Pumpkins, picking and petting (zoo)

Yesterday was Columbus Day in the U.S. (Happy (belated) Thanksgiving, Canadians!) and the kids had no school. The chill in the air made it a perfect day to go to the pumpkin patch.


We started out by picking apples; only Granny Smith were left, but that's okay since they're good cooking apples.


The most popular aspect of the apple-picking was the stick with a claw on the end of it, to get the ones on the highest branches.


Then it was over to Pumpkinland, a massive display of pumpkins and other gourds,



as well as various Halloween decorations ranging from the typical


(there is a comment to be made about my daughter appearing as a witch, but I am not the one to make it) to the terrifying (Dr. Mel, say it isn't you!):



After we picked up some small pumpkins for decorating,



we walked through the petting zoo, and saw sheep



and goaties (obligatory goateh shot for Mindeh)


and - is it an emu? or an ostrich?


We then spent some time on the large playground, and returned home happy.




P.S. Among the decorated pumpkins, we saw this:



Do you think it's an omen?

Fall preview: Berroco

I've come full circle when it comes to Berroco. Way back about ten (or more??) years ago, they used to have single-breed, all-wool yarns that I really liked; one was called "Wensleydale Longwool" and the other was some kind of Leicester. Then it seemed they started shifting focus to novelty yarns, the bumpy and the shiny and the bling-y, and I lost interest. (We won't even talk about the Berroco Chick.) Then Berroco did the smartest thing they've ever done -- they hired Norah Gaughan. (Whatever they're paying you, Norah, it should be MORE...)

Now I'm in love with Berroco again and completely transfixed seeing what kind of wonderful pattern booklets and yarns -- especially the all-natural fiber yarns like Pure Merino and Palace -- they come out with.

At TNNA, the lovely Cirilia Rose (formerly of WEBS), who now works at Berroco, showed us some of the new yarns and patterns coming this fall. Berroco definitely has gotten the message that the economy stinks and is offering yarns that feature good price points relative to yardage, which should make thrifty knitters happy. At the top of the list was Vintage Wool, a worsted-ish-weight blend of wool/nylon/acrylic that truly, really doesn't feel like it has 55% synthetic in it. (And I'm sensitive to these things!) The colors were nice, the hand was good and it's machine wash -- and a super price point, about six bucks for over 200 yds. (Good for kids' knits, with that machine wash thing, and some good fun colors.) Another new yarn is called Blackstone Tweed, 4.5 sts per inch, with a unique (for tweed) blend of 65% wool/25% superfine mohair/10% angora. Lustra is a 50/50 blend of wool and tencel, with sheen and a soft, single-ply construction -- another great price point, at $9 for about 200 yds of aran-weight yarn. Finally, Sundae is a bulky (around 2.5 sts to the inch) blend of 50% wool/50% acrylic, with plies of various colors, most of them on the conservative side. Another relative bargain at $9 for 62 yds, which is pretty good for yarn this bulky. In their existing lines, the popular acrylic/nylon blend, Comfort, now comes in heathered shades, and the lovely Pure Merino now comes in a "chine" or marled look.

I always find myself especially keen to see the patterns that Norah and her talented design staff cook up. Yes, there will be Norah Gaughan No. 5 and it looks like it won't disappoint, but I was also pleased to see a separate collection by Norah just for men. There was a cute pattern booklet for little girls featuring Comfort, and a great collection by Cirilia for tweeners, that hard-to-fit age when girls don't want "babyish" stuff but their moms don't want them wearing Brittney Spears/cleavage-hanging-out stuff either. That book features Vintage Wool and I certainly intend to get a copy for Miss Thang. (If she won't wear any of the patterns, I can roll it up and use it as a stick to defend myself....) There are also 3 other booklets devoted to the new yarns, one each for Blackstone Tweed, Sundae and Lustra.

So... get ready for lots of new lovelies from your friends at Berroco. It looks like the Berroco website has already started to feature teasers of some of the new yarns and patterns.

