hello, literally, from ohio

and, bye bye Columbus.*

Door to the sweet airbnb house I stayed at  in Columbus for TNNA this past weekend.  TNNA is the annual summer trade show for the yarn & knitting industry, this year in Ohio. Rest assured that the knitting world is alive and well...and wow there's some nice yarn coming to a LYS near you.

 

For example the gorgeous new Swans Island All American sportweight yarn.  Maybe I am biased, I photographed the  new pattern grouping that debuted for the yarn - I (jokingly) call it  MY LINE.  I love seeing images almost life size in the booth, from a freezing cold shoot up in Maine last January. Really excellent patterns and colors- so new they are not even on Ravelry yet. I'll add links as they appear because you will love them.

The wonderful Clara Parkes caught me looking happy with them.

Goofy smile but authentic.

More loveliness from Feederbrook Farm, in northern Maryland. They do gradients. striping skeins that look handspun--and have a yarn & fiber  CSA. Nice folks. Can you tell she is a former science teacher?  They offer some cool classes, too. So many good people in this industry.

It was fun to see friends & clients and of course to be immersed in materials I love to work with-but it wasn't a vacation. We did a small photo shoot, many meetings, some work with co-authors on a book that is moving along at a trot. And there's the long established irony of working at a knitting event that leaves you precious little time to actually knit! I brought along what I think of as my slo-mo Cladonia shawl. One of these days I'll finish it.

I kind of like how it fit into our airbnb's living room seating though. 


* out of nowhere this movie popped into my brain. I bet it would be a hoot to watch.

with icing on top

I hope you had the sweetest of holiday seasons. It's been an unusually- even for me, who doesn't sit still easily-  bustling month.  My blogging habit evap-o-rated!

Above, a sneak peek* from yesterday's photo shoot in Portland, Maine for Swans Island yarns. Such lovely clients, such to-die-for designs, and oh yes, the donuts are awesome, too. So good we are swinging by the shop to get some before we leave town today.  If I am allowed one teeny tiny kvetch, the temperature is -8F degrees...and it wasn't too much warmer while we were shooting outside yesterday. Although it was above zero.  The warmth of squeezing in visits with friends Mary Jane Mucklestone and Samantha at A Gathering of Stitches made this work trip all the sweeter.

See you in NY next week, between January 13-18? ? I'll be at VK Live for funs  and am so excited to be helping Jani from Starcroft Fiber at her pop=up Nash Island yarn  in the City shop at lf8elevate at 80 east 7th street in NYC. If you'll be in town, come down! Jani's yarn and island wool, some knit and chats with designers you know and love, it is a charming, artful shop..  I'll have a limited edition set of Nash Island photographs mounted and cards just for the occasion. The special events  are on Thursday evening 6-9 (with Mary Jane Mucklestone there)  and Saturuday afternoon. 4-6 with Kay Gardiner knitting along .details tomorrow!
Stay warm, wherever you are!

* ok if you know me, you know how I can go on and on about how there's one main story per photo, and how wrong a photo shoot can go when you can't keep it straight. That, my friends, is definitely a photo about donuts.

postcards from maine: swans island yarn

 Saturday 11/10 : a full day Photo for Knitters Workshop in Needham MA.
A one-of-a-kind class:  meeting in an historic schoolhouse (props! setting!), with enough time to learn, shoot, and to edit, look at work and critique too. Thanks to Elissa at Creative Warehouse for sponsoring this!

If  a hands-on photo workshop might be a bit much,  Friday night 11/9  I'm doing a slidetalk : 10 Tips for Fabulous Photos: Knitwear & Beyond  for the Common Cod Guild in Cambridge at MIT (heh , me teaching at MIT) 7pm.   Info here.

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Back in September, one misty morning at Fiber College, I played tourist with  Mary Lou Egan. We set out on a short drive south to Northport.

Not on the island anymore.They welcome visitors.We're both crazy about Swans Island yarn, and this is where it comes from. It's all organic and naturally dyed. The displays show the plants & nature that go into the colors. Showrooms of the stunning wool woven blankets (sliver at left) and the yarns. If I needed to receive to give a special gift, it'd be a Swans Island blanket. So elegant and simple. Side room with irregular colors,  off dyelots. These are amongst the discounted skeins, from mixed dyes or limited runs. To call them seconds is unfair, they're so beautiful.  I bought one skein of a green, but wish now I'd chosen some of the indigo on the right, as well.We toured behind the scenes too. Natural yarn, waiting to be measured out. 
Skeining yarn before dying.Pre-soaked skeins waiting to go into dye baths. 
It was very very warm in the dyerooms. Yarn drying. Mary Lou had taken an all day workshop the day before, with head dyer, Jackie Degraff aka DyeMama. I was utterly impressed, as were the dyers working, that Mary Lou called out the name of the nature dye source on these skeins.We visited the weaving rooms too. The looms are so wide, they have an airpump assisted shuttle that makes a satisying whooooooosh.Weavers' worktable.The Swans Island woven signature.One of the things I love best about visiting dyers is how their colors and sensibilities reflect the local palette.In this case, the local palette couldn't be more beautiful. Camden harbor, just down the road.

A few last thoughts, if you're still with me: 
• Swans Island yarn may be available at your LYS. It is at mine :-)

• An oft repeated but wondrously true aspect of naturally dyed yarn is it all goes together. You can't make a bad color combo.

• Yarn like this, from small producers, costs more than commercially produced imported skeins. Choosing it is to vote with your pocketbook (as we like to say around here). To knit with it is a joy, no question.  When you buy it, you're supporting small business and  enabling real jobs in a challenged economy. These are people who put great care into what they create. You can read more about who's behind Swans Island here.

(sorry that was kind of preachy but I just had to say it, stepping off the soapbox now)