Back in stock: Classy mini-skeins.

Posted by Julia on March 24, 2015

Back in August, we got a bundle of mini-skeins from Dream in Color and a fun, simple pattern to go with: the “Technicolor Cowl.” We all had fun putting wild colorways together, and before we knew it, they were sold out. I’m happy to report that we were finally able to get Dream in Color Classy mini-skeins back in stock!

Dream in Color Classy is a worsted weight superwash merino, hand-dyed in Chicago, IL. Each of these mini-skeins comes with about 50 yards of yarn.

Nancy Leuer’s “Technicolor Cowl” calls for 8 mini-skeins.

We’ve seen so many kinds of color combinations made from these mini-skeins, and they all look great. Some are gradients, pulling 8 shades from one or two color families. Some are brightly colored, with high contrast shades side by side in each stripe. Some feature duplicate skeins of one main color studded with only a few contrasting shades, for a less colorful but no less interesting look.

Come by the shop to put together a “Technicolor Cowl” colorway of your own!

Rowan Pure Wool: new colors, booklets.

Posted by Julia on March 15, 2015

Rowan has added six new shades to their Pure Wool Worsted line, and we’re happy to have them on our shelves.

All six are heathered, each shade composed of a few solid shades that are blended together to look solid from a distance. They fill out our existing selection nicely to make a well-rounded palette.

What to make with Rowan Pure Wool Worsted? Martin Storey has answered this question with two pattern collections in Pure Wool Worsted.

Pure Wool Worsted makes a great sweater yarn, especially for casual everyday sweaters.

It’s smooth and predictable on the needles, sturdy and easy to care for, renders stitch patterns crisply, and happens to be the most economical superwash worsted weight wool we’ve found.

Superwash wool at this gauge is tremendously versatile, and has many uses beyond adult-sized sweaters: use it for baby blankets, children’s sweaters, slipper socks, cold weather accessories, home goods, and the like. It’s also a good candidate for toy-making, as it happens.

I used Rowan Pure Wool recently to knit this pair of bunnies from a pair of free patterns. The bigger one, “Henry’s Rabbit,” is for my niece, and the smaller one, “Henry’s Bunny,” is for her sibling-to-be, due at the end of the month. One skein of Rowan Pure Wool was enough to make the pair. Stuffed animals are definitely not my typical knitting project, but I must say, this was a truly delightful diversion, and this yarn was a perfect fit!

Come by the shop to peruse the Martin Storey booklets, see the new colors, and plan your next project. See you there!

Ewe Ewe Trunk Show!

Posted by Julia on February 27, 2015

Snowy weather delayed our Ewe Ewe Trunk Show a bit, but now it’s here!

We have a variety of garments on display knit in Ewe Ewe’s superwash merino yarns, Ewe So Sporty and Wooly Worsted.

From small projects, like socks, mitts and cowls, all the way up to baby blankets, shawls, and sweaters, the range of garments here reflects the multiplicity of uses for these soft, easy-care yarns.

Come by the shop this weekend to see the Ewe Ewe Trunk Show! We’ll have it on display until Tuesday, March 3rd.

New colors in Canopy Worsted.

Posted by Julia on January 25, 2015

This week’s delivery from Fibre Company held more than just new colors in Acadia; we also got three new shades of Canopy Worsted!

“Turmeric” and “Dragonfruit” really brighten up the Canopy Worsted basket, and “Lemur” is a particularly beautiful steely gray that we simply couldn’t say no to.

Canopy Worsted is a light worsted weight blend of alpaca, merino wool, and bamboo. These fibers combine to create a yarn that is smooth and round, soft and drapey, with excellent stitch definition and a slight lustre.

What to knit with Canopy Worsted? Anne is rarely seen without her “Cumberland Cowl” around her neck, and has inspired many knitters to make Canopy cowls of their own. One 200 yard skein is all it takes, and the same is true of all five accessories in the Kelbourne Woolens Weekenders booklet. Consider the cabled “Greenpoint Cowl” from that collection; Amy is offering a class on the subject this spring!

Come by the shop to pick up a skein or two of Canopy Worsted for a cowl or two! See you there.

New colors in Modern Cotton.

Posted by Julia on January 18, 2015

Berroco has dreamed up a few new colors for their Modern Cotton yarn, filling out their palette of crayon-bright colors with some more subdued hues.

Berroco Modern Cotton is a worsted weight blend of cotton and rayon, and since it’s arrival last spring, it’s become a staple here at the Hillsborough Yarn Shop.

