sweetgeorgia

Pulling back to snap back.

Umm, did someone say hiatus?

As some of you may have heard already, I am planning on pressing the pause button on both my businesses (one of which I’ve run for the past ten years!) this spring.

Starting April 15th, I will be travelling for at least six months and possibly up to one year. During this time, I will not be able to fulfill any yarn orders. Some of you already have orders set with me and I will be working on them before I leave. But unfortunately, I cannot accept anymore special orders at this point because there are just not enough dye days between now and mid-April to get everything completed. If you would like to purchase my yarns, please do contact the retailers listed on my website. They are all fabulous and helpful and would love to see yarn in your hands!

To me, it’s been obvious that I have been MIA for the past few months — zero movement on the FO front, zero time to do any personal dyeing, or spinning, or weaving. The only way I’ve been able to survive these past few months is with the unconditional support of family and friends — all of whom have pitched in hundreds of hours to wash, dry, reskein, package and label yarn and orders that are shipped out to you. But even with all the help, I still find myself working 18 hour days and 7 days a week. Compounded by working for the past 10 years on my design firm… well… I need a vacation ;P

I would LOVE to be able to work out new colourways using new yarns and natural dyes. I would LOVE to see your new projects in my new yarns. But before all that can happen, I need to recharge and reconsider — see if it is actually feasible to be a production dyer… and sustain that energy over a long period of time.

I sincerely appreciate all the support you guys have shown me and your passionate interest in my yarns during this past year. It is my hope that I will be able to return to the dye pots at a later time with more energy and enthusiasm, brimming with new ideas and experiments that I can share with you all!

<3 SweetGeorgia

PS. I do have a whackload of yarn I’ve stockpiled (accidentally, of course) and will be looking to unload over the next few weeks. Please stay tuned

And just for the hell of it, let’s have a contest. Tell me where you think I’ll be traveling to. One randomly selected commenter who correctly names at least one of the many spots I’ll be travelling to will get yarn. Contest ends Friday, February 16 at 11:59 PM PST.

I’ll have the holidays, on the side

I’ve been avoiding holiday stuff in general these days. No tree this year, no sugar-loaded cookie baking, no crazed shopping excursions… I’m bypassing it all. Instead of gifts between friends this year, we are making donations to our favourite charities and foundations. For me, that will be the Maiwa Foundation and the Surfrider Foundation… We really don’t need anything except for our family and friends to be healthy and happy and to enjoy that with them. But I was more than tickled this morning when I found a photo from Meredith in my inbox:

She wrote:

Words cannot express… So I figured a picture would do. Just wanted to send a little thank you for making such beautiful yarn. I just received it today in the mail from Pick up Sticks here in Ontario and have been on pins and needles waiting for it!! I’m so excited it’s here!

I can’t wait until the holiday knitting is done because these two babies are for ME! Ha ha! Looks like I’m getting two pairs of luxurious socks for Christmas this year, huh? big grins

Thanks again, you do such beautiful work with yarns and dyes! All good things, Meredith

Well, I was downright touched. That’s all that I can hope for… that yarn, colours, and fibres bring you joy this holiday season.

Thank you, Meredith!

my bags are full

Vancouver has a new yarn store, hurrah! Yes, we went to the grand opening at three bags full on Saturday morning… see the view:

The shop opening was packed with friendly knitters, flipping through pattern books and scrummy yarns while snacking on the cutest little cupcakes. There’s a computer terminal set up near the back of the shop where you can look up knitty.com and double-check yarn requirements… so handy. I bumped into fellow weaver, Barb, as well as Astor, the local knit & crochet instructor and knitwear designer.

Oh oh oh, and I bought myself Norah Gaughan’s new book “Knitting Nature”. So many things I want to make now…

Afterwards, we headed over to Nat Bailey Stadium for a friend’s company picnic/BBQ. With over 700 people at this picnic, there were plenty of activities planned from wallclimbing to bocce to… get this… human foosball!

You strap yourself into this velcro belt which doesn’t allow you to move from your “post”… so it really is just like foosball!!

