A trip to the lion brand yarn studio

Hello!
As I mentioned in my last post, I recently visited the lion brand yarn studio in New York City. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures inside the store, but you can take a virtual tour at their website here. The store was really, really lovely. Unfortunately, I was so exhausted and sweaty from the heat that I didn't get to appreciate all the yummy yarn goodness as I normally would (but this only means I'll just have to go back!). The store was great-the window display was a yarn masterpiece, and everything in the store was covered in yarn, including the outside door handle and the exposed piping inside. One wall of the studio is lined with small cubbies filled with all their yarns, as pictured on the website. In the front portion of the store they had a display with some projects they have featured on their websites. It was really cool to see the actual projects that I recognized from the photographs of some of their patterns in person! You could touch and feel everything, it was incredibly cool. Also in the front portion of the store is their sampling wall, where they have about eight large spools of yarn ready for you to sample. Here is a picture of the yarn I took to sample:

The sales folk were super friendly, walking around the studio (knitting the whole time, might I add) ready and willing to help. The man who was by the sampling station said to take as much as I wanted to sample, and he offered spare knitting needles or crochet hooks to try it out. As you can see, you could wind the yarn onto this bookmark-card. You might be able to see a ruler on the card, something I thought was a really smart touch, so you could see how many wraps-per-inch the yarn gauge was. I sampled what I believe is an LB collection yarn, but I can't recall the exact name of it. 

In the middle section of the store was a large table, where you could sit and try out the yarn samples. There were baskets already on the table with swatches of various yarns already on needles that you could pick up and knit. They also had swatch booklets of their yarns crocheted/knit up so you could see how they all looked. The studio offers private lessons, and there were several people at the table being taught to knit. 

They also had a table featuring their relatively new "LB Collection" yarns, which is not currently sold in stores. It was really cool to see them in person, including their cashmere, wool, steel wool (more later on this), angora, and mohair yarns. They had shelves in the back with books and magazines with patterns featuring their yarns, and a weaving station. They also had crocheted baskets full of their needles and other accessories, including yarn bags and tape measures (I picked up a lantern moon tape measure I'll show a picture of). They also had several computers you could browse patterns on, as well as print them out. 

Overall, the atmosphere was very friendly and really cool to see. I highly recommend checking it out if you are ever in the NYC area. 

Anyway, the important part: what i bought. lol

A lantern moon tape measure. The tape measure comes out of a tab on the right side, you may be able to see it in this picture. They also had crocheted ladybugs and a turtle, as well as a few other sheep shades, but the button that retracts the tape measure didn't work so well on some of those, so I chose this one. I've always admired the lantern moon tape measures, they are pretty adorable. It was cool to see them in person. 

This is really adorable- its a mitten keychain kit! It gives you the mitten keychain and a pattern to make a mitten to put on it out of sock yarn. I thought it was unique and I'll definitely be giving it a try. 

Just to give you a size comparison.

I bought a skein of the lion brand wool stainless steel yarn! I've been so intrigued by this concept. For those of you who don't know, the concept originally came out by the brand habu, and this is lion brand's knock-off version, essentially (for interests sake, the label says made in japan, which is where the habu yarn comes from...hmm...). Its a laceweight thread, and because of its stainless steel component, the knitted or crocheted material is pliable and sculptural. They had a few projects that used 2 spools of the yarn, but I only bought one just to experiment with. I'm not sure if I'm going to make anything out of it, but I thought it would be really fun to play around with.

Here's a better picture of the color- the colorway is called "wine", which is essentially what it is. A dark wine/burgundy/brownish color, with what looks like a metallic thread (which we know is the stainless steel) running through it. Very pretty. 

I hope you enjoyed this post and please let me know if you are planning on ever going to visit the studio, or have visited it!

-Abby

wait, its been a month?

Oops.
Yes, its been almost a month since I've posted and I'm sorry! I haven't had any FOs to show, and what I've been working on has been pretty boring and not really WIP post-worthy. But i know, I know, these are just excuses. I've had ideas for blog posts that don't require actual knitting. For instance, I recently went to the Lion Brand Yarn Studio in NYC, and I am planning on posting a review of the store and the goodies I came away with. Does that make up for the lack of posts? I sort of hope so.
ANYWAY, here are some pictures of a bright yellow scarf I just finished the other night. It's 2x2 rib (CO 36, i think) made of Caron Simply Soft and I used size 8 needles. I've had this yarn in my stash forever, so I finally did something with it. Nothing exciting at all, except for the fact that it's obviously ridiculously bright yellow. So yeah...not the most stylish thing, thats for sure.
Sometimes 2x2 rib on and on and on is enough for me, it makes for good tv knitting.

