Imagine! is 2 1/2 years old (toddler) and we have attended the What' New Fair for three seasons. The first year Debbie Manning and I set up a small table and displayed and sold a sampling of what we offer at the store. The second year, Barb Slumsky helped and we only offered class sign up sheets and samples. This year we looked so professional thanks to Jim and Anne who lent us their beautiful booth design and shared the space with us. The Fair is a great networking opportunity and a great way to visit with friends. Here are a few pictures. By the way Anne fans, she is getting ready to launch a whole bunch of new classes so stay tuned.

Miniature Ornaments- 2 classes
Make darling miniature ornaments with Debbie Barry. The Stocking class is Saturday November 8 from 10:00-noon. It is a two needle project. Class is 20.00 and kit is 5.00 for yarn. 

Needle Felted Pumpkins
Make darling little needle felted pumpkins that are three dimentional. Debbie Barry shows you how in a new class on Sat Nov 1 10:00-Noon. Class cost is 25.00 and 5.00 for you kit.

What a great way to display the crafts at Imagine on our delightful model. Her necklace is an original Miss Cooper !and her hat is from our superwash merino.

Nick Rizzo (Chef to Go) will start teaching his Pasta classes every Tuesday from July 8th through August 15th. Although, the classes have not yet started, they are completely sold out. We are hoping to persuade Nick to present a new series in the fall. We'll let you know!

    Everyone in Chautauqua County knows what we mean when we say "the season" is here. We mean that the county expands to welcome summer residents, tourists and homecoming friends and family during the short months of summer. At the shop we have been gearing up, adding staff, adding inventory and this has kept us busy. We love the "season" but we also love the cozy winter down-time when we can visit with our year round friends at leisure.

    In the next few weeks I hope to share with you some of the incredible items we found on our shopping trip to the annual Needlework show in Columbus. Knitters and designers and manufacturers from around the world come together to display their new items each year. There are more than 1,100 booths. What struck us this year is how creative and inventive people are. Just when you think no one can come up with anything new, there it is- something stunningly beautiful or very original.

      I hope to get the the knack of posting pictures on the blog to show you some of our finds. An example is "Flat Feet" by Conjoined Creations. Many of you may have read about this fun and innovative sock stock. The company sends fine, undyed merino to a mill to be woven according to their specifications. What emerges is two finely crafted rectangles of wool which are then given to their artist who paints them with dyes. These are then packaged with a socks pattern booklet and the knitter unravels them as she/he knits them into socks. We are on a three month waiting list for these. We also have wonderful kits for market bags, and lovely summer cardigans from Woodstock, NY. The yarns are hand spun and dyed. Sassy Skeins offers kits and patterns for kids in crayon colors. They arrived yesterday and already are selling. We brought back scarf pins from Gita Maria. These are enamels and  we found dichroic buttons from Nancy Geddes of California. Come see. More on the way. I will keep you posted.

     About 10 years ago, while I was visiting family in Cleveland, my family was entertaining friends from out of town who wanted to visit a bead store.( You guessed it, they were from California- why do they know everything before the rest of do?) I had never heard of such a thing. Being crafty and curious, we found Isle of Beads in the yellow pages and went to see. I couldn't get over how many beads we saw. On my first visit , it just made me dizzy. Most were sorted according to color. I didn't know a regular person could make a piece of jewelry. Our guests were into hemp bracelets and bought supplies but I was totally intrigued by the other possibilities. I didn't stay long enough to try a class but I did buy some supplies and a book. After that is was trips to Cleveland to visit family and to stop by the bead store. It was quite  a distance to go for supplies and I didn't plan ahead very well, it seems I would be in the middle of a project and forget to have gotten something really vital in the design.  I shopped the local craft superstores, but I was already spoiled and wanted the beautiful beads. I also got some things on the Internet but sometimes they would be describing cerulean blue in a dainty size and puce green would arrive the size of a gnat. 
    When we envisioned our shop, Imagine! it was one of those totally out-of-hand family free-for-all  meetings attended by 3 generations in which everyone had a different concept. I was campaigning for beads. They let me have my way and I am happy to say that our bead department (one of 5 departments) is growing and you can get a great range of pretty and unusual beads, tools, books and instruction right in Chautauqua county. Also, thanks to our bead instructor, Anne Jackson, we carry the largest seed bead collection in the region.
    The other day a customer said, "Wow you are lucky because you can make whatever you want and all the supplies are here." I smiled but the truth is, I made more jewelry before I owned the shop. There is always so much to do in our store. But is is great for me to see the same excitement and enthusiasm I felt when I learned and discovered how many really beautiful things anyone can make. I love watching people in classes really enjoying the experience of making something unique and getting complimented.  The really great thing is, anyone can bead! Really. There are some crafts that take skill and patience, but this isn't one of them, you can make something lovely right away and there is always something more to learn. My friend Norma picked it up immediately and she makes me laugh because she wakes up in the morning and looks in the mirror and often says, "Hmmm. I don't have earrings to go with this blouse..." then she makes them. I make coffee in the morning, Norma makes earrings!  

From Sublime The new, lush organic cotton yarns are all the rage right now in the industry. They are so soft, you want to pat them as if they were kittens. We have a sample in our shop of one of the simple and elegant sweaters for summer. The colors are muted and inspiring. They just make you want to knit. Perfect for classic warm weather  wear.. We have two great books and all of the colors.  Come see and feel..... simplicity and luxury.

Lucy Frisicaro has been knitting for almost two years. She has a great eye when it comes to design and color. She did the usual series of rectangles as a beginner, many scarves, all great , some shawls, lap warmers. But this year she took Sandy Canone's class on how to knit a cardigan, pretty ambitious for a beginner and she stuck right with it. Below is her proud moment which we wanted to share with you. She was just beaming as she got the approval of some of the veteran knitters that hang out at the store on Saturdays. What do you think? If you have a project that you are particularly proud of or if you finished your cardigan that began with Sandy's class, we'd love to hear from you!