Seasons Greetings

It's been a long time since I blogged. It normally slows down in the office in the month of December but it hasn't this year until the last couple of days. We were shipping out last minute orders at 4 o'clock yesterday which is really unusual. Today is our last day for the year. We're leaving at noon to have our Christmas lunch. We're going to the same restaurant that we went to last year, Remezzo. You can see the menu here http://www.remezzo.ca/home.html The food is good, it's close to the office and there is parking. The restaurant just called to confirm that we are still coming. We're having a terrible snow storm today, expecting 15 cm. We won't be back in the office until January 5. I'm looking forward to the break.

I went to the Vinyl Cafe Christmas Concert last Sunday with my friend Susan. It was wonderful as usual. This year it was at Massey Hall. It has always been at Convocation Hall in the past. We took the subway down and wandered through the Eatons Centre before dinner. The Swarovski Crystal Tree was on display. It was really beautiful.

I'm working on a hat and scarf out of Arequipa for work. They have a heart motif that I found in one of Barbara Walker's books. I've been using the chart but have written it out for knitters that aren't familiar with charts. I have the hat knit, it needs to be finished. I've started the scarf and am randomly placing the motif on the scarf. I'm alternating between using the chart and the written instructions to make sure they are accurate. We'll publish the pattern for Spring 09.

I'm making myself a shrug out of our Superfine Alpaca. It is really beautiful to knit with. I'm using the dark charcoal gray colour. I'll have some left over so I think I'll make a neckwarmer and a pair of fingerless gloves. It tends to be freezing in the office during the winter so I wear fingerless gloves quite a lot. Every time the warehouse door opens a blast of freezing air comes in. I sit closest to the door so I get the brunt of it. Thank goodness I have lots of warm sweaters!

It's almost time to go. I hope everyone that reads this has a wonderful and safe holiday season!

Happy Knitting and Happy New Year!

Susan

Lunch in Oakville

I had a lovely lunch in Oakville on Saturday with my friends Bob, Lyn and Mary. We all worked together at Bell in Product Management. Bob is the only one left at Bell. I gather it is not a happy place to be right now. Mary and Lyn both live in Oakville so Bob and I made the drive from London and Scarborough respectively. We had lunch at the Olivepress and it was excellent. You can see the menu on their website http://www.olivepress.ca/ I had the Honeymoon Spaghetti and it was delicious. It has been two years since we got together so it was wonderful to get caught up. I had the waiter take our picture.

From left to right are Lyn, me, Bob and Mary.

My father has been in PEI visiting my sister for a few days. It was her birthday on Saturday. He came home on Sunday evening. He was a little concerned that he wouldn't make it home as the tail end of a hurricane was supposed to hit the island but it didn't, fortunately.

I'm working on a pair of over the knee socks right now. I'm almost finished the calf shaping. Once that is done, it will be a simple matter of finishing the foot like a regular sock. I'm doing it out of one of the newer colours of Arequipa paint. It is colour 210 on the shade card. http://www.estelledesigns.ca/images/Estelle/EstelleArequipa.htm It is a really lovely colourway. I'm very pleased with the way it is working up.

We're expecting another big shipment from Peru any minute now. Unfortunately, these shipments have to come through New York and always get tied up in security there. Ever since September 11, security has been extremely tight there. Understandable really.

It's raining today. I might have known it would because I got my car washed on Sunday. Oh well what can you do?

Have a good week and happy knitting!

Susan

Lots More Yarn!

It's been a busy few weeks here at Estelle. Last week we received a container of yarn from Peru. I think it was the biggest shipment we've ever received. The container was parked at our receiving door to be unpacked. Here's what it looked like from the outside.This is what it looked like from inside the warehouse.
Needless to say it took some time to unload and unpack. It's all done now and the orders are going out the door to the stores.

Last week Lisa, the new owner of the Naked Sheep, was in to pick up some Cascade. She's still working full time and the Sarah and Emily working during the day. Lisa has made lots of changes to the Sheep both physically and to the inventory. She's added lots of sock yarn. I'll have to go down and have a look at the store. She lives not too far from here so it's convenient for her to stop in on her way to the store and pick things up.

Tomorrow is the Kitchener Waterloo Knitters Fair. We've had several stores in to stock up for their booths. I had contemplated going but decided not to for several reasons. First, my great-aunt Elizabeth is turning 102 tomorrow. There was a message from her son waiting when I got home last night telling me that he'd convinced her to go out for dinner tomorrow night and my father and I like to join them. So that would mean that I'd have to rush back from KW and I didn't want to do that. Second, it's going to rain tomorrow and I'm not fond of driving in the rain. And third, gas went up 13 cents overnight to $1.37 a litre. Ouch!

