Yarn of the Day

As promised I have sent that silly yarn diet packing and a new age is being ushered in.  Well...  Maybe not a new age.  I guess really I'm ending an age so that I can return to the age before.  Let us forget the time of no new yarn and embrace the joy that is hand dyed fiber!

While in New Orleans, I made a side trek to a little yarn shop smack in the middle of the French Quarter.  The shop's name is The Quarter Stitch and it is really more than just a yarn shop.  The walls of the shop are covered in beautiful hand-painted needlepoint templates.  The windows are full of charms and ornaments in varying shapes and bold colors.  Yarn is clumped in baskets around the store, not really organized, but not overly chaotic either.  And then on the wall behind the register from counter to ceiling is a feast of colors.

Just looking at it made new projects jump to mind.  I perused the baskets, touching and imagining.  that is until I found MY yarn.  The second I saw it, I knew I was going to buy it.  Just looking at it made me giddy.  Right now I'm imagining stocking caps for my girls.  A thick cabled scarf.  Or simple mittens to keep my hands warm.  They really are never very warm.

The camera on my phone doesn't do this yarn justice.  The basement lighting is also not my friend.  *sigh*  But trust me this is the most beautiful yarn to ever break a yarn diet.  I swear it is.  For those who need the details, it's Malabrigo's Rios line, Merino Superwash.  The two skeins are from the same dye lot, but I'm not sure how similar they really par.  Just about every color I can think of is in there each blending into the next like a vibrant autumn unset.

And the way it was packaged up?  I have to give credit to the ladies at The Quarter Stitch.  I loved the yarn at the store, but I enjoyed discovering it all over again when I got home from my trip.  They had wrapped it up just like a gift.  And it was even more gorgeous the second time around.

And the best news?  I've gotten about 3 more inches added to Inchie's Baby Blanket.  Another 2 rows and I'm starting the border.  She'll have it before Thanksgiving (I HOPE).  Yeah new yarn for making the blanket grow.  I owe you one!

While I wasn't looking

I haven't purchased yarn in over a year.  I'm not exactly sure of the last purchase, but thinking back the last memorable purchase was the beautiful teal sock yarn purchased for Inchie's baby blanket.  I bought it in May of 2010 well before Inchie was born. I love that yarn.  I love the blanket it is making.  I am tortured by this one stitch which turns three stitches into nine.  That stitch makes the blanket.  I'm so tired of that stitch.

And I can't recall a single yarn purchase since then.

*twitch*

I'm shocked.  I wasn't consciously on a yarn diet.  I don't have a yarn problem.  I have yarn.  I'm a knitter; these things go together.  I do remember dismissing a few purchasing opportunities under the oppression of unfinished baby blanket guilt.  You can't cheerfully work on a light hearted new project when there is a skeleton in your closet holding out a baby blanket you NEVER finished for your second born.  A blanket representing her status as a second class citizen...  There's just too much guilt.

But no new yarn?  None?  For 17 months?  Really?  How did I get here?

And worse...  How to I leave?  What purchase can live up to breaking a 77 week yarn diet?  Does such a purchase exist?

YES!

In fact, it will be the purchase to break the never ending baby blanket spell.  To show that blanket who's boss!  Times change.  Adding new yarn to the rotation will break the 3-to-9 star stitch spell.  The day will come when the blanket will come off its needles and be handed over to Inchie.  After 544 days, this NEW yarn will set me free!

And I solemnly swear to never make this mistake again.