Saturday, November 26, 2005

All Work, No Play

I would like to sincerely thank each and every one of you for you sweet words of encouragement regarding Yarntopia. It truly means a lot to me to know that I have such a wonderful set of friends out there cheering us on. I'm so glad that you are taking this journey with me.

Sheryl and I both really appreciate your taking our little survey as well.

As for the title of this post, it alludes to what I've been doing the last couple of weeks. I volunteered myself the duty of coming up with the yarns we are going to sell in the shop. I am a person that likes to confront a situation well informed, so I pulled out all of my most recent knitting magazines and books to survey what yarns designers are knitting with. That helped me decide which yarn companies we should concentrate on. From there, I took all of the color catalogs from those companies and divided their yarn into 19 different categories (wool, cotton, boucle, sock, eyelash, etc.) Then, I separated those piles into the various yarn weights. Finally, I calculated the price per yard on every yarn to see which yarn in each category was the best value.

Sheryl came over this morning to help. As usual, we are on the same page. (Love ya Sheryl!) We will not make the final decisions until we meet with the yarn reps to see what they recommend and to see their spring and summer lines. I have figured out how our inventory budget will be allocated between the different lines so that we will come to the meetings prepared.

We will be making our first yarn purchases on Monday. Wish us luck!

In normal life news, I'm knitting Christmas presents like a demon. The sad thing is, what I want to be doing is knitting something for myself. Sad, but true.

15 Comments:

Blogger Jennifer said...

Wow! That sounds like a huge undertaking! I say sneak in a knitting project all for you. You deserve it!

7:33 PM  
Blogger Ruth said...

i hear ya on having so many projects for other people during the holiday season! all my personal projects are put on hold...

11:08 PM  
Blogger Mary Ann said...

Now that you helped me with my bloglines, I'm up and running quite well. Thanks!
I agree that you need some time for yourself. How about a massage appointment?

3:36 AM  
Blogger SAM said...

Love ya back and take your mom up on the massage idea!

6:26 AM  
Blogger knit_chick said...

You really are busy, busy, busy! Some of it sounds like fun, though. Good luck with the yarn rep meetings. Once your Yarntopia opens, you can knit for yourself all you want.

Go for the massage! It'll do you good & you can concentrate on work more. ;)

10:09 AM  
Blogger MiniLaura said...

I wish I lived closer to you. I would be over at your house day and night rolling around in your yarn samples. They don't let me do that at Y2E.

As for wanting to knit for yourself--I've learned that I have to balanced my knitting for other with knitting for me. I don't knit for other just because I think that I should. I knit things that I want to knit for other people. Everyone will get handknit gifts from time to time, but I don't think everyone HAS to have a handknit gift at Christmas.

10:15 AM  
Blogger Karen said...

Yay, shopping for yarn! Sounds like fun, and alot of work! I too am madly tring to finish christmas gifts as there is less than a month to christmas(and I usually give friend gifts before the 25, yikes), and I woke up today with snow! Now I'm really in the christmas mood!

10:42 AM  
Blogger chris said...

I can't even fathom how busy you must be, setting up Yarntopia, knitting Christmas gifts AND being a full-time mom and wife, too. I give you SO much credit for all your hard work and dedication. I know that you love what you're doing, and all your hard work will pay off soon. What a labor of love! Good luck with the yarn purchases- you and Sheryl will do great!! :-)

10:51 AM  
Blogger knittingnurse said...

Ha! I am NOT the only one who would rather knit for herself! YEAH!!!!! finished up sock pair #2 last night (whew) and started teacher scarf #2. Sigh. I want to knit for me!

12:42 PM  
Blogger Liz said...

I'm so jealous! I'd love to be buying tons of yarn.

I've been bad all weekend and spent all my knitting time on myself!

I know you'll do a great job with your yarn selection. I can't wait to see the store. Will you guys be selling online too?

3:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Good Luck!!

I understand about the Christmas presents...I swore I wouldn't knit anything and here I am..about to finish my first Irish Walking Scarf and getting ready to cast on for my 2nd...

5:30 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Gosh Amy, it all seems to be moving so fast! I'll bet you are in HOG (or should I say Alpaca) HEAVEN!!! Congrats, congrats, congrats!!!

7:58 PM  
Blogger Catherine Kerth said...

hey girl! i haven't read blogs or blogged myself in weeks so i am behind times... so the cats outta the bag! yeah! you know i am going to be the first customer ;)

8:51 PM  
Blogger Jillio said...

even if it is work, that's a great job to have! one thing at a time, though. congratulations to you and sheryl! you'll be up and running in no time :)

10:18 AM  
Blogger Lynda said...

Go Amy and Sheryl!!! You guys are living our dream... and we get to go along for the ride! Thanks for sharing all the tidbits, it's so much fun! By the time you're up and running we're all gonna have such an emotional stake in this business of yours! I'm keeping you both in my prayers.

And, knit for yourself, yeah-nothing wrong with that!

7:02 AM  

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