Getting yarn or knitting books in the mail, of course!
I've been getting rid of some of my knitting books and receiving yarn in return ... as well as some yarn from a dear friend who was buried under (and I'm always willing to help in similar situations -- I know, I'm a living saint!) ....
Anyway, the fun thing about getting bits of yarn from others is the ability to really go wild with designing. And earlier this week, I received the perfect book for knitting on the wild side: Anna Zilboorg's Magnificent Mittens and Socks . This book is wonderful -- fun to read and learn new techniques and the color combinations are spectacular! I like how she explains just how much yarn you'd need (like 50 yards of each or 10 yards of bits) .... which is great, especially for stash-busting knitting like I want to do. And I love the style of these mittens -- big cuffs that go over jackets to keep wrists and sleeves warm and dry.
Another great book for playing with "oddments" is Color by Kristin: How to Design Your Own Beautiful Knits
, by color-knitter extraordinaire, Kristin Nicholas. (For a full review of this book, click here.) Or how about some of the Fair Isle (including Alice Starmore's Book of Fair Isle Knitting 
or The Art of Fair Isle Knitting: History, Technique, Color and Pattern
by Ann Feitelson) or Norwegian books (Norwegian Handknits 
is gorgeous and I'm anxiously awaiting the publication of Lucinda Guy's newest, Northern Knits
) that are available now? Color-knitting is fun to play with yarns ... especially when you get them in trades or gifting from other knitters!
Mary C. Gildersleeve
By Hand, With Heart -- hand-knit designs
bhwh.mary@gmail.com
bhwh.mary@gmail.com
2 comments:
Hi Mary, I used a lot of that yarn to make crazy hats for a little holiday sale in the Fall. I was determined to use it up, but I found it doesn't take much yarn to knit up a striped child's hat and thus, I was left with a lot of bright colored yarn. Why are you sellling so many of your knitting books? Do you not reference them after a while? Are there knitting books that you would not part with? I'm trying to be careful about what knitting books I purchase. I bought Color By Kristin based upon your review. I'm interested in getting better at colorwork. Enjoy the yarn!
Actually I'm not selling many of my knitting books ... all the ones I'm selling have other's designs in them rather than technique books ... I have about 60 other books that I'll never part with ....
The ones I've gotten rid of are ones that I've bought on a whim and then found they were less than I was hoping for, y'know?
You'll love Color by Kristin ... she does a great job in there of encouraging creativity and imagination!
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