It was only a matter of time

Rachel and I have all kinds of fun working together on the GLYC. It's an excuse to hang out and knit, visit yarn shops, and talk about yarn-y things. Basically, about as much fun as you can imagine having a knitting bestie is!

So it was only a matter of time before we were coming up with ideas for more projects that we can work on together.

We can't tell you about those now (but don't worry - we will!) but we CAN tell you about our first design collaboration as Yarn in the City - the Watching the Tide cowl:

We snapped these pics in Brighton last week just as a huge storm was rolling in.

Watching the Tide was designed for the Unwind Brighton Design Competition and is a light, lacey cowl, perfect for a heavy lace or light fingering yarn for just the right amount of warmth on a breezy summer day. We used some gorgeous yarns by Victoria from Eden Cottage Yarns.

The cowl can be knit either short or long, in one colour or two - or whatever tickles your fancy, really!

The lace stitches mimic the Brighton seashore but aren't too complicated - making this a pretty quick knit. Just when you're getting into the rhythm of the pattern, it's onto the next stitch. A nice way to keep momentum going right up to the end.

Once the contest is over (it ends at midnight on May 31) the pattern will be available in early June. If you'd like to show us some love and vote for the pattern you can do so here - and you'll note that Rachel has the lovely Brighton Dome socks in the competition too! There's a pretty clear winner already but its been amazing to be shortlisted with so many other gorgeous designs.

We'll get back on track with more GLYC-related posts next week - have a terrific weekend!

We're back!

Hey folks!

Did you miss us? :)

We've spent the last few months getting ready and gearing up for this year's Great London Yarn Crawl, and of course figuring out ways to make it even better for our participants, as well as our charity of choice, Refuge.

This is a great time for us to say THANK YOU to all of you who took the time to answer our survey, or email us, or pull us aside at last year's after party and let us know what you thought of the event (why yes, we DO know that we need a bigger venue for the after-party!). We've taken on board as much as we reasonably can and it's going to be a great year two for the GLYC!

Did you see our fab ad in the latest issue of PomPom?

What can you expect this year and in the coming months leading up to the event:

• new shops joining us this year and a GLYC expansion outside zones 1 and 2
• hearing about other ways we're hoping to give more back to the charity
• smaller group sizes and more routes to tickle your fancy!
• more routes and groups means we'll need some more volunteers - can you help?
• a kick-ass after-party brought to you by those party-planner extraordinaire gals at PomPom Quarterly
• and of course, more fab stuff in the goody bags and after-party prizes!

Key dates to remember: the GLYC takes place on Saturday, 20 September, AND tickets will be on sale as of Tuesday, 8 July - so mark your calendars now!

In the meantime, why not join the chat in our Ravelry forum and share what you've been making with last year's stash enhancement, or visit our Media Shout-Outs page to re-live last year's fun. We've just put up a write-up of the event from Mollie Makes, written by one of last year's volunteers, Zoe Willis. (Sadly, Zoe has moved to Australia so won't be joining us on this year's crawl - but perhaps she'll start her own Down Under!)

And of course, stay tuned and watch this space for more posts and updates in the coming weeks and months to keep you excited as the big day approaches. We can't wait to share with you all that we have planned!