So, I'll stay home and start a new work project instead. It's going to be a pair of over-the-knee socks. I'll just start them and when I have the shaping worked out I'll have Mrs. King finish them. I'm going to see Spamalot on Sunday afternoon with my friend Susan. I've seen it before but it was so much fun that I can't wait to see it again. So all in all it should be a good weekend.

Well, I'd better go. It's 3:00 and the rush for the door is starting. I hadn't seen anything like it when I first started working here since I'd been in a unionized environment.

Have a good weekend.
Happy Knitting!
Susan

Photo Shoot

We did our photo shoot last night. We transform the office into a temporary studio. We've used the same photographer for the last several years. He's the retired fashion photographer from the Globe and Mail. He's also very French and very nice. I sort of act as stylist for these things, making sure that garments that have special features get shot at angles that will emphasize them. We had a lovely young lady as our model. This was her first time in front of the camera. She was really nervous at first but she soon relaxed. Alain was very good at making her smile. I took a shot of Alain taking a shot of Keating. Today Chris chose the shots that we will use for each pattern. We usually try to show a couple of different angles on each pattern. I'm in the process of making sure that the patterns are correct and formatted properly. Then we'll get them off to the printer. Once we get them back and proof them the printer puts them together into tear off pads. We then make sets of each pattern and send them out to all the stores. People always like to get something free.

We're also putting together binders for all the stores. These will include all the shade cards for the Cascade yarns we distribute along with most of the Estelle shade cards. We're also send a King Cole shade book.

I'm testing a new sample that arrived. It is 60% merino,20% alpaca, 10% silk and 10% nylon. It feels pretty nice but I'll haven't got far enough on it yet. It looks like a sport weight. I'll report back on my next post.

I was just talking to Karen at Sheepstrings. She'd just read my last post about the Eagles concert. She'd been at the Tuesday show and loved it as much as I did. We both agreed that we'd have loved to go to the Thursday one. She's been trying to find their new CD and can't. I was planning to go to Walmart to get it for myself so I told her I'd get her one also.

The warehouse is a hive of activity right now. We've got Annie and a young guy pulling orders. Chris tries to arrange it so that shipments come in on a staggered basis but as usual Murphy's law steps in and they all come at once. Our knitting needles came in. That was two full skids on its own.

Well I'd best get back to my patterns.

Happy knitting!

Susan

The Eagles

I went to The Eagles concert on Monday night. It was fantastic. My friend Joan called me last week to see if I wanted to go. She'd been given two tickets. Of course I wanted to go! They played some tunes from their new record but they played a lot of their past hits. They did some of their solo tunes also. Joe Walsh was amazing. Well, they all were. They sound just as great today as they did 30 years ago. They played for over 3 hours. The concert didn't end until 11:45 and I didn't get home until 12:45.

I've been taking Mondays off for the past few weeks. It's been nice have long weekends. I've been working on a baby sweater out of the new pale pink Arequipa It's almost finished. Of course in the meantime I've started a scribble lace shawl out of black Arequipa and the new bright colour of Woolly Bully. We had this done a few years ago out of Watercolours and Woolly Bully but we've discontinued Watercolours so thought it would work with Arequipa. It's looking good. I'll have to finish it this weekend because we're doing our photo shoot on Tuesday after work. The photographer we use is the retired fashion photographer from the Globe and Mail.

I went to see Pick Up Sticks in Bradford on Wednesday. They have a new puppy, a 14 week old Golden Retriever named Rocky. Talk about a cute puppy and so good. He didn't bark once the whole time I was there. Here's his picture.

I'm leaving early today to go to a funeral. My first singing teacher passed away this week. They wanted former choir members to participate so I'll me singing in a choir for the first time in many years. After that I'm off to see a new children's store in Unionville. (We have another side to the business in the gift industry which I'm involved in also.) Then I'm getting my hair cut.

Happy Knitting!

Susan

WWKIP Day part 2

WWKIP day at Scarborough Town Centre was a great success. It was lots of fun. We had a table that we set up a display on. We took two mannequins and two of our Cloud Cotton sample sweaters. We had lots of sample balls of various yarns. We took some of our free pad patterns so that people could help themselves. And we took lots of Jungle/Shimmer scarf kits. I ended up giving a kit to everyone there. I'd say there were between 30 and 40 knitters there. Some of them stayed the whole day. Here's a picture of the group. I asked Jody, the organizer, to take a picture of the DKC members. We are, left to right, Flo (an amazing bead knitter), yours truly, Wendy (DKC Treasurer) Joan (Frolic chair) and Wanietta (Canada's fastest knitter and 3rd fastest knitter in the world).

A couple of people came up to me and said " I know you. You used to work at Shelly's" As soon as they said that I recognized them also. It was nice to catch up.

