Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Knitting Little Luxuries: the book that saved Christmas.

First, thanks for your patience while the site was down for two excruciating days! There was apparently a fire at the source of our server in Utah, and after much frenzied rebuilding, everything is back to normal. Rest assured that all of this took place completely out of our control (oh, so much fun for this control-freak knitter here!) and FAR FAR AWAY from any yarn!

Now, on to the post I was preparing when everything went wacky...

Honestly, I didn't know what I was gonna do. I hadn't even started filling in my own dang Holiday Gift Knit To Do List. As a yarn shop owner, naturally I have friends and family that anticipate hand-knit gifts at the holidays. And yet, as a yarn shop owner, I find my holiday knitting time generally reduced to the hours between, oh, 2am and 4am.

My denial was running deeper than de Nile.

And then, like a literary angel from above, Louisa Harding's blessed new book, "Knitting Little Luxuries," arrived. This book IS my Christmas list! Plus (big bonus here) it uses all the Louisa Harding yarns we have been amassing ever since the line debuted. I've already finished 1 1/2 pairs of her beautiful fingerless mitts, in Grace Silk & Wool and Glisten, which gives such a pretty beaded effect. There are patterns for both a striped version:

And a "plain" version that is anything but! (This photo reminds me of an arsty version of the shower scene from "Psycho." It's hard to capture mitts without looking a but creepy):

Bonnie has almost finished three little bags from the book for the young girls she's teaching to knit. I think I will make this for one of my nieces. It's made in Thalia, a soft ribbony-looking yarn that knits up all soft and textural. Two skeins of Thalia made three bags. Bonnie has already woven her ribbon through, and just needs to add the knitted flowers from the pattern.

Of course, if you read my Turkey Day e-blast, you already know that Louisa Harding is coming to Loops! She will conduct informal workshops at the store on Thursday, January 17th. The first workshop was scheduled from 6-9pm and has sold out, so I'm opening up a second workshop from 2-5pm. While we will be paying a fee to bring her to town, we're making the workshops FREE to our customers because we want as many people as possible to experience this. It's a huge thing for Tulsa and we want a great turnout, so that she (and possibly other famous international yarn types) will visit again.

If you haven't already signed up for the Louisa event, please click here to email me. Please give me your phone number and, if you can only make the evening workshop (due to a pesky job or something ;-) ask to be on the waiting list. Some of our evening attendees may choose to switch to the day class.

And finally, here's a photo of an international yarn type who visited Loops on Black Friday. It was such a wild, fun day because we had so many visitors from around the country - and the world! This nice knitter was with the rock group "Australian Pink Floyd," except she was quick to point out she was actually from England. Still she was fun to chat with and enjoyed the store. Darn if I can't remember her name - although why I thought I would remember it without writing it down amid the Black Friday chaos, I'll never know!

- Shelley
shop online at loopsknitting.com

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Would the pink lady's name be Amy, Ola, Emily or Jacquie? What was she knitting, and does she know Lucy Neatby?

November 29, 2007 at 12:51 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I missed your site while you were out! Strange thing, though... I am able to pull it up on my PC but not my Mac?? Good luck!

November 30, 2007 at 6:54 AM  
Blogger Shelley Brander said...

Yes, I think her name was Amy. She was lusting for some Tilli Tomas and bought some other stuff - can't tell 'cause what happens at Loops, stays at Loops! ;-) I asked if she knew Lucy Neatby, but she said no...

December 2, 2007 at 8:08 AM  

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