Smooth, soft to the touch, economical, and machine-washable, Modern Cotton has been embraced by knitters and crocheters alike.

It’s perfect for baby sweaters, blankets, and the like, but just as well-suited to grown-up garments like the ones you’ll find in Berroco’s new booklet: #358, Modern Cotton Women.

Last year, designer Amy Christoffers took over Norah Gaughan’s position as Design Director for Berroco, and this collection has a distinct Christoffers look to my eye.

Christoffers seems to specialize in casual, wearable garments, especially those decorated in texture patterns and small lace motifs.

Look for Berroco Modern Cotton in the worsted weight section here at the shop; you’ll find this booklet tucked in the cubby with the yarn. See you there!

Weekenders Trunk Show.

Posted by Julia on November 26, 2014

It’s been a season of trunk shows here at the shop. Since September, we’ve shown garments from Shibui, Hanne Falkenberg, and Swans Island, inspiring knitters along the way. I’m happy to report that our next trunk show has arrived!

Here is a trunk show from Fibre Company, featuring all five garments from the Weekenders pattern collection, three hats and two cowls. Each of the accessories in this collection are knit with just one skein of Fibre Company Canopy Worsted, a soft and lustrous blend of merino, alpaca, and bamboo.

An accessory show like this one seems especially well-suited to the season, as many of us are planning small projects to give as holiday gifts. A skein of this special yarn and a copy of Weekenders would make a great gift for a knitter, too.

Come by during the Trunk Show to see the garments for yourself and plan your next project. We’re closed Thursday, November 27th, for Thanksgiving, but we’ll have the Weekenders Trunk Show on display until December 17th. Have a great holiday; see you at the shop!

Hello, Rowan.

Posted by Julia on November 17, 2014

We’re thrilled to announce that we now carry two yarns from Rowan: say hello to Pure Wool Worsted and Wool Cotton!

Pure Wool Worsted is a superwash, worsted weight wool that comes in a wide range of colors, including subtle heathered shades that we don’t often see in superwash yarns. Each 100 gram skein boasts 219 yards, enough to knit a hat, small scarf or pair of mittens.

There are so many uses for medium weight, machine-washable wools, from sweaters and accessories to blankets and baby things, and we carry many yarns like these for exactly that reason. So far, Pure Wool Worsted is the most affordable, however, and we love finding sources for high quality fiber at a reasonable price.

We put Pure Wool Worsted to the test on our needles and in Anne’s washing machine, and it came out looking good: stitch definition crisp, gauge unchanged, fabric softened. Look for this machine-washed swatch at the shop and feel for yourself.

Wool Cotton is a dk weight blend of merino wool and cotton, also machine-washable. Each 50 gram skein has 123 yards, enough to knit a baby hat or short pair of fingerless mitts.

Working with Wool Cotton, we were impressed by the smooth, obedient quality of the yarn, and pleased to see it come out of the washing machine looking like new.

Cotton and wool make a lovely fiber blend for our climate, particularly in a dk weight. I can see Wool Cotton in the same wide variety of projects that suit Pure Wool Worsted: sweaters large and small, baby blankets, hats, mitts, shawls, and cowls. Look for more project ideas and pattern inspiration on the HYS Pinterest page, and come by the shop to plan your next project with Rowan yarns!

Back in stock: Ultra Alpaca and Ultra Alpaca Fine.

Posted by Julia on September 30, 2014

These mighty big boxes arrived from Berroco last week, with over 30 pounds of Ultra Alpaca yarns in each one. New colors made up some of the weight, as did some old favorites; the rest was a new yarn entirely, but that’s for another post. The unpacking, sorting, storing, and displaying took Anne and I most of a day!

Good old Ultra Alpaca. This 50%/50% blend of wool and alpaca is a classic, with the structure and elasticity of wool and the drape, halo, and softness of alpaca.

It comes in reasonably-priced, 100 gram hanks with 219 yards each; enough yarn to make a small scarf, a hat, or a pair of mittens. Ultra Alpaca comes in a wide range of colors, from fun brights to classic neutrals; I’ve always particularly admired the heathered shades.

Ultra Alpaca is a great sweater yarn, too, as Mindy here can attest. A bit of show and tell: Mindy came in the other day, having heard about our big Berroco shipment, to show off her very first sweater, knit during a “Start Your First Sweater” class here at the shop. She used Ultra Alpaca in a heathered charcoal and a friendly top-down seamless cardigan pattern from our pattern binder. Look at the fabulous result!

