Tuesday, May 05, 2015

April Travel Review & Kit Winners Announced






Hi, Knitters,
Well, today is the day. Anne Vally of Little Skein upped the ante due to the ENORMOUS response to the giveaway. She decided to offer 2 of the Big Woods Luxe Kits as prizes. I have randomly selected 2 winners from the 1,077 entries, each will win a Big Woods Luxe Kit from Little Skein.

The winners are.... lindarumsey and sewmanygirls (both rav usernames)! 


Congratulations to the winners. I have given your names to Anne Vally of Little Skein and she will be contacting you via Ravelry pm to gather your preferences and mailing addresses to send your kits. Thank you for the overwhelming response.

Click here for the Little Skein Etsy Shop!

Anne asked me to pass on some further kit information to you. There are still some of the Plucky Knitter Primo Fingering Big Woods Kits available in the red- Mr. Edwards and green- Big Woods colorways! The golden Half Pint colorway is sold out. Also, be sure to note that Anne provides many different kit combinations so there is something for almost any price range, you can pick and choose.

collage photo provided by Little Skein

I wanted to thank Anne for sending me my shawl sample back to keep and wear and for including some of the lovely kit items as gifts in the package. One of the available kit items she sent, which is my favorite by far, is the photo collection by Joy Prouty. I follow and love Joy Prouty on Instagram along with tens of thousands of others. I am framing these Little House photos, signed by Joy, and will be hanging them in my home studio. They are joyful, peaceful and perfect. The photos are from Joy's personal collection and include original photographs of her visit with her family to the Ingalls' Homesteads in Walnut Grove, Minnesota and DeSmet, South Dakota. 

Read all about this beautiful Little House photo collection right here! You can purchase only one photo or all of them.

Click here for the Little Skein pop-up shop!

Thanks to Anne for the giveaway and for the fun opportunity.

Now that May is here and I am home for awhile (or at least until SSK in Nashville this July), I wanted to share some photos of my April travels to Maryland, California, and Minnesota.

And with that off we go!
Than

Fun and successful Pasadena students are making their adorable 3 Wee Sheep. Some of the students got really far along during class which is always fun to see. Note (top left) the Yowza Weigh It Shawl in Miss Babs Yowza in the Funny Papers colorway, and the lovely Esther in her Quaker Ridge Shawlette (top right). Esther won the Arne & Carlos Regia yarn from my blog giveaway.


I loved the artsy stenciled walkways of Pasadena. What a pretty area.


Minnesota is where I got to meet lots of my Itty-Bitty Knits group members! And Twinset Ellen (center top row) of the Twinset Designs Podcast! And I was excited to hear Amy Herzog speak (top left photo) at the opening dinner for Yarnover. She was a wonderful and vibrant and informative speaker. Very impressive. I met a couple more Itty-Bitty Knits group members Carla and Robin (bottom left) at Yarnover.

My buddy Rae Lynne (bottom right) was at StevenBe's on Sunday. I have known her for a few years now through our Ravelry group. She gave me a couple of very sweet gifts from her Etsy Shop Chase Art. Thank you Rae Lynne!

I taught at both Yarnover and at StevenBe's in Minneapolis on the same weekend.


In Minnesota I also got to spend time with my son. Let's just say we ate A LOT! Many restaurants were visited in a couple of short days. It was fun because he stayed with me at the hotel on Saturday night. I loved that time we had together. He is the second of my four children so as you can imagine we have never had a lot of one-on-one time together. It was wonderful.

I purchased the Irish yarn called Hedgehog Fibres in the Teacup colorway at StevenBe's. It is so pretty that I immediately wound it and cast on a shawl... more to come on that. I finished a pair of Arne & Carlos socks and started a very casual Instagram knitalong for any Arne & Carlos Regia socks with the hashtag #acregiakal if you are interested in joining in.

