As the name implies, Your Daily Fiber is the local yarn store with personality, humor and fiber fun.
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We are happy to share our story.
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Your Daily Fiber is truly a family owned and operated small business.
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The owners of Your Daily Fiber are Darrell and Elaine and their daughter, Ivy. Darrell is a 3rd generation Fort Collins, Colorado native. (Darrell’s maternal great-grandfather has a street named after him in Fort Collins. No other yarn store can boast about that.) Elaine is not so fortunate. Elaine was born on an army base in Germany. She came to Fort Collins, by way of Hammond, Indiana (Chicago) as a child. (Please don’t hold that against her. Elaine feels bad because nothing was named after her great-grandfather.) Darrell and Elaine met in high school. Ivy, well, she came along later.
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If you think that opposites DON’T attract, you have not met Darrell and Elaine. Elaine introduced Darrell to the fiber world (with both of them kicking and screaming) while Elaine was studying the fiber arts in college. Darrell was not fond of clothing that was not cotton or Gore-tex.
Time went by. Elaine knitted at sporting events, watching television and at movies. (A person needs to be a pretty good knitter to knit at a movie in the dark.) When Elaine’s favorite yarn store in Fort Collins closed due to the retirement of the owners, Darrell asked Elaine to consider purchasing the soon to be closing store. Elaine considered the purchase, for about 15 seconds. There was no way Elaine was going to own a yarn store. At this time, Ivy was just finishing Kindergarten and did not have a strong opinion about buying the store. Darrell was out voted.
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Let’s fast-forward past a bunch of Little League baseball games, school plays and a few years of ups and downs, the building of a goat llama, and yak ranch. All while Elaine was working for an electrical engineering firm, Darrell was working on a career in construction in 25(+) states. Ivy was frolicking around being Ivy. Elaine’s knitted projects started attracting attention around art shows and magazines.
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Elaine started selling her artwear (At the time, Darrell didn’t know what artwear was, he thought artwear was knitted stuff.) at trade shows. Darrell went along to the trade shows to carry heavy stuff. Ivy went to the trade shows because she was just a kid and she thought she was on vacation.
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After fifteen years of traveling to trade shows, Darrell came up with a brilliant idea. “Let’s have the customers come to us! We can call ourselves Your Daily Fiber and sell your garments and yarn in a brick and mortar building; just like when I asked you to do 25 years ago.”
Your Daily Fiber opened in the fall of 2009. It didn’t take long for Your Daily Fiber to become the “Goldilocks” of brick and mortar yarn stores. The first location was “too small”. The second location was “too old”. The next (and current) location was “just right”.
Let’s meet them
Elaine- Wife, Mother, Electrical engineering designer, Fiber artist (Knitter, Weaver, Spinner)
Taught to knit at an early age, (age 4) Elaine quickly decided following patterns were not the kind of knitting she was interested in. Elaine liked knitting without patterns and designing her own stuff. With the help of her teacher (sister), Elaine learned to follow patterns and disliked every minute of it.
Unlike most kids, who would have just quit knitting, Elaine secretly started “tweaking” the patterns. Throughout her early years, she continued changing patterns and sketching “stuff” to knit, continuing right through high school.
With a (lukewarm) desire to teach middle-school art (And a music scholarship, please don’t make fun of her, but Elaine played the cello) Elaine enrolled in the Art Dept. at Colorado State University. At CSU, Elaine worked towards a BA with a concentration in education and fiber arts.
While at CSU, Elaine developed an interest in weaving techniques from a distinguished professor who hung toilet paper from the ceiling and called it “art”. Elaine who couldn’t process that hanging toilet paper was “art”, received her degree and started searching for another career.
Landing in a career of architecture, landscaping architecture, electrical engineering, (somehow that all ties together) Elaine could not get fiber arts out of her heart. Weaving (knitting and spinning) became her passion.
Her passion was not without its own rewards. Elaine’s weavings and knitted art pieces have been featured in magazines and art shows in Japan, Australia, Taos, New Mexico and Jackson, Wyoming. Her husband’s favorite of Elaine’s accomplishments was the handknit cardigan she traded to the local orthodontist for two (not one) of their children’s braces. (How many artists can say that?)
Check out Elaine’s award winning woven and knitted art wear in the store.
Ivy- Pattern Designer, Master Knitter, Knitting instructor, Crochet instructor, Store manager, Daughter
Ivy, like her mother was taught to knit at an early age. Where she differed from her mother, Ivy hated knitting. Knitting was for "nerds". Ivy spent her childhood chasing butterflies. throwing rocks, (she blamed the other girl) and tackling her brother. Kid stuff; but not knitting.
As a teenager, Ivy (always independent) went to work at a large grocery store chain. Climbing that ladder was not anything Ivy saw herself doing. She soon found herself working at a dude ranch during the summer months and attending business classes during the winter months.
After one summer of working at the dude ranch, Ivy was "promoted" to Head Kid's Counselor at the dude ranch. She loved it! However. life has its obstacles and Ivy found herself working as a nanny at a home deep in the Colorado Mountains. Working as a mountain nanny, Ivy didn't actually ward off any mountain lion attacks, but she did carry a gun.
Ivy continued her business classes and decided to move on. Ivy reluctantly listened to an offer from her parents to manage Your Daily Fiber. After all, she had only recently started knitting again.
Ivy attacked Your Daily Fiber and the fiber arts like she has done everything else in her life, she was all in. Ivy earned her Master Knitter Level I certificate in 2016. Her knitted lace shawl won Ivy, Grand Champion in all Fiber Divisions at the Larimer County Fair. Also in 2016, Ivy won 1st place in a design competition, sponsored by Skacel Yarns for her knitted necklace design. Ivy uses her experience as Kid's Counselor to teach fiber arts. She can do it all!
Darrell- Non-Knitter, Non-Spinner, Non-Weaver, Yarn Dyer, Husband, Father and Story Writer
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It is hard to determine what exactly Darrell's position is at Your Daily Fiber. He has no great talent working with the fiber arts.
Darrell's responsibilities at Your Daily Fiber amount to the jobs no one else wanted to do. Darrell became the store's yarn dyer because Elaine's favorite color resembled "dirt". Colors like terracotta, brown, browner and brownest were what Elaine liked best. Darrell quickly saw the need for purple, pink, blue, green colored yarn. He took over the dyeing of yarns for the store. Amazingly, people seemed to like his colors.
Putting her business knowledge to work Ivy decided the store needed a website and a blog. Ivy informed Darrell that since he had the least responsibilities in the store, maybe he could write a blog. Darrell was not sure this was something he could do, as he did not even know what a blog was.
Ivy explained that Darrell should write "stories" about happenings in the store, family recipes, yarn and stuff. Fortunately, Darrell believes no one wants to read about any of that.
Please check out his stories/blog on our website.
Girl Twin and Boy Twin- Knitters, Spinners, Athletes, Granddaughter and Grandson, Niece and Nephew
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Like everyone in the family, except Darrell, the twins were taught to knit at an early age. Just like their aunt, Ivy, they decided knitting was for other people and not them. Their interest in spinning lasted about a week. However, they are proficient in both knitting, spinning and even weaving.