Whew.

We are finally back to blogging. We have never had a busier day than the Super Sale earlier this month, and it's taken us a while to recover!

In the meantime, here are some new treats. These are new fabrics that just arrived from Kona Bay's Emperor Collection II. They are not only beautiful, but they will go with any decor!




Stop by today to see them in person!

Are You Ready to Party???

We're getting ready for our big sale on Sunday! We thought we'd give you a few previews of what you might find. All we're going to do is show you a few pictures of just a few of the items that will be on sale. We'll tell you about the deals and show you even more items when you come in on Sunday!

Remember to come prepared with the team that you think will win. If you choose correctly, you'll get a coupon for 25% off the fabric or yarn for one project. If you lose--well, you'll at least get a consolation of 15% off!

We'll have special hours that day between 10 and 4.

In the meantime, here is just a little taste of what's to come:





















May the best team win!

People often think that since we own a knitting and quilting store, we knit and quilt all day--but most of what we do in our store is help to solve problems for people. The other part is administration-- bookkeeping, working on the newsletter, coordinating classes, ordering merchandise, and putting it away when it gets there.

This past week, we made the executive decision that we desperately needed to get a new desk. You may not have noticed this, but for the past 3 years, we had been using an old desk from Cynthia's parents' basement, with TV trays for our computer keyboard. It was not the most efficient (or comfortable) system, but our space requirements were pretty specific. We couldn't buy any desk because it had to fit our space.

Cynthia found the perfect desk at Staples in Altoona. She ordered it and we had to wait for it to arrive and make the trip to Altoona to pick it up. Now that we had a new desk in plan our old system (the one we had lived with for 3 years) became nearly unbearable.

Finally we got our desk and we began the setup at noon on Thursday. The desk came in one big, very heavy box; we were shocked to see the huge assembly booklet with 29 pages of instructions for building the desk.

The instructions assured us that two people could put together the desk in approximately 1 hour and 40 minutes. This is an unretouched photo:
We figured we'd be done well before 3:00 or 4:00, assuming that it would take us a little longer because there would be people coming in. (You know where this is going, don't you?)

And so we began to work. It took a long, long time, and there were thousands of little pills of styrofoam everywhere, with a particular concentration in Kim's hair (she is apparently the one who is "attractive"), and what seemed like hundreds of pieces of desk with thousands more little fasteners.

We hammered and screwed and nailed, for hours and hours: 3:00 and 4:00 came and went. It began to get dark. At about 6:30, the desk was finally together. But then we had to move it. The old desk was heavy and wedged in hard. We took a break for dinner.

Kim rounded up her husband and nephew during dinner, and they moved everything around, putting all of this:


into place, and left.

We were not done. The store was still littered with thousands of little pills of styrofoam, and all of the stuff we normally use to help people solve problems (see sentence 1) was scattered to the winds.

And so we kept working. By 10:00 that night, the store looked like this:


And we were ready to start helping people.

So if there are days that we look at you with tired eyes, and we drift off into a fog as we talk to you, forgive us. It's not you. It's probably a day where we were putting together a desk in a dark store the night before.

And now, we're off to do some quilting, crochet, and knitting!

January is in full swing here at Stitch Your Art Out! Here are some of the highlights for you.

• There are a few spaces left in the 7:30-9:00 Knitting Calendar Club and in the Crochet Calendar Club. Call or stop by to sign up now!
  

• A couple of sessions are full, but there are still spaces available in this year's Block of the Month, Stepping Stones!

• Excitement is building over our Mystery Quilt, which will start Wednesday, January 24th. This year's mystery is suitable for comfortable beginners through advanced quilters. Sign up now to crack the case!
  

• There is a new page on our website that lists ongoing specials and sales! Check this periodocally for the latest offers.
  

It's the most wonderful time of the year! Stitch Your Art Out's 2007 Winter Newsletter is currently winging its way to you! We dropped them off at the post office yesterday, so many of you should receive them today or tomorrow. We have lots of new, fun classes, workshops, and clubs scheduled for you!

If you want a sneak peek of what's in store, check out our website at www.stitchyourartout.com.

Cynthia writes:

This fall, I discovered a mistake in a raglan sweater I had started in the summer. I noticed it only after the front was finished. As I made the last bind-off stitch, the front suddenly seemed small .... very small indeed.

First phase of denial: Was it really small, or was it really okay? I held it up to myself, and I decided that it might fit ... but only if I were to stretch it out real hard.

This didn't compute. I was sure I had planned for this sweater to be roomy and comfortable. I had dutifully made my gauge swatch. I always swatch.

I put it away in disgust. Five minutes later, I couldn't stand it. I pulled out both the front and the back to see if they were different. They sure were--by over 4 inches:

Second phase of denial: Can I just sew them together anyway? That phase flew by and went out the window within a half a second.

Clearly something had gone wrong.

But what? To figure it out, I remeasured gauge on both of them. It was the same. Then I counted stitches. The back had 87, and the front had 67. I had no idea why the large discrepancy (I always double or triple count my cast-on row), but there was only one solution: rip and reknit the front. I did that.

Then I came to the sleeves. Before I had started the front, I had already knit both of them, and had stopped at the armholes (read: most of the way finished), figuring I'd get back to them. I had been proud of myself for working on the sleeves early in the process, so that I would not to have another vest sitting around.

Okay, sure, the sleeve had always seemed a little tight....

...barely able to fit around my wrist.... but I kept knitting them.

You guessed it. Too few stitches again. I had to rip and reknit both sleeves too.

Then I looked at the pattern. The problem, it turned out, was that I had followed the instructions for the "chunky-weight" when I knit the front and sleeves. I was using worsted-weight yarn. Therefore, I was casting on too few stitches.

And so I ripped and reknit both sleeves. The yarn was wonderful, and while it was a bit of a bummer to reknit almost the entire sweater, I still loved working on it. In the end, it was all worth it: I had a new, beautiful sweater made out of Southwest Trading Company's Karaoke.


Despite my experience, I highly recommend this great little Oat Couture pattern. (It's not their fault that I didn't read.) It's an easy, quick knit that looks great. I added a little crocheted edge around the neck to finish it off, but otherwise, I followed the pattern exactly. (The second time.)

Why do people have unfinished objects laying around the house? The reason is almost always that they have a sticking point: Things are going wrong, and you need to fix them, but you don't know how, or you don't want to.

Part of the secret of finishing what you started is simply to take a deep breath and persist through the ripping and redoing. It happens to everyone.

Need help figuring out where you went wrong? That's why we're at the shop. We're happy to help cheer you through that slogging stage. And to help you end up with something you love.

Our Holiday Knitting/Crocheting Gift-a-Thon--and You're Invited!!

Did you wait till the last minute to start knitting or crocheting for the holidays? Well, join the crowd--literally! We're going to get together to have a marathon knitting session on Wednesday, Dec. 20, from 6 p.m. until .... whenever. Bring along your projects, and we'll work through the night until we're all yawning! (That may be 10:00 for many of us, or possibly as long as midnight.)

We'll have Christmas music, warm cider, cookies, and good company. Stop by that night, and get those projects finished just in time! (Or if you want to work on projects for next year, that's fine too!)

See you on December 20!