Where in the world…?

Are you bored hearing about our weekend in Turin?  Just one more post about it, and it’s full of photos and knitting and yarn goodness, so bear with me!

As mentioned in my last post, I’m thinking more about buying local and not spending so much money on things that are shipped all over the world when you have perfectly great quality stuff right at home.  In Turin I went looking for yarn shops to buy yarn to make Nancy’s capelet (ok, KnitPicks calls it a poncho and it’s not the best example I’ve seen, but anyway).  I found the most amazing yarn shop.

At via Barbaroux 5 you will find Albozzi Filati Alma.  It’s a very big shop with shelf after shelf of lace weight yarn and mohair and fine lovely things.  There’s a bit of sock yarn, but mostly it’s just an amazing array of fine solid colored wools.  Unfortunately they didn’t have much heavy weight yarn, just some kind of scratchy Scottish wool that I didn’t really want next to my skin and definitely not around my neck.  I did buy some sport weight yarn, but I will probably end up making Christmas present hats with it.  Ah well!  

No one in the shop spoke English but we all spoke knitting.  The women working there were so nice and helpful and just loved having their photo taken!

Now that I’m home I am just KICKING myself for not buying lace yarn there.  What was I thinking?  Was I just so overwhelmed by by all the yarn porn that I just couldn’t think straight?  Especially since the day AFTER visiting this place M. & J. announced that they are getting married!  Of course my mind goes directly to “wedding shawl, must have yarn” and it should be yarn from Turin since that’s where J. proposed!  

I’ve been searching the web and Ravelry to find where I can buy Italian lace weight yarn online.  It’s nearly impossible.  There’s a site for a Danish store that sells some.  That’s only a LITTLE detour in the shipping from Italy!  It seems that the Italian market is a little hard to crack, especially when you don’t speak Italian, but I’m not giving up.  There’s a long and lovely yarn and knitwear tradition in Italy and we only see a tiny tip of the iceberg outside the country.  If/when I find out where to buy, I’ll let you all know!  And if YOU know where to find stuff, please post it here.

In other knitting news, I’ve put down the Sunrise Circle Jacket for a while in order to get Christmas knitting done.  The first alligator scarf is now finish and I’ve started on the second. Here’s a photo of the first one, still in process, at Lake Maggiore last weekend:

The second one is hot pink for a little girl who loves pink.  I’ve also started a hat for another lucky recipient.  I’d like to make some more hats for presents, but I just don’t know how far I will get and I can’t send a hat for ONE and not for the rest of the kids or there will be problems. 🙂  I plan to finish the jacket for myself over the Christmas break when we are hibernating on the couch in the cold and dark.

Just one more photo…. here’s me knitting on DB’s “Forever Scarf” also at the lake.  Why is it called that?  Because it’s fingering weight yarn knit on size 3 needles in 2×2 rib.  You just want to kill yourself from the boredom and it will take FOREVER to finish it.  But it’s what he wants so I have to do it.  It’s my train commute project.