Coming in July: A New Home for Yarn Folk!

April 29, 2025

Mark (aka Mr. Yarn Folk) and I took a huge leap of faith and love, inspired by the Yarn Folk community.

We bought a building.

The illustration above is a mock up of what it will look like soon, created from an actual photograph.

If you are interested in the whole story, I'll explain below, but here are the highlights:

We will be located on Third Ave, between The Botany Shop and Hayday Bake & Brew.
There are three dedicated parking spots in the alley + a city lot with all-day parking across the street.
First floor retail space is ~50% bigger.
Mezzanine level will become the cozy Stitcher's Loft, with plenty of space for Social Stitching, classes, events, and more.
Hours will shift a bit, with better afternoon availability. (More on that later.)
Lots of operational improvements; just ask me if you want to hear me carry on about having an actual office after 12 years!

Our physical move dates are June 29 & 30, and we will be closed the following week. We will have a soft reopening on Monday, July 7, and a grand reopening party on Saturday, July 12th!

Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, for making this plan something we could even dream, much less set in motion.

✨❤️🧡💛💚💙🩵💜✨

…mark your calendars

Social Stitching

Every Saturday, 2-4p

Bring your current project, and spend some time with others who really vibe on yarn!

Stitch Every Day in May

See below! We start on Thursday!

Temporary Hours

Saturday, June 14 1-4p

We'll be at Commencement in the morning ☺️

Sunday, June 29 - Sunday July 4

Closed for moving to 211 W Third Ave!

…new in the shop

Stitch Every Day in May is BACK, and it starts on Thursday! Full guidelines are on this page, along with a printable PDF. PLEASE NOTE: If you have a tracker sheet that shows May 1 as a FRIDAY, you may use it anyway, and just mark off each of the 31 days OR you can print out a corrected calendar at the link above. My apologies--I personally use a Monday start week, but I transferred the dates from a Sunday start calendar. Time is hard, y'all.

The Twice Sheared Sheep Trunk Show is here through the end of the week, and I want to highlight this sweet gizmo. The Quick Gauge is clear plastic, and you can place it on top of your knit or crochet fabric, and whichever grid the individual stitches fit into indicates your gauge. How's that for easy and clever?!

Also: HOODIE PRE-ORDERS ARE READY FOR PICK UP! 🥳

…to inspire

It is bittersweet: Yarn Folk's space on Pearl Street is filled with memories. The first time I saw the space, it was dark, and pretty grungy, and now it is filled with light, and color, and fiber loving friends.

However, for about a year, space has gotten tighter and tighter around the round table. That is a great problem! But I'm very aware of how hard it can be for new faces to join in when there just doesn't seem to be any space. The building also changed ownership, and the new owners have different needs.

I initially made some quiet inquiries about other spaces that might be available to rent, and there wasn't anything that was a step up from staying put. On a whim, I checked the commercial real estate listings. I showed Mark the listing for 211 W Third, but also dismissed it as a real possibility. A few days later, he said, "I think we should try."

It has been a wild few months, and there were several junctures where it looked like it wouldn't happen. And even when it did, there were still big questions about the timeline. A little bit of serendipity goes a long way, and once we were able to communicate directly with the tenant, we found out that they were looking for more space, and Yarn Folk's new lease had a clause that allowed for 60 day notice at any time. Even once everyone was on the same page, it was a bumpy ride, but early last week, the tenant was able to give us formal notice, and I gave my landlord formal notice, and now there is a LOT TO DO in 60 Days.

The building is in the Creger block of Third Avenue, between Main and Water, and dates from 1890. We will have some projects on deck to help it keep living its best historic life. The site is very close to the location of Robber's Roost, the trading post that was the first store in the Kittitas Valley.

To put this all in stitching terms, we found the pattern, it took a bit of time to find the right yarn, and now we are gathering up the all needles and notions we'll need, and we'll be CASTING ON July 7th. It's a long-term project ☺️

As a side note: if you need a realtor for anything at all, I cannot recommend Nicole Prigge-Taylor highly enough. This whole experience was pretty high-stress; she kept it calm, and she kept it fun. 11/10, would recommend!

...currently stitching

I finished the Aura Glow Cowl, one of the patterns we featured for Local Yarn Store Day. When I put together kits, I used Merino 401 because I liked the bold clear colors Brittany had used for the pattern photos. I was thinking of non-football sports teams, and I think we did pretty well for hockey, baseball, and men's soccer. I'm on the lookout for good options to add women's soccer and basketball at some point.

The Arlitt Cowl was another LYS Day pattern, also crochet, pictured here in Malabrigo Seis Cabos in Arco Iris. (The dress form is wearing the Mira tee, which is not that wonky, I promise--it is just lightweight, and, well, the wind was blowing....)