4.27.2015

Frolic

After standing in the sunny but cool line with many dozens  of other knitters waiting for the doors to open I was able to get in a quick tour of the show before it got crowded.

I was shocked, along with a lot of others, to see Emily of VIOLA yarns standing at the Purple Purl booth.  After her own beautiful booth was literally swamped by seriously crazed women at the Frolic a couple of years ago she and her wonderful hand dyed creations moved to England and all but disappeared from our local scene. So it was great to see and handle her lace weight and fingering and even be able to chat a bit and share how much I've appreciated her "dirty pink" colourway "Blossom" (that I got as part of that riot of colour crazed women - see above.).


As I was telling her of my appreciation for how this colourway "does" pink but in such a cool, contemporary way she remembered the colour and said she too loved that kind of pink. Maybe she'll offer more in that vein in coming months! Fingers crossed!


Next it was time to actually make some purchases.

I spent some time drooling over giant cakes of  Briggs and Little Country Roving. I think I'll need to work with that someday soon - not sure if that's because of the yarn, because as a proud Canadian Knitter I probably should work up a Cowichan sweater at some point in my knitting career 'and that's the yarn to do it with, the fabulous red colourway or because the cakes are so amazing looking. ('Can't believe there isn't a good image of them on line!

I spent quite a bit of time hemming and hawing in front of the Peace Fleece yarns contemplating various tweed options for a casual pullover until one kind woman asked how many skeins I needed and pointed out none of the options had sufficient for my requirements. Man its always the details that get you!

So in the end I only came away with one sweater's quantity of yarn - Debbie Bliss Donegal Fine made in Ireland. I picked up four balls at half price from the Purple Purl booth.

I was drawn to the thick and thin texture as well as the tweedy bits in blue and white.

I bought it with a "Clayton" cardigan by Julie Hoover in mind, but since coming home, cruising through my Favourites and starting to swatch I'm thinking it might instead become a Julie Hoover "Elmont".

I'm having trouble signing into the new and "improved" BT website so I won't be able to decide for sure until I can get in there and buy a pattern or two.

It was a fun morning, a bit of visiting, a bit of shopping and little bit of yarn to bring home at the end of it. Many thanks to all the TKG volunteers that make this event possible every spring!

And thank you for dropping by!



4 comments:

Brendaknits said...

I prefer your second choice as well. Especially if done with only the racer stripes on one arm. Yarn looks lovely.

Mary Keenan said...

I can't believe I missed you! I was in the lineup too... but I turned right as soon as we got in, to beat a path to the Stoddart booth. I didn't know Viola yarn was on display until after I ran into Emily (oddly enough while thinking some yarn at another booth looked like Briggs and Little, and thought of you... I saw a sweater on a person and thought, That looks like something Emily would wear, so I looked up and saw it was her!) I got two skeins of her yarn ;^) So relieved I can knit up some of my old Viola now - I'd been rationing it, heh

Lorraine said...

Marie- I thought it was an omen that the Don Valley was closed.

The next time you are at Romni, if you head downstairs, and look right (fiber and stuff) there is a boatload of Briggs Country roving.

Anonymous said...

It was a fun day at the Frolic indeed.
Your yarn choices were excellent.
I too like the sweatshirt-type pattern - especially in that Peace Fleece.
Glad we had a chance to catch up!
LisaRR