Yarn Pr0n: Silk is the Bacon of Fibers

I'll get back to the title later.

Being single and living alone means that I live my life with a certain degree of selfishness and abandon.

For example, yesterday I got paid and decided to celebrated by going to the Mr. Gatti's pizza buffet for dinner. I arrived 45 minutes before they closed. (Hey, they had enough stuff out for me.)

I was so stuffed that I didn't eat much for breakfast (except a nibble here and there) but by about 2:30 today, I was ready for another meal. And what really sounded good was, well, Mr. Gatti's pizza. If I lived with someone, they'd probably say "we just had pizza last night." But I don't live with anyone.

So I went to Mr. Gatti's pizza again for lunch. This makes two meals in a row, and two trips in less than 24 hours. (Fortunately, I don't think any of the staff from last night was there today.)

Being all pizza-ed out, I decided to make my second trip to Gauge in less than 24 hours. Last night I picked up some stuff that was on sale. Today I returned for something that called for a waiting period.

This is Handmaiden Silk Cotton in "Paris." You say you didn't know Handmaiden made Silk Cotton? Until last night, neither did I. In fact, I suspect much of the knitting world is not aware of it. No one on Ravelry has cast on any projects with it, there are no pattern recommendations and it has only been stashed five times.

Gauge also has Sea Silk (the same stuff I'm using for Strangling Vines) and Double Sea Silk, a DK version of the original Sea Silk. I don't think Double Sea is even listed on the Handmaiden website, and there are only three projects listed for it on Ravelry.

It was a hard deciding what to buy. The Handmaiden stuff wasn't on sale, but I knew it would go fast. And because it's hand dyed, it takes a long time to get a shipment. The Handmaiden that came in at Hill Country Weavers last summer went fast and to the best of my knowledge, hasn't been restocked since. Also, Carly said the store has already sold out of a couple of colorways.

Both of the Sea Silks came in some great metallic colorways that I found myself gravitating towards. (Which is unusual, because I normally go for brighter colors.) However, I finally decided to get the Silk Cotton because:

1)I'd never seen anything like it. There are other cotton silk blends, but none quite so....silky.
2)I could only afford one skein, and the next time I buy Sea Silk, I want to buy two skeins for Hanami.
3)I decided I could blaze a trail and be the first person on Ravelry to cast on Silk Cotton. In fact, I plan to design something for it. (Of course, now that I've posted this, someone will probably beat me to it. But I'm ok with that.)

Speaking of silk blends...
When I came home and checked my mail I had a small envelope that baffled me. It was too small to be my Knitters Scavenger Hunt package. And who did I know named Becca?

I remembered when I opened it.

This bit of orangey goodness is 8 yards of Artfibers Kyoto.

Nicole from Stash and Burn started a post in the Stash and Burn Ravelry group entitled "Would you like to try..." The idea was to offer up your little leftover bits for others to swatch. I jumped at the chance to swatch some Artfibers yarn, since it is only sold through the Artfibers store in San Francisco. After hearing about Artfibers on Stash and Burn, I want to visit San Francisco someday, just to go to there. I hear they offer up a few swatch-sized bits of yarn there for free. (Don't quote me on the free part. I may have that wrong.) You can buy some yarn "samples" online, and someday I intend to do that.

But now I can get a head start with my free little bit of Kyoto. I've learned something new about it already. I thought it would be an even blend of wool and silk, like Lorna's Laces Lion and Lamb. But in person, I can clearly see it's one ply of silk and one ply of wool. Thanks Becca.

And back to the title, I read on the J-Walk Blog about the Atwood Tavern Bacon Eating Contest. In the video of the contest, a contestant says "Bacon is special. Bacon is sacred. Bacon is the kind of thing that you wrap other food in to make it taste better." I think that's what silk is. You wrap it around other fibers to make them taste better. Or to just make them better. Not that I licked my new yarn...much.