We did it! Blaine and I are married and it is great! The historic Hinton House (yarn warehouse) and orchard provided a fabulous setting.

One of my favorite times of the day was hiding in the Hinton House with my girls right before the ceremony. We posed for pictures, drank champagne and peeked out the big picture windows to see all the friends and family arriving. Sasha, one of my bridesmaids, even did a little yarn shopping, choosing some thank you gifts for her mother. One skein of Wild Iris and one skein of Charcoal Natural equal "thank you for watching my cat!"

There are hundreds of stories from the wedding, and not enough space to share them all here, but I have created an album on Facebook for those of you who would like to see more of the fun.

Keelia Carver

Hi everyone! In just under a week we will be headlining the evening of October 6th at Portland Fashion Week. (Pictured here Portland Fashion Week 2009.)

We are so excited! There are some pretty incredible players involved in Portland Fashion Week this year. Mitsubishi will be doing a green carpet (made from recycled plastic bottles) event just before our show where they will be launching their new electric car, the Mitsubishi I. How exciting! There is also sponsorship from some very exciting partners that we (I’m on the board of Portland Fashion Week) are so pleased to be working with such as Intel, SolarWorld   and Delta Airlines among others and of course, we have sponsorship from the lovely Iberdrola Renewables for Imperial Yarn’s show!

Since we are putting hand knitwear on the ready to wear runway, we have worked to figure out the best way to communicate this distinction and really add value to the experience. I am so pleased to have been able to work with my talented fiancé, Chris Pickolick, who has written and orchestrated original music for the show including a vocal piece that helps explain the connection across urban and rural, fashion and craft. He just finished the sound track for the upcoming film, “Ecstasy of Order” about world class Tetris players that will have its world premier at the Austin Film Festival at the end of the month. How exciting to work with him on this!

If you are local, make sure to watch for the front page of the Sunday Oregonian this week for a story on Portland Fashion Week for which I just had an interview yesterday. Also look for us in Willamette Week, Portland Monthly, TV news stations, radio and blogs – whoa! Pretty exciting. If you aren’t local, there will be plenty of photos and video to share afterward.

And of course, we’ll be having our Imperial Yarn trunk show on Saturday the 8th at Twisted. We anticipate a broad cross section of guests to attend this particular trunk show. Jeanne, Dan and I will be sharing a bit about our stories and our work, and we’ll be offering Oregon wine and chocolates for all! If you are in the area, don’t miss the chance to win great door prizes.

My warmest to all of you,

Anna Cohen

Subtitle: Sunflower Saga

Dear Friends,

I was reminded the other day, that I need to update the Imperial Stock Ranch website, as our oldest son Blaine is no longer a bachelor.  He and Keelia were married here at the ranch on September 3rd.  What a joyous occasion, and a great celebration.  We are all grateful that Keelia, who works full time with Imperial Yarn, is now officially part of the family.  Whew!  They left immediately on a three week honeymoon.  I’m sure it went by too quickly for them, but it sure seemed like a long honeymoon to us!  We’re glad to have them back and the team functioning smoothly again.

Keelia and I both love sunflowers, so last May, we planted four fence lines coming into the ranch headquarters, with giant sunflowers that would make a magnificent display for the wedding.  They were up and growing just fine, when the boys giving the white board fences a fresh coat of paint, coated them in paint and they all died.  So we got out there and planted again.  The little sunflower plants jumped right up and were growing strong, when one of the boys accidentally ran the lawn mower over them and so we started again.  Now I usually spend my time praising the boys, because they just get amazing things done around here, but we had some challenges this summer in our wedding preparations.  Everyone was being very cooperative by the time our sunflowers were up for the third time.  Unfortunately, we had a group of lambs living near the headquarters, and one night they got “out.”  Guess what they ate.  Yes – we did plant again.  I don’t give up easily.  But the weeks had flown by, and I knew most of them would never bloom before the big day.  I shared my frustration with an old family friend, and she suggested we put up silk ones on bamboo poles.  Wow!  What a great idea!  I would never have thought about fake ones.  Beautiful rows of giant sunflowers magically appeared about two days before the wedding.  I don’t think anyone even noticed they weren’t real.

Warm Regards,

Jeanne

We started our Retro Thrum Slipper Knit-A-Long on the Imperial Yarn Ravelry group on September 15.

Taking our time and going over the pattern step-by-step as a group has been so much fun. Watching everyone's progress, raising questions, sharing stories, following the tutorials and the sense of community with a group of people all over the world knitting the same thing has been a great experience.

It's not too late to join!  We start a new project on November 15, so you have plenty of time to catch up. The photo tutorials and comments will remain on our group's page. Join the group here and make your very own pair of these toasty slippers!

Don't forget that those who complete our 6 part, yearlong KAL have a chance at winning 6 hanks of Columbia Yarn in the color of their choice.
 

Knit on!

Tanis