Sunny Waikiki

I love Hawaii. Seriously, I'm supposed to leave for home in a week, and I don't want to. I think I'll knit a tent and pitch it in the woods.
Do you think anyone will notice?

When I last kept you updated, I was in sunny California, enjoying Disneyland in wonderful company. We went back to Disneyland the next day, and seeing as this time I wasn't so busy talking my head off, I did some knitting in some of the lines. This brought some interesting reactions. While waiting for the "Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage", there were two Korean teenage girls in the line ahead of us. They got so intent on watching me knit at one point, that I I had to remind them that the line was moving along. Then there was another lady and her daughter, aged about 10. All the lines snake around each other, so that you end up passing the same people over and over. Every time I passed this lady, her daughter whispered something. The last time, her mum blurted out "I've never seen anything like it, it's so beautiful!" I was pretty pleased with that reaction. And the teenage girl and her boyfriend, who discussed it with each other (not with me) and dubbed it "cool".
At home, no-one would say a word.
The sock visited in Minnie Mouse's knitting basket at her house in ToonTown while we were there, too.

The yarn collection is growing at a nice rate. Laura gave me some yummy yarn while I was with her.

Yummy yarn, yummy colours! Dizzy Blonde Sock Yarn, in JenLa. Love it!
After we'd enjoyed Disneyland, we moved home base down to Beverly Hills, and I spent a little time exploring the local yarn stores. First up was Knit Cafe.

Nice store, nice stock, nice staff. I came away with some Blue Sky Alpacas Sport Weight in a nice pale pink. Heavenly soft! And a set of Lantern Moon Sox Stix. I'd seen these in a few places, and I tried to resist, because I really don't need any more sock needles, but the lure finally got to me, and I had to have them.

The same day we tried to visit The Knitter's Studio, but we just couldn't get a parking spot, and we also tried to visit Blacksheep Knittery, but it's closed down. Last visit for that day was A Mano Yarn Center. Another really nice store with nice stock. There was a knitting group happening while we were there, and it was just a really nice vibe. She had some really, really nice stock, but I stuck to laceweight this time.

2 hanks of Lacey Lamb in a dusty pink shade (I really should branch out some, huh?), and some Malabrigo in a natural. I've got three hanks of the Malabrigo, and I would have liked to have got a colour other than natural, but everywhere I went, there weren't enough skeins of a colour for a shawl. But I figure I can dye it.
I laughed when I got my purchases for the day back to the hotel.

I felt like I'd bought my lunch.

On Monday, we packed up again and moved in on my friend Jill and her husband for a few days. Jill and I have been online friends for four years or more, so it was fantastic to finally get to meet her.

But on the way to her house, Google maps and Ravelry told me there was a yarn store. So we popped in and had a look. This one was Stitch Cafe.

Smaller selection this time, although they have a great collection of hand dyed yarns in the centre of the store. Em fell in love with some Kraemer Yarns Sterling Silver and Silk that had been dyed by the Stitch Cafe.
So, of course, it followed us home.

She looks pretty happy with it, doesn't she? Of course, I'll be the one to actually knit the socks for her. Eventually.

In the afternoon, we headed down to Santa Monica to check out some more stores. This turned out to be a bit of a disappointment, because nearly all the ones I wanted to visit are closed on a Monday. First up we tried a store I found on Ravelry, called Knit Knacks Designs, but it appeared to be a house, so we didn't go in. Then we went to Stitches From the Heart.

Lots of stuff I hadn't seen anywhere else, including this gorgeous Mirasol Yarns Miski. 100% Llama, and it's soft and squishy and delicious.

I wanted tog et enough for a sweater, but I didn't know what sweater, and space is becoming a bit of a problem. Last of all for the day, we visited Yarns Unlimited, and the selection was alright, but it was a lot of stuff I'd seen before, and there was a lot of really old stock and novelty yarn. This was the only Californian yarn store that I left empty handed.

And now we're in Hawaii. Yesterday I tried to visit Isle Knit, and Yarn and Friends, but I think my family staged an intervention or something, because they were both closed.
Did that stop me? Not a chance. Another blog friend, Debbie, had invited me to join her local knitting group, Aloha Knitters. It was a great meet! Lots of friendly faces, and lots of great projects on the go.
And one of the visiting members was destashing. Destashing Wollmeise sock yarn.

Thank you, Kris!
Mission accomplished.