Only 9 more days!!

The book Not My Daughter by Barbara Delinksy is being released on January 5th! In this book there is a group of women who knit and dye yarn. We have worked with Barbara to create a new colorway that celebrates these women dyers. We have been shipping it to yarn stores during the past month. The colorway is called "Spring Eclipse". Some stores already have it in stock. If your local store doesn't have it yet have them give us a call. We are offering it in all of our yarn styles and also in our Targhee Top.



Won't it be fun to knit a project in Spring Eclipse while you are reading the book that inspired the color?!!

Happy knitting!

New Colorway inspired by New Book

We are so excited!! Barbara Delinsky, the well known novelist, has a new book called Not My Daughter coming out Jan 5, 2010. In conjunction with this book we have designed a new Colorway called Spring Eclipse. We have been working with her publicists at Doubleday to make special tags that talk about the book and the yarn. It is such an honor to participate in this project with Barbara!!

The main character in this new book has a hand dyed yarn business with her friends. That is not the main storyline but we were excited about it anyway!! And all the ladies in this fictitious business are knitters. How fun is that??? If you are interested in reading more of what Barbara wrote see her blog post dated October 5, 2009. www.barbaradelinsky.com/blog




Here is how Barbara described this colorway when she first saw it, "Flares of fuschsia, copper and plum in the shadow of a sapphire night, forest green and teal."

Spring Eclipse is available in all of our yarns. If you would like to order this exciting new colorway contact your local yarn store and ask them about it. If they haven't heard about it yet have them contact us. We are going to start dyeing soon. Then you can knit Spring Eclipse and read Not My Daughter at the same time!!

Sally Melville's Faux Fur Hat

Sally Melville is such an amazing knitter. She always has a new, clever idea. This time she came up with a technique she calls knit-weave and to demonstrate this technique she designed a hat!!

Won't this hat make a great winter accessory? I just read that the Farmer's Almanac is predicting a very cold, stormy winter. Why not knit one for yourself or someone on your gift list so you are ready when the temperature starts dropping!! You need 1 skein of Mountain Colors Moguls and 1 skein of Mountain Colors 3-ply wool. They can be in the same colorway or in two different colorways.

And the BEST part is the hat is completely reversible. Sally asks that you please where the hat straight across the forehead at about your eyebrows!

Happy knitting!

Portland Rose Bearfoot NOW available

Portland Rose Bearfoot was the Mountain Colors entry into the Sock Summit/Ravelry Dye for Glory contest. It was very well received in Portland at Sock Summit and now all of you who couldn't attend that show can order some too!

The color comes only in Bearfoot yarn and we welcome special orders through any of the Special Orders shops listed on our website. Or contact your local yarn store and have them order some! It is great for socks, sweaters (held singly or doubled), baby clothes, etc. Don't miss out on this fun new colorway!

Have a wonderful August and happy knitting!!

Sock Summit/Ravelry Dye for Glory contest

Portland Rose

This is our entry into the dyed sock yarn contest being held right now on Ravelry. The voting is open and our yarn is in the Painted category. If you are a member of Ravelry you can go there now to vote. www.ravelry.com/socksummit The yarn will be for sale at Sock Summit in several different booths and later in August it will be available to everyone!

We called the yarn Portland Rose as it is inspired by the many rose gardens of Portland. This is also where Sock Summit is being held in early August.

We hope everyone is having a great summer!

Leslie & Diana

We are back from TNNA

We are home from the trade show in Columbus, OH. Whew. That is always a busy 5 days of travel, setting up a 40 foot booth, visiting with shop owners, designers, publishers, booth tear down and wonderful dinners in nice restaurants! It is great to be home.

We introduced a new design that was VERY well received. It's the Sock Stash Hoodie. It uses two strands of sock yarn...one of Mountain Colors Bearfoot in the main color and then 1 to 4 different colors of sock yarn from your stash. It has cute cabled ribbing and zips up the front. Be sure to check it out.

Our new colorways were also well received. These newest colors are:

Peppergrass-Teals, Peacock, Deep blue and a splash of Lime green

Indian Paintbrush (new retro)-Orangey red, pinkish red, true red and a dash of dark purple..not sure why picture is so small

Heather-Subtle blend of Mauve, Plum, & Chocolate

Cedar-Chocolate browns, Raspberry, Burgundy and Teal

Copper Mountain-Copper with Violet, Blue, Teal and Raspberry

New River Twist colors:
Bear Creek : Chocolate with touches of Copper, Teal & Rose
Canyon Ferry : Fun mix of Navy, Marigold, Violet, Raspberry & Teal
Rosebud River : Rich blend of Sienna Reds, Copper, Dusty Green and Plum
Salmon Falls : Subtle blend of Plums, Rose, Mauve & Chocolate
Sundance Springs: Wild blend of Yellow, Lime Green, Purple, Blue and Pink

Check out these latest additions on our website!

Happy knitting to all!!

Leslie & Diana

Trendy Triangle Shawl

We are off to TNNA on June 11 and hope to see many of the shop owners who are attending. We are excited to show them our new colors, designs, etc. This past week we have been busy packing and shipping the contents of our booths and trying to get some last minute dyeing finished before we leave.

