Jill Draper's Mohonk and Nimbus Yarns are Here!

We have a bit of a craft crush on Jill Draper. We fell in love with Jill Draper's hand-dyed yarns when we saw our friend, Stephen, knitting a shawl with Nimbus, a lace weight angora silk. Jill's colors are stunning and unusual, and the base yarns she uses are unique. Jill Draper makes her home in upstate New York and mostly dyes on US grown and milled wools.

Nimbus Angora Silk Laceweight

Mohonk is Jill's 2 ply sport weight Cormo wool made from US Cormo wool. It is springy and soft, perfect for sweaters. The colors are almost solid, but with a beautiful gentle color variegation from being dyed in the skein. The wool is minimally processed--you'll find a bit of hay here and there due to the absence of harsh chemicals during the cleansing process at the mill. This also leaves a bit of moisture rich lanolin in the yarn, the better to knit with!

We love these spacial yarns from Jill Draper and hope you do to!

Lucky Cat Crafts: Rare & Unusual Fibers are here!

Handspinners, you won't believe your hands when you feel Lucky Cat Crafts' unusual and amazing fiber blends!

polworth/mugasilk  |  yak/angora  |  camel/mugasilk/yak  |  merino/mugasilk/yak |  merino/mulberrysilk/possum

Kim, the adorable lady behind Lucky Cat Crafts, has these fantastical fiber blends specially milled in small batches.

We love the warm smoky palette of colors she has created by blending unique undyed fibers in soft greys and browns.

Below is a handspun yarn made with Lucky Cat Yak/Angora, a blend of two downy fibers that are so fluffy soft and ethereal, it almost feels like you are touching sunshine.

Lucky Cat Crafts' fibers are a dream to work with! They are perfect for a special project and extra soft against sensitive skin. We hope you love them as much as we do!

Delicious Downy Rabbit Fluff Wrapped Around My Neck

I've been knitting a lot of awesome summer sweaters and lace projects lately so I decided to take a break and do some mindless knitting. I couldn't resist the fluffy and oh-so-soft awesomeness of a new yarn we just got in from Schulana - Angora Fashion Print. Angora Fashion Print is a dk weight blend of 80% angora and 20% nylon. This yarn rules for two reasons: fluffy, too-soft-to-handle, cloud-like, angora bunny-cuteness and the fact that it comes in four stunning colors. It was hard to choose, but I finally went with this acid-chartreuse green for my new angora cowl.

The nice people at Skacel were kind enough to write up a quick cowl pattern that uses 2 balls of this downy deliciousness. This cowl is a moebius cowl and it was my first time doing true moebius knitting. I used Cat Bordhi's Moebius Cast On to cast on 180 Moebius stitches on size 7 needles (this cast-on was mind blowing) and then it was just 2x2 ribbing until I was almost out of yarn. If you want to see this moebius cowl knit up in all the different yarns distributed by Skacel, click here!

My cowl is huge and luscious and wraps me in a protective, velvety layer of supple bunny fur. Angora is also a very warm fiber, so I won't be wearing this too much right now, but when winter comes, this feathery-light bunny-cloak is going to be my shield against the cold. You could make an equally delicate and cushy cowl with just one ball of Angora Fashion Print as each ball comes with 123 yards of creamy rabbit fluff.

angora + cauliflower = ♥

Trust me, once you touch this you are going to want to wrap your neck in some brightly-colored, mushy, angel-like bunny hair. Here are the amazing colors that you now must choose between...good luck!

Emily's Handspun Angora Aestlight

Some of you may be familiar with Victoria--Queen Victoria, that is--one of the cutest buns of all time. Victoria is my mischievous and fluffy English Angora Rabbit, my first and only fiber animal. She sheds all her fiber twice a year, and seems to shed three new bunnies every time! She loves my dog Branwyn and follows her around, eats things growing in the yard, and her favorite treats are stale bread, arugula, and dandylions.

Ever since Amber cast off her Aestlight, I have been wanting to make one of my own. And after playing and refining the spinning of my lovely bunny Victoria's locks, I decided that this would be the perfect project for my handspun yarn. I started by spinning Victoria's English Angora wool with the wheel, but the yarn wasn't quite right. I then tried my sweet little Turkish drop spindle, spinning and then plying little skeins one after the other. The fiber began to sing in my fingers, and the yarn was exactly what I was looking for.

