New Season Yarns

Ruth and I made our annual visit to Stitches, the annual UK trade fair for Crafting, Sewing, Haberdashery and Yarn shops.  We are generally chauffeured there by my husband, Greg (also known as our Logistics Manager for any yarn related outings) and this year we were also joined by Gaelle, our crochet specialist and Prudence the Prototype cow.  We were out of the house by 8.30 am (on a Sunday!) and headed off up to the NEC, Birmingham with notebooks in hand and budgets fixed firmly in our minds ready to meet our suppliers and replenish our shelves ahead of the new Season.

It is so hard to be restrained with so many new lines being shown.  The first to arrive (probably by the end of this week) will be Dream Catcher from Stylecraft.  This is a new cake yarn in with 10% wool content and will retail at £7.99 for 150g which is really very good value.  It is available in six shades and is a beautiful, DK weight mélange of colours in a roving style yarn. The colour change is phased so that the shades shift gradually.  The range includes relaxed shape garments and a range of stylish accessories. There is also a beautiful free shawl pattern on each ball band.  As well as the garments in the patterns, Stylecraft have also included accessories with exact yarn quantities given so that knitters can weigh their leftover yarn and choose to make the accessory too or download a different one.

West Yorkshire Spinners were launching their new Signature sock colours (designed by Winwick Mum herself, Christine Perry, some new colours and designs in Bo Peep and a new wool range, Colour Lab.  WYS haven't forgotten the crocheters in their pattern support and there are some lovely new designs being released to support the yarns.  Bo Peep has particularly strong pattern support for knitters and crocheters with super-cute toys to match the garments and mini-garments to fit the toys.

I've only skimmed the surface of the yarns we saw and yearned for -- there will be more information as the different yarns makes their way into the shop.  You can also expect a post shortly about the mysterious Prudence and her adventures at Stitches and the forthcoming Wonderwool.

---