Sunday, April 18, 2010

Textile Center Garage Sale

Wow. That is the only way to characterize it. Imagine a giant room with rows of tables. The tables are piled high with yarn, fabric, notions, patterns. The area under the tables is also piled high. Then there is another room with books and magazines. A hallway full of weaving/quilting/sewing tools. Another room with silent auction items, many sewing machines, a couple of spinning wheels, a couple of looms. And that is just what I saw. Who knows what I missed! The items are all priced at garage sale prices. Now, let's say it is 3pm. Everything you can fit in a grocery bag for a dollar. Everything. So that bag of yarn marked at $35.00? Yep, a dollar! The original retail prices on that bag? Over $150.00. It was insane! I have photos of everything I got. I spent under $50.00. Yep, everything pictured here totaled less than $50.00. Most of them were in misc bags, which I have separated a bit by color/fiber content here.

Eight ounces of sport weight 25%angora/75%rambouillet Softie from Kimmet Croft Fibers. I will have fun dyeing this!


This is a bag of various mostly cottons and tape yarns. I think it might make a great summery Scrappy Lengthwise Scarf. (Ravelry link.)


This is 85%mohair/15%Vinyan. What the heck is Vinyan? I discovered it is probably Vinyon. A pvc fiber! I bought it thinking I could overdye it, but Vinyon melts at 170 degrees. I'll have an excuse to explore a new to me dyeing technique, cold dyeing!


This ball of novelty yarn was in one of the misc bags. I love the color, and can see plying it with a strand of black alpaca handspun.



Although these are by different manufacturers, they seem to have the same fiber content and construction. 50%merino, 50%acrylic. No plans for this yet. Did I mention that I was awake a good part of the night thinking of what to do with it all?


This grouping is by color only. It ranges from 3 balls of a blue variegated cotton/viscose to a sublime 50%alpaca/50% Mulberry silk in a nice green skein. What can I do with only 50 grams/123 yards?


Some browns, including at least one ball of 100% alpaca. The dark brown one. I suspect the lighter brown is as well, but is missing the ball band. Because you know, I need more alpaca!.


Six balls of Capri, 3 in a light denim, and 3 in a darker denim. I want to experiment with weaving this on the peg loom.


That is silk noil on the left, merino on the right. The drop spindle was $2.00!


It has cute little painted flowers? on it. I stood by the van and spun a little of the merino while waiting for the 3pm bag sale. It spins wonderfully.


I'm not sure what I'll do with 2 yards of this fabric, but it spoke to me. Maybe a tote bag or two? Some nice big potholders?


This one spoke to me too. Such pretty blues and purples. There is only about a yard here. Maybe I'll just hang it in my bedroom and admire it?


This rayon batik spoke to me too.

I have several bags of these rolls of fabric in varying widths. I want to try my hand at weaving a rug on the peg loom with this. Some of them are a burlap, some are more lightweight than that. They might also make great straps for purses or totes. Or who knows what I might come up with!

That is all I got. We had a leisurely lunch at Cupcake (but I didn't have one, what was I thinking?)just down the road, and also got lost in the Architectural Antique store for a bit. A couple of the people that went in our two van convoy were not spinners, but rather sewers. Hehehe...one of the sewers came home with a spinning wheel from the silent auction. We'll soon have her spinning! There may have been some slightly hysterical laughter as we tried to fit all of our purchases and all of our people into the two vans when we left the Textile Center. Of course we also had to have each person show what she got as she came straggling out of the building.

We had a bit of time, so we also stopped at Depth of Field on our way home. The poor saleslady (bad me, I didn't catch her name. I admired her shoes though.) was gracious when dealing with us all, even though there may have been some maniacal giggling going on as we descended. I bought some yarn and some needles there...how about I show you those some other time? Oh, I lied, I don't have photos of everything. I didn't show you the magazines I bought either. Later, ok?

8 comments:

Cindy said...

OOOOh,such pretties. Sounds like you had a blast!!!!

Faren said...

Wow, what fun!

Julene said...

Wow - that sounds like an amazing event!!! $1 bags??!!

I know what you mean from your last post about hearing a familiar sound. Sometimes I think I recognize my Mama or I'll find something that smells like her lotion/perfume, and it brings it all back. Sometimes that experience makes it be a better day, but it's taken a long time.

Glad you're back on the blog!!

Rayna said...

WOW amazing! I wanan go!

Linda said...

It sounds like you had grat fun and got amazing bargains. Too bad I don't live nearby ...


Re your last post - I don't hear breathing but keep catching myself thinking "I'll have to call Mom (that's my MIL) and tell her about ... " Eventually it hurts less and brings more joy. Give yourself time.

Rhonda from Baddeck said...

So glad you're back to the blog - your day at the Garage Sale sounds like a blast! Oh, what damage that $1/bag sale could do to my stash... We avoid the used book sales for the same reason.

foodhoe said...

I love pandemonious sales like that! I used to work at Williams-Sonoma/Pottery Barn and the sample sales were exactly like you describe. Looks like you scored on a ton of gorgeous stuff!

steph said...

your post on the textile sale is wonderful, and i hope you don't mind that i added a link to your post in my blog entry on the textile sale. it has taken me two days to get that post completed :) Now that i have all the pictures taken, i can start putting away all my finds.