 Yeah...sorry for looking completely awful, I'm currently sick with an awful cold/possible sinus infection.
Anyway, here's a WIP i've been working on, another simple ribbed scarf. I started it the same day as the yellow one, but clearly I worked on the yellow one way more frequently. It's a skinny scarf in 1x1 rib (CO 24 stitches, size 7 needles) made of Caron Spa yarn, which is beautiful and silky soft, but ridiculously splitty.

(awful picture, sorry...)

Anyway, I'm in a bit of knitting rut right now, but I'm kind of okay with it. I started some mittens a few weeks ago as well, but haven't worked on them. Michael's stopped selling a full stock of clover needles and only sell metal boye DPNs, which I kind of hate to use, because they are so heavy. I'm thinking of ordering some plastic lion brand ones I tried out at the lb yarn studio that I surprisingly enjoyed using, and then maybe i'll get back to working on the mittens. 

Hope to talk to you soon!

Seaside Mitts, Tips for travel knitting

Hello again,
This past weekend I found myself on a bus going to and from Maryland. I brought my knitting with me, but on the ride there I didn't do any knitting because the thought of knitting with my body drenched in sweat from 100+ degree heat didn't really appeal to me. However, on the ride back, I got a chance to knit and worked on completing the second mitt of another pair of the easy fingerless mitts.

For those wondering, the ride was quite boring and uncomfortable. As usual, here's some proof of my bus travelin'. This is what I was looking at for about four hours:

Ah, the ever-classy stylings of a coach bus. Check out those beautiful patterned seats...

 And as always, a lot of this:

While I was knitting, cramped up in my seat, I thought of some tips for knitting while traveling-especially when in a cramped place like a bus seat.

Yes, I was this close to a stranger's butt and thigh for four hours. Good times. The only better times were when I was in the bus bathroom...yayyyy

Anyway, here are some tips for bus knitting I compiled while cramped up between a window and someone else's body:

1. Use circular needles. Cramped quarters means you won't have fun using 14 inch straight needles. I use circular needles for knitting flat things as well, and they take up way less [elbow] space than even short straight needles.

2. Bring a thread cutter or small scissor. Trust me on this one. Last time I was on a bus knitting, I needed to change to a new ball of yarn and didn't have anything to cut the old one with. I ended up sawing off the yarn...with my teeth. NOT FUN PEOPLE! Bring some effin' scissors and you won't regret it. I use one of those clover thread cutters thats about the size of a half dollar. Very easy to travel with.

3. Bring enough yarn. Self explanatory-you'll regret it when you are on a roll knitting, have hours left to the trip, and you've run out of yarn.

4. Bring WIPs, not UFOs or new projects. Always bring a project that you know you'll actually want to knit. Don't bring that UFO that's been sitting in a plastic bag of shame under your bed for the past six months. It's easy to think, 'oh those 12 hours on a bus will be a great time to get myself to finish that sweater'. But if you don't want to knit it in the comfort of your own home, you definitely won't want to knit it on a cramped bus with a stranger's arm rubbing up against yours. Also, don't bring a new project that you are planning on casting on during the ride. You may not end up liking the project or you might have trouble with it, and then you'll be stuck with nothing. Bring an in-progress fairly simple project that you won't have to look at the pattern every 5 seconds for. Just trust me on this one.

5. Get a window seat. Maybe. As you can see in the picture above, I'm sitting with the yarn wedged between my leg and the side of the bus. This helps keep the yarn from flying all over the place, versus keeping it on your lap like you'll have to do in an aisle seat (I don't believe strangers appreciate yarn wedged between their leg and yours). However, window seats sometimes kind of suck. Pick your poison.

And lastly,

6. Don't forget the pattern if you need it.


ANYWAY,


Here's a few pictures of my finished project. I loved the way the yarn pooled on this one, but the quality control at the loops and threads factory is clearly made of suck, because the yarn was flat. Seriously, flat. Not spherical, like its supposed to be. Whut.