In the afternoon a girl came with her spinning wheel. You can see her sitting behind Flo and Wendy. That really attracted a lot of attention. People walking past in the mall would stop and watch for a long time. It really was fascinating.

Yesterday we had our final ballet performance of the season. It was a mixed programme and it was excellent. I hadn't seen The Second Detail before and it was great. Jennifer Fournier (who is retiring at the end of the season) did a solos piece - Five Brahms Waltzes in the Manner of Isadora Duncan. The third was Etudes which was more classical and the highlight was The Fiddle and the Drum. It was performed by the Alberta Ballet and was amazing. It is performed to Joni Mitchell's music. The creative director worked with her to create the ballet. She's got such a great voice. Walking from the restaurant to the ballet we had to walk past CityTV. Queen St was blocked off while they set up for the Much Music Video awards last night. It was pretty cool to watch the rehearsals.
Well I'd best go. I'm off to show the Wool Mill Autumn.

Happy Knitting!
Susan

WWKIP Day

WWKIP stands for World Wide Knit in Public. June 14 is WWKIP Day all around the world. Creative Yarns, which is a new store in the area, have worked with their city councillor to have space inside the Scarborough Town Centre to set up an area where people can come and knit in public. They asked us to sponsor part of it so we are. We're going to have a table there where we can have some of our yarns for people to try. I've got a stack of straight needles that I never use so we can take them. It should be fun! Wendy from the Wool Mill was just here so I showed her the flyer. She took it to put in her window. She thought she'd drop in to Creative Yarns on her way back to say hello. She was in picking up a couple of bags of Cascade 220 to make two sweaters for an upcoming movie. She does this all the time. She made a sweater for John Travolta in Hairspray.

I have finally finished Annie's socks. As you can see they are fraternal socks not identical ones. They are still a bit damp from blocking them last night. I don't know why but I always block my socks. I think they look better.

My father has been broadly hinting that he needs new socks and they he's had to go out and buy socks so I guess I'll start a pair for him next. He wants brown and plain. We have the new Jawoll Silk in stock now so maybe I'll grab a ball of that for him. It is self striping but very subtle.

We finished inventory this afternoon. It took longer than usual as we have about 25% more product than last year. Annie was back and I was paired with her. As nasty as inventory can be it is a great opportunity to get the warehouse in really good shape.

Chris had symphony tickets for tomorrow night that he wasn't able to use so he gave them to me. It's a casual concert that is quite short, no intermissions so I'd imagine that we'll be home before 10. I haven't been to the symphony for a long time.

The weather has finally turned hot. It is 32C here today but it feels like 41C. It's not supposed to be too bad for the weekend. I've having a pedicure in the morning now that sandal season has finally arrived.

That's it for now. Have a good weekend.

Happy Knitting!

Susan

Time for Inventory

We'll be closed next week for inventory. Groan. I was on a panel discussion at DKC last year http://www.downtownknitcollective.ca/dkc_prevmeetings.html (scroll down to the May 2007 meeting to read about it). There were four of us who work "in the industry". One question was "What is the worst part of your job?" My response was taking inventory. People seemed genuinely surprised by my answer, except for one of the panel members who used to work for another distributor. One of the members asked why and I replied that it's hot and dirty. It's amazing how filthy some of the bags can get. Everybody wears their oldest clothes. We usually go through a full bottle of hand soap in the ladies room while we're working. We work in pairs, one person counts and the other records. I'm not good with ladders so I'll count the lower shelves and my partner counts the higher one. I have a feeling it might take a bit longer this year. We have a lot more product, both yarn and gift, than last year. We count everything once, then a different pair will re-count it. That normally takes two or three days. Once that is done, we go back into the office and start modifying the various inventory items to make sure we have the correct quantities in the system.

I've been working on the website again this week. I got all the Lana Grossa wool sock yarns updated. You can see the page here:
http://www.estelledesigns.ca/images/Lana%20Grossa/Lana%20Grossa%20Yarns.htm

I've also put images on several of the pages. Karen Lawrence of Sheepstrings in Huntsville designed a cute shawl/shrug our of our Superfine Alpaca Paint so I put a picture on that page.
http://www.estelledesigns.ca/images/Estelle/EstelleAlpaca%20Paint.htm

I had a nice compliment from my friend Joan today. She sent me an email to say she really enjoys my blog, it makes her feel like we've just been talking when we haven't. She says that for people who don't know me I write exactly the way I talk.

I haven't been doing very much personal knitting this week, a little bit on a sock but that's all. I've testing a cotton/silk blend. It is 70% Pima Cotton, 30% Silk. It's nice but I'm not that crazy about it. Yesterday Chris brought in a sample ball of a hand dyed pure wool that would felt. It's a little scratchy and it's too thin. We're going to ask the mill in Italy to make up some that would be closer to a worsted weight.

