Sorry for an inconvenience, but our theme seems to dislike Internet Exploder users and they are complaining they can’t comment. So I will be “working on fixing this” over the next few days
–
If you have a moment to leave a comment and let me know what browser and version you used that would be very helpful.

Thanks

Wheat

It is always fun to be the one who gets to tell someone they won a prize and so I am having a good week –
contacting the Retailers who visited the

TNNA Designers and Teachers PreView Promenade activitiy at TNNA’s Winter Show Last week.

It is even nicer when you get to tell someone whose shop you have had a chance to visit, (remember I lived in the NY Metro area from birth to … well for a long time) YOU WON !!!!

That is why I am so enjoying sharing with you about to Eileen Aird of Ridgewood Needlepoint Her shop is located downtown at 6 South Maple Ave., Ridgewood, NJ 07450 over in Bergen County – just outside on New York City.

You can find out more about her shop by visiting the store (tell’em you read about it here)
After getting a close look at the models for Janet Perry’s Stitch Guides – I may have to give Eileen a call about The Christmas Sweets. After all, Mother’s Day is coming, my Mom loves Christmas, and she should not be eating candy, so this just might make a GREAT Mom’s day gift.

So much at the show has me itching to get stitching – girl hardly knows where to start.

Wheat

Few Independent Designers can afford the high cost of professional photography.

Thanks to the wonders of today’s digital photography, and a bit of ingenuity, it may well not be completely necessary –

Lightboxes like the EZ Cube have always been on my wish list.

But if you are “handy” and your products are small, there is no reason why you cannot construct a “usable” light boxes. Here is the link I am sending to TH so he can build some for me to use.
http://www.studiolighting.net/homemade-light-box-for-product-photography/ Be sure to read the comments as many great suggestions have been made.

Meanwhile, as we are experimenting with some other options for “larger” items – I’ll let you know of any “improvements” that “work for wheat”

While I am away, if you won’t be at the show,

You might enjoy taking a look at the last few days of postings over at

The Preview Promenade

Have a great week.

Wheat

Have you ever seen that kids game – the one where the moles pop up out of the hole and the player is supposed to smack it back into its hole?

There are a lot of days when that is exactly what running a small business feels like – except somehow our customers have the hammer and we are moles.

Earlier this week I was sent a copy of a message from a Retailer. After two days of thinking, I agree that other retailers “need to know” about a potential “situation” but do not believe it can even remotely be applied to any single yarn. And BETTER YET, yarn buyers might need to know too

So here’s the situation as I understand it:

The Retailer apparently has a wonderful customer who is an avid sewist as well as a knitter. Many who sew are in the habit of pre-washing fabrics – so she also pre-washes her yarn.

As a spinner, I am not unfamiliar with the idea of fulling a yarn and other techniques for setting twist and yes, I do use the soak and spin cycles of my washer to do this sort of thing. And a gentle SOAK, rolling in a towel or even a spin cycle in one of Dawn Stone’s Fiber Washing Bags has been known to happen in this house especially with hand dyes where I am concerned about dye bleeding.

NOT THE CASE HERE: It seems this person actually follows the label instructions, instructions until now I always thought were tested and intended to be used on “finished garments” so am really not all that surprised when a yarn “in the skein” felted into a tangled mess.

I don;t yet have all the details, but my first thought was how unreliable “temperature settings” on a washing machine can be-I have a bunch of others, but that is what topped the list.

Then I thought about it ‘some more’ and realized it certainly an opportunity for a LYS to use their unique position to educate the consumer and like Marcy Simms says, an educated consumer is our best customer

I honestly do not see how any manufacturer or distributor could have foreseen this one
Who would have thought yarn sellers would need to explain that the care instructions “assume”
“finished garment” or at the very least a swatch to test the “fabric” .

See you in San Diego, where I hope to get a first hand look at the result of this “interesting” experiment and find out the details.

Travel Safe

Wheat

Visit Preview Promenade

And for the curious – here are product contact details for the Fiber Washings Bags
Suggested Retail $19.95 plus Priority Flat Rate $4.10 postage
Check or Money order.

Dawn Stone – Little Hollow
he Fiber Washing Bag
RR 5 – Box 1003
Ava MO 65608

417-683-2060

email: lilhollow@getgoing.com

PDF of Instructions