After starting the shawl, a local "bunny herder" brought in her beautiful angora fiber, which we now carry in the shop. I picked out a gorgeous light peach shade and used it to spin yarn for a contrasting border, finishing the edging with more handspun Victoria.

I love it so much, and want to wear it every day!

And now, for your viewing pleasure, here is an adorable look into the life of Queen Victoria as she enjoys some park funtimes (also starring Eddie). Enjoy!

New Angora Bunny Wool!

Fluffy clouds of soft angora bunny fiber is here! This locally raised angora is from a small fleet of bunnies right here in Denver.

Natural Angora Colors: White  |  Tort  |  Agouti  |  Blue  |  Black

Twelve cute French angora rabbits owned by Peggy Pearlman provided us with this rainbow of five natural colors. Handspinners, this is one amazingly soft fiber! Angora is super warm and insulating and can be blended with other fibers to add a sweet halo to your handspun--or you can spin it all by itself for an amazing yarn.

Emily has been spinning some 100% Angora yarn in the natural Agouti color. She is knitting it into what will be a beautiful Shetland-style shawl with a lace edging in Tort.

Emily's handspun 100% angora Shetland shawl in progress

Her fiber came from her own adorable bunny, Ms. Queen Victoria. (Branwyn the shop dog's sister!)

Queen Victoria the Angora Bunny with her sister, Branwyn

They are best friends!

Emily's Prairie Rose Shawl

I fell in love with the skein. You know how it is, that little panic attack when you walk away, thinking that someone might pick it up before you return, nervously glancing every now and then to see if it is still there. Love.

You might be thinking you have seen this image in this very blog. You have. In the Staff Holiday Gift Pics post. Not too long after that post went up, I knew I had to wind that skein. I had to have it! But what to make? I finally decided on a lace triangle shawl from the Knitter's Book of Wool by Clara Parkes, the Prairie Rose Shawl.

The Prairie Rose Shawl is not a mindless knit, but I took that project everywhere putting special time in it when I could. Sometimes when something wonderful would happen, I would quickly grab the project and knit a few stitches to capture that moment forever into the knitting. I would look back later in better light with a more lucid state of mind and gently coax mistakes out. There are some special times caught forever into this sweet angora shawl.

Estes Park Wool Festival Report: 2010

Fancyporters Emily and Cat visited the 2010 Estes Park Wool Fest this year to check out the cute and woolly madness. And they did not come home empty handed--we are happy to welcome Queen Victoria, baby English angora rabbit, to team Fancy Tiger Crafts! Shop dog Branwyn is excited about sharing her customer greeting and cuddle receiving duties with Queen Victoria when her new sister gets a little older. For more on the Wool Festival fun here is Cat and Emily!

Cat

Hello! In spite of the cold, rain and mud, Emily and I had a great time at the Estes Park Wool Fest. We fell in love with the angora bunnies, especially Queen Victoria (little lady on the left above), but there were so many other super cute creatures to look at as well!

This cashmere goat loved the camera! And how adorable is the girl in her green knitted cap?


Lambs and llamas and goats, oh my! Here are just some of the animals we met at the festival. The Southdown Babydoll lamb's face (top left below) was just like velvet. Her wool was thick and heavy with lanolin. We're considering getting Amber one for her next birthday...their insanely cute smiley faces make Southdowns sheep her favorite!


Daybreak alert! We saw several folks sporting their Daybreak shawls, one of our favorite knitting patterns by Stephen West. This lovely lady stopped to pose for us in the rain.


In addition to the sheep, goats, llamas and bunnies there were also yaks. This little guy was just five days-old. His family is starting to bottle feed him to keep him really sweet and tame. What a cutie!

Emily

Hey guys, Emily here! The picture below is Queen Victoria--taken at the exact moment that Cat and I realized that we were in love. We tried so hard to resist the gravitational pull of Victoria's cuteness! We actually left the festival, went to get coffee, and realized in a panic that we had to go back and bring home our little queen. She is from Backyard Rabbit Burrows where Cassi Swanson breeds angora rabbits, the most magical of little fiber animals.


Soon we will go visit Backyard Rabbit Burrows. Cassie has a new batch of baby bunnies and Victoria has dreams of finding her Albert. We'll keep you posted when that happens!

Thanks Cat and Emily! And, thanks, cute woolly fiber animals that came out to Estes Park!

New! Llama and Angora Yarn! Jared Flood Book!

Two new yarns are in!

Montera is a 50% llama 50% wool blend aran yarn that comes in a ton of lovely colors.


