SWTC

Last week on our podcast, Ready, Set, Knit!, we had the pleasure of interviewing Joe Raffino, owner of Southwest Trading Company (SWTC). It was extra special because Joe had just been at the NENA show, only 45 minutes from the shop so he was able to be in-studio with us when we recorded. He had samples of the new yarns they are introducing and not only did he share info about the yarns on the podcast, but he also allowed me to photograph the items he had for the blog!

The first new yarn they have is Therapi, which is a wool/silk/jade blend. Yes, jade. We had heard about this yarn and to say the least, I was skeptical. What the heck would jade add to yarn? What was it's reason for being, other than being an interesting conversation piece? Jade is considered the most valuable of precious stones and among other things is considered a symbol of tranquility. Knitting and crochet are known to be stress reducers (when we're not fighting with a project) so the theoretical link between the jade component of the yarn and the zen we achieve when knitting or crocheting (again, when not fighting with a project). The yarn itself is quite lovely - the silk and jade add a nice luster to the wool and the fiber has a soft hand. It knits at 5 sts = 1" on a US #7 needle.

Look at those beautiful colors!

Now I have to admit something - I left my other notes on the other yarns at work! Yikes! I guess we'll have to have SWTC part 2 tomorrow!

I hope all of you Moms had a great Mother's Day. I had a wonderful one myself. I got to sleep in a bit, I received great gifts from the boys' and then we went and golfed as a family. The weather was perfect and it was just a great day.

Jonathan presented me with this:

This is not your average bouquest of construction paper flowers. Look what you get when you pull each flower out of the vase:

A list of the chores he was willing to do so that I could relax on Mother's Day. Here's the only one that really mattered to me:

Jackson brought me this:

And this:

I particularly love #10. The reason? I did NOT get him an iPod. Dad did (sorry honey).

More SWTC tomorrow and photos of Pixie's Babette from our Crochet-A-Long!

Kathy