference about personal blogging and social media and I’m intrigued by some of the other sessions like “Overcoming Social Anxiety” and “How to screw up your own personal blog” (hmm, this may be insight into my own psychosis). In our session, Fibre Arts Online it’ll be Kim Werker (of the all new MightyUgly.com — very very cool concept), Mandy Moore (of Yarnbombing and Knitty fame), and me… talking about how blogging about what we love changed our lives… for better or for worse.

These are the four new variegated and “gently” variegated colourways: Maple, Summer Dusk, Violet Hill, and Peashoot. As well, a couple very delicate and almost neutral semi-solids: Tumbled Stone and Summer Skin.

And, also debuting at Fibres West last month, the DK (4-ply) weight of our Merino Silk series. Merino Silk DK is 4-ply whereas the Merino Silk Lace is 2-ply and Merino Silk Aran is 8-ply. It’s been great for really quick or beginner lace knitting. I’m getting a gauge of 24 sts per 4″ for 3.75 mm needles, but I’m sure everyone knits at different tensions and everyone prefers a different hand. I’ve dyed a whole bunch of it to either knit the new Manu cardigan by Kate Davies or Coraline by Ysolda. I can’t decide. And I also have a little stash of it in a special blue shade to knit the Apres Surf Hoodie by Connie Chang Chinchio

Fibres West was a really wonderful experience and I’m so grateful for all the customers and friends, both new and old, who stopped by the booth to say hello. Since we were positioned next to the Ravelry booth, we were audience and participant in a few little reunions.

It’s the very first time I’ve ever participated in a show situation and I was so nervous about getting enough stuff ready to display, getting the booth together, driving a truck… but luckily my old high school friends, James and Teresa, do this kind of thing for a living. They are both industrial and interior designers with their own design company, Light Couture International, and they helped me design and build the booth. They came over to the studio throughout March to paint all my shelving and helped set it all up on Thursday evening before the show. Amazing and professional, they took a huge weight off my shoulders so that I could just focus on dyeing great colours and making lots of yarn.

I am completely in awe of shop owners who are able to get their whole kit together and go from show to show to show. It’s a ton of work, but so worth it to see people in person, excited about the yarn and fibre. Thank you to everyone who came to help and visit!

I’ll leave you with one of our photos from Fibres West… the rest are on Flickr.

Our newest yarn base has arrived and we finally had a chance to select a name for it!

Thank you to everyone who took time to email me name suggestions! It took sorting through nearly 300 suggestions from readers and customers for us to finally pick the name. A long-time SweetGeorgia friend and student, Dana, suggested “Secret Crush” and it was the closest thing to describing the slightly crystallized look and feel of our new silk and superwash merino blend yarn. Kind of like crushed velvet in yarn form. Charming, rustic and wonderfully soft.

Like all our yarns, I always recommend that people handwash and air dry their precious handknit pieces. But of course, the convenience factor plays a big part and for my own handknit socks, I’ll admit to throwing them in the washer… but the socks don’t do well in the dryer. That’s a big no-no for me, personally. So, if you want to knit socks out of this yarn, definitely, on 2.25 mm needles, I found it to make a beautiful, soft fabric. Delicate, yes. Not for hardwearing boot socks, no.

Better yet, I think this will make a wonderful baby gift yarn. It’s superwash so it’s easy-care, but then it’s got the 50% silk to make it so much more luxurious and gift-worthy. And if you love knitting small shawls or tiny cardigans, I think this new yarn will fit the mix very nicely.

It’s available now on our shop website as part of our dyed-to-order collection. You can also come visit us at FibresWest this coming weekend to see it in person! I’m knitting it up in the Traveling Woman’s Shawl, so you can definitely have a look and feel.

You will be able to find Wetcoast Winter in Tough Love Sock, Superwash Sport, Superwash Worsted and CashSilk Lace at both Urban Yarns and Three Bags Full in Vancouver and also at Pick Up Sticks in Ontario. We even have it as dye-to-order until February 28, 2010 online here »

See what some people have knit up already with the Wetcoast Winter colourway: Julia at Crispy Noodle and her Luscious Lace, Alexa the Gourmet Crafter’s 5-Hour Baby Sweater (which, I think, you can see in person at Urban Yarns).

And how about an Olympic knitters meetup? Some of the knitters on Ravelry have been discussing how we might be able to get together with guests and visitors to Vancouver over the next 16 days. Want to join in the conversation? Visit Ravelry for the full discussion. I’m thinking we might be able to organize a brunch at The Whip Gallery & Restaurant on East 6th Avenue and Main Street in Vancouver on Saturday, February 20th and then walk over to the studio afterwards so that you guys can have a look at how the space has changed since we first opened. Again, nothing is confirmed yet, but I’d love to hear if you guys would be interested in getting together!