Ravelry is a lifesaver!!!

Ok I do exaggerate! Maybe not a lifesaver but a project saver at least! On my first trip to Scotland I purchased some beautiful yarn in a shop in St. Andrews. it was in my stash for a long time and finally over the summer I decided that I wanted to knit a short sweater out of it. I wanted a sweater for my trip to Olympia that I could throw it over a tank top before & after teaching dance. Being a southern Californian I get cold easily when the weather dips below 70*! So I poked around looking for something cute & found the Nob hill pattern, http://www.knitty.com/ISSUEspring08/PATTnobhill.html, by Ashley Adams Moncrief on Knitty.com to be a perfect!

I live by the seat of my pants really, or is it knit by the skin of my teeth? ha.. I didn't actually know how much yarn I had because after winding the skeins into balls I misplaced the labels. I also had no idea the name of the yarn only that it was soft beautiful and I liked it. Being practical has never stopped me! I figured I could fudge the pattern if necessary to finish, and if really necessary I could dye & spin something similar for the sleeve caps.

You know where this is going right? I almost finished the body of the sweater...only 4 or 5 rows left and I would have been done when I ran out of yarn. I launched a thorough search of the silly craft room to no avail! I looked all over for the labels hoping I could find some more of the yarn somewhere in the world also to no avail. I looked up the yarn shop in St. Andrews to see what they had to offer just in case I could order some but I didn't see it on their website. And it was getting too close to my trip to mess around any more. I abandoned the idea and decided I would work on it when I got home.

After coming home I was so buried in making pirate costumes and preparing for pirate faire the sweater just sat on one of my work tables ignored and forgotten! Until one day while cleaning my desk (you realize by now I'm a very disorganized housekeeper) a piece of paper fell out of one of my notebooks...it was the familiar yarn label! Yay! Naturally I abandoned the desk cleaning operation for a yarn search. First I looked up "The Fibre Company" and found the yarn was no longer being made! Then I googled yarn stores looking for the yarn which I found in other colorways. Oh yeah, the label I found didn't have the name of the color way....So I contacted the manufacturer to ask them if they had any more of it ANYWHERE!!! And then realized I could use Ravelry to see if anyone had the yarn in their stash. Low and behold! I found someone who had 2 skeins of it...I sent her a message and she got back to me right away. She said it was just in her stash doing nothing in particular and she would be happy to sell it to another knitter in need, and she would buy more yarn with the money! I was so happy! I sent her the money and have the yarn! After that I got a message from the company that they have one skein of the yarn left...I think I'll buy it just in case!

So that is why Ravelry is a life saver!
p.s. yes the dye lot is a little more orange, but at this point who really cares? I'll unravel and probably alternate the orangey w/ the pinker color so it blends more easily. I don't mind reknitting.