Market Research (A.K.A. Momma gots herself some Mohair)

My trip to Guangzhou yesterday yielded a whole slew of new treasures, including 1 kg of these two beautifully coloured yarns made of mohair and cashmere. I used to have this wonderful mohair cardigan that I loved so much that I wore holes into the fabric. I ended up cutting the fabric of the cardigan and making some small sachels out of it, but I was so sad that I couldn't feel it's silky goodness against my skin anymore...

Normally, mohair is quite an expensive material to buy. Especially in North America where DIY crafting has led to a number of companies making copious amounts of cash on their "high quality" items targeted specifically at hobbyists. Well, if they're not getting it in China for a fraction of the price, I'll eat my hat. In fact, I'll eat my lime green mohair sweater that I am going to whip up when I return home. I have seen products "Made in Italy", "Made in France" and made in just about every corner of the world turning out of Chinese factories. The materials may come from another part of the world, but China is the world's assembly factory and I'm looking to pick up the run-off.

So, it's my new goal to use my Chinese connections to bring a small business back to my hometown. I want to provide affordable, quality materials to the people I craft with. I don't even need to make a monstrous profit like everyone else. Hell, it won't even be my day job!

I think it might work out, I just need to work at it.

In Other News...

I've been knitting my yoga mat bag like crazy. I've had to restart it about 4 times because I couldn't get the pattern right. Out of immense frustration, I finally went over every little detail, even rechecking how to do the different techniques. My universe almost exploding during this process, as I was struck by the fact that I've been performing yarn overs wrong for about a year. Everything clicked, every pattern that gave me difficulty and every stitch count that didn't add up. So I restarted for the last time, isolated a slight quirk in round 4 (one yarn over at the end is a tricky little devil), and everything has been going peachy. Now I just need to train myself to stop wasting time on the internet and learn how to read and knit at the same time. Learning how to read, knit and do yoga would make my life robotically efficient.

Anyone that interested in fine yarn from China, let me know. I can get wool, cotton, acrylic, mohair, angora rabbit, chenille, cashmere, and many more that I haven't researched yet.