My friend Susan and I are going to the ballet on Sunday. We're seeing Cinderella. I was telling Chris that we were seeing it and he called me a princess! And then he said he really enjoyed calling me that. Brother!

I think this weekend we're going to get the summer furniture out of the crawl space. We have wrought iron chairs and a table for the front veranda. It really needs painting so my father bought a couple of cans of spray paint. Our front gate also needs painting so hopefully the weather will cooperate.

Now that all the inventory has been quarantined in warehouse, I have the urge to go shopping back there. Oh well, it will have to wait for a week. It's not as if I don't have enough in my stash already:)

Have a great weekend and happy knitting!

Susan

Friday Again

It's Friday again. Considering this was a short week it has felt very long. Everyone seems to be dragging today. I think the fact that is has been so cold this week has added to it. I'm getting tired of wearing my winter clothes. I want to break out the summer dresses and sandals. It's going to be a bit warmer this weekend but still not hot. I'll probably be writing in a month about how hot it is:)

We had a visit on Wednesday from Vogue Knitting. I understand they are doing a piece in the next issue about Canada. They had been at Needful and they sent them to us. I didn't get to meet them unfortunately but they spent several hours in Chris's office.

I'm just about finished updating the website. It hasn't been this current for quite a while. Once you get into a rhythm it really doesn't take too long. This afternoon I finished up all the commission files for our reps and got them in the mail. They'll all be happy campers next week when they arrive.

I knit a test swatch this week out of a 70% Cotton, 30% Silk blend. It is very nice, a crepe sort of texture, but I don't think we're going to go with it. I'm now going to do a swatch of the same blend but a lighter weight. I think it will be a DK but we'll see. I've been working on a multi-directional scarf out of our Superfine Alpaca. It's looking really nice and will only take two skeins.

Karen from Sheepstrings in Huntsville stopped in this afternoon to pick up an order of Cascade 220 she emailed me yesterday. She and her husband had to take their dog to a specialist in Newmarket so she decided to pick her order up. I'm going to the cottage in June so I'll stop in and see her. She really liked the new colours of Arequipa and Cadenza so I gave her a couple of sample skeins to play with.

We're going to the garden centre after work today to get plants for the garden. It should be a good weekend for gardening. I think we're going to try a few different plants this year just to be different. I'll post a picture once it's done.

I bought a dress for the wedding last Friday at my hair dressers. They sell great clothes there. It is black and cream and very 60s looking. I'm very pleased with it, fits perfectly.

Well I'm of to the garden centre. Have a good weekend.

Happy Knitting!
Susan

Two Reviews

I saw We Will Rock You on Saturday and it rocked! It was so much fun. The plot was totally silly and you could see they actors weren't even try to take themselves seriously. The band they had was fabulous. I ended up buy Queen's Greatest Hits CD. We had lunch at the Senator on Victoria St beforehand. It looks the same as it always had. Lunch was delicious and reasonable.

Last night I saw something diametrically opposed to WWRY, My Fair Lady. It's playing at the Toronto Centre for the Performing Arts. It was absolutely wonderful. The woman that played Eliza had an amazing voice. When I looked at the programme and saw who was playing Henry Higgins I recognized the name, Christopher Casanove. He played in many Masterpiece Theatre productions back in the 80s, most notably The Duchess of Duke Street. He did a really good job as Higgins. The costumes and sets were wonderful. The orchestra was great and of course the songs in My Fair Lady are so wonderfully recognizable. I almost elbowed the woman sitting next to me when she started humming along. Fortunately she caught herself. We had a great dinner at an Italian restaurant on Yonge St. It was a late night though. We didn't get home until 11:40 pm which is way past my bedtime. Oh well, it the Victoria Day weekend so three days to relax.

I've been busy updating the website again this week. I've updated the Cascade and King Cole pages. I'm hoping to get a pdf file from King Cole with all their patterns on it so I can put that on also. I think I'll tackle Scheepjes next.

I'm working on a scarf that is worked in different direction out of the new Superfine Alpaca. I'll be playing with that this weekend. I'll also be making sure that the decreases at the top of an Alpaca hat are correct. This is not my design but I'm having trouble interpreting the instructions so I'll have to knit the top of the crown myself and re-word the pattern.

We've decided to hold off planting the garden until next weekend. The weather isn't supposed to be great this weekend. Maybe we'll get some of the summer furniture out though. It's always a challenge to get the doors opened and closed before the cat tries to escape. My cat, Toby, is pretty old (I think he is 18 but he was a stray when I got him so it's hard to be certain) and doesn't move as quickly as he used to.

