Last Wednesday TheEnabler and I headed off to the Netherlands via train. A key part of packing for any trip is determining what craft projecs to bring.
My approach? Bring just a little too much because you never know. I speak from experience from the time that a quick overnight trip via plane ended with an extra night and a 10hr train trip after bad weather totally screwed over the flights out of New York and New Jersey. I ran out of yarn 1hr before my train arrived at my destination. I learned from that experience.
We would be away for 5 days total, with two long days of train travel. I also knew that because I would be working through Friday that I wouldn’t visit any yarn stores until Saturday.
I brought two small projects, one of which was mostly complete socks, as well as two spindles with fiber. Again, one spindle didn’t have much left to spin.
As I look at this, I realize that I’ve got something from Unplanned Peacock in every project I brought. The purple and blue yarn in the future hat on the left, the red mohair with the lower right spindle, and the socks in the right hand image…
I finished the socks late Saturday evening, but this wasn’t an issue due to the back up hat and because I did a mini yarn crawl Saturday.
If my plans on what to bring were carefully calibrated, my plans on what to buy were less precise. I didn’t know what I’d find, but generally intended to be modest. While I didn’t go crazy, I did buy more than I expected, and had to exercise some serious restraint at the last store.
I visited two stores in Utretcht and one in Amsterdam. The first was Modilaine, which was a tidy, well organized and well stocked shop of decent but larger brands. Some I recognized, though others I think must be more regional or European as I hadn’t seen them in the US. I bought some cotton (top left yarn image below) for hot pads, as I don’t have any right now. I left my old crocheted ones in the US since they were pretty ratty after 5yrs of hard use.
The second, Sticks & Cups, was smaller, but the owner hand dyes some of the yarn she offers. I picked up two skeins (top right yarn image below). TheEnabler has professed his dislike of the orange, so it’s a good thing I wasn’t planning to make him something of it. I found something better for him at the last store.
Then I headed into Amsterdam, where I planned to visit a Catholic house church, Ons’ Lieve Heer op Solder (I will post later on some fun textile/craft things from this visit) and more yarn stores. In the end, I only made it to one, Stephen & Penelope, due to time, fatigue and damage done to my wallet.
This was by far the best of the three for souvenir shopping as they specialize in hand dyed yarns, including local and European ones. It took a while to narrow down what to get. I settled on some sock yarns and some lovely angora blends dyed in the Orkney Islands (bottom row of yarn image below). The blue angora will be something warm fro TheEnabler before it gets cold next winter.
Luckily, I got a bag to go with my purchases the better to haul it back…
(Store images from Stephen & Penelope)
After stores 1 & 2, I noticed a pattern in the colors I was buying, so I worked hard to shake it up a bit at the last store and avoided coming home with all blue and orange yarns. However, there is definitely a preponderance of sock weight yarns. A few of my purchases have future homes with other people, so not all of it is going into my stash.
I wisely asked for the purple Hedgehog Fibres (bottom left corner) to be wound for me, so I could start socks on the train ride home.
Sure, its more sock yarn and more socks, but I am expanding my personal knitted sock collection to include darker colors. I have a bunch of lighter socks, yet wear lots of black pants and shirts, indicating total lack of forethought. These socks will begin to fix this. I really love the bits of brown in among the purples and blues.