Asheville, thy name is heaven

Today Cristi and I met up and headed to Asheville, NC. We headed out after picking up beverages at Panera and after an uneventful, if not a bit longer than it should have been due to the other slower drivers, we arrived at Earthguild which was the reason for the 2+ hour drive to the beautiful NC mountains. No we didn't take pictures of the mountains, Stacey. What we did do was raid Earthguild with passion. You see, they have spinning stuff. And dyeing stuff. And knitting stuff. And yarn. And wax if you are into candle making. And paper stuffs if you are into making paper. And word worky stuff if you are into wood working. And more stuff that I can't begin to mention because after that my brain turned off.

I left with a lanaset starter kit in order dye some yarny bits, a set of Ashford Handcards and a 1/2 lbs. of domestic wool top for dyeing. Also, 2 new bobbins for the Lendrum (so now I have 6, yes 6, precious).

Then we headed over to Purls Yarn Emporium. Wow. What a great shop. So very nice in there. The service and the shop. After a significant amount of time in there I left with Knit Fix: Problem Solving for Knitters and a line magnifier for my magnetic board. Perfect for lace charts. The guy that was working there (and yes I said GUY) was super nice and we chatted for a bit about Cables Untangled: An Exploration of Cable Knitting which I reviewed in my last podcast. They didn't have it in the shop, but he was very interested in looking at it as he teaches a cable class in the winter at the shop. He was awesome and def made our day.

Do you see a pattern here...no yarn. I am sticking to my yarn diet.

Lunch was had at The Bier Garden in downtown Asheville. To say I was overwhelmed by the beer selection there would probably be an understatement. I had the Hurricane Hefeweizen to start and let me tell you this is a nice beer. It is a thicker beer than you would think with a citrus taste to it. I really enjoyed it. Food was good and an Ace Apple Cider later (it was ok, but a bit bitter, which I don't really like in my ciders) we finally got our check (service wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either). And then we discovered that although we managed to feed the meter before lunch (for another HOUR) we were 15 minutes over our time and had gotten a ticket. *sigh* I should have mentioned that it ate one of my quarters and didn't give me time for that last 15. Whatever. Day was good, we aren't going to let this tarnish is.

Then we hit Yarn Paradise. Word from the wise...Asheville's streets are not well marked as you move into Hendersonville so you will probably miss the road. When you get to I-40 coming from Earthguild you have gone too far - Turn around and take a right at the next light (I am pretty sure it is the next one). The shop is on the right. And it is worth it.

Let me sum up this shop in one word. And that word is what you see when you first walk in the door. KOIGU! And I have 3 more words that make it even better - MILL ENDS KOIGU! OHMYGOD!!! (I didn't have my camera, but Cristi took pics - she will post them to her blog, I am sure of it). So, Several Koigu skeins of mill ends later - I found the Colinette Jitterbug. And then I bought some of that too. I made it all day. ALL DAY!!! Now, the ladies at this shop were great too. They wanted to know what we are into. They wanted to hear our squees and whatnot. It was an awesome experience.

I just cast on the Knit and Tonic Dream Swatch from one of the mill ends of Koigu I picked up. Yeah, I know I don't need another project, but but but...its KOIGU!!! And I did work really hard on Pinwheel today. Sleeve one is DONE and the stitches for sleeve 2 are now ready to go.