One of our sales reps, Andra Asars, has a beautiful and VERY popular triangular shawl design using one 12 oz hank of our Wool Crepe. It is called the Trendy Triangle Shawl and can be found at www.andra-asars.com then click on For Knitters. After that go to Free Patterns. She is letting us borrow the shawl for our TNNA booth. It is so simple to make but in the Wool Crepe the finished shawl has such a nice drape. A smaller version can be made with one Half Crepe. Check it out!!!

Happy knitting to all!!

Leslie & Diana

Bearfoot Now in Pastels!!

We ARE listening!! After a large number of requests and much discussion about dyeing techniques we have decided to offer our Bearfoot yarn in ALL of our colorways, including pastels. In the past we did not offer this yarn in the lighter colors as there is a marbled/frosted effect with lighter colors. Knitters have told us they don't mind these lighter highlights so....effective immediately these yarns are available. Keep in mind that our Bearfoot yarn takes the color a bit darker than any of the other yarns we have so our pastel Bearfoot is lighter than our other colors but it is not extremely pale!!

It may take your local shops awhile to get the colors in stock so if you contact your shop for a Special Order don't forget to mention you read this NEW information in our blog!! We don't mind Special orders and we can fill your special order quickly!! We can then send the yarn to your local shop or drop ship it to you if the store isn't nearby.

The lady who knit the socks in the photo above said these were the "most beautiful socks" she has ever knit!! Wow. That was sure nice to hear! We hope you will love this yarn as much as she did!

Happy knitting,
Leslie & Diana

Spring Cardigan

Have you seen our new Spring Cardigan?? It is knit with our Silk 'n Ewe yarn and we have been shipping the yarn and pattern to many yarn stores recently. If you don't see it in your local shop, you might ask them to place a special order for you!! It only takes 4 skeins of yarn and is light weight and perfect...for SPRING or cool summer evenings. Silk 'n Ewe comes in all of our colorways!!

Kristin's Sad Knitting Tale

Kristin is a gal in our building who is a new knitter. She runs a daycare and during her lunch break she runs over for help with her projects. Several weeks ago she decided to knit a baby blanket for a future niece/nephew who is due to arrive in late April. All was going well...she had finished knitting the first ball of yarn. And then she went to the car wash. Not just any car wash. It was one of those "fancy" ones where the people actually wipe down your car and open the door to wipe off the door jam.

You guessed it. The blanket fell out of the car, unnoticed by the car wash guy and unnoticed by Kristin. A mile later Kristin arrived at her next stop and realized that her blanket had unraveled/dragged as she drove down the road. She didn't lose her needles but the blanket was just about all gone and what remained was not worth saving. She was so depressed about the whole thing that it has taken several weeks for her to start a new blanket. Today she came over and cast on for her new blanket. It may not be ready for the newborn baby but hopefully she will finish it before that baby graduates from high school!!!

As fellow knitters we were all so sad to hear Kristin's tale of woe. And next time I go to a car wash I am going to be sure and keep track of my knitting!!

Baby Knitting

There is nothing more quick and satisfying than baby knitting. Every time I have baby knitting to do I am tempted to make at least 6 sets of booties or 3 hats or 2 sweaters....you get the idea. It's hard to stop!! Someday I hope to have grandkids and then I won't have to stop!! For now a cousin's son and his wife have a new baby and I have finished 3 sets of booties and 1 hat. Maybe next Fall when the little girl is older I will make her a sweater (or 2).

If you like to knit for babies and young toddlers watch for our newest Back To Basics patterns coming out this summer. There will be three really cute designs.

Stitches West 2009

Stitches West was huge. There were a LOT of people in the market place where we had our Sponsor Booth. Saturday was the busiest day...probably because a train full on knitters arrived from Sacramento at the same time 2 buses full of knitters arrived from somewhere else in the area. Whew.



We had a small booth in the Sponsors aisle and it was packed with folks checking out all the colorways, etc. No yarn store could possibly stock all colors so we had a display where folks could write down their favorites for shopping later. Everyone seemed to be having a wonderful time and we especially appreciated all the folks who brought in projects they had knit with our yarn. I love "Show & Tell".

Every time we go to a show I try to learn something new. We couldn't take classes because we were in the booth but I did manage to learn about knitting back backwards. It has always intrigued me and now I will have to practice to make sure I can really do it later.

For those who stopped by to say Hi we really appreciate it. And for all those newer knitters who made the effort to attend the show...keep on knitting!!

Now we are home dyeing yarn and planning all of our new colorways, designs, etc for the next Trade Show. If you are in Western Montana be sure to come see us!

Sock Contest Winners

We have returned home from Stitches West and wanted to congratulate the winners of the Mountain Colors categories in the Knit Outside the Sox contest.

In the Cuff Down category the winner was Terri Gogolin from Michigan (photo is sort of dark):


And in the Not Cuff Down category the winner is Nancy Hazen from Washington:


There were LOTS of beautiful entries and the judging was difficult. Everyone had beautiful socks and we were thrilled to see the quality of the work. I got to try on some of the socks to see how they looked on a foot. That helped us look at the patterning, shaping, style, etc. It was great fun.

