After much contemplation and a desire to change the feel and look of my blog, I have taken the plunge and created a new blog on Typepad.  For now, this blog will remain as an archive as I refocus and regroup on my new blog.

Come join me!  You can find me here:

http://zenyarngarden.typepad.com

And subscribe to the blog while you’re there – I’ll be having a celebration contest in the coming days and you don’t want to miss it!

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And we have a contest winner everyone!  We didn’t have anyone land on the exact number but only one skein off was Uli with a guess of 376.  The actual number on that table is 375 skeins.  I won’t be able to show the colour yet as these yarns will soon be winging their way into the arms of many knitters.  Thanks everyone for participating…that was fun and I appreciate you all dropping by!  

And I’m sure you’d like to see the prize yarn colourway, yes?  Here she is…a lovely semi-solid colourway on a 100% superwash merino base yarn.  

Happy knitting Uli!

It has quite literally been ages since I held a contest so it’s high time I did again!  And what better way then to celebrate the finish of a large order?!  I have been uber busy the past few weeks with this order and I’m so pleased it’s finished.  Finishing is a bit surreal really – putting that last label on and packaging it all up is a huge relief but it also makes me happy as these yarns will soon be winging their way into the arms of many knitters.  Of course I can’t reveal the actual colourway until later and once they have been mailed.  That would spoil the surprise so for now, they are all in grayscale just to tease everyone a little…LOL

So now, onto the fun part – the contest!  It’s a simple one – guess how many skeins are in the yarn pile in the photo by leaving a comment and if you guess the right number, you win a skein of sock yarn in a surprise colourway!  I will take the first correct guess as the winner and one guess per comment please.  Contest closes on Sunday, February 15, 2009 at midnight.  If you’d like to see more photos of the yarns, please click here.  The last 3 grayscale photos are the photos you want to look at.

And finally, are you on Twitter?  I’ve just started using this mini-blogging tool and it’s been a lot of fun!  Come follow me and I’ll follow you back – click on the cute image to the left and it’ll take you to my page.  It’s a really cool tool for keeping in touch – some of my tweets are about my daily life as a yarn dyer and some of it is regular life stuff.  Hope you’ll join me if you haven’t already!

Happy Friday everyone!  Have a wonderful weekend.

UPDATE:  Contest is now closed and although the number wasn’t guessed exactly, I’ll be announcing the person who is closest during the day on Monday.  Thanks everyone for playing – it was fun watching all the guesses come in!

My good friend Natalie, over at The Yarn Yard had a wonderful post today about the Letter C so I asked her to send me a letter to blog about and here we are – the Letter T….LOL  Now I must list 10 things I like/love that start with the letter T.  If you’d like to participate, leave me a comment and I’ll randomly send along a letter for you to blog with!

Here goes:

1.  Toronto - it’s the largest city here in Canada and I’ve had the pleasure of living there when I first got married and also visiting when I was first being courted by my DH.  It offers anything you could possibly want and more!  The most memorable location for me?  The CN Tower.  Why?  It’s where my DH took me for dinner the first time we met…awwwwwww…and it was so romantic.  Wonderful company, delicious dinner and who would’ve thought we’d have gotten married?  Okay, secretly I knew we had a future even then but I don’t think he knew it!  LOL

2.  Twitter – I just signed up and what a fun little program this is!  It’s an easy stream of consciousness kind of updating blog where you just type about what you are doing throughout the day.  Fun stuff!

3.  Technology – where would we be without it?  My entire day and yarn business revolves around computers, digital cameras, etc.  I remember the days when computers took up an entire room – look how far we’ve come and don’t remind me how old I am!  LOL  

4.  Texture – how would life be without texture around us?  From the knitted item that has a wonderful texture to the yarn that feels oh-so-soft to the feel of your loved one’s cheek – just imagine how life would be without texture in it.  Everything around you possesses this trait – take a look around you and let me know what doesn’t have texture!

