Pike Place Market

Hello:

Yesterday, my father-in-law (Pop), sister-in-law (K), Doc and I went to the Pike Place Market in Seattle.  We are having a really nice visit.  K has been here before, but never in the summer.  Pop has visited many times, but not for at least 5 years.  Our weather is cooperating beautifully in that it has been cool with a bit of cloud cover in the mornings burning off around noon with sunny but not too hot afternoons.

Yesterday was the same.  The temperature stayed in the 70's and was just lovely in Seattle.  We got to the Market around 11 am.  Wow it was crowded.

The top floor, which is street level on the west side, was absolutely packed.  This floor has the fish markets,

produce markets,

flower stands,

etc.

The next level has a book store that sells my book, Salt and Pepper at the Pike Place Market (shameless plug - but buy one, it's a really cute book - also available at Amazon), as well as the Giant Shoe Museum, one of my favorite stops in the Market.

Actually the 2nd and 3rd levels are full of all kinds of fun shops from magic to art.  We continued down then took the elevator to the waterfront level.  I have never seen that elevator actually working.  You cross the street on a sky bridge to the Pike Place Hill Climb, a pubic stair that takes you down to the street level right across from the Seattle Aquarium.  Pop was not excited at the idea of all those stairs, and as we saw someone come out of the elevator, we were happy to take it down.  But, ha!  the down button didn't work (not kidding).  So Doc ran down the stairs while we waited in the elevator.  He pushed the button to get the elevator down and so we went.  OMG, fix that elevator.  I wrote that book more than 10 years ago and the elevator was broken then.

We crossed the street to the waterfront

and walked along watching the boats on Puget Sound

until we came to Anthony's Pier 66 Restaurant where we had a great lunch.

Today, we are headed out to Mt. Rainier.

Peace,
f1bercat
shaping the planet while driving around Washington.

2012 Puget Sound LYS Crawl Day 1

2012.05.18 Black Bart Iris

I have been participating in the 21 shops in 4 days madness called the 2012 Puget Sound LYS Tour.

Day 1
Yesterday, I got home at about 9 pm and seriously, I was exhausted.  We only hit 4 stores.  But I was dead.

Well, I went to 5 stores because I snuck off to Serial Knitters in Kirkland Washington by myself first, right when it opened.

It's a wonderful shop, although it seems small, it has a terrific selection.








They are currently having an Abstract Fiber Trunk Show, and wow those yarns are yummy.

What's best about it is, this is my most "local" of LYS's and it is really great to be able to see the yarn in real life.  And touch it!



Allifer came over at about 2:30 pm and we headed across Lake Washington to meet up with GwenS.

Our first stop was So Much Yarn  in Seattle's Belltown neighborhood, near the Pike Place Market.

I am writing this with the help of GwenS who took great notes.  (I was the driver).  So Much Yarn is upstairs and the space is small, but they have it packed with some wonderful yarns.  At every shop I asked the owners if they had anything that was unique to their shop.  Not every shop had an answer to that, but So Much Yarn did.  They carry a line of alpaca sock yarns from a local farm.  The yarns are all undyed, in the natural colors of the alpacas, some are blended, and they are named for each alpaca.  I had to buy a skein, knowing that I would be able to use it during the Solid Socks Challenge for Brown next year. They had a great mix of yarns at various prices, so you could find something really special, and still afford it.

Our second stop was The Knittery in Renton.

This is a well lit, open space, with a large selection of general workhorse yarns.

Our third stop was the Yarn Stash in Burien.


One of the fun things about the tour is that every shop has 2 featured patterns, and the yarn (the pattern can use 1 or 2 skeins) for the pattern on sale for 10% off.  Most of the patterns have been specially created for the Tour.  The pattern at the Yarn Stash this year is a pair of fingerless mitts, and is really nice.  It can be done with color work, or using texture instead of the 2nd color.  It was one of our favorite patterns.


The final stop for yesterday, was Seattle Yarn in West Seattle.



This shop was a delightful surprise.  It was much larger than expected, and had a really nice selection of both brands and prices.

A few of the stores had this sign in the window, Seattle Yarn did, and it was important to us because we had Allifer and Ellyol with us, both primarily crocheters (as well as me).




They had a huge button selection.

Gwen was particularly happy with their selection of Malabrigo and Madelinetosh.








I will try to get photos of today's excursion up tomorrow, etc.  But we are going to hit the northern most shops on the Tour, and it will be an absolutely crazy day.  I hope I have enough energy to blog.

Good night.  Stay safe and well.

Yours,
f1bercat
shaping the planet one growing yarn stash at a time!