My first favorite is Noro Kureyon. I love this yarn so much that I had a long and drunken conversation about it with a random fellow knitter when I was at the 2006 Texas Renaissance Festival in the campgrounds. In 2007 she eventually remembered me. We camped near her and she was nice.

Kureyon is all wool and good for things like hats, scarves, hand warmers, and legwarmers. I have knitted all of these except legwarmers, which I am plotting as I write this. Why? because legwarmers are cool. Especially hand knitted ones. Some people knit vests and jackets and even blankets out of this beautiful yarn, but I can only buy a couple of skeins at a time. Here are some pictures of Kureyon in all its woolly goodness:

I wish I could buy bags and bags of it, but sadly, it is a bit on the pricey side. If anyone in a major city finds a pile of it for uber cheap (say 2-4 bucks per skein), buy it and I’ll pay you back. Even if it’s aqua and pink: someone will wear it.

My other favorite kind of yarn is self-striping sock yarn. I’m currently very happy with some Regia 4-ply sock yarn (75% wool, 25% Polyamide) that I picked up to make James some “Gentleman’s socks for evening wear” from the book Knitting Vintage Socks. Regia has several different hand painted color ways and it knits up very prettily. I will have to show pictures of my socks I knitted in similar yarn and also some Regia I bought for myself for Knitpicks‘ Two at once toe-up sock pattern. Some examples of Regia (I can’t show my own and my socks because I don’t have my own camera – James keeps it):

These yarns are so kickass. I have other yarns I like but it could be a long night if I listed them all. These were just on my mind tonight.