A Very Fun Day!

You may recall me mentioning in Wednesday's post that I had been to Frankfort (the state capital ... just under 45 miles from here) for an appointment.  That's not the fun part though.  The fun part is this: I have been living here in the devil's playground (this part of the state) for what will soon be 4 years.  Now hold on ... this is not the fun part either.  No way!  The fun part is that a well-known fiber shop (all things wool) has been just under 45 miles from me for what will soon be 4 years but I have never gone there.  I thought about it.  It just never happened.

After enjoying my visits to a few yarn shops while in NYC a couple weeks back, I decided that while I'm awaiting my parole, I should check out a few shops I know of that are closer to where I'm currently doing time. One of those shops is in Frankfort.  It's The Woolery.

I was a bit apprehensive to drive there.  It is sort of located in downtown Frankfort.  I grew up with "downtown" referring to downtown Pittsburgh which in my day was a big, sprawling, traffic infested nightmare of a city.  However, I saw that The Woolery is located less than 2 miles from where I had to go for my appointment so I decided to take the chance.  John would be driving anyway.  He's driven in Italy so he can drive anywhere   : )

The Woolery was actually located on a very quaint little brick street with many old buildings.  I think I read something on The Woolery's building about it having housed the town's newspaper offices once upon a time. There weren't many parking spaces on that street.  We were fortunate to find one right in front of The Woolery.

I could tell as I was walking toward the store that I was walking toward fiber heaven.  I opened the big wood & glass door & literally almost lost my breath.  My eyes were bombarded with so many things to see in so many places!  I was the only customer in the store at that time so I didn't embarrass myself too badly.  However, I'm sure the salesgirl working there thought I had never been in a fiber shop in my life.  I sometimes get a little ... okay, a lot ... excited about things.  Sort of like a little kid.  I remember going somewhere with my son one time ... I don't remember where ... & getting so excited that my son said "Gee mom, you act like you just walked off the farm!"  One time John & I were looking at houses to rent & this one house, which unfortunately slipped through our fingers & it's the house I will always remember as being "the perfect house" ... a beautiful old colonial thing with a gorgeous staircase, gorgeous outside, immense & gorgeous kitchen, interesting nooks & crannies, wonderful rooms ... you get the idea.  Anyway, in the kitchen there was a trash compacting unit.  I had never seen one before.  It was inside a bottom cabinet so you didn't really know it was there.  The agent showing us the house opened up that cabinet & said "here's the trash compacting unit" & it was like I had been blind since birth & my sight suddenly returned & I saw the face of God!  I'm not being disrespectful here ... it's just that I was that excited about this goofy trash compacting unit inside a kitchen cabinet!  I remember gushing about how neat it was, & John sort of got this embarrassed look on his face & the agent looked at me as if I had indeed just walked off the farm.  Anyway, it was a sensory overload experience to walk into The Woolery.  

I give the salesgirl credit for approaching me to ask if she could help me with anything. My first thought was "I could use an oxygen tank," but I managed to tell her I was looking for Cascade 220 superwash worsted.  She took me over to the yarn area. showed me where it was, & said she would be happy to help me if I had any questions or needed any other help.  Here's a picture of where she took me.  Look at that wonderful yarn!  Look at those wonderful baskets!  I was overwhelmed with those baskets as much as I was overwhelmed with the yarn!  I wanted one of those baskets!  However, my mind was nearing overload at this point & I couldn't handle trying to find the perfect yarn & trying to find the perfect basket at the same time.  The basket purchase will have to wait for another day.

John did not come into the store with me at first.  He wanted to walk up & down the quaint little brick street to see what else was there.  While I waited for him, I walked around the store & became more & more overwhelmed with things.  They had wool fabric, rug hooking supplies, a huge spinning supplies area, & beyond that a huge weaving area.  A man, who seemed to be the owner or manager of the store, passed by & I asked him if I could take some pictures for my blog & he very graciously said that would be fine.  How I was able to work the camera I don't know but here's a bit of what I saw.