Congratulations to all who participated!! We wish everyone could be a prize winner! Keep on knitting those great designs!

We're headed to Stitches West...

We are busy packing our suitcases in preparation for our trip to Stitches West. We leave Montana bright and early Wednesday morning. Mountain Colors is one of the sponsors for the "Think Outside the Sox" contest. We will be judging the socks entered in the Mountain Colors categories and will have a display booth so folks can see our yarns, models, etc.

If you are going to be attending Stitches West in the Santa Clara convention center be sure to stop by and say Hi!! We look forward to visiting with all of you and I personally enjoy seeing what everyone is wearing. Some of the knitwear that folks wear is amazing. Last year I met a very precocious ten year old knitter who wasn't sure why she couldn't use her Mom's credit card to buy more yarn!!! Wow.

Of course I will have to do some shopping while I'm at the show. It is so nice to be able to touch yarns and see knitting related products that I've read about online.

I have my airplane/airport knitting all set to go. For me that is the most important item to pack for any trip. I started a sweater using our 4/8's Wool in Harmony Mist and I am really enjoying the project.


I want to read up on short row shaping for the shoulders before we leave as I really prefer that effect rather than the stairstep look of casting off at the shoulders.

Happy knitting to all and I hope to see some of you this weekend!!

Newest Harmony Colors and Silk n' Ewe Yarn!!

I was gently reminded that I forgot to post the photos of our newest colorways and our recently added yarn style. I'm so glad I received the reminder as I had completely forgotten!! So here are some photos of the colorways!! We call them Harmony Colors. They are all tone on tone and have only subtle color variation within a skein. All of the colorways come in almost all of our yarns (except Cashmere, River Twist and Winter Lace). Harmony Mist also does NOT come in Bearfoot and Twizzle.


Harmony Woods--from plum to coppery brown

Harmony Rose--from rose to cranberry

Harmony Mist--from wintergreen to soft bluegreen

Harmony Lake--from dusty turquoise to peacock

Harmony Iris--from purple to deep blue

Our newest style of yarn we are calling Silk n' Ewe. It is 50% Raw Silk and 50% Wool. It is very light weight and feels like raw silk when knit up. It will make wonderful Spring sweaters or non-fuzzy sweaters for those who like that look. It is coming in 250 yd/75gm skeins. Look for this yarn in any store that carries our yarn. If they don't have it ask them about it!! Silk n' Ewe comes in all of our colorways.


We hope you like these new additions. Diana loves the Harmony Rose and has made herself a Lace Vest in 4/8's Wool. I also used 4/8's Wool to make a Now & Then Cozy Vest in Harmony Lake. Both turned out great. Now I am working on a simple scarf in Silk n' Ewe. It will be nice to wear when it is a bit chilly but not frigid cold outside.

Happy knitting!!!

Planning My Next Project

Well somehow January came and went before I was ready for February. We have had a very snowy winter this year and I think my focus was on that instead of days of the month. I even scheduled a Saturday to help teach two friends to knit...but I had the wrong weekend in my head. Sigh. The knitters get together did happen and the ladies are progressing nicely.

But now it's time for ME. I want to start planning my next sweater. I want to use Mountain Colors 4/8's Wool. I still haven't picked a color and I still haven't decided for sure on a pattern but I decided today that I really needed to do a good gauge swatch. You ALL knit swatches don't you!!?? For what ever reason I knit very loosely. I almost always have to go down at least one or two needle sizes when following a published pattern. No big deal once I am knitting BUT how do I know what size needle to use to make sure I get the CORRECT gauge? You guessed it...I knit a swatch.

At some point in the past I learned a handy way to keep track of what needles I have used to knit a given swatch. So I thought I would share this tip with all of you. As you can see in the photo I put holes in each section of this swatch. When I use size 5 needles I make 5 holes; size 6 needles I do 6 holes, etc. To make these holes I just do a YO (yarnover), K2tog for each hole. I find this method very handy and much easier than finding a tag somewhere in the house and attaching that with string.



After I knit my swatch I treat it like I would the finished garment. Then I measure over 4 inches and divide the result by 4 to get my stitches per inch. My results on this 4/8's swatch were:
Needles: 5 Measurement over 4": 20.5 sts= 5.1 sts/inch
Needles: 6 Measurement over 4": 19 sts= 4.75 sts/inch
Needles: 7 Measurement over 4": 18 sts= 4.5 sts/inch

One of the gals who works for Mountain Colors is a very tight knitter. For her to get a gauge of 4.75 sts/in she would have to use a size 8 needle. Everyone is different and everyone knits a slightly different way....that's why the swatching is critical to the success of your project. I recently ripped out a sweater that was going to be 8" too big because my gauge was completely different in garter st than it was in the stitch pattern I was using. So if you plan on using a stitch pattern be sure to check that gauge too!!

I'm off to start browsing the patterns. I might try something with cables as I really want to improve that area of my knitting skills. What do you have planned? Be sure to do that swatch!!!