I spent the early part of the day today at Future Green a new store near Dupont Circle specializing in eco-friendly products for the home. Leigh Baily, a local knitter has been working with the owners of the store to build an inventory of eco-friendly and fair trade yarns. She’s asked me to offer classes at the store.

It was a fun event and I got to sit and chat with Paula of Woolarina she spins and dyes gorgeous yarns in a studio in Silver Spring, MD. Future Green is the first retail shop to carry her yarns. Paula gets her fiber from small, local farms raising their sheep sustainably. I got to bring home a skein of their merino sock yarn to play with…

Andrea Price, another local knitting teacher was there and brought a cool project–a knitting bee shawl (see first picture, above) set up to be worked by three knitters at once. It was great because each knitter works with only one ball, but since each ball was a different color you end up with a fun stripy pattern.

When I got home there was a big box waiting for me in the foyer. I turned out to be stuffed full of yarns from Kraemer Yarns for me to sample and play with. Wheee! I’ll have to wait until I finish my projects with deadlines to start swatching with it, but here are some quick first impressions. I love their Bear Creek super bulky. It comes in enormous 200g skeins so you get a generous 130 yards. I also like their Mauch Chunky, a single ply yarn that felts and comes in some great colors, and there’s a cotton blend called Tatamy that I’m looking forward to trying.

Ok, back to that ribbed scarf for my upcoming knitting class. All that knitting on the metro, and I’m half-way done.

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Busy day, still no socks… UPDATE–PICTURE ADDED