TNNA Report, part 2: Westminster Fibers

I am very relieved that my computer continues to work just fine and so I am able to continue my TNNA report with a sneak peek at what's coming this fall from Westminster Fibers.

Yes, yes, my adoration of Westminster Fibers is well-documented by now -- and has taken a leap into the stratosphere since I discovered their fabrics. (Check out these adorable bags from Amy Butler). But as TNNA does not include fabric or quilting, today I'll tell you about some of the things that my favorite yarn companies Rowan/RYC, and Nashua have coming up.

I first must borrow a schtick from Stephen Colbert and issue a Wag Of The Finger to Rowan. I am most displeased about the discontinuation of Rowan 4-ply Soft. Courtney said it well in this blog post: this is a wonderful, versatile, soft, machine-washable fingering weight yarn that is all wool! You can make socks out of it, you can make sweaters like this one:



you can make adorable baby items, you can make gloves and mittens and hats that will be wearable so many days of the year, so many pretty colors, why, oh why, why must you discontinue it?

Now, when my dear husband, whom I love more than anything in this world, sees the UPS man bringing in boxes of 4-ply Soft that I shall have to begin stockpiling, he will begin saying things like "Honey, beautiful woman that I treasure, do you not already have bins and bins full of yarn? Dearest, do you really need WEBS to send you more boxes of yarn?" and I shall have to explain to him that this is an emergency, that they will not be making this wonderful yarn anymore and I must Take Steps or it will be Unavailable Forever Except At Exorbitant Prices On Ebay.

Mr. Coats and Mr. Clark, if I ever run into you, I'm going to administer a spanking to each of you (and not in a good/sexytime way). Also, a word of warning: don't you dare to even consider discontinuing Rowan Wool-Cotton. I mean it. You Don't Want To Go There. Trust me on this one.

To start off the preview, it's worth mentioning that I think -- but I am not positive so if someone knows for sure, please correct me on this -- Rowan Classic or "RYC" will be folded into regular Rowan, with everything being called "Rowan" in the future. (The RYC website hasn't been up lately, which supports this theory.) I suppose it makes sense to get rid of any duplicative yarn lines and just call the whole darn thing by one name.

Anyhow, Rowan has some lovelies to introduce to us this fall, including Lima, which is not made from beans, but rather a lush blend of 84% baby alpaca, 8% merino, 8% nylon in a chainette construction (similar to Cork's?). Rich colors, supersoft hand, and the combination of the fiber blend and chainette construction will, I suspect, give it more elasticity than alpaca usually has, meaning less of a tendency to stretch or sag. (Linda, do you need my address to send me some to swatch with? Because, oddly, you forgot to give me one -- or one of each color -- when I saw you at TNNA.) At 109 yds/50g, looks like a worsted weight. Yum, yum.

Felted Tweed will now be coming in aran and chunky weights. (Is it me, or does Rowan seem to spend a lot of time swapping out tweeds for each other? Because the Scottish Tweed is going bye-bye, to join DK Tweed, Magpie Tweed, Chunky Tweed, Rowanspun, Yorkshire Tweed and Soft Tweed to that big tweedy knitting basket in the sky.) The single-breed Purelife British Sheep Breeds line -- introduced last year -- will now come in a second, lighter weight (DK -- yay!). Some of the shades will be undyed single colors, with a few marls in which two undyed colors are blended together.

More colors in Kaffe Fassett Colourscape (nom, nom); an 80% wool/20% silk blend called Silky Tweed in a heavy worsted weight (a nice blend for places like Philly, where the addition of the silk makes the wool more wearable); a 100% cashmere DK; and Alpaca Cotton, a 72% alpaca/18% cotton blend which at 148 yds per 50g ball sounds like about a DK weight or so -- but I seem to have no good notes on this, so don't quote me on that one.

There will, of course, be a new Magazine (lots of cabling, fair isle and colorwork), along with a booklet of Lima designs, a book of DK patterns shown in the new cashmere yarn, a new PureLife book with patterns for the original chunky weight and the new DK weight, and another book devoted to the Kaffe Fassett Colourscape yarn.