5.  Trolley – this word makes me giggle and you’ll never guess why!  My DH was born in Jamaica and their English is very British-based so everytime we go to the grocery store, he always says “get a trolley”.  Well, when I first met him, I looked at him and said “a what?” and he repeated it again “a trolley” and I said “what’s a trolley?” and he said “the thing you push your groceries in” and I said “oh, you mean a shopping cart” and he said “ya, a trolley”…LOL!  Even today I still giggle when he says “trolley”.  You definitely have to love the nuances of the English language – it’s not like he was speaking another language…LOL

6.  Time – because when you are young, you believe you have an infinite supply and when you get older, you learn that time is precious and to live in the moment.  Time has an uncanny ability to heal – do you remember when you broke up with the first love of your life or  your childhood pet passed away?  Remember how sad that time of your life was?  Now that time has passed, how do you feel?  Yes, see!  Time heals.  And when someone says “this too shall pass”what they really mean is that with the passage of time, whatever you are dealing with now will soon be a distant memory.

7.  Tunes - where would life be without a little music in it?  It makes us happy, it makes us nostalgic, it reminds us of a past loved one, it gives us energy.  I listen to tunes everyday…do you?

8.  Trust - it’s the binding word of relationships.  Without it, what do you have?  It’s a powerful word with a lot of meaning!  I like to surround myself with people that I can trust!  It makes life a lot easier.

9.  Theatre – one word I wish I had more time to indulge!  I remember going to the theatre for the very first time and being mesmerized.  Now if I could only talk my DH into going and enriching his life too!  LOL

10.  Talk – it’s what binds us as human beings.  Being able to talk and express our feelings or just to simply find out directions from someone or to just say hello does define our human existence.  Or how about listening to talk radio?  It’s all about listening to the spoken word and enriching our lives with it.  

So there you go!  My 10 T words that I love!  And in the interest of #6, I must get back to my dye pots…LOL  If you want to play along, leave me a comment and I’ll send you a letter to randomly write about!  This was fun!  Have a great day everyone.

I’m excited to announce the release of our new Papaver Sok Kits in the store today!  Paired with our Serenity Sock Yarn is a fabulous sock pattern written and designed by Anne Hanson of Knitspot.com.  Anne is a design master and I’m so pleased with what she designed for this particular yarn.  For more photos, please check Anne’s blog posting and while you’re there, browse all her patterns in her shop – she has a lot of really wonderful patterns and it’s really hard to choose just one!  

In Anne’s words, 

Wavy rows of nodding poppies trail down the leg and over the foot of this top-down sock [while] yarnovers and decreases create an undulating rib that mimics the gentle motion of this bright spring flower.

We have the kits available in 4 luscious colourways and invite you to drop by Zen Yarn Garden to find one you like:

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!  It’s going to be a very cold one here in Ontario so if it’s cold where you are too, stay warm!

Wow, it’s 2009 already and as always, I just never know where all the time has gone in the past year.  Why is it that when you get older, time flies by faster?  I don’t get that phenomenon!  When I was younger, I spent a lot of time wishing I could be 20 or wishing I could be 25 or wishing I was out of my teens or wishing high school was over or wishing university was finished.  Now that I’ve made those milestones and am not wishing time would go by faster, is there some way to actually slow time down so it doesn’t go by so quickly?  Who knew that not paying attention to time would make it go that much faster?  Wish I had known that when I was 16 or 20…LOL

2008 has been a wonderful year full of colour and yarn and for all my customers who continue to support me, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for allowing me this wonderful opportunity to bring colour and joy into your lives with each and every yarn or fibre that I dye.  2009 will be another year full of colour, fun and lots of fibre and I’m really looking forward to it.  January is starting off with a rather large project and once it’s over, I think it’s time for a contest again.  It’s been a long time since I had one of those and the new year is a great time to give away some yarn.  

I’m pleased to say that I started 2009 with finishing another handspun.  I really do love spinning and it’s been hard to find moments for doing it but the holidays was the perfect chance to grab a few moments on my wheel so I took advantage of it and learnt a couple of new spinning techniques.  This is my very first navajo 3-plied yarn!  It’s a bit thick and thin and uneven but I love it nonetheless!  I like how navajo plying makes a nice round 3 ply in the finished yarn.  It’s very cool.  Spinning from the fold was also fabulous to get a feel for and I plan on using it in my future spinning – I seemed to be spinning faster which is always good.

