Indie Dyer
Things are pretty crazy here at Gourmet Crafter Headquarters (aka my house) because we have 2 events coming up this week. I’ve been printing, writing, dying, winding, and tagging like a mad woman! The window at Urban Yarns is filled with TinCanKnits in anticipation of the launch on Friday (reminder: 7pm at Urban Yarns!). My living room/crafting zone is also full of Gourmet Crafter yarn. My yarn will soon be featured at Bird on a Wire and of course, there is still free shipping on all Etsy orders until the 30th. I’ve also been getting ready for my second event: the Knit Social Yarn Swap!
I’m so excited to have a table at the latest Knit Social event! I’ll be there with patterns and yarn for sale as well as lots of other great local people, including my personal dying hero: SweetGeorgia.
The Details:
Join us for an exclusive evening featuring locally hand-made yarn and fibre, and meet your favourite dyers, spinners and designers.
Indie Night: a Yarn Sale & Swap
featuring vendor tables from local dyers, spinners and designers
Thursday September 29 from 6-11pm
at the Vancouver Alpen Club - 4875 Victoria Dr.
Admission $5 – includes $2 off a beer at the Alpen Club
Launching!
It has been a wild ride but the book is finally ready to go and launching on September 30th!!! Urban Yarns is having a party at 7pm so I hope to see you there! If you’re not in town you will be able to find the PDF version of the book as well as individual patterns for sale here on the Gourmet Crafter blog, at www.tincanknits.com, and of course on Ravelry. You will also be able to get the physical copy of the book at our etsy shop, I’ll have all the details the second they are ready.
I’d also like to introduce a free pattern from our book, just to whet your appetite. This hat is part of an adorable little set, you can find the sweater pattern in the book, or as an individual pattern on the 30th. You can download the i-heart-rainbow-hat here and if you wanna check out the details on Ravelry you can go here.
Let me take you all through a little of my journey to this fantastic outcome….
A little over a year ago (OK like a year and a half) Emily and I got to talking and we said to ourselves, let’s write a book! We were both already designing knitwear and we were both interested in designing some baby knits so a plan was hatched. We brainstormed and sketched and came up with a tentative game plan. We were well on our way, even with Emily living on the island and me living in Burnaby. No problem, we have email, it’s not too hard to walk on the ferry, and if all else fails there are always long distance phone calls right? No problem.
Then I was pregnant with Hunter and COULDN’T KNIT FOR 4 MONTHS! It was a rough time and knitting made me feel dizzy and ill. So that gave us a bit of a setback. Over on the island Emily was working hard as an architect and our design work hit the back burner for a bit. Once I was back to knitting I headed to the island and after a weekend of more brainstorming and ironing out details things were back on track! Then Hunter was born and Emily moved to the UK, another couple of minor setbacks to the book. We weren’t going to let anything stop up this time though, we kept at it. There was lots more work to do than we originally anticipated and we had to figure out (with the help of Ann) how to publish our book ourselves. There was photographing, re-photographing, knitting, re-knitting, testing, layouts, writing, websites, and much much more. It was overwhelming but Emily kept her head at least.
So that’s our book story and we are finally ready to say: here is our new knitting book, Nine Months of Knitting. It’s full of cute and quirky baby knits and a few knits for the whole family. We hope you enjoy!
Back to School Sale!
It’s just that time of year again. I grow somewhat sad watching excited students pass my door on their way to scholarly adventures. I love school and I always miss it when I’m not attending! So to keep life fresh I’ve decided to have my very first sale: Free shipping on all yarn orders throughout September! Head to my etsy shop (here) and enter the coupon code BACKTOSCHOOL2011 to receive free shipping.
In addition to free shipping I’ve got 5 new colourways: Lake Louise, Cape Breton Sunflower, Berry Picking, Lost Lake, and Urban Outdoors. These five are available in both Cashmere and Sock at Urban Yarns and the sock is available on etsy. If you are looking for worsted weight or cashmere via etsy, just drop me a line and I can dye some up alexaudeman@gmail.com. I believe introductions are in order:
Berry picking is an all time favorite summer activity. First strawberries and raspberries, then blueberries! A freezer full of berries and a cupboard full of jam to last the winter!
