grouchychris did the grand tour of North Seattle my-favorite-kind-of-toy-stores. What did I come home with? Yarn!!It had been a long time since I'd been there (at least three or four years) and I discovered that in the interim they have added an entire wall of yarns and knitting needles (all circular that I noticed, but I was entirely distracted by the yarn itself). Really high quality, lovely stuff. Most of it was unusual - the sort of thing that I believe gets called 'novelty' but that's kind of a dumb adjective IMuHO. Ribbon yarn, eyelash yarn, amazingly fine kid mohair yarn, kits to make ribbon/lambs-wool scarves... and there was a sale bin with a number of skeins at half-off or so.
So I came home with about ten balls of various mohair, lambs-wool and cotton yarns from France and Italy. You Have Been Warned. *grin*
Funny thing to me is, I can usually resist even the siren call of SALE! in a 'regular' yarn store. So, clearly the way to my heart & pocket book is link yourself with science. In particular, be a local small business about science. (And yes, I'd also made purchases at Science, Art and More earlier, so we did spread the wealth, such as it was.) If this is a season you give people things, and you are giving tangibles, you might consider looking their way. Both shops have programs where they will pass along portions of their proceeds to local schools, either by way of merchandise or cash, so any gifts gotten from them will be extra-gifty, even.
