Chapter 42: In Which Jo Comes In From The Cold

Holy Frack! It was 19'F / -7'C today in the sun!

This is what I was wearing today:

• Long Underwear
• Wool Sweater
• Wool Hat
• Mittens
• Down Parka designed for -30'F
• Smartwool Socks

And if I was moving, I was okay - at times I even felt warm enough to unzip my jacket and take off my hat... but if we were on the shady side of the street, Jack Frost was nipping at everything! I've been home for nearly two hours now and my fingers still feel a little stiff and cold. I see a long hot shower in my future.

Why did I expose myself to these extreme temperatures? For a yarn crawl, of course! My knitting group has been talking for a while about taking a trip into Philly to check out the yarn stores, and we sure picked a doozy of a weekend. Not only was it below freezing, but President-Elect Obama was taking our local train line for his Whistle Stop tour - so the police started shutting down all the local train stops for security. I think we were smart (and lucky) to get a train before 9am or or plans may have been derailed (haha! Pun intended!)

Once we got into Philly, our first stop was Rosie's Yarn Cellar, where I bought this lovely Claudia Handpaints Short Sport in 'Watermelon':



And these unidentified mill ends, which were a bit more expensive that I was guestimating. I'm planning to make handwarmers out of both of them.



Then we headed down South Street and found out that Loop didn't open until noon, so we stopped at Pumpkin Cafe for a hot beverage. We continued down South Street (seeing many scantily clad mannequins in the windows. Seriously, I think prostitutes must buy these things.) only to find Nangellini closed as well. Now, before you start saying we hadn't planned this very well, this store was supposed to be open at 11 (we called), but the sign on the door said differently. Again, we continued down South to what was supposed to be our last stop, Sophie's Yarns. They also were not open until noon, but we had fun going into the discount fabric stores on 4th Street while we waited.

I bought this amazingly soft alpaca at Sophie's - and it is intended to be a hat for Andrew. His current hat (made of Malabrigo) is getting a bit worn and pill-y.



We turned back up South Street to drop in at Nangellini again, and despite the fact that it was now around 1pm, the store showed no sign of being open. We hit Loop again, and it was bustling with shoppers and people taking knitting classes. It's a very clean shop, and I liked how they had IKEA bookcases down both long walls full of yarn.

I bought this Silk Garden Lite sock yarn at Loop - and I don't think you will get the true colours unless you click and go to Flickr and see the largest size. The colors made me think of renaissance paintings. I know from reading other people's experiences with this yarn I will have to curb my tendency to knit tightly so as to not break the yarn.



And if you look on the side, there is a bit of purple and grey hiding in there. This is one of the enjoyable things of knitting with Noro - you never know what you are going to get.



We have decided that we have to do this again in the Spring when the weather is nicer - and I can't wait.

Okay - time for that shower!