Inspiring Places: Churchmouse Yarns & Teas

On a recent trip to Seattle, I discovered this beautiful shop called Churchmouse Yarns & Teas. As the name would imply, it's a yarn shop, but with the added lovely bonus of being a tea shop as well! How cute is that?!

Churchmouse is located on Bainbridge Island, just a scenic, half-hour ferry ride from Seattle. As is typical, it was an overcast, cold & drizzly day as my husband & I walked the charming main street, so this cheerful, glowing shop was a welcome sight. Near the front door is a cozy work space where you can take a class or simply grab a seat to try out your new yarn. Just beyond that is a magical land of knittiness with yarns of every type & color imaginable, plus all of the knitting books, needles and nifty little extras a knitter or crocheter could want!

One of my favorite things about the shop was the number of finished projects on display. There were so many amazing & beautiful handmade garments - many made from techniques I'd never even seen before!

I also loved all the little bowls of fancy buttons. I'm a sucker for organization, especially when it involves pretty little things like these buttons. Check out those teeny tiger faces! eek!

But perhaps the coolest part of this amazing knitty wonderland is the little tea shop in the back! Tons of teas, by the bag, tin, even loose tea by the pound, await to delight your senses. Of course they had dozens of cute teacups, teapots and all of the other accessories as well. Too bad we had only taken a day trip over to the island; I wanted to curl up with a cup of tea & stay forever!

E.A.S.T is here!

This weekend kicks off the amazing 9th annual East Austin Studio Tour! We're super excited to be listed as an exhibition space and on the map under E8. We'll be open this weekend and next with our button maker out for all you button fanatics!

We also are hosting two awesome events during the week that are listed under "furthermore" in the catalog.
The first is on Tuesday from 5:30-10pm called Eastside Knit Night & is going to be a gathering of all types of craft lovers! You'll be able to learn knitting or crochet, get FREE drinks (beer & liquor!) and see "Handmade Nation" documentary. Hosted with Yarn Harvest and goodie bags from Gauge Knits! Here is the blog post about it with more details.

The second is on Thursday from 5:30-9 called Mustache Mania. We'll be making mustaches on a stick, stenciling mustaches onto glassware & generally celebrating everyone's mustaches!! Most importantly its a "Movember" event where we're raising money for men's health issues, specifically benefiting LIVESTRONG and the Prostate Cancer Foundation.

Both are FREE events too! Hope to see you out during EAST!

The EAST website is really amazing this year, you gotta check it out!

Photo Essay: Scenes from a Make Day

Today all of us WonderCraft gals got together at Kim's for a crafty Make Day! We each worked on our own projects while catching up on what's going on in each other's lives... oh yeah, and watched some old episodes of "21 Jump Street." Good times, for sure!


Kim had a pretty plate full of Mexican pastries for us. So delicious.


I stuffed toys until my hands were tired.


Jen worked on some vinyl jewelry made from old records.


Beth A screen-printed tees to prep for a crafty bachelorette party we're throwing tomorrow night.


And Kim created some new looks with her stash of colorful beads & gold chain.

It's so much fun to get together to craft, and we all had a super-productive day! We're all working on some great new stuff for our upcoming events, so be sure to check the calendar on our website or follow us on facebook to find out what we're up to. Hope to see you soon!