Saturday, November 26, 2005

After-Thanksgiving Sales & a little contest!

Yesterday, I talked my mom into going on a yarn crawl with me. She doesn't knit, but she loves my knitting and I told her she could pick out some sock yarn. We were going to start at Mabel's and work our way westward, but I decided to drive by Close Knit first to see if they were open so I could get my second hank of pink variegated Cascade to finish up the felted clogs. Doing that put us on a different route, so we headed downtown first.

My mom is a library director and loves all things booky, so we made our first stop at Powell's, Portland's gigantic independent bookstore. It's possible to spend hour upon hour in there (it takes up an entire city block and is several floors high), but I made a beeline for the knitting books (what else?) and picked up these:


Mom doesn't need to buy books since she gets them for free (the advantage of being in charge of buying books for the library is you get to make the decisions), so we wandered a bit and then set off for Knit/Purl which is just a few blocks away.

I'd never been to this shop before, and I really loved it. It's nice and light with well-arranged yarns and nice big windows. They had a basement filled with yarn that was all on sale for 40% off. Yup - 40% off! Yahoo! When I first went downstairs, all I saw was novelty yarn so I was thinking it would be a bust. But...here are a few little treasures I managed to dig up and take home:

This is Douceur et Soie in Rose Plum and a ball of Trendsetter Aura that goes perfectly with it. I see these becoming scarves of some sort, with the Aura as a carry-along.


Misti Alpaca Chunky. I don't know what this will become, but it was so soft and pretty that I couldn't put it down once I picked it up.



Yes, that's a boat-load of Misti Alpaca Worsted (in pink and tan) with one lonely ball of Misti Alpaca Lace (periwinkle) in the middle. I love this yarn so much! I'm wishing I would've bought more.



After gorging myself on sale yarn, I went upstairs to do some more damage.

A nice pile of Cascade 220 Superwash for my Knit Net sweater, which I cast on for this morning...




And of course sock yarn. The two skeins of Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock are in the Pin Stripe colorway and are for my mom. I also picked up a hank of Socks That Rock from Blue Moon Fiber Arts in the Olivenite colorway for myself. And some size 0 Addis. Yahoo!

As if that wasn't enough, we then headed back to Close Knit which had opened since our first drive-by. I got the felted clog yarn I was missing along with some more for a pair for me (yes, I am obsessed with purple). And a couple hanks of Artyarns Supermerino that were so pretty I just couldn't leave them behind.

Contest! Contest!
I'm going to count up my stash and see how many balls I have. Any guesses? There might be something in it for you if you get it right! I'm going to cheat a little bit and only count virgin hanks... Post your guess in the comments and I'll announce the winner on Dec. 1st.

19 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well if nothing else, I count 32 balls of yarn p0rn just in this post. Hoo boy, you know how to crawl the yarn. Nice finds. Misti is nice stuff, especially the chunky. I'm like you, i always gravitate towards purple.

My guess on your stash, hmmmm, 104.

5:27 PM  
Blogger Laura said...

Wow! Nice haul. If we're talking only virgin balls, then I'll guess ... 156.

6:03 PM  
Blogger Acornbud said...

That is some beautiful stuff you collected! I suspect these 32 are just the tip of the iceberg. Hmm, I don't even know where to begin. Lets see, you started knitting at 10...I'm going to guess 150 balls.

6:04 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

84? Oh boy, I hope I win! You have great taste in yarn!

6:09 PM  
Blogger msubulldog said...

Okay, my guess is 183. And I'm going to have to head to Knit/Purl soon! I've driven by and peered in the windows, but I live way out West and hardly ever get into downtown *dork*, but that 40% bargain basement is a-callin'! What a haul, by the way! Yahoo! :)

6:16 PM  
Blogger Karen said...

That's some great stash enhancement you picked up today. And at 40% off, it would have been a sin not to buy. I'm really bad at the guess the stash stuff, but I'll give it a shot anyway. I'll aim high at 217.

8:16 PM  
Blogger Jillio said...

good god woman! i'm definitely visiting you next time i go to portland. and i'll be saving lots of yarn money because you're an enabler just with all the yarn porn going on over here!
i'm going to guess 503. hehe...

12:24 AM  
Blogger Sonya said...

Lovely stash enhancement photos! I'm a library director too, and our collection just happens to have a large knitting section. Weird, huh?

I'm going to guess 175.

4:21 AM  
Blogger Heather said...

Wow, sounds like you had an awesome day! You got lots of beautiful yarn.

For your yarn stash, I guess 282.

7:45 AM  
Blogger chris said...

Holy cow, girl, you are OUT OF CONTROL!! No more diets for you. Something about the deprivation puts you in a crazed yarn-buying mode. :-) Sounds like you guys had an awesome time (and I'm guessing you, especially!). I'm so happy that you get to spend some time with your mom and get a little bit of a reprieve this weekend. Okay, just virgin stash alone....I'm guessing at least 303.

3:14 PM  
Blogger Christy said...

I've got a guess of 194. It's making me want to go and count how much I really have. I know there is some good stuff down there in my stash that's just begging to be knit!

4:25 PM  
Blogger Bitterknitter said...

220? I have no idea, really, just thought I'd guess.

11:23 AM  
Blogger Brianne said...

Oooh! I'm guessing your stash comes in at 262. *crosses fingers*

1:23 PM  
Blogger Jennifer said...

323. Heehee!!

What a nice yarn haul!

6:45 PM  
Blogger Karen said...

I guess 86. Looks like some great deals you got, lucky! I still need to cast on for my brown & pink fuzzy feet.... but have to much christmas knitting! gah.

10:55 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hmmm... Let's see... I've been doing pre-algebra with my 6th grader, so if one Knitter X leaves Yarn Shop A travelling at 30 miles an hour and Knitter Y leaves yarn shop B travelling at 45 miles per hour, then they will meet at the the coffee shop to compare stashes at...

Oh never mind! I'll guess 132 virgin skeins!

11:26 AM  
Blogger Chrissy said...

How it the Knitting Tips and Trade Secrets? I've been thinking about getting it, but haven't seen it in person.

7:54 PM  
Blogger Jen said...

Hmm, this one's a tough one. With the amount of designing you do and this yarn crawl as an inkling, I'm guessing pretty high. Especially since there's a stashbusters button right here. But since we're only counting unused hanks here and seeing the size of the WIP list on your sidebar, that could seriously cut into your final ball count.

Okay, I'm saying 302.

9:16 PM  
Blogger stricken madchen said...

Lovely yarn you just got. ;-) I may be a bit late, but I'll guess you have 95 skeins.

7:12 AM  

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