J. Knits Bits: May 2007

Hello, hello, hello!!!!!

How are you knitting, crocheting, spinning, felting and other creative friends (if I missed anyone, apologies!)??

I have been the largest blogging SLUG on the planet and you have my deepest apologies. I know your very existence depends on my silly blog (he, he!) and I don't want to have to talk you down from the ledge any longer :). You know I love you guys and the wait is over! This post is chocked-full of photos!

There is so much to say and so much has been going on around here that it feels as though my head is going to lop off! Where do I begin? Well, I guess at the beginning so here goes:

The NENA Show (New England Needlework Association) we had been preparing for for a month has finally come and gone! This is a retailers-only show (no general public) which is similar to TNNA but smaller. I was so glad once the show dates finally came (and went! No, just kidding!). We are pretty much back to normal here in the shop and I am glad! Now I have some time to enjoy the little things in life (like blogging!). I promise (fingers crossed!) not to be gone from you this long again! I've missed you! Anyway...

Here are some pics of our booth:

We did a lot with what room we had to work with. Overall, it was a FANTASTIC show and to all of those I finally had a chance to meet in person, it was wonderful (and I really mean that!). See you all again next year!!

I tried my very, very best not to actually shop at this show but since it's one of the only shows that is cash -n- carry, it was difficult! I did buy 2 things.

1 thing we desperately needed around here was an electric cake (or ball) winder. Here it is:

I had been promising the staff one for a long while to cake up all those ends of yarn that are left on the big skeins after all the other skeining is finished. I knew the time was right when the booth next to ours had a vendor selling one! It was a sign or something... So, $265 later the deal was done! I know it's a lot of money but I have to tell you, if you've been wanting one of these, it's well worth the bucks! It works AWESOME and I'm glad! Not all skeining equipment available to hand-dyers turns out to be as great as they say but this certainly was! If you can afford one and do a lot of cake-ing, grab one!

Then I had to buy something for me...

GLASS NEEDLES! They were only $20... A STEAL in my opinion. They are made out of the same material as Pyrex and seem pretty durable (unless you drop them of course...). When you buy glass needles however, the size is never exact. These are about a size 11-13. I'm saving them for the perfect project to try them out. I'll let you know how they work out when I use them. They look awfully pretty, don't they??

Moving on... (still with me? Grab coffee and I'll see you in a bit...)

J. Knits has introduced 6 new colors for the Fall 2007 line and 3 new yarns (I knew you'd like that...). Here are the new colors:

AC #142 & AC #143