Santa Fe County Fair by guest blogger Annie

I wanted to reminder everyone about the SF County Fair.

The fair this year is Aug 2-5. If you plan to enter anything you need to take it on 7/30 between 1-6pm or 7/31 between 9am-1pm. I haven’t looked at the fair book yet but last year they promised to broaden the hand spinning categories. The fair is very tiny and struggling to keep going. There is an active 4H component in SF but very few adults participate in the fair. I'd love to see more knitters,crocheters, spinners, and weavers, as well as all other artists and crafters get involved by entering their works. It's just plain old fun - plus the fair building is air conditioned so as you browse the exhibits you will be nice and cool!

If you want to see the fair book or get more info you can go to:
http://santafeextension.nmsu.edu/santa-fe-county-fair.html

My Love at First Sight by guest blogger Annie

Jana gave you her idea of the best pattern ever so when I saw this I thought I had to pass it along. Go to Ravelry's pattern section and look up "Union Suits - Adults". There you will find what I think is the absolute best pattern ever for the one garment that I would be happy to wear every single day of the year, if only they were acceptable outwear! I have long been a fan of the adult footie pajamas but an actual Union Suit with a flap door is so much better than that. We could knit them and wear them to a knitting slumber party!

Tour de Fleece Wrap up by guest blogger Annie

So the Tour de Fleece ended on Sunday and it took me until yesterday to realize that while I had lots of fun spinning for 3 weeks straight I totally screwed up my destash plan for the year. All year long I've been trying to knit only from the stash, buy very little yarn, and gift  yarn that I knew I wouldn't knit. It was going pretty well and by June I had knit about 22,000 yards from the stash. Then TdF comes along and I spun for three weeks every minute that I wasn't at work or a knitting event. I nearly spun up all the fiber in my stash and even though I didn't reach my goal I was content. Last night I was putting it all together and I thought I should add up the total yardage spun to include with the total weight. That's when it hit me.....I would have to add that yardage to the stash and undo some of the destashing work I'd done all year ----urgh. Now I'm thinking that maybe everyone I know really wants some handspun yarn for their birthdays and Christmas.....even the non knitters.

Love at First Sight

by guest blogger Jana

Run as fast as you can, do not linger, get to Ravelry and look up this pattern: Sanagi Dress by Olga Buraya-Kefelian. Go to the video and watch the 10 different ways you can wear it. THIS THIS THIS is my kind of styling -- a little bit Japanese a whole lot fun, and very very different. I swore I'd never get married again but I may have to ask the NM legislature for a law permitting me to marry a dress.

Someday I Will Find You

by guest blogger Jana

Wanted: knitting bag. Perfect specimens only need apply (see requirements below).

1.            Stand up by yourself – have some backbone!

2.            Widebodies only. No skinny shanks bags for me. But not pear-shaped – definitely NOT bigger on the bottom than the top.

3.            Your straps must fall automatically to the outside, not toward the inside of the bag. Don’t be so clingy.

4.            Light-colored linings only. I don’t need anyone with deep dark secrets.

5.            Multiple pockets, at least one of which is big enough for a pattern or magazine. You need to be able to carry whatever baggage I have.

6.            But the pockets can’t be so deep I have to root around in them to find things. See #4 above.

7.            Separate compartments to hold non-knitting stuff (wallet/keys/lipgloss/phone/snacks). Please respect my boundaries.

8.            Able to pass for a real purse. I want to able to take you anywhere, so please don’t embarrass me.

I know you’re out there.

Buy a Bag for Charity

by guest blogger Jana

Like many knitters I am also a knitting bag fiend and am on the quest to find the perfect one. My personal bag needs list is a subject for another (very long) future blog, but in the meantime I wanted everyone to know about the sale coming up next week of Jordana Paige bags -- they're "seconds" for only $50 each, and 100% of the proceeds goes to the Preeclampsia Foundation. The sale is next Wednesday, July 18, and is online at jordanapaige.com -- where you can also find out more about the sale and about the charity. If you score one and I don't, please don't tell me how wonderful the bag is.

Knitting in fiction by guest blogger Annie

Knitting in fiction by guest blogger Annie

Over the weekend I had the chance to catch up on my reading. I picked up A Fatal Fleece    by Sally Goldenbaum at the library. I had never heard of this author but I liked the cover and needed something to simply escape into so I took a chance. I really enjoyed the book which tells the story of a group of knitters and their loved ones in a small seaside town. The knitters become amateur sleuths when a local legend is found murdered in his yard. I was able for a few hours to just immerse myself in the cast of characters and forget my troubles, which to me is the sign of a good read. What I didn’t know when I selected this novel is that it is the 5^th in a series so I’m now anxious to see what other adventures the group undertakes. 

Do you have a favorite novel with knitting in it? I know many knitters have switched entirely to audio books and I enjoy them very much. Sometimes I just like the feel of book as I sit curled up in my chair, especially on a nice rainy weekend.

Shredded Dignity

by guest blogger Jana

Think of me surrounded by piles of yarn as I tried to gather together the tattered remains of my dignity and come to grips with the damage I did to my budget at the 5th anniversary sale last Friday. That's how I spent my weekend. How about you?

There was some hope that, since I couldn't get to the sale until 7:30 am, most of the stuff I was interested in would have been snapped up already, saving me from myself. I reckoned without Annie and Amy, who managed in the midst of shopping for themselves to set aside "a few" skeins they thought I might like. "A few" as in "all the MaggieKnits linen in the colors we haven't already grabbed." That came to about 27 skeins. Plus the two or three Amy rooted out from under some other things. Then there was the Sublime merino boucle in -- surprise! -- just enough skeins to make a sweater. I fell over a bag of the Malabrigo worsted in the "Frank Ochre" color I adore. And some Yummy sock yarn because, you know, sock yarn doesn't count as stash.. And while I was grabbing at the Hempathy, a bag and a half of Ripple leaped off the shelf and hit me on the head. Ripple in, I might add, a color I already had enough of at home from a previous sale accident to make a sweater. I guess now I'll make two sweaters. The universe demands it.

On Sunday I had to try to wrestle it all into the yarn room. Turns out I don't have enough of those wire mesh cubes. Turns out I also can't find any more in town. But wait! The six cubes holding my knitting books don't really need the mesh back -- I can remove the backs and have enough to build three more cubes to hold yarn! And it won't cost me anything!

Here's a helpful tip for anyone who might ever use the wire mesh cube storage system. Turns out the back is there for a reason. IT HOLDS THE WHOLE THING TOGETHER SO IT DOESN'T COLLAPSE.

So thanks to Sheila and Kay for providing me with such entertainment and a learning experience all at once. Let's do it again sometime.

Yarn Fumes

by guest blogger Jana

So Looking Glass is having its 5th Anniversary Sale tomorrow and Saturday -- endless opportunities for stash acquisition. I expect that I will humiliate myself once again and exceed whatever fantasyland budget I set for myself, but honestly, it's not a lack of willpower -- it's yarn fumes. This is a medical condition that has received virtually no attention from the medical/scientific research community -- I suspect collusion between that group and the sheep/alpaca lobby. Its symptoms include, but are not limited to, a state of denial about how much yarn is already in the stash, a willingness to ditch any "rules" about what colors and/or fibers are appropriate for the victim, temporary blindness about the size of the Visa bill, and an enormous ability to rationalize any purchase ("I'm shopping locally and helping out my community"). In my case, the condition comes on whenever I'm within eyesight of the words "sale" and "yarn" combined. The only treatment for it is to make sure that the only yarn on sale contains mohair. I suspect this will not be the case at Looking Glass. I will report further once I recover from this latest assault on my immune system.