Of stripes, miracles and big balls of yarn

The Sugar and Cream cotton comes in a stripe varigation. These long repeats are a lot of fun to work with. Behold



and



Both made out of the same colorway (natural stripes) and both patterns are free on Ravelry.

A miracle has happened here in the country side. A new yarn store has opened up! It's called Fiber FUN studio. Now there is no longer 30 min. to travel to the nearest yarn store. The new one is in my township (yes we have townships, that's how rural we are) and only about 10 min away max. It opened on Friday and I stopped there on the way home from work. It is very surreal. You go on a country road follow signs deeper and deeper into middle of nowhere and all of a sudden you are at a yarn store! It is very quiet and cosy and the lady has the yarn store in the basement of her house. The basement is at the ground level (the house is build into a hill) and the entrance is very nice. She has a big space and she weaves too and has many looms set up for teaching. I had a look of her inventory and ended up getting lion brand cotton in my kitchen and bathroom colors. I also had a look at her knittery works of art. She made a wall hanging that's just stunning. If you are travelling through Ohio (or live around here) drop me a note and I can give you the directions to this place.

In other news, I just started using my birthday stash. Last year my Icelandic online knitting group had a birthday game where we sent each other birthday gifts. I, as well as the other participants, got a lot of knitting goodies and some great yarn. I'm finally starting to use it. First I had to figure out what I wanted to do with it, then came Christmas knitting (and traveling to Iceland), then a very busy time at work. So now I'm ready.



I started with yarn that came from Rebecca and it's handdyed and local (for her). The yardage is very generous and I started a shawl called 'Simple yet effective shawl' by Cosmicpluto. It is very simple and I love how it alternates between stockinette and garter stitch. It really adds depth to the shawl but keeps it simple and easy to knit but interesting at the same time. Originally it calls for Noro sock yarn and it would be stunning in that yarn.

I wound the yarn up in the biggest ball of yarn I've ever work with. Here is my daughter as a comparison.



It was very hard to wind it up in the end because my hands were starting to hurt from holding it :o

Happy Easter and Passover everyone :)