I'm meeting my friend Cynthea at Bayview Village tomorrow after she's through at the Textile Museum. I'm hoping to look for a dress for my god daughter's wedding. I have six weeks so there's no panic.

I'm getting my hair cut after work. I'd better go, we're closing at 3 today.

Have a good weekend.
Happy Knitting!
Susan

Open House

We had an Open House here last weekend (only for yarn store owners, not the general public). We have one twice a year to launch the Autumn and Spring collections. It's an opportunity for store owners to get a preview of the collections. Sunday was the busiest day although we did have quite a few stores come on Monday also. Chris came up with the brilliant idea to set up an concept shop at the back of the warehouse. We used some of the booth panels we use at the Gift Show (that's a whole other story). We displayed the top 50 colours of Cascade 220, our Cloud Cotton, the new Superfine Alpaca Paints, Cadenza, Arequipa and the new Arequipa solids.

The response to our new qualities was excellent. We are now offering Eco Bamboo knitting needles and crochet hooks. We're only doing straight needles and double points for now. I wasn't happy with the join on the circular samples we were sent. It was fine on the larger sizes but not on the smaller ones. Apparently the supplier has invested in new machinery to fix the problem. I hope so as I don't use straight needles, just circular and double point.

Mrs. King finished my shawl so it was on display and people loved it.

I've been busy the past couple of weeks working on our website. I've got Lang all updated with pages ready to load in the near future. Today I finished the Cascade page. I did a bit of work on the Lana Grossa sock page but I've got more to do on it. They've got 3 new sock qualities to go on.

The award ceremony I attended last Friday went very well although the drive down was horrible. It started to rain very heavily just past Trenton to the point that visibility was terrible. Add to that the big transports passing and rain spraying up from that, it was scary. The drive back was much better. Here's shot of me handing out an award. The girl in the picture told me that my brother was her favorite teacher ever.

The reactions of some of the kids were pretty cute, especially the kindergarten ones. One little girl was so upset about having her name called she literally clung to her father's leg and was sobbing. On the opposite end of the spectrum one cute little guy in a yellow dress shirt and tie jumped up in the air when his name was called.


I had an email this afternoon from our sales rep Diane in Victoria. She'd been to see The Button and Needlework Boutique in Victoria. The owners had knit this really adorable doggy sweater out of Jo Sharp Alpaca Kid Lustre for her chihuahua. Too cute.

I'm going to see We Will Rock You tomorrow. Should be good. Everyone that's seen said it was fantastic, not much plot but the music is great.


My father called me yesterday afternoon to tell me that a pair of Canada Geese and 7 goslings were walking along the fence at the end of the backyard. I wonder how they got there??? He said the goslings were tiny so they couldn't have flown there. In another ornithological anomoly, we have a pair of red winged black birds at our back yard feeder. I always thought they were marsh dwelling birds. Strange. I must say we are getting a really wide variety of birds at the back feeder this year: cardinals, blue jays, brown headed cow birds, both the red and white breasted nuthatches, purple finches, gold finches, grackles, doves, chickadees and of course sparrows. It's quite entertaining.


Well, I'd better go. Have a good weekend.


Happy knitting!
Susan

The Frolic part 2

The Frolic was a success although I understand attendance was down. The fact that the TTC went out on strike at midnight Friday took the entire city by surprise. They only gave 48 minutes notice. Quite a few people got stranded downtown. I've spoken to several of the vendors this week and they all felt that it was a roaring success.

We had 2 US vendors for the first time. I talked to both of them. Rebecca from Busy Hands in Ann Arbor were comparing notes on one company that we deal with (who will remain nameless) and discovered that they were just a difficult south of the border as they are north of the border.

I'm taking tomorrow off. My father and I are driving to Gananoque to attend an award ceremony. My younger brother died very suddenly in 2005. The school he taught at established an award in his memory. The criteria is the the recipient must share their talents with humility. This is what they felt my brother did. So we go every year and I present the award to one student in each classroom. The look of joy and excitement on the younger students faces is wonderful to see. Makes you realize how old and jaded you are (not really).

Mrs. King has finished the shawl I gave her last week. I'm going to take it home and block it. I can see where I stopped and she started. Nothing that blocking the heck out of it won't fix.

Lynn from Mary's Yarns finished a baby blanket and baby sweater and hat out of Cloud Cotton. I have it hanging up on display. The ladies in the office went crazy for the set. It really is lovely. She was in a bit of a rush to finish it and didn't have a button so I told her I'd go through my button box and bring one in.
I finished the neck warmer thing out of Superfine Alpaca. I'm quite pleased with it, especially the fact that I did it out of one skein. Now to right up the patterns for both of them. One of my least favourite things. I find I get so close to the pattern that it's easy to miss small errors or omissions.

