here, there, and everywhere

Posted on Posted in Bare Naked Wools, book reviews/events, designing, lace/shawls

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what a month! i have literally been all over the the map and filling every moment with some important task or other—and i have so much to tell you as a result, haha!

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well, you all know by now that we recently exhibited at the maryland sheep and wool show and then followed up immediately with the release of our spring ensemble collection.

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but i would like to back up and show you some of the gorgeous knitted samples that have been the real show in my eyes. we couldn’t put our beautiful booth displays and collections together without a considerable contribution of fine knitting to show off our designs and yarns.

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i don’t think one person came to our booth at maryland that didn’t notice whatever barb was wearing that day—in the two weeks before the show she knit this cute striped amalfi coast skirt AND a janet guthrie top in our hempshaugh fingering yarn. she also packed along the costa figueira jumper that she knit just before that.

SO many visitors to our booth made a beeline for “barb’s outfit” each day. believe me, we won’t leave home without her now!

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another eye-catching sample on display was this stunning ponte di rialto square, knit by vanessa with two skeins of our cabécou brillant lace, the champagne shade. this beautiful design by romi hill was part of our january ensemble and can be knit in fine lace yarn  or a slightly heavier weight, such as better breakfast fingering yarn.

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many people wonder how to wear a square shawl—the answer is that there are a variety of ways. with a super lightweight fabric like this lace sample, the piece can be draped in layers for outerwear or used as a light blanket or umbrella in a shower.

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lightweight lace is surprisingly (and efficiently) warm when layered up in folds—it traps air to reflect back our own cozy body heat.

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when the shawl arrived at knitspot headquarters, it was yet to be blocked—vanessa always saves that part for me, haha. it looks very crumply and somewhat homely coming off the needles, but that is easily remedied with the magical process of blocking.

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i put it in a soaking bath right away, but wasn’t able to actually pin it out til a couple of days later. no matter—undyed natural fiber is safe to sit in water for an extended period.

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it was well worth the wait—when i finally had a little time to stretch and pin it, it was a spectacular 60-inch square of lace finesse. this piece is not only a work of art, but one of considerable generosity; thank you vanessa!

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another generous contribution of knitted prowess was this outfit of the amalfi coast skirt, knit by our dear friend cherie and the costa figueira vest, knit by our good friend kristi. both pieces are shown here in the millet shade of hempshaugh as we had intentions of photographing them—along with the square shawl—as a wedding outfit.

while that plan went astray when we couldn’t coordinate good weather with a wedding party of models on the same day, we were still able to photograph it as a wonderfully summery outfit that will be perfect for a hot weather party later in the season. come june and july, we’ll be looking for a combination like this to wear . . .

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and guess what? i finally finished up the physalis shawl that had been on my needles since february, in our stone soup fingering yarn. there is absolutely no reason it should have taken this long except that i kept getting distracted by new designs.

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still, a few rows or a half hour of morning knitting at a time and it is now done. i even got to block it right away; my favorite part. i just love how those spaces between the leaves open up along with the mesh body.

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it’s a total transformation.

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we displayed this shawl at the front of our booth with the cream outfit above and it got SO much attention—the organic forms within knit in the rustic tweed yarn, made for an incredibly realistic (and dramatic) portrayal of leaves, vines, pods, and bark.

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i love this shawl—it’s so me; it’s really fun to knit and much faster and easier than it looks.

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i’ve knit it three times now and each one is my favorite, haha. from front to back in chebris lace (truffe), stone soup fingering (granite), and cabécou brillant lace (champagne)

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just before maryland and the ensemble release, erica and i had a date to spend the weekend with the miami valley knitting guild in dayton. on the way, we stopped off to visit our ohio mill for the afternoon. i love this photo because you can really see where all the gorgeous shades of our better breakfast yarn come from—carrie and robbie can tell you in minute detail about the coat of fiber each animal produces, haha.

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carrie does a lot of weaving and showed up this awesome rug that she made using the fiber that comes off of our hemp blend in the dehairing stage.

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she makes this really cool tubular yarn from it that she weaves into rugs. it’s so pretty made up, isn’t it?

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after a nice visit with them, we moved on to meet up with our friends at the guild. we set up a popup shop with yarn and samples so they could preview a few of the ensemble pieces.

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over the weekend we did some classes together in sweater fitness and finishing; it was a really great weekend. thank you miami knitting guild for a lovely opportunity to meet and work with you!

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back home everyone else was working to get ready for maryland—we even pressed doug into service, packing patterns and yarn to go into the truck.

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we pretty much stripped the shop bare and took every spare skein along with us.

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i love that our truck has a camel on the side that kind of also looks like an alpaca.

setup went like clockwork with everybody helping and before long, we had an adorable booth filled with yarn goodness and pretty samples—ready to show customers on saturday and sunday.

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on friday night we ate at a classy joint, haha. but a well deserved break for all of us; it felt as if we had not paused for weeks.

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and we had a terrific show—many many thanks to all who visited our booth and introduced yourselves to us. we just love meeting readers and customers and ravelers at our events. it makes the whole journey worth it; thank you all so much!

speaking of journeys, just wait til you see where i am now; i will catch you up in the next post, hopefully tomorrow.

12 thoughts on “here, there, and everywhere

  1. That all looks like a ton of fun! Here’s hoping that I’ll be able to attend one of your future events. Will California be on your schedule some day?

  2. Stunning! Gorgeous! What a beautiful collection of knitty goodness! I love Barb and Helen’s outfits so much that I want them both. I am amazed at how fast Barb knitted those pieces up, too. I am very drawn to the skirts. I hope to get started on one soon. Maybe for next Spring and summer. I love the hemp and linen yarns, but honestly can wear wool all year round in Nome. I am in three groups on Ravelry that promote handmade wardrobes. One is Curious Handmade, the other, Truly Myrtle, and the other, Me Made Wardrobe. If you can find the time, I recommend to check them out. David has been doing some fine posts while you were away. Eagerly looking forward to your next post to see where you are now. Oh, and I absolutely love the new shawl!

  3. I don’t know where to start, everything is so beautiful! I wish I could have been at the show. Beautiful collection.

  4. No wonder the blog has been so quiet! Love seeing all the pretty samples and ensemble is amazing!

  5. Wow, the Physalis shawl calls to me more and more with each variation of yarn base. Time to add it to the queue!

  6. The pictures do not do justice to the finished items! Thanks again for sharing your Ensemble trunk show with MVKG!!!

    And…I really am short, aren’t I???

  7. So glad the show went so well! And of COURSE Barb was a walking sales lady! I’m gonna make that skirt!

  8. I’m so sad that I missed the MDS&W. Hopefully, I will catch you next year. In the meantime, I would LOVE to knit the Ponte di Rialto square but I’m a little confused about the amount of yarn required. The pattern states that 2250 yds are required for the square yet Barb knit the square with only 2 skeins, which your website shows is 750 yds. Please let me know which is correct as I would love to knit it from your yarn.

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