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With St Patrick's day just around  the corner,
March is a great time for
WOOL-TYME Kingston to show how we are
going green!
When we first started buying coffee for the WOOL-TYME Kingston staff room, I knew that I wanted to support local business and wanted to buy Fair Trade products. We were so lucky to have Multatulli Coffee merchants just across the street to meet those needs. Not only did we get excellent and responsibly produced coffee but they also gave me a lesson in what is available to consumers in environmentally friendly ways to buy electrical power by advertizing their association with Bullfrog Power.
Now, I am so proud to announce that WOOL-TYME Kingston
too is now powered by  Bullfrog Power, which is the first electricity retailer in Ontario to sell power exclusively from wind and low-impact water power generators. It is available to businesses and homeowners too. It was ridiculously easy to make the switch and although we do what we can at the store to conserve energy, it's great to know that the power we do use is helping to support the movement to help heal the earth.
Read more in this newsletter about how WOOL-TYME Kingston is supporting the environment. | |
| "Green Yarns" are in! Don't be left out!
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Some SPRING EVENTS AT WOOL-TYME Kingston
FINISH YOUR SWEATER TODAY! Workshop.
Sat. April 5th. from 10am until completion or when the store closes (whichever comes first).
$30. Sign up soon as class is limited to 5 participants.
ROBERTA MCKINNEY, weaver extraordinaire, will be demonstrating the versatility of the Ashford Knitter's Table Loom.
Sat. March 15th, 1-3pm $15.
Sign up now... It's a great way to bust through that stash of yarns that you've got piling up.
Another great local fibre artist: KIM PARKINSON will be teaching DROP SPINDLE FOR BEGINNERS on Sat. March 29th from 1-4pm $45 includes a spindle to take home and a selection of fibres to work with. It's really fun and opens up a whole new fibre world to you.
WE NEED YOUR KNITTING, CROCHETING, FELTING, WEAVING, HOOKING, TATTING. |
New BOOKS from old friends...
 Patons has just come out with 2 of their finest publications, each geared to very different knitters. Click on the picture of Top Down Classics- Book 860 at right to see the gorgeous patterns that they have come up with for Shetland Chunky in this popular no-sew method.
 Book 861 is the newest in their excellent "Next Steps" series, that covers all kinds of footwear, from basic slipper and sock instruction to these gorgeous lacy slippers pictured on the cover. Felting projects too. Grab this one when you see it, as I know that we'll never be able to keep enough of them in.
I'm always shocked when I hear knitters who haven't picked up their needles for a few decades say: "Oh, I just used to make those Icelandic sweaters is the round," as if finishing any sweater wasn't a major accomplishment.
LOPI, the company that popularized those beautiful sweaters is back with 3 books full of classic and updated styles, including  (I kid you not) a pattern for a horse blanket which takes only 12 balls of Lopi (That's just a couple more than it would take for a human sweater. What a deal.) How innovative is that!
The most popular patterns that we carry at WOOL-TYME  Kingston are from Sirdar. And why not, when you see this cutie who was also featured on the cover of the most recent "Mary Maxim" catalogue. But their spring collections for adults are  equally beautiful featuring a book for "JUST BAMBOO", whose patterns can actually be used for a wide range of other Aran weight summer yarns (including our 2 new organic cottons: LINKS and CLOUD COTTON). |
EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN! (in yarns that is.)
Three of our best selling yarns from the past few years have been returned to us for a new life. And we're thrilled to welcome them back to the store.
The jacket at left has been a hit in our store for years, made of Sirdar's SNOWFLAKE CHUNKY which has been very sensibly re-formatted into a smaller ball at a better price, in a nice assortment of colours.
We carried Jo Sharp's lovely SILKROAD DK yarn  for a while and it seduced our customers with the comfortably simple pullover that was featured in her first book. Then when that book sold out we slowly fazed out the yarn and I started wearing the sample sweater to the store. Even more customers noticed the beauty of the sweater and I realized what an amazing yarn it truly is, so we brought it back. Check this one out, it's a winner and works well with most DK, light worsted patterns.
One of the funniest little yarn stories from our store was with LIN, from Marks Kattens. A great summer yarn of acrylic, linen and cotton, it came in a single colour (cream/beige twist) with a single pattern. How odd! But the truth was that the yarn, the colour and the pattern were so classic that they were quite a hit...But how long can it last? Then they came out with a second colour (pure cream) and it keeps on trucking (You can use any DK pattern with it). The reality of linen, as I understand it is that it is incredibly resilient and actually gets nicer as it is worn and washed over time.
For those of you who might want something other than cream, we have also brought in Katia's LINEN DK, which is actually a blend of linen and cotton and is reported to have all the be beauty and comfort of pure linen without the roughness of the original product.