Well, I'm off to Scarborough Town Centre to buy a wedding shower gift for my god-daughter. She's getting married at the end of June and is registered at the Bay. Maybe I should look for a dress while I'm down there. Having just paid over $1300 in income tax (ouch!) I have to hope they have a good sale on.

Have a good weekend and happy knitting.

Susan

The Frolic

This weekend is the Downtown Knit Collective's 11th annual Knitter's Frolic. I missed it last year as I was in PEI. I'm volunteering tomorrow from 9 to 2. I'm working the workshop registration desk. I'll take my knitting to work on between classes. After I'm through I'll take a stroll through the market. It's getting bigger every year. Joan Kass really has organizing the Frolic down to a science. She does a fantastic job! This year it is two days for the first time. People are coming from Washington DC to attend. I mailed flyers to all the yarn stores in Ontario, Quebec, upstate New York, Pennsylvania and Michigan. I also printed name tags for all the vendors, teachers, volunteers and the executive.

Yesterday Jennifer and I unpacked a couple of skid from Lang. This shipment contained the new colours of Maxi Tosca, Tosca and Mille Colori that Chris ordered when he was in Cologne. It also contained West, which is a new quality. I think it will be the big winner this season.

We also got a Jo Sharp shipment and a Lana Grossa shipment. The Lana Grossa shipment contained their samples so I've spent this afternoon getting shade cards organized. They've sent lots of sample balls for our reps however the ball bands are blank. So, that means Monday I'll be sitting at my desk with a set of shade cards and the bags of yarn trying to figure out which is which. I then have to make up stickers to put on the ball bands for the reps so that they'll know which quality it is. Fun! Good thing I have a pretty good eye.

Mrs. King finished a hat and scarf out of our new Superfine Alpaca Paint. It looks really good but I think I'll adjust the pattern to make the scarf a bit longer.

I'm almost finished the neck warmer thingy that I'm doing out of it. Maybe I'll finish it at the Frolic. Got about 18" done on the Feather and Fan shawl and I gave that to Mrs. King to finish. She's really fast and I have a deadline on this project.

My sister and my niece are coming for a visit in June so I'm taking a week off. My god-daughter is getting married on the Saturday so they're going to come to that. I've known her mother since we were ten so it won't be a problem. Should be fun.

It's raining today which is good. The grass really needs it. It's so nice to see the flowers coming up and the trees out in bloom. I was going to buy a finch feeder for the back yard but the purple finches and yellow finches are using our regular feeder so I guess I won't have to after all.

Well, it's almost time to leave. Have a great weekend.

Happy knitting!

Susan

Doughnut Day

It's doughnut day at Estelle today. Every time someone has a birthday, Caroline buys doughnuts for the office. Today is my birthday! All I can say is I'm way too young to be 53.

The Fall 2008 samples are starting to trickle in from our suppliers. I've gone through the Lang samples and once again they have a really strong offering. King Cole also have a good programme this season. I still have to go through Lana Grossa and Madil. I don't think the Scheepjes or Dale samples have arrived yet. I'm updating the price list for the sales reps as I get information.

Once we have everything, we'll make up sets of samples for all our reps. They will be shipped to them in early May and then we'll all hit the road again.

Chris got back from Cologne earlier in the week. He brought back some interesting samples and had really good meetings with our suppliers.

It has been such a beautiful week it's too bad it is ending with such a miserable day. It has rained almost all day and been very windy. I had to take some samples of our new Superfine Alpaca to Mrs. King today to have her knit up some swatches to include with the rep samples. It was so windy I could feel my car being blown around.

I had a really nice dinner at my friend Joan's on Saturday night. She had invited our friend Cynthea also. We met in our first year of university, 35 years ago (now I feel old) and have been friends ever since. When we turned 40 we took a cruise to Bermuda and when we turned 50 we did a walking tour of Tuscany. I loved Italy and would love to go back. Maybe some day. Joan was have a knitting dilemma but I think she's OK now.

I'm working away on a lace shawl out of the new solid colour Arequipa. I chose the red because it is a really beautiful red. I'll hopefully have enough done after the weekend that it will look like a shawl and I can take a picture of it.

I'm getting my hair cut after work, not before it needs it. I can't believe how fast my hair grows. I have been going to the same stylist for 7 years and just let her do what she wants. I trust her.

Well I'd better go. Have a good weekend.

Happy Knitting!
Susan

Spring!

I didn't get a chance to update my blog last week. I was working in the warehouse most of the day. Brian, the fellow in the warehouse, was off that day so I was pulling orders.

I was on the road yesterday, up to Lakefield, Lindsay and Uxbridge. It was a beautiful day for a drive. I stopped in to see the ladies at Happenstance Yarns and Books. Lakefield is such a pretty town. Then I drove to Lindsay and dropped of some yarn at Kawartha Yarns. Naz moved earlier this year to a much better spot on the main street of Lindsay. She's getting lots of walk by traffic at this location.