Urban Outdoors: Granville Island is a place with a very interesting pallette. From the industrial greys to the spunky primary colours. My favorite spot is the meeting of metal and fun at this bright yellow door.
While Honeymooning in the east my new hubby and I came across the most beautiful field of sunflowers at sunset one day. The golden yellow of this yarn is flecked with brown to represent the sunflower seeds.
Lost Lake is a happening place in the heat of the Whistler summer. Ski bums trade in their snowsuits for swimsuits and take a dip in the lake!
The magestic Lake Louise is nestled in the rocky mountains. It’s glacier fed waters are a unique shade of grey-blue-green, a destination must!
What’s Happening!?
This summer is flying by for me! I’ve been madly working on the book (we are sooooo very close, everything is done but the arrival of our prototype I will keep everyone updated). I’m trying to enjoy mummyhood day by day but it moves fast and suddenly family is in town, we are trying to get out and about as a family on the weekends, and *POOF* there goes summer! Fast fun and furious and it’s gone. I’m one of those weird people who doesn’t really care for summer, it’s always too hot for me (even in BC and even during kind of a cool summer) so It’s not really so bad that it’s going fast but I haven’t even been swimming in the lake yet!
It’s late at night as I write this so I don’t have any great pics to pass on but I thought I would let everyone know there will be a Gourmet Crafter Yarn update shortly and some lovely FO’s! I’m working my way through a blocking queue right now so things feel like they are getting done really quickly even though they have been sitting and waiting for me to get out some blocking boards and pins! What a procrastinator!
Something New
Some of you might know (and some of you might not) that my dear friend Emily and I are working very hard to finish up our very first book! We have been madly designing, knitting, writing, and photographing our designs for Nine Months of Knitting.
Emily and I first met while we were both working at Urban Yarns and bonded over our love/obsession with knitting. Emily is a master lace designer and I’ve knit her very popular designs, the Photosynthesis Shawl and the Sunflower Shawl, both were easy to follow and the finished projects were beautiful. Emily and I have joined knitterly forces in Tin Can Knits. Because we are living in different cities most of the time we communicate via phone and email so we were inspired by the idea of little children and their string connected tin cans.
Nine Months is a book of 9 patterns to knit while you are expecting, or for some little wonder you know. Some of the patterns are designed so you can knit them up for the whole family. That’s all I can say for now, but stay tuned!
Knitting Neon
When I first ordered the yarn for the Stripe Study Shawl I thought the yellow was a little more mellow. When it arrived in it’s neon glory I wasn’t quite sure it would be all that I had hoped for. I was originally planning to pair the yellow with a grey but after a considerable amount of thought I decided to go with a dark teally blue (Norway Spruce). I figured if I was going to go for it, why not really make the neon pop? So I’m working away on my Stripe Study shawl and now all I have left is that big neon border and I have to say: I love knitting in neon.
It’s super crazy, reminds me of my elementary school years in the 90′s (I’m 27, no need to do any math) and it’s a real conversation starter. People are quite intrigued by the eye popping colour and always want to know exactly what I’m making. I think they either love it or hate it but no one has said they hate it. I can just tell.
The problem with this neon thing is that I suddenly want to knit everything in neon. My favorite outfit for Hunter lately is her shirt with a bright green trim and her neon pink booties. Wouldn’t an electric yellow sweater go well with that?! I’m losing it. Possibly I burned out my retina’s knitting the Stripe Study Shawl and I no longer understand colour…..
A Summer of Lace
Shetland Triangle
Ugh, I have been on a bit of a yarn buying bender lately and it’s all coming up lace for the summer. I’ve cast on for 2 shawls so far, the Rock Island in SweetGeorgia Silk Lamb Lace and another Shetland Triangle (more on the Shetland here) but I have a feeling they are just the beginning!