By the way, that ugly brown mark on one of my fingers is a burn. Thanks toaster oven.

Something Different

Hello again,
Something that I've done off and on for years has been sewing. I have super few sewing skills (even less than I used to have) and only know how to do a few hand-sewing stitches. But what I like to do sometimes is create felt stuffed animals. They are really easy to do (just two-dimensional) but I find that it allows a lot of space for creativity. Anyone that I've ever shown them to always want one for themselves, and with my excess time this summer I've started doing them again. Just for fun, I made a video tutorial on how to make a monster felt creature that I made last week. I know it's really simple and you could probably just make one from a picture, but I needed to make another one anyway (for a gift) and I thought it'd be fun to film and edit it.
So here it is anyway :)

FO Mosaic Mitts

Hola.
Today I have another finished project to show you. The pictures are crap as usual and have no natural light, so the colors are totally off, I apologize.
The pattern I used is this. (ravelry page) It's ridiculously easy and I recommend it to anyone who is a super beginner or just wants something simple and doesn't want to deal with DPNS.
I used Bernat's mosaic yarn, which is okay. I love the colors, and the two-ply yarn, but not so into the feeling of the gloves as a whole.
The colors ended up falling out so that on both of the gloves one side is green and dark blue, and then on the other side of the first glove is mostly turquoise and pink and the second one was green and pink. I like the color scheme of the second one better, not so into the turquoise.

 chubby fingers ftw!

 And of course I started a second one. This time in Loops & Threads Impeccable ombre yarn. This yarn is pooling like ca-razy. I kind of like it though, haha.

That's all folks

What's in my notions bag? + a WIP and FO

Hello,
Today I thought I'd share with you what I keep in my notions bag. The bag I use is a small pouch that I got for free quite some time ago that actually originally held pads/tampons (I think it was a kotex giveaway at CVS). Anyway, its just the right size for my everyday tools or notions.

Here's a picture of the bag itself, as you can see my needle gauge is too big for the bag. When I'm traveling I take it out so the bag can zip, but at home I just keep it in there for easy access.

 And here are the contents of the bag:

I have a needle gauge, a clover row counter, two measuring tapes (one soft and one harder plastic...the triangle thing), two crochet hooks (one tiny for smaller yarn and one larger), a clover yarn cutter (so useful) and clover stitch markers and stitch holders. Inside the stitch holders bag is a tapestry needle for sewing in ends. 

The FO:

Another washcloth! Surprise surprise. I completed this one, last week out of lily sugar n cream. I really like how the colors striped and pooled on this one.

The WIP:

A SHITTY picture of me holding up the beginning of some really stupidly simple fingerless gloves. I'm making it out of bernat mosaic yarn, which so far I quite like, and size 7 needles. I dont think the gloves will match at all (this one will look green and i think the next one will end up with pink the majority color) but i'm okay with that. I think.

Something Sweet?

Hello again,
Yesterday I spent way too much time starting and completing this. Like way too much time. I don't know what's with me, but sometimes when I start something I have to finish it the DAY OF. This used to happen to me a lot with crochet because it went so much faster for me so I felt like I could finish it in one day, but because knitting is so much slower for me I've never felt like that. This is partially why knitting has become more calming than crochet was. However, I got lured into finishing this silly thing, mainly because it seemed like a small project. Silly!
Anyway, its a...

Cupcake!

 A cupcake pincushion, to be precise. The pattern is from here. As you can see from the pattern picture, I skipped the frosting scallops, mainly because I couldn't figure out how to create the bobbles. I thought I'd be able to crochet them on, but I couldn't figure out how to since its not actually at an edge (duh...). It would have looked better with the scalloping, but oh well. Anyway, the bottom part is filled with polyfil, and within the frosting is one of those tomato pincushions. I also didn't knit the cherry like the pattern said, because it was getting way to fiddly and difficult to even close the cupcake up with the tomato inside it, let alone be able to do some little annoying cherry that probably would have taken forever for me. So i just crocheted in the round a bit and sewed it to the top. Easy.
Okay not that easy. The crocheted part was easy, but this cupcake was such a pain in the ass! I forgot how to do M1s and every time I did it left a hole, the bottom of the cupcake is all wavy and warped, my gosh! PAIN IN THE NECK! Don't bother with it unless you have patience. Or if you are a better knitter than me. (Which you probably are, lol)

Yummy?