After I left Naz I went for a stroll on the main street. I wandered into a nice clothing store and they carry my favourite brand of jeans. I tried on a pair of the new wide leg ones and bought them. I like to help the local economy:)

I filled up my car at the Loblaws in Lindsay. Gas was 2 cents a litre less there than at the other stations. Don't know how they do it but when gas is $1.119 every little bit helps.

My next stop was On The Lamb in Uxbridge. The store is in the back of the old tin mill on the main street. There is a really nice restaurant, a jeweller and a gallery in the building also. The mill has been completely refurbished.

I was home by 4 and went for my daily 3 km walk. It is so nice to be able to walk on the sidewalks again and not to have to wear boots. I was having to walk on the road most of the time because the sidewalks were too treacherous. It's raining/snowing at the moment but we're supposed to have a great weekend with the temperature up to 14 on Sunday.

Chris bought me a new toy earlier in the week - a new scanner! I've been scanning balls of yarn all week and setting up web pages for the new yarns we'll be introducing for Fall 08. We'll publish them after we start selling the Fall yarns. I'll be scanning more today. Chris is in Germany right now at the Cologne fair and left me a long list of things to do. I still have to scan the new Cascade yarns we'll be offering and the new solid colour Arequipa. The colours are really beautiful. I see something in lace for this yarn. Maybe I'll take a sample home on the weekend and play with it.

I've been working on a neck warmer out of our new Superfine Alpaca. It is really, really lovely to work with. I'll finish it off on the weekend, block it and have a picture of it next week. I think there will be a few iterations of this as I'm playing with buttonhole placement.

Well, I'd better get back to scanning yarn. Have a great weekend!

Happy Knitting!

Susan

Rooster and DKC

I forgot to tell you about the ballet we saw a couple of weeks ago. It was their Winter Mixed programme and it was fabulous. The first ballet was 24 Preludes by Chopin. It was choreographed by a Canadian choreographer that is very avant garde. The costumes were made of sheer black mesh with shiny black tape over strategic areas. It was interesting the combination of classical music with very modern ballet. It was really wonderful. The second ballet was Soldier's Mass. It was very powerful the way the dancers brought the violence of war and death to the stage. The last ballet was Rooster set to the Rolling Stones early music. It was great! The costumes were reminiscent of the early 60s London scene. The dancing was fabulous. I can hardly wait until they perform Rooster again.

We had DKC last night. I met Fiona, Bonnie, Sandra and Trish for dinner before hand at Pasta Perfection on Yonge St. We meet there every month. The food is always great. It's cheap and cheerful, just like us. Here we are after dinner.

The speakers this month were the ladies from Cabin Fever. They were talking about self publishing their patterns and books. They used a great format of interviewing each other about how they got started, what difficulties they encountered, what was the best and worst of it and so on. They were great, very funny also.

I was able to get quite a bit done on the licorice allsorts sock. I'm ready to start the heel flap. I'm working on a 2.5mm needle but am thinking that if I use this yarn again I'd use a 2.75mm.

Yesterday I wore a Hanne Falkenberg jacket I made years ago. I actually forgot all about it (terrible thing to admit isn't it?) Anyway, I wore it to DKC and people were quite interested in it. Many said they'd seen her kits but had never seen it made up. Here's a picture of it (not mine, from Hanne's website).

Well, I'd better go. It's Easter weekend so we're off tomorrow but back on Monday. Have a good weekend.

Happy Knitting!

Susan

Cloud Cotton

Where has the week gone? It's Friday already. It's been a busy week here at Estelle. Mrs. King finished the baby blanket so I picked it up from her on Monday. We're calling it the Hearts and Flowers Baby Blanket. I think it turned out quite well.

We're having another one done. I did a test swatch last night and wrote up the pattern this morning. I took it to Mrs. King to knit it up. This is the swatch.
It will be 9 blocks across with a garter stitch border. Totally reversible. It really is beautiful cotton to knit with. I still haven't decided which colour I want for me. Do I want to make a white cardigan for summer or should I go for the darkest blue? Decisions, decisions.

I finished the first sock for Annie and I've started the second. Here's what it looks like before blocking.

I don't know why but I always block my socks. I think they look better for some reason. I also started a cardigan out of Cascade 220. I decided to use the Horseshoe Lace stitch and have it done in one piece to the armhole. I think the bodice will be stocking stitch. I also put an eyelet border at the bottom and will continue with that for the trim. Once I'm a little further along I'll take a shot of it for you.

It's a beautiful sunny day today. I took a picture of the snow mountain last week. This is what it looked like on Monday after all that snow.

