My husband and I recently spent a couple of weeks in Western North Carolina. I’m happy to say that all seems to be open and ready for visitors after Hurricane Helene went through 8 months ago. Locals told me stories of 3 ft of mud, the riverfront area shops underwater to the roof. But also the amazing spirit of the locals helping each other and the towns to re-open for business.

In my travels, I always look for yarn shops. This visit, I found the Maggie Valley Yarn Shop had only been open for 2 years by Cindy. (My last visit, the shop didn’t exist.) Cindy has her dream job after working in corporate HR for many years. The shop is a former bank, hard to believe because it’s so small for a bank, but perfect for a yarn shop. Maggie Valley Yarn has a great selection of yarns, both weights and brands, and a terrific selection of notions, too.

Maggie Valley Yarn offers basic learning classes, CAL, and KAL. A trip to Rhinebeck has the shop buzzing. Maggie Valley Yarn participates in the Western NC Yarn Crawl and the NC Mountains to Sea tour. I always inquire about local yarns and locally dyed yarns when traveling. Here, I purchased Wooltribe Yarn in Homegrown Sport, a color dyed exclusively for Maggie Valley Yarn in Mountain Magic. I immediately created the Maggie Valley Hat that will be released in September or October of this year.

I’ve been in many shops over the years, large and small, and the best way to describe Maggie Valley Yarn is a combination of the show “Cheers”, where everyone knows your name or soon will, and Debbie Macomber’s book series Shop on Blossom Street, centered around a yarn shop in Seattle. During my 12-day stay, I visited the shop three times and met many locals and visitors to the area. During Hurricane Helene, Maggie Valley Yarn did not lose power and was very lucky to have survived the storm. Cindy opened the shop for anyone who needs to charge phones and electronics, someone to talk to, or maybe justsit with friends.

One of the shop employees, Jess, picked up crochet and was wearing this beautiful Granny maxi sweater, lol, she’s still working on weaving the ends in.

If you find yourself in the Maggie Valley/Waynesville area of WNC, stop in, the shop is on Hwy 19/Dellwood Ave in Maggie Valley. I will definitely be back, maybe next summer to escape the Florida heat.

Follow Maggie Valley Yarn on Facebook, Instagram, and her website.