or someplace else that doesn't specialize in knitting supplies. I buy a lot of my yarn online at http://www.knitting-warehouse.com or http://www.yarn.com

They have a decent selection of basic yarn at decent prices and the shipping is fairly fast and the rates are reasonable.

If I was looking for something really special, I would probably wait til I was near s yarn store so I could actually see/feel what I was buying.

She is ordering as I type. Last day of big sale today.

The knitters there often include recommendations for yarn, including websites that sell their recommended yarns. I also shop at Michaels and Joann Fabrics (but never, ever at Hobby Lobby!). I just wish we had a local, locally owned yarn shop. I would live there!

Looks good.

... where you can look up the yarn by brand and type, and read people's comments. It will let you know what issues people have had with it (is it thinner or thicker than the manufacturer specifies? ; does they dye bleed in the wash? ; do a lot of the skeins have knots in them?, etc.), and you can see what projects people have made with this yarn.

that you know exactly what you will be getting when you order on line. Or, if a trustworthy source of some kind recommends a specific yarn for a specific pattern.

As with any sort of on-line ordering, shipping costs can be all over the place. But well worth it if you are no where near a yarn shop that carries what you want.

All I can get in my local stores is acrylic junk, so I'm really glad I found an online source.

I buy yarn at two yarn stores, online, and from places like Stitches Midwest & Wisconsin Sheep & Wool Festival.

As far as online I buy from mostly from Webs, Jimmy Beans Wool, Wollmeise, and Paradise Fiber. As far as bare yarn for dyeing I buy from Wool2Dye4. Only once have I had a bad experience from ordering online and it wasn't the shop but the yarn. It was a Madeleine Tosh Lace and the color was completely different from the example on the website. As a result I never buy MadTosh online. Too many times the color is vastly different from the pictures.

Jimmy Beans has a wool watcher special that runs for two hours or until the yarn sells out...which ever comes first. They will also hold your yarn until Friday in case you buy more Wool watcher specials during the week. You can also build up loyalty points to use during future purchases. Shipping is $4.

Paradise Fibers also runs hourly specials, has loyalty points, and offers free shipping usually once a month.

Webs will never ship free but does a nice discount if you purchase over $60/ 20% off and $125/25% off. They have a good selection of yarn and a wicked 2 month sale that starts April 1st.

A good site to use to substitute various yarns is yarnsub.com

I've ordered from a bunch more, but these are the ones I felt comfortable recommending.

Any questions, please don't hesitate to PM me.

I used to be a avid knitter years ago when we lived in Alaska. There weren't many yarn stores up there in those days. I purchased all my yarn by mail. The last time I knit was about 15 years ago, made my grandson a sweater. A few years back, I was on a kick of felting old wool sweaters and making patchwork vests from the felted wool. I wanted to get a kind of crazy quilt look with embroidery on the vests, so I bought yarn at Micheals and Hobby lobby to use for the embroidery work. The yarn sold in these store is mostly acrylic, not wool and much of it is of inferior quality, it was okay for what I was doing..

I think if you are going to take the time to hand knit a sweater, you want to use high quality materials. Glad to know about the yarn sites. if decide to take up knitting again.

but when I first started, I bought my first sweater's yarn in a store. After that I bought online from Halcyon when I made orders for weaving supplies. I was open to the occasional find, like three pounds of Irish bainin in an obscure shop in Boston that usually didn't sell yarn .