Hope your new year is turning out to be a good one!  There’s lots in store for Zen Yarn Garden this year so stay tuned for some of these things to come to fruition throughout the year.  Did you make any resolutions for the New Year or are you like me and don’t because they  just get broken in 5 minutes anyways?  LOL

Yes!  I love the holidays for a bit of down time to actually spin a bit on my wheel!  I’ve been missing it and just relaxing a few days and sitting with my wheel was fabulous.  I managed to figure out how to spin from the fold this time around and I love spinning this way.  It helps to control the draft zone and the fibre pretty much spins itself with relative ease.  This roving I “stole” from one of my latest dyeing sessions and kept it for myself!  I rarely do that but every once in awhile, the fibre speaks to me and after hearing how others have enjoyed this blend (merino/nylon) I just had to try a bit myself.

Other than spinning, DH and I had a nice holiday just not doing too much of anything except resting.  Of course, the holidays always go by way too quickly!  Hope you had a wonderful holiday season!

I can’t believe it’s almost 2009 either.  Where does the time go?

It’s been a wonderful year of yarn adventures and learning how to spin and I am thankful for all my wonderful customers who let me dabble in colour on a regular basis!  

Wishing you and yours a healthy, happy and prosperous New Year!

This club is going to be a lot of fun and I invite you to join the Ravelry group and subscribe to the club’s blog to receive updates when registrations open in January, 2009.  Won’t you join us?  I’m super excited to be working with my fellow dyers on this project and hope you’ll join us too!

I’ve been quietly working on a new dyeing technique behind the scenes and finally have time to release this new line into the store!  

Called Synchro Socks, this line utilizes a dyeing technique that will yield socks that are very similar or very close to the same.  The put up is in equally sized skeins so knitters have the option of knitting their socks together!  I am working on a sock now and hope to show those results in the coming days.  The technique is a bit labour intensive but the result is totally worth it!  

If you’d like to see the colourways, please click on over to the store!  We will be offering this dyeing technique on several different base yarns so please check each listing for the yarn type.

Happy knitting everyone!

Have you seen the new issue of Knotions?  Probably you have!  It’s been up for a couple of days now and if you’re anything like me, I dive right on over on the first day it’s up!  Chalk full of wonderful patterns, this issue just happens to feature one of my handdyed yarns in a sock pattern designed by Kelly Porpiglia. Kelly’s a fabulous designer and in concert with her, we came up with a colourway called Foliage that would suit her Hanging Vines Socks.  Don’t you think the green suits the whole theme of her pattern?  We thought it did too!  Interested in knitting up the pattern in the same yarn as Kelly?  If you are, please click here to find the colourway Kelly used in her design.

In other news, we got our first snow fall a couple of days ago and it was probably close to over a foot in 24 hours!  Needless to say, my shoveling muscles got a nice workout that day!  Weather predictions are saying more snow squall warnings tonight and possibly just as much again tomorrow.  Wow, when winter arrives, it sure does so with a vengeance!  And here I thought we might be in for a mild winter…what was I thinking?!  This is Canada!  LOL

Are you a spinner?  The bug has totally hit for me and so much so I decided to open up my first SPIN ART Fibre/Fiber Club.  Quite literally a spin-off from my ART WALK Sock Yarn Club, this club will offer colourways inspired by art masterpieces.  If you’re interested in joining, we’d love to have you along!  Deadline to register is January 9, 2009 and the first shipment will be in February of 2009.  Click here to find more details and if you’d like to join the Rav group, please do so here.

Hope everyone’s doing well!  I can’t believe it’ll soon be Christmas and then onto a New Year.  Time goes by so quickly!  We have a few other surprises in the works too but I won’t be able to announce that until early Spring 2010…it’ll be worth the wait!

Did you manage to catch my roving on the front page of Etsy.com on Halloween evening?  I was browsing through my Etsy store and clicked on over to the front page and low and behold there was one of my rovings!  Be still my heart!  I managed to catch a screen shot before it disappeared.  What a lovely surprise!  In 3.5 years on Etsy, this is the first time I managed to get on the front page!  Given there are so many products on Etsy, it was very exciting for the time that it did last!

