Tag Archives: superwash

Malabrigo Sock.

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A box from Malabrigo is always met with excitement on our part. The bigger the box, the more excitement, and this week’s box was a big, big box. We got a few new colors in Malabrigo Lace and a few in Arroyo, but the big excitement with the big box was all about Malabrigo Sock.

Malabrigo Sock is always a hot commodity at the Hillsborough Yarn Shop. The colors, the softness, and the long waiting period between shipments all conspire to make it disappear quickly from our shelves. It’s always a relief to have Malabrigo Sock yarn in stock, and so appealing to see all the colors together. It has me daydreaming about colorwork socks, but what else is new.

Have you used Malabrigo Sock before? I’m always curious what people are making with it–socks, scarves, shawls, sweaters, hats, baby things–because it has so many applications. Let us know what you’ve used it for and how you like it, and if you haven’t yet had the pleasure, give Malabrigo Sock a try and see what all the fuss is about!

Bergere de France Berlaine, on sale!

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If you’ve been to the Hillsborough Yarn Shop, you’re probably already familiar with the sale trunk.

Just in front of the desk, a trunk overflows with discounted yarns. The contents of the trunk are ever-changing, and this week, we added something new: Bergere de France Berlaine, a dk weight superwash wool.

Most of the yarns in the sale trunk are dwindling in quantity, with only a handful of skeins in any one color. Not so for Berlaine–if there’s not enough for your project in the trunk, just ask us for more, and we’ll gladly check our stash in the back room. We may even have sweater quantities of this lovely stuff in a few colors, depending on the sweater. The machine-washability of this yarn makes it particularly well suited to children’s things, or the kinds of accessories that sometimes need to be thrown into the wash. Dig into the sale trunk, folks! There’s plenty of good, inexpensive yarn waiting there.

String Theory. Once more.

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The String Theory Caper Sock yarn all but disappeared from our shelves in a matter of weeks. Not yet ready to cast on, or even settle on a project befitting this luxurious cashmere and wool blend, I held off on the skein of Caper Sock that had caught my eye. When the last skein in that colorway was sold, I pouted for a minute, then remembered that we were expecting a shipment from String Theory this week. Not only were we awaiting one backordered color each in Selku and Merino DK, but Anne had also ordered another 24 skeins of Caper Sock.

By the time we’d refilled the half-empty cubby that Caper Sock calls home, I had to hold off yet again, for there were at least four colors vying for my attention.

When my Arroyo socks are done, I might be ready to choose a color. Until then, it’s all yours, String Theory lovers. Enjoy this new selection of colors in Caper Sock!

Hello, Malabrigo Arroyo.

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I’ve written before about the popularity of Malabrigo yarns. Known for their softness and many other fine qualities, Malabrigo yarns are always welcomed with great excitement. This week, in the midst of the busiest shopping days we’ve seen all year, we were treated to something really special: the arrival of a new Malabrigo yarn.

Arroyo, a sport-weight washable merino, has been on order for the better part of the past year, so Anne and I were nothing short of thrilled to finally see it in person. We weren’t alone in our excitement, either. There are those among us who memorize Malabrigo colorways, can identify Archangel, Arco Iris, or Indiecita from only a cursory glance. Arroyo comes in those memorable colors and 17 others, many of which have never before been seen at the Hillsborough Yarn Shop. Here are a few of them, ready to be newly memorized.

Immediately, of course, I began thinking of socks. Could I make socks with Arroyo, and could I do it in one 335 yard skein alone? What size needle would make a strong enough fabric for socks, and what stitch pattern would ensure that it remained stretchy? You won’t be surprised to know that I took a skein home on Saturday afternoon, the better to answer such questions in the future. All projects have been set aside in order to experiment with Arroyo. I’ll be sure to let you know what I come up with. Happy holidays, everyone, I’ll see you at the shop!

Hello, String Theory.

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I know I said we were elated at the arrival of Jitterbug last week–and really, we were! But that was before yesterday’s shipment from String Theory, a new yarn company for us. Yesterday, excitement erupted at the Hillsborough Yarn Shop as Anne pulled skein after skein of beautiful hand-dyed yarn out of the box, passing them around to an appreciative group of knitters who petted, hugged, and admired the new yarn with great delight. Several of them decided they couldn’t leave without a skein, and so they were here and gone before they even made it onto the shelf. Luckily, there is still plenty to show off. Have a look at what all of the fuss is about.

String Theory is a small company out of Blue Hill, Maine, a two-woman operation that has been getting a lot of attention recently. String Theory was recently profiled in Coastal Knits, a lovely pattern collection that we’re forever reordering. Clara Parkes mentioned them in a recent post on Knitter’s Review, which led me back to her Knitter’s Book of Socks, where I found patterns using both of the String Theory sock yarns we just got in.

String Theory’s Caper Sock is a luxurious fingering weight yarn, a blend of superwash merino, cashmere, and nylon. Cookie A’s pattern from Knitter’s Book of Socks, below, uses the Caper Sock yarn with lovely results.

