Newsletter
Summer 2010

Super fast shipments with personalized, informed and caring service

Angelika's Yarn Store has moved!!! And not just to the other end of town. I'm now located downtown in Portland Oregon, at Portland Center Plaza, 1975 SW 1st Ave, Ste L, Portland, Or 97201. I have a new phone # too. See it above. Store hours are 10-3 Tuesday through Friday. Most Mondays and Saturdays I'm open 10-12. All other hours are by phone call or appointment. Portland is a beautiful city, full of parks, activities and friendly people. I'm looking forward to meeting all the knitters and crocheters here.

If you wish to unsubscribe, there is a link at the bottom of this newsletter. I'll miss you, but come see me again sometime at http://www.yarn-store.com

Lorna's Laces 5 new summer colors.

Fjord - Turtle Rodeo - Patina - Unicorn Parade - Robot Overlord

These 5 new shades are available in all Lorna's Laces lines by special order, but I currently have stock in Shepherd Sock, Shepherd Sport, Shepherd Worsted, Shepherd Bulky and Helen's Lace. Let me know if you would like it in any other of Lorna's Laces Lines.

New Products from Ashland Sky

The Circular Wallet is a wallet shaped case for circular needles. 16 vinyl pockets inside and hemp on the outside, with the Ashland Sky signature trim.

The Travel Pack is a smaller multi-pack for holding the tools you need when on the road. Short straight needles, circular needles, double points, crochet hooks and tools...a great size for travel.

ORANGE AND TURQUOISE are the two new colors for the Gadget Sack, Project Sack and Flat Sacks.

The Gadget Sack is a 6 inch zippered addition to your Ashland Sky Set. Toss in your remnant tools, your keys, your glasses, or even a small sack. I use mine for my contacts when traveling and another holds my ipod and charging cord! Works for everything and everybody!!

The Project Zippered Pouch, like the gadget sack, is a great addition to the Ashland Sky line of cases. It is large enough to hold an active knitting project, pattern or book and needles. This is another in the line of "cross over to other crafts" style of cases. The 9.5 inch x 12 inch is a great size for cross stitch, crochet, art and any other tools.

Large project bags perfect for full size sweaters and afghans. Orginally designed for needle pointers, these bags meet a multitude of art project storage needs. I took the large one to my daugher who attends AIP (Art Institute of Portland).

Long straps make it easy to loop over your shoulder. #15 Large 24"x18", #14 Medium 20"x20", and #17 Small 15"x15"

3 sizes - - 9 colors!

Order these bags and see all the other styles and colors on my Ashland Sky page.

5 New Patterns from Knitting Pure and Simple

Knitting Pure and Simple is known for its very simple, very fun and VERY wearable patterns. Of all the patterns I sell, at the end of a long day working, I can easily follow these directions. And still have a garment that takes a reasonable amount of time to knit! Knit from the neck down, these patterns have minimal finishing.

Universal Cotton Supreme

Doesn't this look cool enough to dive into?

This is the first cotton yarn I've truly fallen in love with. Universals Cotton Supreme is very soft, and it doesn't feel like I'm knitting with cotton. Perfect for baby afghans and summer evening garments.

See all the solids and multis shades here.

Universal Yarn Wisdom Poem Sock

A wonderful addition to Angelika's sock yarn alcove.

75% wool / 25% nylon roving sock yarn featuring beautiful shades which blend easily from one color to the next.
Available in bright, medium, and sombre shades.
Poems Sock is not just for socks --- try it for mittens, hats, and lace projects too!
459yds, 100 grams.
Gauge: 6.75-8 sts per inch on US#1, 2 or 3 needle.
Care: Machine Wash Gentle Cold, Dry Flat.

15 NEW COLORS

in Cascade 220

As if over 300 shades in Cascade 220 was not enough, Cascade has brought us 15 more shades, to make a total of 324 colors!! The nations #1 selling felting wool keeps up to date with color trends and your special color needs.

Koi	Olive Oil	Smoke Blue	Twight Blue	Hunter Twist
Concord Grape	Misty Lilac	Cabernet	In the Navy	Nutmeg Heather
Rose Quartz Heather	Nebula Heather	Turquoise Heather	Sphere	Tiger Eye

Tonal Fair Isle Jacket

designed by Melissa Leapman in Cascade 220.

Start it now, and it will be done in plenty of time for the cooler days of fall. It's also a great project for gifts. I like to wear cardigans because when I get warm I can take them off. Perfect for early morning or evening walks, or working in air conditioned environments.

Adapting Melissa's Fair Isle Jacket to the Knitting Machine

There are a couple of ways to adapt Melissa's pattern to the knitting machine. The fairisle pattern needs to be addressed. The hem has a combination of knit and purl rows. And often while machines can easily match stitch gauge, the row gauge might not match.

The fairisle pattern is only 2 colors in any row. On the SK860 midgauge and using Designaknit, enter the 4 st repeat design in 2 colors. On the the SK155 bulky, punch the 4st design 3 times across to fill up the 12st bank card. Punch enough repeats so that the card can be clipped together. On the LK150 midgauge or the SK160 midgauge use the slip stitch in colors technique working off the chart in Melissa pattern. By changing the back ground and foreground colors it is easy to reproduce the same look. Other modifications can be to select a similar looking pattern you already have. Or even just do the jacket in a solid, heather, tweed or hand dyed color.

For the hem that has purl rows, you can either reform that row, use a garter bar to flip that row or use the common knitting machine technique of a doubled hem. For a doubled hem simply cast on in waste yarn, then knit 10 rows of main yarn, then go into the fair isle hem doing Melissa's purl rows and stockinet. After the inside band and Melissa's outside band are complete, hang the first row of main yarn.

Matching a stitch gauge to a hand knit pattern on a knitting machine is usually not difficult. But, at times, I've not been able to match both stitch and row, no matter how much I fiddle with the tension dial and tension mast setting. The fact that the knitting machine is forming 3-5 stitches at a single time just causes the row gauge to be shorter. Therefore, a few more rows need to be knit. The solution is to make sure you do a very large tension swatch. A method I use is to cast on the for back width and knit up to the underarm based on the row gauge of the pattern, or what I expect the row gauge to be. Remove on waste yarn, stretch and allow to relax for a day or two. Sometimes I will even go so far as to block that piece. If the garment is a bit short, figure how many additional rows you need to achieve your inches. I've used this method many times. Now that you know exactly what your row gauge is, small modifications can be made throughout the project.

Melissa's pattern is very workable on the knitting machine. Challenge yourself!

KNITTING MACHINE GARTER BARS!!

It has been a long time, but 6.5, 8.0 and 9.0 mm garters bars are once again in production.

If you read the above article on converting Melissa's Jacket to the knitting machine, you may have picked up on the fact that garter bars are now available. Yay!!!! I loved the additional options in design work that our garter bars offered. These are beautiful, quality bars made here in the USA.

KNITTING MACHINE STANDS!!

The good news keeps on coming! Stands are once again available for knitting machines. These stands will accomodate all sizes of knitting machines, and have the tilting feature.

Hope you enjoyed this issue of Yarn Store News!!    Angelika