I think I'll splurge and get my car washed on the way home from work. It is so filthy I can't stand it any more. Well, it's almost time to go. Have a good weekend.

Happy Knitting!

Susan

More Snow

I can't believe we're going to get another storm tonight and tomorrow. I don't know where we're going to put it. It's almost getting dangerous. This morning pulling out of the garage there was a little boy I couldn't see because the snow is piled up so high. It's a good thing his father was walking directly behind him. I took a picture of the mountain of snow in the parking lot here. I wonder how big it will be by Monday.

I started a new sock last night. It is Stile from Lana Grossa. It's a Missoni inspired pattern. Mary from Mary's Yarns calls this the licorice allsorts colour way. It really does look like licorice.

We're just about ready to produce a couple of free patterns for Cloud Cotton. The photos have been taken. I've got one of the patterns ready and the other should be to me on Monday. We're also have a baby sweater and blanket done. I also organized an intarsia blanket in three colours. I thought I'd better do the first two bands of blocks myself to be sure it was working. It did so I've given it to Mrs. King to finish off. I haven't knit intarsia (the I word) for many, many years. I'd forgotten how much I dislike it. It's the only form of knitting I really don't like. The blanket should be really cute when it's done. It's in white, butter yellow and spring green.

I've picked out a bag of Cascade 220 for myself. It is a heather, colour 9336 which they call Lapis. I'm thinking probably a cardigan, maybe with lace to the armholes and a solid bodice. We'll see what it calls out to be once I start winding the skeins. I love winding skeins. You get a real feel of the yarn and it tells you what it wants to be.

Well, I'd better go. The snow has already started. We have ballet tickets again on Sunday. An Italian Straw Hat was amazing. The costumes are all black and white, the only colour is in the sets. For instance, in the Parisian hat shop the backdrop was all hot pink. We're seeing a mixed programme this week. One of them is Rooster which is set to early Rolling Stones music. Should be different.

Happy Knitting!

Susan

Even More Yarn

It's been awhile since I last posted. It's been really busy around here the last week or so. Last Friday we got probably the biggest shipment of yarn we've ever received. I took a before picture of the receiving half of the warehouse.

The shipment arrived at 10 minutes to 3 last Friday afternoon (we close at 3 on Fridays). The yarn was packed in bales. There were 38 bales in total. Each bale weighed 90 kilos (198 pounds). This is what one of the bales looked like.

The warehouse crew started unpacking it Monday morning. This is a video of one of the bales being cut into. They have to be very careful not to cut too deeply or they'd hit a bag of yarn. You can see it expand as air gets into it.

It was almost all unpacked and on the shelves by early afternoon. Then the orders had to be pulled, invoiced and shipped. So we've been busy in the office too.

I bought a new digital camera last week so I've been having fun playing with it. It's amazing what you can do with it. As soon as I figured out how to take movies with it I was filming everything: my cat, Jennifer in the office. She doesn't like that very much. I won't post that one.

I'm turning the heel of my latest sock. I really like the way this Jawoll Aktion is striping. I think I might give this pair to Annie in the warehouse. She's working for us on a temporary basis. She's an excellent worker. Very intuitive.

Well that's all for now. I'm off to get a much needed hair cut. My friend Susan and I have ballet tickets for Sunday afternoon so I'll let you know how it was. We're seeing An Italian Straw Hat.

Have a good weekend and happy knitting.
Susan

My New Year's Resolution

My New Year's Resolution was to update my blog more frequently. As with most resolutions, this hasn't happened.

We had a lovely Christmas with my sister's family. They live in Orwell Cove, PEI. It was a very old fashioned holiday. We managed to leave just as a major winter storm was arriving. The snow was starting as we walked up the stairs to get on the plane. Lucky us.

I took a pair of socks to knit on the plane. I had promised Jennifer in the office I'd make them for her birthday (last April!) I finished them and she loves wearing them on really cold days.

I finished another pair of socks which I gave to Lalenie. She is our shipper. She very kindly made my father a batch of her wonderful tea biscuits and wouldn't let him pay for the ingredients, so I made her the socks. She says she's going to wear them tomorrow since we're expecting another bad storm.

I'm now working on a pair of socks for myself out of Lang's Jawoll Aktion. Jawoll has always been my favourite sock yarn because it has a spool of re-inforcing thread inside the ball. It is dyed to match the striping pattern of the yarn.

We got our shipment of Cloud Cotton in last week. It is such beautiful, organic cotton. It doesn't even feel like cotton when you knit with it. I'm still trying to decide which colour I want. I'm leaning toward the darkest blue but there's no hurry.

That's it for now. I'll bring my camera in to take a picture of my socks.

Happy Knitting!
Susan