Skipping Stones Afghan

It's gonna be a biiiiiig blanket if I use all this yarn .... Of course, since I can make one of these circles in one night, at least the giant project won't take forever to complete (I hope).

Eleven down, three to go!

Today was my turn to drive on the Yarn Discovery Tour (no time to knit in the car! Boo!). We visited Pepper Pike, Cleveland, Chardon, Chagrin Falls, and Aurora (not in that order), which despite being all on the "east side" of town STILL took almost 8 hours.

I'm 11-for-11 on finding sock yarns that coordinate to use in my official blanket project. It was harder today - not all of the shops are sock-centric, and I had to be pickier about colors to keep things balanced. I think I made good choices, though, with the help of my friend and some employees who were well versed in color theory. Thanks, ladies - I can't wait to see how this turns out (and whether I can get that odd blue I picked yesterday to ever work with the rest - or whether it will become some very nice thank-you socks for my friend!).

Anyway, here's today's haul, including the awesome clown-barf roving I found, all of the free patterns (wow, you guys made BOOKLETS to give out?!?), and all of the sock yarn project selections for today. I'm taking tomorrow off, then finishing up on Monday with the Akron-area shops, and my own workplace on Tuesday.

Six in one blow!

That's right - my friend and I hit 3 stores, I visited 1 after I dropped her off, and I went to 2 more with LazyKid. The West Side is done - and I have a somewhat ludicrous amount of yarn to hide before my husband comes home.

If you're doing the tour tomorrow, look for me and my friend on the East Side!

Let's discover

I'm pleased to announce that this year River Colors Studio will be offering two exclusive Lazy Mama patterns as giveaways during the Yarn Discovery Tour!  "Tourists" will have their choice of two patterns being debuted during the tour - a new and improved version of the knit Mario's Brother Scarf, and a crochet pattern I'm calling the Mario's Cousin Scarf (because it's in the same family, but looks a little different).

Both patterns are easy to memorize and can be made using just about any weight of yarn you'd like use - we've got shop samples and swatches made from everything from laceweight up through bulky, and the patterns look cool in every one!

So if you're Touring, make sure to include River Colors Studio on your itinerary ... and if you're there on a Tuesday or Thursday, be sure to say hi to me, as I'll be working those days!
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In the flurry of getting the patterns and the shop ready for the Tour, I almost forgot to mention that I'm a Tourist, too!  My friend and I spent a long time this weekend plotting which shops to hit when to make this the most streamlined event we could, because both of our schedules are crazy this time of year.

I'm hitting the road in about 15 minutes to pick up my friend, and we're visiting all of the far west shops today.  Then we swing back to her house, drop her off, I go pick up my daughter from school, and since she asked me soooo nicely, LazyKid and I will be hitting a couple more shops after school, too.  Then Saturday the friend and I hit the road again for shops on the far east side of town (while LazyHusband looks after our kids), and Monday we're scheduled to visit the shops down near Akron.  That leaves us with a couple shops scattered in the area near where we live to pick up on our own over the next two weeks ... so we actually stand a chance of completely filling our passports this year!

Wish us luck ... and if you see a pair of almost-40 ladies with a GPS in one hand, a large dose of caffeine in the other, and yarn balanced on top of their heads, that'll be us!  Stop by and say howdy, okay?  (and maybe offer to carry that yarn for us ... as long as you don't try to swipe it and buy it for yourselves!)