From Nashua, I was most excited about Best Foot Forward, a self-patterning sock yarn with colorways designed by Kristin Nicholas:



Very nice indeed:



(Plus Kristin has a book coming out this fall, so we have even more colorful goodness to look forward to...)

Nashua will also be giving us

• Champlain, a 100% wool knitting at 3.5 to 4 sts per inch in some subtle multicolors -- some are truly multicolors, with 3 or more distinct hues, while some look more marl-ish, with several shades of the same color varying in lightness or darkness;
  
• Paradise, a blend of 48% wool/48% baby alpaca/4% nylon, around 4 sts per inch with a slightly thick-and-thin texture; and
  
• Shenandoah, another 4 to 4.5 st per inch yarn but with subtle, long color changes (think Tapestry kind of color changes rather than Noro).
  

In addition to a new edition of the magazine, Nashua will release a book of kids' sweaters knit in Creative Focus Superwash, and a booklet devoted to cardigan patterns.

So there you have it, folks: some of the great things you should be seeing in your favorite LYS around mid-July or so.

Next week: a sneak peek at Berroco, and (I hope) a new No-Bull Book Review...

Rowan No. 44 Preview

Because I have friends in high (or do I mean "low"?) places, I am extremely fortunate to be able to bring you this extra-special, extra-well-informed preview of the brand-new Rowan Magazine, No. 44. This year the Magazine is being released a bit earlier than usual in honor of Rowan's 30th Anniversary. Holy crap: three decades of Rowan. I wish when I was thirteen, instead of worrying about making my perfectly-straight hair try to do Farrah Fawcett flips, I'd have been out there buying the first Rowan Magazine. . . but I suppose then I would have been regarded as even more of a nerd than I already was.

In any event, in honor of this anniversary extravaganza, we get Rowan No. 44 in July instead of August, complete with spiffy photo-album-inspired cover:



At 186 pages, this one is a bit thicker than usual, no?

No. 44 begins with a note by Kate Buller, editor-in-chief, who notes that the co-founders of Rowan (Stephen Sheard and Simon Cockin) retired at the end of last year -- but she also assures us that we need not fear, for Rowan will march onward. She also says something which must be a misprint: that Kaffe Fassett, the God of Colour, celebrated his 70th birthday last year. Surely that gorgeous, silver-maned man is not a day over 50... and if he is, I want to know what kind of moisturizer he uses.

But once again, I digress. Let's look first at the designs. This year's Rowan features three "stories," as Rowan calls them, overarching themes around which the patterns are organized and inspired. All of them perfectly suit Rowan's anniversary: Nostalgia (a fond remembrance of the past), Renaissance (a rebirth) and Elegance (because Rowan's stuff is nearly always very stylish and elegant; the only reason I said "nearly" is because of that unfortunate Maori warpaint a few springs ago. But let's not talk about that.).

Nostalgia was inspired by 1930s and 1940s glamour (in honor of the Brits, I shall use the "u" spelling throughout). Each design is named after a film icon of the era -- hence the Hepburn Vest, Lamarr Gloves, and Lamour Sweater, shown from left to right below.


Photography and styling, impeccable and inspired as usual, evoke that vintage era.



You'll find rich shades of forest, browns, and purple, along with some muted shades of sage, cloud blue, rose and taupe, and there are lots of stitch patterns and other clever design details. This is the Hayworth Sweater, with a cowl neck and textured pattern:


Many of the garments have that characteristic sweater girl shape, although some are loose-fitting, too.



