Impromptu Stitch 'n Bitch at Michaels
I went to Michael's last night to take advantage of a sale on Lion Brand Fun Fur ($3.77, reg. $4.99 per skein). Clustered around the Fun Fur display was myself (41), a woman of about 50, another woman of about 70, and a young woman of about 22 years old. It was Fur-tastic: We compared Fun Fur colors, talked about past projects using Fun Fur, showed each other possible combinations of Fun Fur with other yarns, and just talked knitting in general. We split up and drifted off down the other aisles, and found ourselves drifting back to the Fun Fur selection several more times. I found some Bernat Boa eyelash yarn two aisles over and alerted my shopping buddies to that. Earnest comparison between the Fun Fur (on sale) and the Boa (not on sale) ensued. We found a stash of more Fun Fur on the highest storage shelf near the store's ceiling, and used a 4-foot long tube of counted cross-stitch canvas to prod down packages of colors we didn't see on the shelves.

But I think the best part was when the young woman pulled a copy of Stitch 'n Bitch out of her purse. It had been given to her by a friend for Christmas, and she had taught herself to knit from it. She'd made the Hot Head watchcap from it ("but not in these colors, I made some changes"), and had her eye on the To Dye For fuzzy sweater as her second project. Obviously an intuitive knitter in the making. Whenever I hear a new knitter say they knitted a (hat, sweater, scarf) "but changed A, B & C," I know they're going to be just fine. That young woman could have been me 20 years ago, leafing through the latest Fashion Knitting and cruising the aisles at Super Yarn Mart, trying to find a substitute for the Anny Blatt yarn I’d been lusting after.

Unfortunately, we couldn't find a fuzzy yarn that would work in gauge needed for her sweater. We continued chatting about knitting. Her enthusiasm was so sweet. I asked her if she'd looked up any knit blogs on the web. She said, "Yeah! I've heard about those!" and immediately turned to the section in her very dog-eared copy of SnB explaining Online Knit Journals and showed it to me. She said, "Some of my friends have this same book, but had trouble learning from it. I didn't have any trouble, except a little with increases and decreases. But some people have to be shown new things." I said, "Well, then you need to pass your new skills on to someone by showing them." She smiled and said she definitely would. I left Michaels, secure in the knowledge that knitting's gonna be around for a long, long time.

Here's my Michael's haul:

3 Fun Furs, 3 Boas, 3 Free Patterns!


Isn't Boa Pretty?


Boa Patterns: Jeans Jacket Collar 'n Cuffs, and Another Keyhole Scarf


Happy Wednesday, everyone.