This is a photo of some wonderful yarn!  It wasn't displayed like this.  I took whatever I could find out of the cubby & placed it on this table so I could choose 3 skeins to make a hat & scarf.  Absolutely gorgeous stuff!

Here are a few bundles of wool fabric on display.  I'm thinking that there had been more there which had already been purchased & this is what was left.  Why someone left that wonderful bundle you see there on the left, with the purple plaid wool on top, is beyond me.  That baby came home with me   : )

Here are a couple more photos of not all, but some of the shop's wool fabric offerings.

This is a view back to the shop's spinning area.  I tried spinning long ago ... didn't really care for it.  You can see some little rug hooking kits hanging on a display there in the bottom right corner.   

I took a walk back into the spinning area, turned to my left (note the various drop spindles on the shelf in front of me), & gazed into the distance where I saw a sign indicating the weaving area.  It's hard to tell from this photo that there's another whole room back there but I'm sure you can see that there's a sign attached to the wall above the entrance.  I didn't dare go back there.  I had a weaving loom long ago.  I loved weaving.  I just hated warping the loom.  Every so often I think how wonderful it would be weave again.  I envision myself contentedly throwing my shuttle back & forth, stepping on the treadles, moving the beater to position my threads, etc.  I had a jack-type floor loom.  I always dreamed of having a counterbalance or countermarch loom from Sweden.  If it weren't for me hating the warping process so intensely, I might still be weaving today.  I could walk through that spinning area without a second thought, but I knew that if I even ventured close to that weaving area, I would have a flashback of me sitting at my loom with a Mona Lisa smile on my face as I contentedly threw my shuttle back & forth.  Nope ... I didn't need to go there.    

Upon returning to the front of the shop, I just had to take a photo of these adorable bunnies & lambs wearing The Woolery logo t-shirts.  Aren't they adorable?  They were so soft & snuggly!  That bunny there in front really wanted to come home with me, but I resisted.  

John entered the store at this point for which I was very thankful.  He has an amazing color sense.  I have no gift for choosing colors whatsoever, but John excels at it.  I asked him to help me pick out some colors of Cascade 220 superwash for my granny stripe blanket.  We spent a lot of time doing this, both of us actually sitting on the floor facing each other with balls of color in between us, him moving them about, excited about some color combinations, frowning at others.  I was watching a master at work.  I should have asked the salesgirl to take a photo of us.  What a sight we must've been!  We/he finally settled on a combination he was pleased with ... 17 balls, 2 balls each of 8 different colors, plus one. God bless this man ... he bought them for me! Here he is at the checkout counter   : )

I didn't think it fair for him to buy everything, so after taking this photo I went back to the yarn area to buy some yarn for other projects.  I'll share pictures of all this yarn in another post.  Until then, here is a photo of me standing outside the store with 2 bags full of yarn.  If only I had 3 bags, it would've been like "Black sheep, black sheep, have you any wool?  Yes sir, yes sir, 3 bags full."  I'm definitely considered to be a black sheep in my family, but alas, only 2 bags of wool this particular day.

After leaving The Woolery, we made our way to Frisch's Big Boy.  We like Big Boy restaurants & this one in Frankfort is one of the best.  The food has never disappointed us.  I got my usual, a bacon cheeseburger with an order of onion rings & a vanilla coke. John tried something new ... some sort of hot sub sandwich with sliced chicken breast, melted Swiss cheese, & grilled onions.  It was huge!  I helped him eat it   : )   He also got fries & sweet tea.  He is sometimes a wee bit adventurous when we go to restaurants, more so than I am.  As usual, I saw several things on the menu that called to me but I love my burger/rings combo so much that I've never given them a try.  Maybe next time.  I did come home with a takeout piece of coconut cream pie & thought I'd have John take a picture of me with BB out in front of the restaurant.  I really didn't spike my hair after visiting The Woolery ... it was just extremely windy when we came out of the restaurant   : )

Thus ended a very fun day!  In my next post, I'll show you the yarns I brought home & tell you about another yarn shop visit I made yesterday   : )