my ideal wool shop

[wartywarthog]

would be over several floors, packed floor to ceiling with yarn and have little ladders on rails so you could root around in the top shelves.

it would have a whole range from really cheap to ultra expensive and would have every colour conceivable so that you could actually buy several matching yarns in the same brand for eg. cath kidston rip-offs or knit a kaffe fassett jersey using the colours he suggests.

it would have a tea shop at the back where you could scour mags and patterns for your next project whilst sipping piping hot tea and gobbling gateaux.

it would have directories of yarn according to washing instructions (i'm sick of finding gorgeous wool for my dd only to find it has to be hand washed at half moon while the wind is blowing from the north east and dried flat in a room with bouquets of lavender and an ambient temp of 12 deg), and listings of which yarn is appropriate for a needle size.

it would be open late a couple of nights a week for knitting groups or just to finish ufo's.

would you shop there?

what would your ideal be?

Our local shop is abuot to start a knitting club, which would be good. I would like somewhere big though, where there was space to wander round and not have to push past people. That's why the GetKnitted shop looks so fabulous, I think- lots of baskets of handpainted yarn on display but not too precious. It looks as though they have a huge amount of stock too, so might suit your needs better, warty.

bloody hell is that shop open now?

god I had forgotten all about it

see you soon...

its open

its less than an hour drive from my house

its near bristol zoo giving me a justification to go

aaargh stash. what do I do?

Yes, it's pretty close to you filly - did you see the pictures? Click on the second one down, it just looks like heaven.

Ruby, the Debbie Bliss ones vary a lot in how easy they are to follow. There are quite a few books that are aimed at beginner knitters, but it's quite hard to suggest specific ones because obviously it would need to be a style you liked, too. How old is your ds? I think most basic jumper patterns would be easy enough to follow if you can increase and decrease. Ones like this or this are quite easy, though the first is not a conventional design. There are also books like Easy Knitted Accessories by my LYS owner that might be worth a look.

You could start a thread on whatever you choose and we'll check regularly and help

I'm actually just knitting the adult version of this too It just means repeat until the end, so just keep going with k2 p2 k2 p2 k2 p2.... The pattern (that bit of it) is just a 2x2 rib, basically, which swaps over every two rows. You could actually perfectly well do the whole thing in garter stitch IMHO, and it would look just as nice.

Yes, that's right! (don't worry, be as shameless as you like). Bind off is a more American way of saying cast off, but it also has the advantage of having different initials from casting on. Are you OK with the gauge thing? That's the hardest bit of the pattern I guess, althoguh it means you can use any yarn you like, which is great.

That's right about gauge except that you count the number of stitches per inch. I'm doing mine in Summer Tweed, so it's 16 stitches per 4 inches, so I put 4 into the calculations. The Kool Kotton looks great- personally I would go for 5 balls to be on the safe side, but you should be able to manage with 4, I agree.

I would try 4 mm to start with I think

Oh yes, I want daily updates once you start

I agree Filly, community is what we want. I went to my nearest wool shop yesterday, the lady behind the counter was knitting and she gave me some good advice. There was a toybox, which is encouraging, but a play area and teashop would be wonderful!

Which one fio? The imaginary one?

ok now what can i do about my stash?

shall i

a. sort it or

b. start a thread about it?

oh we all know the answer, don't we?

The Bristol one looks fantastic, doesn't it? I guess it helps if you've already got a thriving online business, because you already have a huge stock.

Filly, I am in no position to advise about stashes, believe me.

oh god i so want to go to texere

my mum's family live in yorkshire...different bit though...and they haven't seen my kids, mainly cos they don't give a feck...

. interesting...