Bluestocking, on the other hand, is perhaps the more interesting of the two String Theory sock yarns because of its fiber content: 80% Bluefaced Leicester wool and 20% nylon. Bluefaced Leicester is a particular breed of sheep known for its long, strong fibers, which ought to make a particularly durable pair of socks. (Care to learn more about breed-specific wools? Put Clara Parkes’ Knitter’s Book of Wool on your holiday wish list, or give it to yourself as a gift. Fascinating stuff!) It’s rare and exciting to see a yarn label that specifies the breed of sheep whose wool is inside it, with the exception of the ubiquitous Merino. I can’t wait to give Bluestocking a try, perhaps using Ann Budd’s pattern from Knitter’s Book of Socks.

The third and final kind of yarn we received from String Theory this week is their Merino DK, a name which speaks for itself. I can add little else to describe it, though I’ll mention that it’s superwash, squishy and soft, and that each 100 gram skein is packed with 280 yards. At a dk weight, that can easily take you through a hat, cowl, pair of mittens, or maybe even a scarf.

Come by the shop and we’ll be sure to show you in person all that I’ve shown you here. Forgive us if we can hardly contain our delight: we love yarn, we love knitting, and we are utterly irrepressible. See you at the shop!

Jitterbug. Again.

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You would not believe the gasps of delight that accompanied this week’s much anticipated shipment of Colinette Jitterbug. (I know I say things like that a lot–it seems that weekly, we receive boxes of gasp-inducing yarns–but I’m just reporting the facts, here. We’re an excitable bunch.) Unlike most yarns, the Jitterbug comes to us in bunches of untwisted hanks, which makes for a dramatic entrance.

After oohing and aahing over each color as it emerged from the box, Anne and I got right to work twisting up each hank.

Jitterbug, as I’ve written before, is a tightly-plied, squishy, merino yarn in fingering weight which comes to us all the way from Wales. We’ve carried primarily variegated colorways thus far, but the semisolid colorways have been so tempting that we finally, happily gave in.

I went home with a skein of Jitterbug in a golden yellow to make myself a pair of bright, wild socks. There are several other projects awaiting my attention, but it’s quite possible that I’ll put them all aside to cast on with this yarn, for which I’ve heard nothing but rave reviews.

One such rave-reviewer is Anne, who made a little something out of Jitterbug for herself earlier this year.

No big deal, just one of the most amazing sweaters we have in the shop, an exquisite design from Marianne Isager’s Japanese Inspired Knits. Come by to examine Anne’s sweater in close, glorious detail, and to snag a skein of Jitterbug for yourself.

See you at the shop!

P.S.

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Along with our Malabrigo Lace, we got a handful of bags of Malabrigo Rios in whatever colors were available. It wasn’t a big Rios shipment, but it was enough to brighten the display, and to allow us to breathe easier, knowing there were sweater quantities of a few colors, if needed.

I just knit a very simple garter stitch cowl for my sister out of Rios and loved every stitch for its stretchy, springy softness. Next time you’re shopping around for washable worsted weight yarn, consider Rios!

Hello, Crock-O-Dye.

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Recently, it became clear that we were getting low on Crock-O-Dye. Crock-O-Dye is a fingering weight yarn from Knit One Crochet Too, a variegated blend of wool, silk, and nylon. It’s meant for socks, but does just as well in a shawl, scarf, sweater, hat, or fingerless mitts… or wherever else you’d like to use fingering weight yarn. Slowly over the past half year or so, our stock went down. We ran out of the hot pink colorway, then we ran out of the sage green, then the sky blue… and then last week, suddenly we realized we had only two colors left. Time to reorder.

It’s always satisfying to replenish our inventory of any particular yarn. The colors look much happier when they’re together. Come by the shop to welcome back Crock-O-Dye, and see what else is new!

Katia Fabula. Once more.

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I know I’ve written about this yarn twice before, but it’s time, once more, to remind you of the existence of Katia Fabula. Super-bulky, very soft, machine-washable merino wool which we now carry in a whopping  8 colors. Have a look!

I have a feeling that as the holidays grow nearer, this yarn will begin to look more and more appealing to those of us who’ve been putting off gift-knitting. A hat in Fabula could likely be a knit in two sittings, maybe one if you’re really pressed for time, and a scarf wouldn’t take too much longer if you cast on narrowly… just saying. 
See you at the shop!

Hello, Classy.

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If you’ve ever come into the shop looking for washable worsted weight wool, you’re not alone. This seems to be one of our most common requests. Wool is soft, warm, wonderfully stretchy, and has many applications, all of which are qualities that draw knitters and crocheters to wool yarns. Many of those knitters and crocheters (as well as those they knit and crochet for) are also looking for yarns that can be machine washed without fear of accidental felting. Enter superwash wool. We’ve got a lot of it, and the rich, tonally-variegated Classy, from Dream In Color, is one of the first stops on the Washable Worsted Weight Wool Tour at the Hillsborough Yarn Shop. Our stock had been dwindling, but a recent order got us back up to date on many colors that had been marked with the dreaded “L,” which stands for “Last,” as in, “Last skein in stock. Sorry!” Now there is a good chance that we have a sweater’s worth of most any color one could select from the Classy basket. Dig in, you makers of hats, mitts, baby sweaters and blankets, and rest easy: there’s no accidental felting in this yarn’s future.