ALL GREAT "NEW" YARNS AT WOOL-TYME Kingston FOR YOU TO REVISIT! |
 WOOL-TYME Kingston is connected. We are so pleased to be on-line at the store with an internet connection that lets us show you shade cards from most of our suppliers, allows us to receive your email orders and questions right at the store, and lets you look up your own pages on Ravelry. This ability to access the net at the store will no doubt be of great service to us and our customers in the future in ways that we can't even think of yet. Email us at: wooltymekingston@gmail.com
While we're talking about the net, look up Yarndex�, the ultimate yarn resource, which now features profiles for almost 4,000 yarns....
Check it out when you see a great pattern for a yarn that you've never heard of. Although they seem carry a concentration of listings for yarns available in the US, and some of our best sellers aren't represented at all, at least it lets us look up yarns from American magazines that aren't familiar to us.
And speaking of Yarndex, I was happy to note that despite the American focus, we carry 3 of the 10 top yarns by searches:
-CASCADE 220 (of which we are receiving more colours each month),
-Elsbeth Lavold's lovely SILKY WOOL DK. |
 PROJECT LINUS needs a crocheter...
We have been so blessed with a great assortment of knitted and crocheted squares that would make wonderful blankets for the children of PROJECT LINUS who are going through a difficult time in their lives. But now we need crafters who would like to assemble these squares into blankets for the kids.
You just need basic crochet and sewing skills and a sense of fun and beauty.
Please contact the store at 613-384-3951 to volunteer.
SPRING CLEANING IS JUST AROUND THE CORNER. Please remember PROJECT LINUS when trying to figure out if you really do need that bag of Baycrest Sayelle that you bought in the last century. | |
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Time to think of SPRING and SAVE.
When we first got this pattern in it struck me as a real winner; a great looking sweater featuring a stylish (but hard to find) boat neck that everyone could make and wear all year long. During the month of March you can SAVE 15% when you buy the materials to make this great DK sweater in cotton, cotton/bamboo, cotton/linen, wool, anything, ( even the new and exquisite MANOS del URUGUAY Wool/Silk Blend.) |
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GET OUT YOUR DROOLING BIBS EVERYONE. 
MANOS del URUGUAY'S NEW SILK/WOOL DK BLEND HAS ARRIVED.
This is the latest in that treasured line of eye and finger candy that comes to us from Ururguay. We have a good selection of colours in stock and will order others, as our customers indicate. So let us know and we'll see what we can do. |
WOOL-TYME Kingston thinks GREEN
It amazed me when I started listing how we (and our great customers) have changed our consuming habits in the past few years.
As the city of Kingston is considering banning plastic shopping bags in the future, we're pleased to be ahead of the game:
Our BYOB re-usable bags have been a gigantic hit with our customers. Many return with their bags each visit to the store but others purchase a bag for each project that they have on the go. It has cut our consumption of large plastic bags by half.
Speaking of plastic bags, for those customers who need them, we have been able to source completely biodegradable "plastic" bags made of cornstarch that look exactly like the old ones.
As a further incentive to you to bring your own bag: we will give a free stamp on your customer savings card
when you provide your own bag for your purchase at WOOL-TYME Kingston.
Don't know what a customer savings card is???
Read on. |
Are you a
WOOL-TYME Kingston shopper?
Even if you just manage to visit us a couple of times a year, we would like to offer you our popular CUSTOMER'S SAVINGS CARD
For every $20 purchase at the store you get a stamp on your card. When the card is filled it is a 15% coupon off your next purchase. It's like designing your own yarn sale, whenever you wish.
Ask for your card today. |
 LET'S WIND THINGS UP!
Many yarns come in skeins (pronounced: skanes) like these, and although it is the easiest format for presenting yarn, it also allows us to see the fibres in a whole new way.
CASCADE 220, Manos del Uruguay, most of the amazing lace weight yarns, our new Arequipa sock yarn, CLOUD COTTON organic, and many others are offered in this DIY format that needs to be wound before you can knit with it.
At WOOL-TYME Kingston, we're all about making your knitting experience more pleasurable so we have set up a table with a ball winder (pictured above) and a "Swift" to hold your skein (unless you want to bring a friend who can hold it for you) and are making these tools available to our customers who would like to wind the yarns that they've purchased from us before they bring them home. (Of course, both the winder and the swift are also available for sale at the store for those of you who do a lot of winding) | |
WOOL-TYME Kingston Newsletter
This is a picture of an organic cotton bole. Pretty, isn't it? The cultivation of cotton accounts for 1/4 of all agricultural pesticides in the US and a higher percentage around the world. Organically grown cotton is a big deal for the earth... It's also an amazing product and at WOOL-TYME Kingston, we are proud to carry 3 versions of this earth-friendly and glorious product:
of the fantastic patterns for Estelle's "100% Silk", which is no longer available, and for all of the Mission Falls Patterns.