In other news, I’m feeling hopeful today.  I don’t usually get political on this blog but with the new President Elect I am feeling like the world just might start healing.  It’s time!  It’s time for us to all feel renewed hope.  Congratulations to President Elect Obama who will soon be President Obama.  The world was indeed watching.

Apparently the spinning bug has hit pretty hard because I’m now dyeing more roving too!  I plan on offering as many different kinds of roving as I can muster in between dyeing yarn.  

From what I’m reading online and in Ravelry, spinning is becoming more and more popular amongst knitters so I am hoping people will find a lot of joy spinning up the fibres I dye as well.  

So far I have dyed up superwash BFL, superwash merino/nylon and plan on having 100% merino, alpaca/merino and alpaca/merino/silk in the shop in the coming weeks.  Watch for them!  

What I have dyed so far is currently available in my Etsy store if you’d like to take a look!  Thanks everyone and happy spinning!

Yay me!  I managed to spin yet another yarn and finish it!  This time I got 5.1 oz and about 240 yards…not bad eh?  This really is totally a lot of fun!  The lessons learnt on this one?  Add more twist when the yarn is thinner and add more twist when plying thinner singles together.  This one is slightly underspun but hey, I did it and I figured out yet something else about spinning.  Can you tell I’m like a little kid going to kindergarten and loving every new little thing I learn?  That’s how it feels!  Yay for learning new things and for a blog for Show & Tell time.

In shop news I’m really excited to bring a brand new base yarn into the store which I am fondly labeling as “Serenity Sock”.  Why?  Because this yarn is a combination of luxurious and strong which you don’t find in too many sock yarns!   How could it be both?  Simple!  It’s a lovely fingering weight blending of superwash merino, cashmere and nylon!  Yes, you heard it right…cashmere!  

I can’t begin to explain in words just how soft this yarn is…gorgeous!  And I dyed a few colourways in tertiary semi-solids.  What is tertiary you ask?  In order to achieve these colourways, it took at least 3 different dye colours and because of that, these are definitely one-of-a-kind colourways and quite possibly irreproducible.  

I decided on slight colour shift semi-solids so that all the focus can be on the yarn when you’re knitting with it.  This is a classy yarn and it deserved some classy colourways to match it!  

Enjoy!

How come nobody told me how much fun spinning is?  Okay, I know some of you did but why didn’t I listen?  LOL!  I love it and am having such a ball with it.  It’s the perfect “I’m waiting for my yarn to cook” or “I’m waiting for my yarn to dry” or well, you get the idea - insert anything in there where you’re waiting and you can fill it with spinning!  Of course I am also using it as a distraction - “I should be labeling yarn, nahhhh, I think I’ll spin instead” or “I should be …. (you fill in the blank because anything works), nahhhhhh, I’ll spin instead”!  I love it and I made another yarn…yay!  

I am learning well on the pencil roving and I swear it’s like crack for spinners - talk about a quick fix!  I like it for now for the no mess, no fuss approach of it - I can sit down and spin without worrying about prepping the roving.  I tried to spin and draft merino but forget it!  I hear it’s because the staple of the fibre is shorter so it tends to slip.  Okay, my brain isn’t ready for that quite yet!  I think I’ll stick to pencil roving for a bit longer.

It’s been a long time since I learnt something new and I’m having a ball with it, okay, maybe more like a spin with it!  Happy spinning!

I can’t believe it!  I actually spun two bobbins of singles, plied them together and made what resembles yarn!  It’s pretty thick though and super bulky at 54 yards and 3.7 oz so I’m not sure it’s yarn - maybe it’s rope instead?  LOL!  

However, I am really pleased and the spinning bug has hit!  I took my first handspun to my local SnB on Thursday night and everyone told me how nice it was too so that made me feel good about it!  

Did I mention I handpainted the roving too?  It’s called Choco Cherry colourways and 100% superwash merino.  Yay me!

It’s a long weekend so guess what I’ll be doing?!  Yup, you guessed it!  Spinning!  

I am yanking my own handdyed roving off the shelf too…I’ll probably end up spinning it all up before anyone buys it!  Hopefully my next singles will be a little more thin and a little less uneven…wish me luck!

I spend so much time buying yarn for the business that I very rarely treat myself to anything so I thought it was time I changed that!  Isn’t she gorgeous?  