Rock Island
I’ve been working in the Tosh Merino Light lately and absolutely loving it. The single ply is nice in a lace and the colours are amazing of course. I have acquired more Tosh Light to make a Stripe Study Shawl and a skein in the pretty Tart colourway to make I-don’t-know-what for my Mummy for Christmas. I purchased the yellow (Edison Bulb) from Purl Soho online and it came a little more electric than I expected. I’m still happy with the contrast.
Study Stripe Shawl: Norway Spruce and Edison Bulb
This already seems like a lot but doesn’t really even come close. When miss Emily moved to England for a year she de-stashed a few items to me including 2 skeins of Malabrigo Lace in a brilliant blue, I’m thinking Swallow Tail or Vesna but I’m not sure yet.
Malabrigo Lace
I also partook in a small yarn trade with KT and exchanged a skein of Tosh Light in Antler for some Hedgehog Fibers I’ve been dying to try out in Sour Cherry. It’s a gorgeous light cashmere yarn with a lot of loft to it and it’s so buttery soft. I’m also not sure which pattern I want to do with that one. I’m open to lace suggestions though!
Hedgehog Fibers Pure Cashmere Lace in Sour Cherry
A Hat for Camping
I have knit many a Giacomo’s baby hat, 5 of which currently reside at Urban Yarns. It’s a quick knit with a lot of elements I love: fair isle, baby sizing, usually a pompom. I always mean to pick up the set at UY but never seem able to remember when I’m there. I can knock out a hat in an evening making this project even better with limited knitting time available.
With my beautiful leftovers from the Snuggle Sack I knit for Hunter I whipped up a pretty little hat in a colour combination I’m quite pleased with. It was one of those projects I didn’t think about too much, but I’m really happy with. I immediately wanted to knit a blanket or sweater in the same combo but Alchemy Temple has proven pretty hard to come across. The hat held up well during the camping trip, fitting her head perfectly now and not even coming off while she slept. Wonderful! Even though it is a washable yarn, I decided to hand wash it, just to be safe. It’s still a little smokey but none the worse for wear.
Recent Acquisitions
I was up in Kelowna last weekend and I popped in to their lovely yarn shop. Art of Yarn. It’s a lovely shop with many yarns quite suitable to a yarn snob such as myself. Of course I was immediately drawn to the Madelinetosh rack, it’s really become quite the obsession. I have collected a stunning little bin of the stuff and I have many fantastical plans for each pretty skein. When I was in Kelowna I picked up a skein of the Tosh Merino Light after being a bit smitten with Ann’s picture of it here. It just looked so shiny and nice!
The other purchase I made was 2 skeins of T-shirt yarn from Be Sweet. I think I will make a little top for Miss Hunter out of it. It does seem a bit funny to make a shirt out of recycled shirt yarn but I think it will be pretty cool none the less.
Things that Need Buttons
I have a giant button jar, as you can see. It’s so much fun to dump out the jar and sift through my button choices whenever I start or finish a button friendly project. I was discussing buttons with KT and she made some good points about the combination of knitting and buttons. She is of the opinion that the knitting should be the star of the show but I’m not sure I’m on board. I think it depends on the project. Something smaller, like a cowl, some mittens, maybe some felted slippers, can showcase an awesome button. When it comes to sweaters though, she has a point. It’s just too much work to have your knitting upstaged by a flashy button. A button should really compliment a sweater, not show it up.
Yet, among all these buttons I cannot seem to find the perfect button for these projects. They are small, so a loud button is allowed but I just don’t seem to have the perfect one in this cascade of buttons. Why is this? Every time I go to Button Button I make a purchase of the buttons I went for and I always walk out with a few treasures I have discovered. Perhaps I should have chosen the buttons first, but thinking ahead isn’t necessarily my strong suit. Anyhow, I have a small pile of goods to be adorned with buttons and a few project on the go that I can now pick out buttons for. Time for a trip to Button Button!
