I did get some of the loveliest things at Olds, and I am looking around M1 today, thinking that I am quite pleased with all the stuff on hand for spinners - I mean, I do love knitting, but I know I am not as a good a knitter as many people (I know how much I don’t know!) and certainly I’m not as a good knitter as I am a spinner.

But we have wool combs, and spindles, and silk rovings from Luscious Luxury, more of Annie’s beautiful wool rovings, Stained Skeins in superwash in fun colours, a load of other fibres, including silk and cashmere, wool and bamboo, ball winders, Katie-a-go-gos, wooden swifts and a Schacht-Reeves Saxony wheel (which is on sale), two Louets in stock ready to go and the funky and easy to use Spinolution wheel. A nice range of goodies. And I am feeling all over fangrrl - I just placed my first ad in Spin-Off. I have read it for years, and now I am advertising *my* store in it! Wow!

But I am not neglecting the knitters - I absolutely rang the bell this week with wonderful sock yarn from Turtle Cove. This gorgeous yarn is called ‘Turtle Feet’ - which is such fun! - and the colours are these lovely semi-solids, in everything - browns, yellows, purples, blues, greens, oranges and reds - and have the best names - Another Night, Agogo, Voodoo Dolly, Cherry-Colored Funk… And I also have more from Crimson Orchid - very happy to have their wonderful ‘knit jewelry’ (stitch markers) at M1.

So if you need a break from the Greatest Show on Earth, come on in and relax here. Not that I’m against it - but I don’t have a cowboy hat!

Make One will be closed tomorrow so that we can all go and celebrate the birthday of our great country with our families. Go out there and wave the flag and have a picnic and watch fireworks and think how lucky you are to live here in the True North, Strong and Free.

And just a note to let you know that in addition to the new things like niddy-noddies, swifts, ball winders, silk rovings from Luscious Luxury, Annie’s beautiful rovings, more cool rovings from Stained Skeins, we also have a lot of new patterns from Sivia Harding and Miriam Felton, including Waves in the Square and Phoenix Rising. If you had asked for these before I bought the store at the beginning of May, unfortunately there was a computer crash in which this info was lost - so please call if you were wanting these.

Have a great holiday!

I just got back from my first time as a vendor at Olds, and I had just the greatest time! I brought back a lot of goodies for the store - my DH kept saying “Only buy for the *store*, honey” - and I did (well, mostly!).

I want to say thanks to a few people before I get into the goodies, though:

Marilynn, thank you for your advice and your knowledge and your willingness to share your experience to get M1 ready to go on the road (and all your hard work);
thanks to Kathleen, Angele, and Trish, who were “babysittters” this weekend so I could have a worry-free time in Olds;
thanks to all you “regulars” who took the time to come and say ‘hi’ - it was very nice to have you show so much support!
thanks to my dear friend, Lorette, who came with me and looked after the booth so I could go and meet a lot of other wonderful folks;
and thanks to my DH, Ken, for all his help hauling and packing and unpacking. M1 is a team effort!

I had the pleasure of meeting the ladies of River City Yarns in Edmonton, and brought back some of Cynthia’s dyed rovings for your delicatation; I look forward to a lot of interesting exchanges and collaborations with our ‘cousins in yarn’. It was such fun seeing the sorts of things other yarn stores carry - everyone has such interesting ideas about how to get and keep people interested in our special craft.

I am delighted to say that I met Barbara of Luscious Luxury Silk, and brought home for us some of her brilliant jewel-toned and soft pastel silk rovings - Tussah, Bombyx, and silk/wool. I am spinning some now on my wheel at M1 - you can come and see for yourself how gorgeous these are! I want to also get some of Barbara’s silk caps and hankies for us to try.

The folks at Custom Woollen Mills are always so nice - and thinking of having the shop at the mill open on Saturdays soon. I got some undyed sock blanks from them, and we will have these on hand for classes in the fall.

Annie and Correna took the Wool Judging course, and they have completed it successfully. Congrats!

Annie also took the time to bring me more of her gorgeous rovings and some of the famous Kitchen Sink batts - come and get ‘em! Wow!

The one thing I did get for myself (but might share if you are as passionate about fleece as I am) is a stunning coloured Cotswold X that did rather well in the judging. But I had fallen totally in love with it before it was ever judged, and developed quite a ‘thing’ for it - I kept going back to it and smelling it and patting it and generally being looney all Saturday afternoon and evening. (I would watch it and hiss to Lorette ‘She’s *touching* my fleece!’ when someone else looked at it - Lorette knows me and was vastly amused).

