First Update from the knitting capital of the world........

First update from the knitting capital of the world.......Portland has an abundance of yarn stores, dyers, spinners, needleworkers.  Three yarn stores opened in the last few months:  Happy Knits on SE Hawthorne in Portland, For Yarn's Sake in the Beaverton Town Square, and Make One on Main St. in Milwaukie.  Those are just the new ones.  And all the stores, new and old, have special hours or evenings where you can go to knit, hang out with your friends or just get inspired about all the knitting possibilities.  

I'm lucky to live here.  I met my friend Dee yesterday at Costello's Travel Cafe a few doors down from Twisted, a really neat yarn store with tons of that inspiration I was talking about.  I do love Costello's, not just because it is close to Twisted, but it has really good food, all home made (no fries), delicious.  I always look for the chocolate/filbert scones.  If the scones are gone I just know that someone was there before me and my turn will come again.  

And of course, we had to check out Twisted's sale since we were practically there. The shop was packed with knitters, many of them from the Yarn Crawl group who traveled by train from Seattle to visit the knitting capital of the world.  

Dee invested in a pattern that is sure to go viral.   What is viral?   (A knitting pattern that is so appealing, attractive, practical, easy or has some other characteristic that makes it a must do.  It might go viral).  It's Sivia's Harmonia's Rings cowl.  The store sample looked so good on Dee and soft and squishy she just had to get it.  She will be doing it in Blue Moon Fiber Arts Pond Scum color.  Nice.  Sivia is a talented designer who is known for her lace work.  And she also works at Twisted..

The partially completed socks at the top this page are being knitted two-at-a-time toe-up in the River Rocked color, a Blue Moon Fiber Arts medium-weight sock yarn.  I took a how-to sock class from Judy Becker at All About Yarn in Tigard.  Judy is the inventor of Judy's Magic Cast On and is a good and encouraging teacher.  Now, if I can only figure out what to do next to finish them.  

My friend Frances gave me a shout out on Facebook to alert a few more people to this blog.  Thanks Frances. 

ACTIVITY:  PACIFIC NW ORGANIZING EXPO:  JAN. 30, SATURDAY, 10-3.  

Montgomery Park, 2701 NW Vaughn St, Portland

Products/Techniques/Presentations  brought to you by NAPO (Natl Assoc of Professional Organizers)

Oregon Chapter.  FREE  more info:  www.napooregon.com 

ACTIVITY:  TIGARD KNITTING GUILD, MEETING, JAN. 21, THURSDAY, Doors Open 6:30

Senior Center, 8815 SW Omara (off Hall), Tigard

Program this month:  Knitted Lace!  Lace was the 2009 Theme.  Projects will be revealed.

You are welcome to attend as a guest for two meetings prior to joining the Guild.  

more info:  www.tigardknittingguild.org

Any suggestions, comments are welcome.  I still have to do some blog tweaking and make a few changes.

KaarenB