Wretched Excess

Okay, so I went overboard a bit on the Beverly bootie. As Gene has always said, I should have found a job in procurement. My Dad had another way of putting it, Oregon stimulus dollars coming to Massachusetts. 

I did not get to any of the places I thought I would get to. No Webs, no Harrisville and sadly, one of the places I did a lot of shopping at was going out of business and had some not to be passed up deals. Everything was 75% off by the time I walked through the door in her next to last week.  Angora's in Wenhem MA was a lovely little rabbit den of yarn set in a little blue cottage off the main street. It was one of my favorite stops when I went home to visit. I walked out of there with all that merino in varying shades of golds, greens, oranges and purples. These were Strickwear kits for sweaters and at 75% off a steal for all that lovely hand dyed merino.

 The book Doubleweave was also an Angora's purchase. There in dead stock, still in its wrapper, were two of them at 75% off the cover price of $40.00. I bought both, one for me, one for my Dad as a Father's Day gift. The Rep Weave book rounded out the purchases.

At my second favorite yarn store in the world (Web-sters is my first) Yarns in the Farms in Beverly Farms I found that wonderful hand spun angora goat and wool yarn, titled Curly Begonias.

 Look for it as an accent in a blanket. I always feel so welcome and happy in that little shop, Chaco the dog was there at his greeting post and Tink, the owner has that big Texas way of making you feel right at home. I had to leave all the beautiful Lobster Pot yarn but this homespun was shouting out to me and couldn't be ignored.

The black silk came from my Dad on his early spring trip to Halcyon along with some of their wonderful two sided sley hooks. I added the multicolored silk when we visited A Loom With a View in Newburyport, MA.

 Betsy has a wonderful weaving and knitting shop and it was also the place we took our little afternoon wire weaving class. I think there are plans for some spinning wheels in the future. The 8/2 cotton cones came from there also and I enjoyed being able to use the loom to weave on while I visited.

Dad picked up the two cones of Harrisville Shetland for me also when he took his rug class. On a side note he is weaving a rug himself on Betsy's big Harrisville Rug loom at A Loom With a View and it's coming along wonderfully!

The red fleece is a long swing coat and was my Mother's. I have coveted this since I saw it two years ago and she gifted it to me this trip.It was cool enough on one of the days I actually wore it!  We had a grand time shopping, going through bookstores new and old and one afternoon ducked into the new Nordstrom's department store. We couldn't/wouldn't afford a thing and found ourselves over at Macy's where our dollars went a bit further. My Mother feels she must send me home with shoes. I usually have only two pairs, boots and smelly sneakers. This year we actually found two pairs of footwear I liked. Last year I resisted.  We lunched, we went to our favorite little store North Coast in Manchester by the Sea, drank wine and gin and tonics with abandon, had our usual disagreements and spent a lot of time giggling. The big box arriving yesterday signified the annual trip truly was over. I can now look forward to their visit in late October!

On farm news, Nick suffered from a mild colic on Friday and Saturday. He is fine now but it is never a happy place when you have a sick horse. After getting up and checking on him ( and medicating him) all through Friday night, Saturday I found myself coming down with a cold. It's been a really low energy week so far. I'm ready for this head cold to get gone, but everything in it's own time I guess.

I have started measuring a small warp for the Murphy Loom, maybe I will finish that off today and get it on the loom, or at least near it! :-)