Three on Thursday - A small haul

 Yarn shops are so dangerous!  For today's Three on Thursday, I thought I'd share a recent shopping trip.

I ran into my LYS, Center of the Yarniverse, right before Thanksgiving to pick up a copy of Painterly.  Have you seen Painterly?  Are you into Mason Dixon/Modern Daily Knitting's field guides?  (Sorry - I'll never get used to the new name. I have a hard enough time remembering names and if they suddenly wanted me to call them something different, they should have used different initials.)

Anyway...  If you are a Kaffe Fassett fan, you MUST get a copy of Painterly.  I thought their previous Fassett field guide - what was it?  #13??? - was awesome but Painterly is just.... Oh My Goodness!  If you haven't already bought a copy for yourself, you should definitely include it in your letter to Santa!

But because I'm utterly incapable of walking into the yarn store and buying only what I went in for, I also picked up a new knitting bag.  My friend Betsy from Love Ewe Farm makes them and sells them out of the yarn shop.  Sadly, I don't see them listed for sale on either Betsy's or Yarniverse's website but if you are interested, I'm sure you could contact either place to purchase one. 

There are two versions of the bag.  One has the painted sheep on the turquoise background pictured above and the other is a real photo of two of Betsy's sheep.  I had THE hardest time deciding between the two.  The turquoise background finally won out.

And wouldn't you know, while I was wandering around the shop trying to decide between the two knitting bags, this skein of yarn jumped into my arms.  Frankly, I think I did pretty good to only buy one skein.  It's named Charred Marshmallow and the photo does nothing for it.  The yarn is so much warmer and rustier brown, and well, exactly charred marshmallow color, in real life.  And if the colorway and the name Charred Marshmallow wasn't enough to convince me to buy it, the yarn base is called Sugarcookies Sock.  How on earth could I resist that?

While I'm feeling a little guilty for breaking my 'no more yarn purchases this year' rule, I'm glad I broke it.  The thought of getting to knit with this yarn is keeping me motivated to finish my Christmas gift knitting.

And while I realize that's three things, I have to throw in a fourth.  I just love my LYS.  They always tuck a little something extra into your bag.  It may be a stitch marker, a pin, a tiny bar of soap that looks like a cookie, or a knitting related sticker... You never know and it's always fun to get home and discover it.  This time, it was a tea bag.  A tea bag from Stash Tea.  

How did my LYS know I was trying to drink more tea and less coffee?  I don't know, but I do know the Spice Dragon Red Chai was so good I immediately went online and ordered a box of practically every kind of tea Stash Tea offers.  

Good grief that was an expensive $14.95 Field Guide #16!

Who needs Rhinebeck?

Who needs Rhinebeck?  I don't!  I have the newly expanded Center of the Yarniverse.

too excited to hold the camera still

On Tuesday my LYS moved from a teeny-tiny, little shop to a huge, gigantic, yarn filled place across the road.  The new place has got to be at least five times larger and it's fantastic!  Fantastic!!  I didn't get a chance to stop by on opening day (damn moving boxes that refuse to pack themselves!) but I did attend the Wednesday night knitting group.

I was way too excited about the newly expanded shop and all the new yarns they are now able to stock to take decent photos.  The only one I took that wasn't blurry was of Stacy, the shop owner, shoving food into her mouth and I'd promised her I wouldn't use that one.  :)  

And yes, we get to eat at Knit Night.  That dark doorway in the background leads into Ashland Coffee and Tea.  So now, you can buy some yarn and go hang out in the coffee shop or, you can buy coffee and come hang out in the yarn shop.  Center of the Yarniverse now has multiple seating areas where you can sit and knit the day or night away.  And if you check out the coffee shop's website, the stage where the band is playing is now the classroom area of Center of the Yarniverse.

Oh, and did I mention that now that the Wednesday night knitting group meets in the yarn shop instead of the coffee shop, the yarn shop is open for business an extra two hours which means more shopping potential.  Yay!!

See?  Who needs Rhinebeck?  I sure don't!

packing boxes and the Martha shawl

Yes, it suddenly got cold enough to break out my fake Uggs!

As for my knitting, I finished the baby blanket and promptly tossed it in a moving box instead of photographing it.

Next, I picked up the Martha shawl and knit a few rows between packing boxes.  My entire life revolves around packing boxes, giant dust bunnies and piles and piles of stuff.  There are piles of stuff to take to my mother-in-law's house (where we're moving.  Have I mentioned that??) piles to go to storage, piles to donate and piles that are trash.  Of course, we ran out of trash bags in the middle of the process.  And soon-to-be-excommunicated-family-members-if-they-don't-stop-it keep putting things in the wrong piles.  It's driving me completely insane.  And my husband, who HATES to shop, has spent multiple days tire and clothes shopping rather than packing.  The situation would be pretty darned comical if the movers weren't due to arrive in a few days.

Speaking of comical....

Episcopal Chicken

A church cookbook titled Episcopal Chicken.  I have no recollection of putting it there, but it was on my cookbook shelf.  And I think it's hilarious.  I don't know, maybe it's the cardboard and packing tape fumes getting to me, but I find the title laugh out loud funny.  

So, have you picked up on the fact that we are moving next week and the additional fact that we are totally unprepared?  Yeah.  The only way I'm going to get prepared is to sign off from the blog for a few days, maybe even a week or two.  I really, really need to get some packing done.  I'll be back once we've moved and I've unpacked the important things like my toothbrush and my knitting.

And speaking of knitting, I think I'll go knit a row or two.  I have high hopes that today is the day the boxes pack themselves.