We also got new colors in Ultra Alpaca Fine, a fingering weight blend of wool, alpaca, and nylon. Its fiber content and gauge suggest socks, but Ultra Alpaca Fine is equally at home in larger garments, and especially shines in openwork scarves and shawls.

The alpaca content gives it a bit of a fuzzy halo, something to keep in mind if you’re planning a project that requires sharp stitch definition–those fuzzy fibers can obscure delicate texture patterns a bit. That said, those fuzzy fibers also give the finished fabric softness and warmth.

Come by the shop to see all the new colors in Berroco Ultra Alpaca and Ultra Alpaca Fine, and keep them in mind for sweater, sock, and shawl-making this fall. Stay tuned for the newest Berroco yarn, or come by the shop to see it before it hits the blog!

Hello, Swans Island All American Worsted.

Posted by Julia on September 5, 2014

We’re delighted to announce that Swans Island’s newest yarn has arrived at the shop: meet All American Worsted!

All American Worsted is a 2-ply woolen-spun blend of 75% Rambouillet wool and 25% alpaca. There are 210 yards on each 80 gram skein, every bit of which was grown, processed, spun, and dyed in the USA.

All the colors begin with this shade of gray, the natural color of the Rambouillet and alpaca blend. The gray skeins are then dyed with low impact acid dyes, giving each hue a rich heathered quality.

“Woolen-spun” means that the yarn is spun from fiber that has been carded, but not combed. The carding process organizes the fibers to some degree, but they are not as smoothly aligned as combed fibers, giving woolen-spun yarns a rustic look.

Woolen-spun yarns like All American Worsted are also quite lofty, making them more versatile in terms of gauge. Swans Island suggests a gauge of 4.25 stitches per inch, which we’d consider aran weight, but All American Worsted is happy at a range of gauges. After washing, the fibers bloom to fill whatever space your needles have given them. The bottom section of the little swatch below was knit at 4.5 stitches per inch on a US #8; from there, I switched to a US #9, and the gauge is about 4 stitches per inch.

I knit Stephen West’s “Dustland Hat” at 5 stitches per inch on a US #7, and the fabric is sturdy but supple. All American Worsted renders these knit/purl texture patterns beautifully, and I don’t doubt that it will perform just as well in cables, lace, and colorwork.

For pattern ideas, check the Swans Island binder here at the shop. Their Organic Merino Worsted is comparable, so patterns that call for that yarn will do just as well in All American Worsted. Also, check your Ravelry queue for any patterns calling for Brooklyn Tweed Shelter–I know I am! Of all the yarns we ordered at TNNA this year, this is the one I’ve been perseverating on the most. Any of the Brooklyn Tweed patterns would be stunning in Swans Island All American Worsted, but for myself, I’ve boiled it down to three favorites: “Bray,” “Wheaten,” and “Little Wave.”

Come by the shop to meet this gorgeous yarn in person, and plan your next project! Look for Swans Island All American Worsted in the aran weight section, near the Swans Island Organic Merino Worsted. See you there!

Dream in Color Classy mini-skeins.

Posted by Julia on August 30, 2014

Dream in Color Classy is a worsted weight superwash merino, hand-dyed in Chicago, IL. We just got a bundle of it here at the shop, but not in the usual 250-yard skeins. No, this time, we got a box full of 50-yard mini-skeins, and a fun pattern to suit them.

The pattern is Nancy Leuer’s “Technicolor Cowl,” a simple striped infinity scarf that calls for eight Classy mini-skeins.

When the mini-skeins arrived, I was given the enviable task of knitting a sample “Technicolor Cowl” for the shop, which meant that I got to pick eight colors from the 20+ colors we’d received. Everyone in the room was soon creating colorway after colorway, from the monochromatic to the wildly disparate.

It’s a delightful creative exercise, the “Technicolor Cowl” color game, and we didn’t want to deny anyone the opportunity to play along. Rather than pack them up into kits, we’re encouraging you to create your own colorways.

I settled on the following combination, somewhat reminiscent of Anne’s “Wisdom Wrap,” with its purples, greens, and dark grays.

This is a quick, nearly-mindless knit, one which requires little to no counting, not even an end-of-round stitch marker. The only stitches in play are knit and purl, and the project is going quickly and smoothly on my sharp and slick Addi Rocket needles.

Come by the shop to pick eight colors for a “Technicolor Cowl” of your own!