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Sat 11am - 4pm

First Sun 12 - 4pm

Sun/Mon - Closed

 

 

March 5

I keep intending to send a newsletter at least once a month and clearly I'm behind. At least it's not quite the end of February. We've been deluged with rain as you probably have heard. Fortunately we've not had any serious flooding in Alameda but lots of other areas have been very affected by it all. And we're not done yet. They still think we'll get more rainfall at least through March. The snow pack is doing great and with the storm a couple of days ago, they had wind gusts at the top of one of the ski resorts recorded at 199 mile per hour! Apparently the atmospheric rivers we've been getting also bring higher than normal winds - which we can attest to even at sea level. But rain is good and we're grateful for every drop - ok, maybe not every single drop...

 

 

If you've tried to view the website since Sunday you'll notice it's not available. The machine that hosts our e-mail and webserver got hacked so had to be taken offline. Fortunately it wasn't an ransomware attack but it was pervasive enough the machine had to be completely powered down. As we were planning to move everything to a new system in a few weeks, that plan got accelerated. We've got e-mail working again using Google Apps and anything that bounced after Sunday is coming in now. But it's going to be at least a couple of days before the website, which hosts the online catalog, is back up.

 

In the meantime, I've created a way for you to order the threads, fabrics, embellishments and some of the accessories off the the shop blog (needlestack.typepad.com). We have also set it up so that www.needlestack.com resolves to needlestack.typepad.com for informational purposes at least until we get it all fixed. None of the underlying pages from the website will work so if you have a link to say, www.needlestack.com/classes.html, it will time out. However, having the main domain page go to blog makes it more obvious that we've not floated away - just having machine issues.

 

I'll populate more catalog stuff on the blog pages today as a backup but you can always call us to order something. The backend cart system and the searchable databases live elsewhere so nothing to do with the payment system was located on the compromised machine. It's all hosted on the SparkPay servers (owned by Capital One).

 

We appreciate your patience while we get things back up and running in something resembling a normal fashion.

 

 

 

 

 

We order a few times a year from the US Distributor for Sajou and last year I picked up their silk and metallic threads as sample packs. This week I got spools of every color as we liked them a lot. The weight is similar to perle 12 in terms of diameter. Along with that I purchased some peacock scissors, cute little wood boxes that hold pins and needles, round tins that come with pins or a sewing kit and 2 drawer storage boxes (about 6.5x8.5in). I had been starting to add them to the online catalog when we had to take it offline so it'll be awhile before you can order them through the website. But you can give us a call or send us an e-mail if you're interested in any of them.

 

 

 

 

 

Next Thursday I fly to Nashville for the annual Counted Thread cash 'n carry show. It's where many of the designers and suppliers meet up to show us what's new. For me it's always the time I enjoy meeting up with lots of colleagues, especially my Needlework Mafia buddies (Jean, Jeannine and Deb) and Janice from Traditional Stitches. If you follow any of the designers blogs or newsletters you'll see there's a lot of new fun stuff coming. I barely had time to read them before our server issues but I'm hoping to get  a chance to peruse them before I get on a the plane. If you've seen something you need me to be sure to bring back, drop me an e-mail. Since space is limited to my luggage it helps a lot of I know what you want in advance.

 

 

Back to sorting out intermediate workarounds for the webserver issues. And then I have to rebuild it all when we get the new system set up enough that I can transfer the website files. The joys of technology - I think it's time for more tea!

 

Happy Stitching!

 

 

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We have two parking lots for the office complex. One is off Mariner Square Drive on the courtyard side of the building. The other is behind building #2417, which is next to us. There is no dedicated handicapped parking in either lot and the best place to park for a really flat surface is in the back lot and come in the Mariner Square Loop door. Yes, we are at the corner of Mariner Square Loop, Marina Village Parkway and Mariner Square Drive (go figure!). We keep both doors unlocked during store hours. There is no metered parking here to worry about - it's the two lots and plenty of street parking on Mariner Square Drive. Our complex sits directly on top of the Webster Tube so if you have trouble with your GPS finding us we're 1 block from the Target store (and not in the shopping center).