When I started knitting, back in college, I lived in a town with both a Hobby Lobby and a Michaels, but no local yarn shop for several hundred miles. Not knowing what I was missing, I wasn’t greatly bothered by this – until I got bored with knitting only scarves, bought a couple of knitting books, joined Ravelry, and discovered the big wide world of non-acrylic yarn (including wool that actually doesn’t itch! A revelation).
Once I discovered the range of gorgeous yarns available, I became kind of a snob about craft-store yarn – though it has its uses, I admit. And while I kinda miss Hobby Lobby (we don’t have it up here), I miss it for picture frames and other craft supplies, not for yarn. Because I have found a new place to buy yarn. And – this is dangerous – it’s only three blocks from where I work.
The Windsor Button is hidden in plain sight, just another gray storefront on a street of gray storefronts, next to a wig shop (not kidding), and near a taco joint, a convenience store, the entrance to the subway, and a shoe shop. It has linoleum floors and fluorescent lights, and if you were just passing by you’d never know it held such treasure.
But. Walk inside, and behold the rack of yummy Madelinetosh yarns hanging up near the entrance, and feast your eyes on a WHOLE WALL of buttons, of all conceivable shapes, sizes, materials and colors, and you’ll be in crafter heaven.
I don’t only come here for yarn – I’ve bought thread, needles, denim patches and, of course, buttons from this shop. The employees are friendly, the stock large, the prices fair and the location perfect. But I mainly come to pet the pretty skeins of yarn, hold different colors up to my face, or try to find the perfect yarn for whatever new pattern I just downloaded. (My last dozen projects, at least, are made with yarn I bought here.)
I’m so grateful to have a shop just down the street to indulge my yarn cravings – as well as pick up thread or buttons on my lunch break. But I’m even more grateful to have another place to “dwell in possibility.” Because all those skeins and spools and buttons are possibilities just waiting to be knitted and sewn and crafted and transformed into reality. And that makes my head spin. In a good way.
Where do you go to feed your creative passions – or to glean inspiration?
cakes, tea and dreams 
I felt this way about Purl Soho in NYC. I’d been to Joann Fabrics and the like, but never to a shop where every thing in it was so lovely, and arranged with such care. It made purchasing fabric for projects such a fun treat!
Pinterest! And, oddly, Ace Hardware.
Eastside Tucson doesn’t have any cookie/kitchen supply stores (to feed my baking hobby). But, there is an Ace Hardware with a train that runs on a track around the ceiling. And I do have a 19 mo who loves to go walk in circles around the store following the train. And after we’ve been walking around for 40 minutes I generally feel like I ought to buy something. And they sell cookie cutters individually for 69 cents. So…I’ve been slowly building my cookie cutter collection. 🙂
I read, get outside a bit, paint, and spend time with friends. It’s amazing what a well-placed glass of wine or mug of tea paired with conversation can do!
I briefly learned to knit when I was 8 or 9 years old but promptly forgot the next month. I haven’t properly tried since then but I seem to have a lot of knitting friends and it makes me wonder if I should give it another go. Of course, that’ll need to wait until I finish the eleventybillion other projects I’m working on right now.
Have you ever read Barbara Delinsky’s Family Tree? The main character and her grandmother own a yarn shop. The story itself is about bigger issues, including racism, biracial marriage, and so on. But I loved the portions set in the yarn shop as the women gathered together.
Katie, I can’t remember if my publisher sent you a review copy of my new book, Knit One, Purl a Prayer: A Spirituality of Knitting. If not, give me a mailing address where they can send you one. (If you don’t want to give the address publicly, you can reach me through Image journal.)