I was leafing through the children’s section of my vintage pattern collection when I came acros this delightful how-to:

I know if I was a shut-in, I’d be tempted to flee my home when presented with this little guy:

Where did his torso go????

And if he wasn’t scary enough, the preface to the puppet section presents you with these options:

Not that Charlie the Tuna isn’t charming . . . but this just goes to prove my theory that clowns are evil and weird.  And if you look at the twins in the top right corner, imagine what you would have to do to your hands to get that effect. 

And, since Pack-o-Fun issued this second edition in 1967, the contents do not reflect our more modern view of racial, ethnic and cultural diversity.  To wit:

In case you can’t read the image text, the first paragraph reads:

“Embroider slanted eyes in black yarn, nose in brown and smiling mouth in red” 

I think I’ll stick to knitting socks, and hope that no-one is ever tempted to make a toy out of them.

In trolling the web, I discovered this article about a woman who knits with bear fur.  Yes, bear fur.  I wonder what that smells like when it gets wet?  

Bear fur is far from being commercially available, although there are other exotic fibres that are.  For example, this charming fellow:

is a musk ox, producer of perhaps the most luxurious (and expensive) fibre in the world, qiviut.  Softer, lighter and warmer than cashmere, qiviut is so expensive in part because the musk ox is too grumpy to be groomed.  In the shedding season, the oxen will rub up against trees, rocks, fences etc. to get rid of their warm undercoat–and that fibre is then hand-collected. 

Related to the musk ox is the devilishly dapper bison:

Apparently, his undercoat has similar properties to qiviut. 

Remember the camel-hair coats of yore?  They were made out of actual camel (at least the expensive ones were).  Sounds surprising, until you remember that camels are related to alpacas. 

I’m sure they clean the fibre before spinning it . . .

From the smaller, more marsupial world comes yarn spun from the possum.

Not the ooky North American possum, but the ones that come from Australia and New Zealand.  Apparently this little guy produces fur that spins and knits up with a soft halo, sort of like a merino/angora blend. 

All of these fibres are commercially available, even though we don’t stock them . . . yet!

I found this picture on the net a while back, and just resdiscovered it on my hard drive today.  I’m not sure what it was from, or where I found it, but here it is, for your viewing amusement:

Strange, isn’t it?

Hey people of Montréal! Are you a little tired of seeing this?

Metro strike gettin’ you down? Having a hard time getting around town? No worries!

Just head over to Ariadne for a little Metro Strike Yarn Therapy. We’re there for you after a long day of picket lines and overcrowded buses.
Easy to use, fast and secure. That’s what we are all about.

Why? Because we care. And we like to tempt you. But mostly because we care.