Ok, back to fibre. Via Louisa’s blog I found out that Hannelore from Sun Bench Fibres is retiring and she sold all her inventory to Birkeland Bros on Main Street. So, if you go by Birkeland Bros right now you’ll find some weaving yarn, yummy Ashland Bay spinning fibres, and some weaving/spinning/knitting books. I don’t know if Birkeland is going to keep on with supplying weaving stuff, but it would be wonderful… to have a walk-in shop in Vancouver where we could buy weaving yarn and shuttles, rather than having to order everything by mail-order. Bah. Oooh, someplace like my beloved Weaving Works but in Vancouver.

And speaking of weaving, I’ve decided not to take the fall weaving class at Place des Arts for now. I’m so short on time these days and plus I’ll be missing nearly half the classes because of our upcoming trip to China and Japan. It’s two hours of driving from Kits to Coquitlam and back and that’s time that I could plug into doing actual weaving. I already have several projects planned and several warps ready to go… I just need the time to sit and weave. But to make sure that actual weaving occurs, I’m going to designate one night to weaving (or knitting, or spinning) — no work, no email, no television, no interruptions.

Once I get through these plain weave, twill, and log cabin projects, I’m sure I’ll want to learn something new. Maybe I can sign up for class in January… but that’s a long way off. But if you can take classes at Place des Arts, you should — it’s really the very best place in the Lower Mainland to learn to weave. The facility is incredible and I’m always so grateful for their generosity in lending equipment and resources — so essential to learning and practice.

Room6 in Deep Cove

This morning I drove up to gorgeous Deep Cove in North Vancouver with a big pile of yarn to meet Megan, the owner of Room6, and her cute dog, August. An hour later, I left the shop with a much, much smaller pile!

Room6 is a lovely and eclectic boutique right near the waterfront in Deep Cove and carries clothing, jewelry, accessories, books (like surfer magazine’s Guide to Northern and Central California Surf Spots) artwork and gifts made from local designers and artists. Megan also carries knitting yarn that is altogether different from what you find at most yarn shops in town — she has Magic Balls from Be Sweet, Ozark Handspun, organic cottons from Blue Sky Alpacas, and she’s also the only shop in Canada to carry Suss yarns (you know, Suss from Hollywood Knits). And now, she has some SweetGeorgia Yarn too!

Ah, and being so close to the waterfront made me want to get back on the water again…

Yesterday

Wow, what a way to start the week. I have good news! There’s a new yarn shop opening up in Vancouver called “three bags full” at 4458 Main Street (between 28th and 29th Avenues)… and they will be the first shop in Vancouver to carry my hand dyed yarn and fibre! There is some Blue Faced Leicester rovings, Superwash Sock yarns, Handpainted Lace yarns and Candy Floss brushed mohair going to the shop next week before their grand opening on Saturday, August 26th. I’m so excited!! (can you tell?)

After meeting with Francesca and Zoe from Three Bags Full, I drove out to Langley to do this:

Lara from greysquare photographics and her assistant, Dan, came to photograph the alpacas at Kensington Prairie Farm in Langley Township yesterday so that I can use them in some print advertising that I’m putting together for Kensington Prairie Farm. So. Much. Fun. We were outside shooting the alpacas from about 6 pm until the sun went down and then inside shooting alpaca product (yarn, scarves, socks, fibre, and my favourite… blankets!) until nearly midnight. The woven alpaca blankets are seriously to die for…

I’ve known Lara since we were both about 12 years old. She had always wanted to go into advertising so it seemed natural that she studied to be a professional photographer. I gotta say it was very cool to finally get to collaborate with her on a project. And it’s a plus that Lara is also a knitter.

Finally, my first post has appeared on Whip Up! This first post, called “Killer Colour”, is all about safe dyeing practices… a good way to start before diving into playing with dyes. Whip Up invited me to write about dyeing and spinning for their site, so I’ll be doing that a couple times a month. The photo at the top of that article as well as this post? The Procion MX handpainted warp? Well, I’ll post about that tomorrow.