obsessions

Its a funny thing how some materials (yarn, fabric, floss etc) trigger a desire to hoard while in my hands. Today, on this sparkling, frigid Maine winter day that was supposed to be much snowier, I have been knitting away on a Seasons hat, designed by Jared Flood (he of Brooklyn Tweed fame), in the very same Brooklyn Tweed Loft yarn. One of my current obsessions is two-color knitting, a skill I picked up from, and blame entirely on, Mary Jane Mucklestone.

This a yarn that ticks all the right boxes for me. Rustic? Yes. Soft, but not cloyingly so? Yes. Rich nuanced, dynamic color? Yes. Reminiscent of it's origins (an animals fleece)? Yes.  Wooly? Oh, yes... Before Jared Flood came out with this delightful yarn, I would regularly bemoan the disappearance of all of Rowan's older more sheep yarns like their Rowanspun and the like.  When I find a yarn I like, I tend to want to buy as much of it as I can afford as a hedge against the yarn company discontinuing it. That is why I still have ten full skeins each of Rowanspun in both an aran weight and a four-ply.  I really should just knit with them instead of hoarding them....

Today I have been knitting away, during daylight hours which feels like a compete luxury, on my color work hat and had this vaguely panicky feeling that I needed to stock up on this entrancing yarn before it disappears... So I went on to Ravelry and found some people who were de-stashing (always a default position for me) and then ventured onto the Brooklyn Tweed website itself.  There I was reminded, by a thorough perusal of this well-made, well written, well-conceived and, informative site, that Jared Flood is committed to this yarn, and there is little chance that it will go away in the near future.  What a change for me to find that a material that I love working with is not in danger of going away! I do not think of my tastes of being generally status quo. I am not a fan of Malabrigo, even though I do have some of the lace weight in my stash. When I spend the time to knit up an anything, I get more than a little annoyed when the object pills upon first wearing. This is what happens when I knit with most Merino.  I am someone who does not find wool 'itchy'. I am not 'allergic' to wool. I love wool.  And I love that Brooklyn Tweed's wool is so wooly, and that he celebrates those qualities in his yarn.  So I guess this is an homage to Brooklyn Tweed, Jared Flood and his yarns....

Is there a particular material- yarn, fabric, thread, floss etc- that you feel this way about?