Crawling for Yarn

I've been taking a brief break from knitting through the Knitter's Almanac to work on a different project that I want to finish in time for the third annual Garden State Yarn Crawl, which will be the weekend of April 20 this year.  I've participated in the yarn crawl the last two years and enjoyed it immensely.  A yarn crawl, in case you're wondering, is pretty much what it sounds like: Crafters travel from yarn store to yarn store (around 15 total) to participate in events, enter raffles, and learn about the stores in their area.  During the first yarn crawl, I learned of a unique store near me that combined yarn and pottery, and shortly after I started taking pottery lessons there.  Sadly, the owner sold the store, and the new owners dropped the pottery portion of the store, so no more pottery lessons for me.  On the second crawl, I was introduced to a brand new store very close to me, that I liked much better than the other nearby store I knew of.  It is now my official "lys", or local yarn store.  This year, there are a number of new and different stores on the crawl and I'm looking forward to exploring them.  Although, confession time: I order most of my yarn on line from Knit Picks, since I'm on a budget and their yarn is usually much cheaper than yarn from a retail store.  I'm not getting the gorgeous colors and amazing yarns that I might at a brick and mortar store, but I spend less, so it's worth the sacrifice to me.

On the first crawl, I was unprepared for visiting so many yarn stores.  I was in the middle of several projects for which I already had yarn and needles, and I had not given much thought to future projects and the yarn I might need for them.  I felt a little guilty visiting so many beautiful yarn stores and not purchasing anything.  So, the second year, I made a plan.  I had seen a pattern for a poncho knit in a variety of novelty yarns, and had been contemplating making something similar.  I decided to purchase a single skein of novelty yarn at each store on the crawl and use them to knit a "yarn crawl poncho". 

Yarn Crawl Poncho

The poncho was a pretty simple project, that took me only a few weeks, despite the size.  I didn't like the original pattern that inspired the project, so I just created my own pattern using techniques I've picked up along the way, some from the Knitter's Almanac project.  I'm somewhat unsure how to credit this creation.  On the one hand it was very clearly inspired by an existing published pattern.  On the other, the construction, yarn selection, and design of this particular poncho are my own.  Even when following a pattern, most knitters make changes to the pattern as written, substituting yarn, perhaps adjusting needle size to meet the gauge, or altering the gauge to fit better.  At what point do these changes become a unique pattern separate from the original?

I'm still trying to think what I might do this year.  I definitely feel like I want to support the participating stores, but I certainly don't want to do another poncho.  I'm pleased with the way this one turned out, but I had forgotten how annoying ponchos were for doing anything in.  I'm all set with yarn for the rest of the Knitter's Almanac projects, so I would be buying yarn for a project or projects that probably won't be knit for at least a year.  I had thought maybe of enhancing my needle selection, but needle prices vary pretty greatly from store to store and I'd feel like I was over paying if I bought one set at one store for $4 and another at another store for $10.  Any suggestions?