I sure do love the design of the Louet wheels…sturdy, easy to put together and the DT helps with the treadling a lot!  She’s a Julia model and since I think she does look like a Julia I am keeping that name for her!  

DH helped me put her together and it was super easy to do and Louet even included a screwdriver which I thought was totally cool - no searching for the tools you need in your DH’s toolbox!  

And another funny story about her - I was showing my DH how she spins and he looks at me and says “isn’t it spinning a bit fast for you to start?” and I said “huh?” and he said “adjust it to the higher groove and it should spin slower, don’t you want it to spin slower?” so I did and voila, it spins slower!  I hope this helps me with my overspinning.  It was very cute though…I said to him “see, this is why men should spin too - you guys think more mechanically than we do” and he rolled his eyes and did a “whatever”…LOL  

Anyways, she’s gorgeous and I love her and I hope to be spinning lovely yarns on her after some practice!  So tell me, do you spin too and just how obsessed will I be??

Every once in awhile I get to collaborate with some of the most creative people in the knitting world and this time was no exception!  Jacquelyn Landry of Jacquelyn Landry Designs is one of the most fabulous pattern writers I’ve had the pleasure of working with!  Her ability to create patterns that are “classic glamour for the girl next door” is truly inspiring! When we teamed up to come up with a design that would show off handpainted yarns I was honestly quite a bit nervous because her patterns are so beautiful and I really wanted to come up with something that would compliment her design style.  When we finally got to the final stages of the design process, Jacque and I were both beyond elated with the outcome! 

In her words, the pairing of both her pattern and my handpainted yarn has created the following:

Curvy is a perfect sweater for mixing beauty and sass. Whether you like dangerous curves or safe cables this is likely to fit your needs.  The extended size range with more steps in between will allow you to choose the best fit for your curves. Add one part classic cable twists to one part gorgeous Zen Yarn Garden hand dyed yarn. Mix in a little seamless knitting, weave in a few ends and you’ve got a sexy curve hugging top that is certain to raise a few temperatures. Elongated cables keep the silhouette smooth and figure flattering and are simple enough for even beginning cable knitters.

The kits are currently being offered in the Rubies colourway as shown in the pattern and in chest sizes up to 44″.  If you are wanting another colourway or a larger size, please don’t hesitate to email and ask! I’m happy to do custom colourways and custom size kits and this kit will be offered up to chest size 62″.   

Won’t you consider this kit for some special winter knitting?  I am feeling the twitch in my fingers to knit a sweater again that’s for sure!

Have you seen it yet?  A brand new online knitting magazine that just launched!  Check out the article which includes a few indie dyer’s yarns including mine!  YAY!  

To the left is a photo of my Sea Sock yarn in Autumn Bloom colourway you’ll see in the article.

Make sure to check out the rest of the articles too - lots of great info in this magazine.  It’s lovely for it’s very first issue!

Hope everyone’s having a great summer - I’m really enjoying all these wonderful knitting online resources that keep popping up.

Wow, my poor neglected blog…it always seems to be the last on the priority list of things to do now that we have Ravelry to pay attention to.  However, I wanted to announce the release of another wonderful sock pattern in the store called Tripolini Socks.  It’s a short and sweet and perfect for summer design using our new sport weight yarns.  It should also be a relatively quick knit and it’s available for immediate download in the store.  This one was designed by Harriet from Limedragon.com.  Isn’t it adorable? 

Hope everyone’s doing well!  I have yet another pattern release coming toward early August and it’ll be a fabulous one for a fabulous winter knit!  I’ve included just a teeny tiny hint of that one but that’s all you get until later!

Happy knitting everyone!

I’m really excited to finally re-open my online store with a lovely new design and format!  I was working feverishly behind the scenes to stock the store with new products which I invite you to click on over to see!  Also with the store re-opening, we have launched a brand new COLOUR BURST Yarn Club that’s sure to be a lot of fun!  I decided to make this one a little different in that it will offer slightly different yarn weights other than fingering and will be about bright and vivid colourways.  Come on over and take a look if you’re interested! 

From now until June 15, we are also having a 10% off sale in celebration of our re-opening.

Thanks everyone for your past support and continued support!  It’s very much appreciated.