Designs are by Marie Wallin, Marion Foale, Sarah Dallas, Erika Knight, Jennie Atkinson and Sarah Hatton. The Fontaine fitted jacket, with an all-over basketweave, has great lines:




The second story, Renaissance, features an auburn-haired model who fits my mind's-eye view of what Queen Elizabeth (the first) must have looked like, which I am sure was not a coincidence. Renaissance focuses on pattern and color, both of which have been and continue to be hallmarks of Rowan design through the years. So if you love stranded knitting, you're gonna be in heaven. For example, take a look at the Bellini belted vest, by Sarah Hatton (all of these designs are named after Renaissance artists):

In addition to lots of stranded knitting, you'll find clever and creative embellishment. Take a look at Titian, by Marie Wallin, on the right below:


embellishment is done over the hazy colour-striping of Tapestry yarn, and gives an interesting and unusual effect. Wallin also designed the purple sweater next to it, called Raphael. The crewelwork is extraordinary (and if you didn't want the extra roominess in the bottom half of the sweater that comes with an empire waist, I expect it would be very easy to knit the bottom straight so that you get a more traditional fit. I know that you young-uns like your body-shaping sweaters, what with your lissome, unspoiled-by-childbearing figures 'n all.).

One of my favorites in this story is this Jewel Square Wrap, designed by Mr. I-Can't-Possibly-Be-Eligible-For-AARP Kaffe Fassett:


Very nice. I might have to make one to compensate for the fact that our thermostat will be set at 50 degrees F all winter...

Another feature I particularly like is the way the garments in this story mix different yarns -- including different gauges and different fibers. For example, the Jewel Square wrap mixes Wool Cotton, and Kidsilk Aura with Felted Tweed, while Titian uses Tapestry, Kid Classic and Wool Cotton. The different qualities of the various fibers (a tweed fleck here, a mohair halo there) give the colorwork added dimension.

Designs in this story are by Wallin, Martin Storey, Hatton and Fassett. Most of these garments feature flowing lines and looser fit, in part because of the Renaissance theme and perhaps in part because of the design challenges presented by colourwork patterns (it's hard to combine the repeats with the necessary increases and decreases that more fitted garments require, and stranded colourwork tends to create stiffer, heavier fabric). Appropriately, the emphasis is on jewel tones like gold, regal purple and emerald green.

The last story is Elegance, in which designs from the previous two stories are reworked and re-imagined, for example omitting embellishment, or changing necklines or sleeve length. So you'll see a version of Raphael (the purple one with the embroidery above) reworked plain. The short-sleeved Grable Sweater (shown above) becomes a tunic. The Lamour Sweater is revised as a vest. Below are the revised version of the Bellini vest, now turned into a cardigan (below left; compare with the one above, worn by the red-headed model) and the scoop-necked version of the Hayworth sweater (below right; compare with cowl-neck version in dark blue, shown above in Nostalgia):



For those who have trouble imagining what designs look like when they've been tweaked a bit, this will be a great exercise in the creative process. I hope it gives knitters the confidence to tailor designs to suit their own preferences even without being provided with the instructions.

As usual, the pattern section in the back of the magazine contains schematics; charts; and color insets of each pattern, along with page references to direct you to the full-size shots. Note that the charts are all in black-and-white, however. Most garments are sized from size 32 bust through 46 bust (those are body measurements, rather than garment measurements). Each garment is photographed at least two, sometimes more times, to give you additional insight into construction and design details. This issue seems to focus much more on knitting than crochet with few crocheted garments (now don't get all huffy on me, militant crocheters; just an observation, not a value judgment).

What else will you find in the fall magazine?

• Seven favourite Rowan designers are interviewed to give their impressions of Rowan style (Fassett, Jean Moss, Martin Storey, Knight, Dallas, Kim Hargreaves and Sasha Kagan);
• an article about the new RYC line of single-breed wools (woo-hoo! more about this in a future post);
• "Clever Ideas," a collection of easy-to-make gifts, like crocheted placemats, a sewn apron and a felted wreath;
• a short article on a new book by Sharon Brant, aimed at providing Rowan-style garments in plus-sizes.

Rowan 44 reminds me that autumn is just around the corner, with all the promise of exciting new yarns, patterns to ogle, and an end to the lassitude of summer. Happy days are here again.