In summary, in April I taught on both U.S. coasts and in the middle. I taught Fair Isle Mitts and Fair Isle Hat workshops, 3 Wee Sheep classes, Mary, Millie & Morgan and Ben & Buddy Quince & Co. Doll Workshops, Build a Toy Workshops, Opal Sock Yarn Bunny and Mini-Sock Yarn Bunny classes, Little Dragon classes, Fox in a Vest classes, lectured at Vogue Knitting Live and spoke on a panel discussion.....  And I survived and had fun to boot!

Oh! And.....

I am quietly finishing up my next book with my publisher, Artisan Books. There is lots of editing and deadlines going on there as well. I am super excited about this new book and I hope you will be, too.

Psssst..... my new book is already up for pre-order on Amazon if you are interested in taking a peek!



And lastly, in Maryland Greg of the Knitting Daddy blog shared his new pattern samples with me. 

The hat pattern is called, Scrappy Sock Yarn Preemie Hats. The hats are adorable! 

All of the proceeds from this pattern go directly to the Family Support Network of Central Carolina.  You can read all about it on the project page right here! Plus, there is a discount code for the month of May for $1 off: BLUEBERRY

What a great way to use up sock yarn leftovers. 

I'll be back soon with more. Until then, be well and knit on.
xo ~  susan

9 comments:

Unknown said...

so interesting that you got some Hedgehog Fibers..I have a couple of skeins in my stash. There were for socks but if you are thinking about a shawl.....
It is dyed not far from me here in Ireland and she does some great colourways. I hope that you enjoy knitting with it.

Anonymous said...

Congratulations to the winners! I'm jealous. :)

And, wow, Susan. That was really nice of you to feature my preemie hat pattern. Thank you so much. I got my pattern sales invoice from Ravelry last week, and for April, the pattern ended up generating $95 in sales! I went ahead and rounded it up to $100 and gave FSNCC a check at the annual "Parents of Preemies Day" this past Sunday. They were blown away at the generosity of knitters. Thanks so much for helping to spread the word.

Sam I Am...... said...

Congratulations to the winners! So nice that here were 2 lucky people!
You have been busy. I wish I had your energy...I used to, years ago.
I have been going through your archives, if I haven't told you, and they read like a good book! I take notes on yarns and tips and have literally watched your family grow up and what a beautiful family they are! Last night I made the Lemon Blossoms except I used cupcake liners and regular cupcake pans. You get about 24 and I took the papers off and then dipped them...YUMMO as Rachel Ray would say. My daughter and I are nuts over lemon and our favorites are lemon bars but I plan on making these when she visits this summer....she will LOVE them. Thank you for your blog as without it I would never have continued knitting. (self-taught with the help of 1,000's on the internet, lol!) I'm just finishing up my first sock using Kristin Nicholas Springtime self-patterning yarn and getting ready to order her book and some Zauerball Crazy Sock yarn. Enjoy your time at home and congrats on the new book! You're amazing!

Suze said...

I notice that there are two girls on the cover of your new book. Are there projects that appeal to boys, too? One of my favorite parts of Kristin Nicholas's Kids Embroidery book is the wide range of kids she includes in its pages (boys, girls, many ages and ethnicities...)

Susan B. Anderson said...

Hi Suze,
Yes, I would say that almost all of the patterns could be for a boy or girl, it is definitely boy friendly. The publisher just used the cute little girls on the cover.

thanks for asking!
susan

Esther said...

I just loved the Wee Sheep class and the chance to meet you in person. As a regular blog reader, it was nice to make a personal connection. It was lovely to see how supportive your son was in helping you set up/pack up and handle the technical challenges. Thanks for the shout out on your post. Here's to more shared knitting adventures.

Holly said...

Thank you for another wonderful post. xxGrannyslove (Rav)

baerenwolle said...

So many happy faces! This post was a joy to read. Congrats to the giveaway winners :)
I really love Hedgehog Fibers, too. She is such a skilled dyer!

Hope you have a lovely week, Susan. Greetings from Germany!

stephigordon said...

I am so excited for your new book! Congratulations!! I have an eight year old daughter who sometimes dabbles in knitting! We will definitely add your newest book to her collection!! Stephanie (indigodogmontana on Rav)