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homesewn
The Weekly Letter
Monday, June 22, 2026
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New In✦Fabric✦Yarn✦Classes
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Hi friends,
It's Monday, the solstice was yesterday, and we're already losing daylight — so much for the longest day doing me any favors. I'm not going to make a whole thing of it. The evenings are still long, the light's still good past eight, and I've been eating cheap market fruit on the back step and getting about four rows into a sock before it's too dark to see. I could go in for a lamp. I don't.
Summer is a strange season to run a yarn shop. Half of you want a linen tank for next week; the other half are already plotting October sweaters. You're both right, and anyone who insists wool is strictly cold-weather has clearly never sat on a porch in June doing colorwork. More on that below.
Make something this week if you've got the time. If you don't, the fruit is right there and I won't tell anyone.
— Joey
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P.S. — yes, this is a new format. Links, sections, the works. If it's an improvement, tell us. If you miss the old one, also tell us. Just hit reply — we can take it. |
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It's official
We're open!
The doors are open at the corner of State & Olive in Media. It only took an absurd number of boxes. The lights are on, the kettle's on, and you really can't miss us — we're the corner with the big teal windows.
Two finishing touches landed last: the 14-foot community table — yes, fourteen feet, yes, that pink, and no, I won't be taking notes — built for classes, project nights, and anyone who just wants a chair and some company while they work. And the sign, which the good people at The Boonies bolted to the brick like it was nothing. Watching your own name go up over a door does something to you. The good kind of something.
Thanks to everyone who turned up while I was painting. My son Harry kept me company. Moose appeared with good advice and a few specialty supplies at exactly the right moment. And Hazel offered to help on the one day I'd run completely out of paint, so I had to turn her away — Hazel, I owe you one, and I haven't forgotten.
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 The storefront — State & Olive corner
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 The homesewn sign in pink
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 The Boonies installing the letters
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 The 14-ft pink community table
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What's On Our WIP List
Three makes we're eyeing this week — two you can wear now, one for somebody's baby.
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A tank you can actually wear before November
The Summer Breeze Tank Top from Purl Soho is free, with no waist shaping and no nonsense. Knit it in Sandnes Garn Duo, a cotton-merino blend that breathes like cotton without the part where pure cotton makes you itchy and irritable.Duo DK · from $10/skein
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A summer shawl you can knit on autopilot
Grain by Tin Can Knits is free, top-down, and forgiving enough to knit through a whole season of bad television. Use Knitting for Olive Merino on its own, or hold a strand of Soft Silk Mohair with it if you want the glow.KFO Merino · $11 | Soft Silk Mohair · $12
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A baby quilt, while it's still fast
Suzy Quilts' Summer Haze is a free baby quilt built on simple half-square triangles. We just got Suzy's own Picnic Wovens — soft yarn-dyed cotton in gingham, stripes, and birds — so the pairing basically picked itself.Picnic Wovens · from $4.50/quarter yard
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New In The Shop
Fresh off the cutting table, onto the shelf.
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 Pure Solid – Flamingo
from $2.50
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 Highlands Flannel – Toffee
from $3.50
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 Petite Plaid Quilt Pattern
$15
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 Eleganza 8wt Perle Cotton
$3
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 Picnic Wovens – Cardinal
$5
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 Picnic Wovens – Fruit Salad
$4.50
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Trending in the Maker World
Every June, same story: everyone suddenly wants something they can wear before fall. The shawls never actually leave Ravelry's Hot Right Now — fingering-weight triangles and crescents basically live there — but right now they're sharing the space with airy tanks and tees in lighter fibers.
Want in? Mandarin Petit (100% cotton fingering) is built for the breezy tanks; Knitting for Olive Merino is the shawl workhorse; and a strand of Soft Silk Mohair held alongside makes any of it look like you tried harder than you did.
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Friend of the Shop
Chelsea Martin's Saugerties Pullover
We are unreasonably excited about this one. The Saugerties Pullover is a steeked colorwork sweater — DK weight, XS through 5XL, $8 on Ravelry — with charts for sheep, bears, and fish, plus a guide to draw your own. It dropped the first days of July. And yes, "steeked" means you knit it in the round and then cut your knitting open with scissors, on purpose. It's a rite of passage. We'll talk you off the ledge.
Steeking wants non-superwash 100% wool at DK gauge so the cut edges felt and hold. The designer used Kelbourne Woolens Scout. Our closest in-stock match is Sandnes Garn Double Sunday — 100% non-superwash merino at DK — which will hold a steek. The honest caveat: merino is softer and slicker than a sturdier wool like Scout, so the cut edge grips a little less. If you want maximum hold for your first cut, come in and ask — we'll point you at the right wool and stand there while you do it. (Skip the superwash — Smart DK, 220 — it won't felt, and it will unravel.)
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A Few Things Bringing Us Joy
Watching · Love Island, and no, I won't be defending it. Some nights you want a knit that asks nothing of you and a show that asks even less. In June, that's just good sense.
Reading · The Little Bride by Anna Solomon — a young woman answers an ad and becomes a mail-order bride on the South Dakota frontier. As bleak as it sounds, and better than it has any right to be. It stuck with me.
Eating · Summer fruit, and that's the whole list. Berries, the first decent peaches, whatever's cheap and ripe and doesn't need a recipe. I eat it standing at the counter, over yogurt when I'm feeling fancy. Six good weeks — I plan to use all of them.
Doing a little good · The Media and Swarthmore farmers markets are running. Buying fruit from the person who grew it forty minutes away is the rare good deed that also tastes better. Bring a tote, skip the plastic.
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In the Background
I've had Dax Shepard's Armchair Expert on while I work. Long, rambling, and more honest than you'd expect — ideal for the kind of plain stockinette where your hands run themselves and your brain clocks out. Put on an episode, cast on something boring, lose an hour.
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Around Delco This Week
Media Farmers Market — Sundays, 10am–1pm, N. Edgmont St. Worth planning the weekend around. Go get your peaches.
Swarthmore Farmers Market — Saturdays, 9am–12pm, Borough parking lot. Nineteen-odd vendors and a dependable morning.
Media Arts Council Twilight Music Series — Friday, June 26, on the Community Center lawn. Free, outdoors, bring a chair.
Swarthmore Lions Independence Eve 8K & 2.5-mile Walk — Thursday, July 3, 7pm. Run it, walk it, or heckle gently from the curb with a cold drink.
Swarthmore Amped Up Concert Series — next up Thursday, July 16, at the Park Avenue amphitheater. A good excuse to sit outside with a project.
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That's the letter. Reply and tell me what you're casting on, or where the good peaches are — I read them all, eventually.
See you in the shop,
— Joey
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homesewn
Handmade, a little disorganized, and powered by far too much yarn.
homesewn · State & Olive St, Media, PA
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