It was indeed a bit like getting a crush on an actor - I know my love can’t be returned, exactly - but boy, do I have it bad! Correna and Annie are going to bring it home for me, as it had to stay and be displayed, but the owner, Jody McLean, was kind enough to take pity on my passion and allow me to buy it before I left yesterday.

And the classes just get more and more interesting and exciting every year - you should go!

Make One will be at Olds this weekend in the shopping mall; we will be there Saturday and Sunday. If there is anything you are looking for that you know is here, I can bring along with me and you can pick it up there - just let me know before Friday noonish. See you all there!

I am ordering copies of this interesting book from England, with dozens of amazing patterns from the 40s and 50s in it, and really looking forward to having it in Make One. Claire suggested it - she is knitting a lovely sweater from it - and it is fascinating! We hope to have a knit-along for at least one of the patterns in the Fall.

I also hope to have the list of Fall/Winter classes up for registration by the middle of July, so do kep checking out the website for that.

Hope today to see you for the first of what I hope will be many Saturday potlucks! And if you have arranged to pick up your Year of Lace in Calgary, I have them here for you. Please remember to write to Amy and Sandra at info@yearoflace.com if you have any questions about your package or pattern.

Have a great weekend!

Just want to keep you updated about what is going on around here - and there’s a lot!

First of all, thanks to those who came out for KIP Day - we’ll get a flag for next year!

In the ‘this just in’ department - we have gotten in the last few days:
GoKnit bags in various colours and sizes
Sock blockers
Baby Bamboo in a variety of not baby colours
Therapi yarn
Cashmere/silk in three colours from the Diamond Luxury Collection (these are the “tribbles”)
Cascade 220 in a wide range of colours
Wool combs
Beautiful spindles in a variety of weights
Angora yarn (a little fibre snack)

All Jamieson Shetland Spindrift yarn is now 30% off - this is a very interesting yarn in a wide variety of colours, if you haven’t tried it. And don’t forget that we have a regular 30% bin we try to keep interesting - there are silk and cashmere in there right now.

The new event is Potluck Night on the third Saturday of the month here at Make One - to replace Pub Night for a while. So this Saturday, the 20th, I hope you can join us after 5ish, with something to share. We can hang out and chat and eat - certainly a nice way of passing the time on a summer Saturday evening!

I hope that you can join for the International Knit in Public Day this Saturday. The Knitting Room and Make One are co-sponsoring this event. We plan to meet here at 10.30 or so, get on the Ctrain and ride to Somerset and back, knitting all the while, and then go to Riley Park for lunch and more knitting.

The weather looks good for this (so far!) but the default will be to knit here at M1. If you are coming - and I hope you do! - please bring your knitting, a lunch, and maybe a hat. Call me for more details.

All of us have different, but very important, reasons for sharing in this wonderful craft. For some, it is meditation and peace; for others, pure creation. Others like the precision of making an item just perfectly. But all of us find something special. We are so lucky as to live in a time when it really is our choice to handmake a garment, and we all owe a lot to knitting. And spinning. And all the other lovely, satisfying, extraordinary handcrafts we are able - privileged - to do.

So I say this to encourage you to think seriously about entering one or more of your own items into the Calgary Stampede Creative Arts & Crafts show this year. It is up to us to support the effort to remind people how important and how amazing handwork is. There are catagories for kntting, crocheting and tatting, sewing, needlework & stitchery, quilting, rugs and weaving, beading, pottery - and spinning - as well as a number of others.

The rules are pretty simple and straightforward - you can find them here: http://www.westernshowcase.com/creativeartsandcrafts.html. I also, thanks to Marilynn, have a number of the booklets with all the rules and categories here at the store.

It is up to us to make sure everyone knows that “people still do that”.

Another thing we can do to make sure of this is to support Worldwide Knit in Public Day on Saturday, June 13th. The Knitting Room and Make One are co-sponsoring an event. Our plan is to meet here at about 10.30, swap box lunches (to get in on this, give me a call at the store), and ride the Ctrain from downtown to Somerset and back, kntting all the while; then to go to Riley Park, continue knitting and eat lunch. There will be a draw for a gift certificate to Make One for those attending.

So, get out there and fly your flag as a proud knitter!

We just got a shipment of new books from Interweave Press. I am sure you will be interested to know that we got Cookie A’s new book, “Sock Innovation”! We also have “The Intentional Spinner” by Judith Mackenzie McCuin, who will be teaching spinning classes at the Sock Summit.

The other books are:

“Feminine Knits”, Lene Holme Samsoe
“Simple Style”, by Ann Budd
“Classic Knits” and “Japanese Inspired Knits” from the Marianne Isager Collection
and in the Harmony Guides “Colorwork Stitches”.

Can you knit and read?