The Marly Bird Poncho Crochet-along is sponsored by Red Heart.
That's right, it's that time of year for a crochet-along and boy do I have a good one for you. Welcome to Section 2 for the Marly Bird Popular Poncho Crochet-along. (Get Section 1 here)
Queue it up and Like the Pattern on Ravelry
The Marly Bird Poncho Crochet-along is sponsored by Red Heart.
That's right, it's that time of year for a crochet-along and boy do I have a good one for you. Welcome to the details page for the Marly Bird Popular Poncho Crochet-along.
This is a new design of mine that is fun to make, great to learn new things, and totally on trend.
A Poncho! Something that is rather simple, intriguing, and popular. The project for this CAL is a rather basic poncho but it packs a lot of punch. There are many learning opportunities for me to teach you while you make the Marly Bird Popular Poncho.
The official start date is September 20, 2016 – October 11, 2016. There will be one video released each week along with the pattern instructions for that section. You will find a full schedule at the end of this post with links as they are available.
There is a dedicated Facebook group for this CAL that is monitored by me and several of the WONDERFUL sample crocheters who tested this pattern for me. We are all there to help you with this project. Please join us!
During the CAL, each section of the pattern will be released at the same time as the corresponding video release. This will help everybody who wants to participate in the crochet-along (CAL) stay at the same pace and subsequently make it easier for me to help!
Once the CAL is complete the full pattern will be available at RedHeart.com
Queue it up and Like the Pattern on Ravelry
As I mentioned, one video will be released each week during the CAL. In these videos, I walk you through making this popular poncho and offer tips and tricks and suggestions to help you crochet this and future projects. Here is a link to the introduction video #1 (coming soon).
You will be able to find all the videos on https://www.YouTube.com/MarlyBird.
The Complete Surprise by Cully Swansen proves that the classics taught to us years ago are still pertinent to us on the Yarn Thing podcast with Marly Bird.
Cully Swansen is very modest about how he learned to knit. He is the grandson of master knitter Elizabeth Zimmermann and son of knitting designer Meg Swansen, so we may assume they sat him down and taught him. He recalls like the rest of us, the stories Elizabeth shared with us of learning to knit a few stitches at a time. He says he learned while attending a Waldorf school when they lived in Los Angeles for a year. The focus is on the arts, and he worked in languages, arts and knitting. He knit an entire doll! Much later, about ten years ago, he came back to it. He had been to college and had a career, but when he broke his leg and realized this was the perfect time to pick it up again and work on it while he was healing. [Read more…]
Craft Yarn Council‘s Mary Colucci and Jenny Bessonette joined us on the Yarn Thing podcast with Marly Bird to 
share big new plans for this year's I Love Yarn Day happening October 15th. [Read more…]
James Cox Knits for the Man in your life, was today's HOT TOPIC on the Yarn Thing podcast with Marly Bird. This was his first visit to a podcast, we're so tickled about this First Date!
James Cox called into the Yarn Thing podcast from Palm Springs, California, which is a ways away from where he 
grew up in Kansas. His family was very crafty, he says, his mom taught them everything from knitting and crochet to quilting. One day as an adult in the line at Woolworths he saw a booklet to Learn to Knit, stepped out of line and collected what he needed to start. That first project was a Fair Isle sweater that he still wears.
The mention of Woolworths kind of dates this story, he admits that was more than 30 years ago. He's always been a fan of fashion and understands construction or how things are put together. He sees knitting as 3-dimensional grid in rows and columns of stitches, admires how things are finished. He found a local yarn shop that was helpful and nice, continued to design things for himself, and they led him into mosaic. During this time, he worked in the advertising industry which approached as an art director. It's apparent that he has that detail orientation that successful designers and knitters have from his background and formal training.
The Yarn Guys, Jeffrey & Dennis have a Wall of Yarn and came to share what it's all about with us on the Yarn Thing podcast with Marly Bird.
Jeffrey Wall and Dennis Rinkenberger own the LYS Wall of Yarn, in Freeport, IL. Their yarn shop just hit it's 5 year anniversary this May and they are also the North American Distributors for Rauma Yarns from Norway. Rauma has been producing high quality yarns for about 90 years. Their shop can also order pewter buttons and clasps from Norway and have an Amish family make wonderful wooden yarn bowls for us as well.
Jeffrey started knitting at age 9 and stopped in high school but picked it up after graduating from college in 2000. Dennis started knitting in 2011 when they were in the planning stages of opening the shop. He says the mechanics of how yarn works attracted him, weaving initially as many guys who take up crafting. Jeffrey's mom is the one that thought they should open a yarn store. Their customer's call Jeffrey ‘the Yarn Whisperer' because he can recall what they've been working on, fix what they've been working on, can find and identify patterns.
In the shop, The Yarn Guys try to carry a little something for everyone though they do specialize in Scandinavian/stranded knitting. Because the shop is in a small town, they try to find other ways to keep the business viable, first becoming the distributors of Rauma yarns and patterns. They have a large variety of colors and yarn, perfect for fans of color work. Jeffrey translates all of Rauma's patterns from Norwegian into English and teaches knitting classes throughout the midwest. Dennis is also a yarn rep so he travels around the country trying to find good homes for our yarns. They both travel to large events to share the yarns, like Stitches (where they are news sponsors of the events), Interweave Yarn Fest, Vogue Knitting Live and KnitLab so that they can share this yarn to people who don't know about it!
For the fifth year anniversary, they worked with Anne Poldesak of Wooly Wonka Fibers. The conversation began with realizing the traditional anniversary gift is wood, which made them recall that Birch is the first letter of the druid alphabet which uses tree with a lot of meanings and interpretations in fairy tales. For the shop's knit-a-long (they've had one every month) Anne created The Beitha Shawl pattern and two yarns to represent the leaves and the bark. The next is blackberry (which is a luscious purple), and later will be holly, further out is apple… So much inspiration but a huge project!
They have also recently worked with Alasdair Post-Quinn who was on the program recently, who created a pattern with their yarns for Yarn Box.
Our distribution website is www.TheYarnGuys.com. Our website for the shop is currently under construction but will be www.WallofYarn.com. People can follow us on Facebook as the Yarn Guys (the shop) Facebook for Wall of Yarn. They have a Ravelry page for the shop and one for that fantastic Knit-A-Long Ogham, and Instagram.
So here's the thing… Jeffrey Wall and Dennis Rinkenberger own the LYS Wall of Yarn in Freeport, IL. They're also the North American Distributors for Rauma Yarns from Norway, which has been making high-quality yarns for about 90 years!
Honestly… they specialize in Scandinavian/stranded knitting and carry a little something for everyone. Because they're in a small town, they've become distributors for Rauma yarns and patterns, and Jeffrey even translates their patterns from Norwegian into English.
Yes! For their 5-year anniversary, they worked with Anne Podlesak to create The Beitha Shawl pattern. It's inspired by trees and nature, with yarns representing leaves and bark. They have a knit-a-long for it every month!
You can find their distribution website at www.TheYarnGuys.com. Their shop website, www.WallofYarn.com, is currently under construction. They're also on Facebook as “the Yarn Guys” and “Wall of Yarn,” and on Instagram.
They seem like such adventurous folks! They love traveling for yarn events and also look for breweries that serve vegan food. It sounds like they're really living their dream and finding so much joy in the fiber industry!