Lush is an 50% angora and 50% wool blend--perfect for soft and magically angora-y projects.


We have two new books with great patterns for both yarns. Jared Flood's new book, Made in Brooklyn, is full of beautiful, classic shawls and sweaters, hats and mittens.


Snow Day has adorable patterns for sweaters, cardigans, hats and shawls.


Jaime made this Big Stitch Hat from Snow Day in just one hour last craft night!

New! Donegal Luxury Tweed Chunky & The Big Easy by Debbie Bliss!

Hot tweediness, this new yarn is making me so excited for the arrival of fall weather! A blend of wool and angora, this cuddly soft, chunky weight yarn is quick to knit up. Perfect for gift knitting!


Also new, The Big Easy by Debbie Bliss is full of inspiring cozy knits for chunky yarns.

Estes Park Wool Festival 2009

Jaime and I had a super fantastic time in Estes Park last weekend at the Wool Festival! We were real excited about cuddling with all the adorable animals and checking out all the locally produced goods.

The Angora rabbits were first on our cuddle list. They were irresistible! We ended up buying a few bags of fairy-soft angora fluff from Woodlake Woolies. We hope to bring some of their angora fiber into our fiber loft soon!

Next stop--cute goats! Or could they be baby unicorns? Look at how pastoral they are with their curly locks and magical baby faces!

The highlight of the trip was being reunited with our favorite lamb, Diamond Lil. First we had to fight our way through crowds of her admirers.

We were lucky enough to be asked by our friends Peg and Woody to lamb-sit Diamond Lil' while they showed their Shetlands. Lil' was getting really sleepy in our laps watching the show. She was a little bigger, but she was still the smallest, cuddliest lamb in the barn!

We were super excited about the presence of Gotland sheep at this year's wool market. Gotlands are an ancient Swedish breed of sheep who were made famous by the Lord of the Rings films - it was Gotland wool that was used to make all of the Elvin invisibility cloaks. There are very few Gotlands here in the US (mostly they live in New Zealand today) so we were super-lucky to meet them. They were so pretty with their lustrous grey locks! Jaime and I acquired some sweet Oregon-made Gotland yarn and Jaime is already planning her invisibility cloak-lette. We hope to stock some Gotland yarn and roving soon for all of your Elvin needs. Nerd alert!

Here are some other highlights from the animal side of the festival - from top left moving clockwise: a Jacob sheep with totally sweet horns, a sleepy Wensleydale sheep, the leaping llama competition, a close up of Diamond Lil's adorable wool, the craziness of showing 7 Shetland lambs, and a freaked out Wensleydale!

Of course we had to visit the vendor barn - this is where you can buy everything from a whole fleece to hand-carved drop spindles. One of our favorite booths at the wool fest is Stephania's naturally hand-dyed rovings and yarns. Jaime had a tough time deciding, but ended up choosing a really pretty madder and tesu flower dyed corriedale.

Thanks Estes! We've got our fiber fix for the summer!

Norwood Fiber Farm Trip (Pt 2): Walkabout Ranch

The first fiber farm we visited in Norwood was Walkabout Ranch, where it was shearing day for the Angora goats. Our friends Jeannie and Howard Davis keep the adorable, friendly goats for their soft mohair fiber.

The little guys were very curious. The bravest goat of the herd became friends with Jaime, and shared a goat kiss with her.

The unsheared goats were really interested in what was going on in the barn, where shearing time was happening.

The shearer, Sunny, specializes in shearing small flocks of fiber animals. He is known in Colorado and surrounding states for his care while shearing the animals.

The ranch is also home to Cara, an Anatolian Shepherd who lives with and guards the goats. Cara was separated from her herd while they were getting sheared. She watched and worried while she couldn't be with them.

This is Cara when she got her herd back. She was literally jumping for joy.

Jeannie and Howard also raise buckskin Tennessee Walking horses. When the last goat had been sheared and the clippers had been turned off the horses decided it was safe to come back from the pasture.

They were the sweetest horses I've ever met. I got so much horse nuzzling action, it was out of control. This is Buddy and little Sheila giving me soft horse kisses.

Stay tuned for part 3, our trip to see alpaca and Shetland lambs at Piñon Wood Ranch. It gets even cuter!

Norwood Fiber Farm Trip (Part 3) Shetland Lambs and Alpaca

Norwood Fiber Farm Trip (Part 1) Buckhorn Gardens