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Good Knitting Books

  • Vogue Knitting Magazine Editors: Vogue Knitting

    Vogue Knitting Magazine Editors: Vogue Knitting
    Great all-around reference. Covers tons of knitting techniques, with step-by-step photos and illustrations. Includes a glossary of knitting terms and abbreviations used in patterns, which is a big help. (*****)

  • Montse Stanley: Knitter's Handbook

    Montse Stanley: Knitter's Handbook
    Dry reading, and almost too comprehensive and detailed — I definitely would have been put off if I had picked this up as a beginner. But where else can you find instructions for more than 30 different methods of casting on? (***)

  • Debbie Stoller: Stitch 'n Bitch: The Knitter's Handbook

    Debbie Stoller: Stitch 'n Bitch: The Knitter's Handbook
    Good beginner's book, with a range of projects to help you get started. Many patterns are geared toward the 20-something set, but others would work for any age. (****)

  • Debbie Stoller: Stitch 'n Bitch Nation

    Debbie Stoller: Stitch 'n Bitch Nation
    Debbie Stoller's second knitting book takes it to the next level, with advice on understanding knitting patterns and changing them to suit your size and style preferences. It also spotlights knitting community, with profiles of Stitch 'n' Bitches around the world and patterns and tips from knitters across the country — including Boston's own Stitch 'n' Bitchers Trinity Muller and Christine Quirion . (****)

  • Alice and Jade Starmore: The Children's Collection

    Alice and Jade Starmore: The Children's Collection
    Although it's out of print, it's worth tracking down a copy of this book of patterns for classic children's knits — or any of Alice Starmore's other books. Most of the patterns in this book feature Starmore's trademark Fair Isle and Aran styles. (****)

  • Vicki Square: The Knitter's Companion: Expanded and Updated (The Companion series)

    Vicki Square: The Knitter's Companion: Expanded and Updated (The Companion series)
    Handy reference of knitting techniques, sized to carry in your knitting bag. Also includes size charts, needle and swatch gauges, and lots more.

Good Knitting, Crochet, and Spinning Mags

  • Knitter's Review
    Includes reviews of yarns, books, knitting tools, discussion forums, etc.
  • Knitty

    A great, fun webzine with lots of how-to's and lots of free patterns for every skill level.
  • Rebecca
    Great magazine with fun, trendy patterns for GGH brand yarn. The web site usually offers a couple of free patterns from each issue. (The actual magazine is in German, but the U.S. version has the patterns translated into English. You can get it at many knitting stores.)
  • Crochet me
    Crochet Me
    This online magazine is sort of like the crochet equivalent of Knitty or MagKnits. It offers free patterns and articles. I'm kind of tired of seeing knitting sites and books described as "hip" and "modern," but those descriptions do fit.
  • Spin-Off
    Interweave Press's excellent spinning magazine.

Some P.C. Knitting Companies

  • Himalaya Yarn
    Small company offers mostly handspun and hand-dyed yarns made with recycled and/or Nepal-grown fibers. The company provides business opportunities for local people. For instance, its recycled silk yarn is handspun by women’s cooperatives and the profits support women’s shelters and programs.
  • Lantern Moon
    This company sells baskets, beautiful wooden knitting needles, and accessories like silk needle cases, hangers and measuring tapes, made by a Vietnamese women's cooperative.
  • Malabrigo Yarns
    Like Manos del Uruguay, this company works with a cooperative of women in Uruguay to make its yarns. It offers hand-dyed 100% merino worsted-weight wool. They are in the process of introducing two new lines: handpainted handspun Angora and handpainted variegated cotton. The company says new colors and yarns will be introduced all the time — you can subscribe to their mailing list to get the latest news.
  • Mango Moon
    Like Himalaya Yarns, Mango Moon offers yarns made in Nepal from recycled silk in order to provide income for women there.
  • Manos del Uruguay
    The web site says this yarn company was established “ … to give support to Uruguayan craftswomen … Its purpose was and is the economic, social and cultural development of its members and the environment in which they live.”
  • Peace Fleece
    Peace Fleece makes yarn from wool bought from Russian, Israeli, Palestinian, and American shepherds. Also sells wooden knitting needles with tops handpainted in Russia (very cute); needle cases (also v.c.); adorable learn-to-knit kits for kids; felting supplies; Russian drop spindles; unwashed fleece; and wooden buttons. Everything is reasonably priced.

Blogs and Web Sites Totally Unrelated to Knitting

Sea Colors Trunk Show

Got this info on a trunk show from Allison Nevitt, who owns the yarn store Circles in Jamaica Plain.

Sea Colors Trunk Show
Circles
555 Amory Street
Boston
This Friday, January 16th
4pm - 8pm

Come meet Nanney Kennedy, from Meadowcoft Farm, and her Sea Colors yarns that are sun dyed in seawater.

Ms. Kennedy will bring her unique, beautiful yarns and will share with us the fiber dynamics of running a small farmstead yarnery. This is a rare opportunity for urban folk to learn about the challenges of sustainable farming directly from a shepherdess.

Featured in The Boston Globe for her work as a conservationist of land and rural traditions, Nanney is the driving force behind the Maine Blanket. Be sure to ask her about this “heirloom for today, conserving Maine farms for tomorrow.”

But you have to be there to ask! So, please join us for this wool gathering at Circles. Snacks will be provided.

Circles is located at 555 Amory Street in Jamaica Plain between Green Street and Williams Street, in the parking lot closest to Green Street. Parking is free.

On public transportation take the Orange line to the Green Street station. Exit the building and go right on Amory Street. Walk to the entrance of the parking lot across the street.


LINKS

Meadowcroft Farm

Globe article on the Maine blanket

Maine Blanket

January 16, 2004 at 12:51 AM in Organic Farms and Fibers, Special Events, Stores | | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

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Other Knitting Blogs

  • 2Ktog

    Boston-area couple (and fellow attendees of the Somerville SnB) blogs their knitting adventures.
  • Cyborgoddess
    Local blogger and member of the “Knitting Bloggers” webring.
  • Grumperina

    "Neuroscientist by day, silliness embodied by night," Kathy writes about crafts, science, dreams, and life.
  • Kenneth's blog
    Local blogger on knitting plus Quakerism, religion, reading, houseplants, contra dancing, international folk dancing, GLBT issues.
  • Knitting Antiblog by Fallingblox

    Knitter/artist and True Grounds Stitch 'n' Bitcher Alasdair is always teaching himself with techniques.
  • Qblog
    Boston-area crafter Christine Q. on knitting, t-shirt making, books, occasionally politics, and random other stuff.
  • The Blue Blog

    Incredibly prolific knitter and Knitsmiths member chronicles her many projects, with photos galore.
  • True Grounds Stitch 'n' Bitch
    Group blog for the Somerville Stitch 'n' Bitch meeting collects posts from many of the group's members — including this blog and some of those listed above. Plus others as well.

Good Listening

Good Reads

  • Moonlight Chronicles
    Moonlight Chronicles
    Dan Price is a self-proclaimed “hobo artist” who, when he's not traveling, lives in a meadow in a hobbit-like, semi-underground studio he built. He writes and draws journals about his life, drawing, and the way we live, and mails them out (old-school style — no blog to be found here) to his subscribers.

    His journals can be thought-provoking, calming, inspirational, sometimes even irritating, but are pretty much always worth reading. Watch his interview on Oregon Public Broadcasting, try an issue of the Chronicles, or read one of his books.

Two Knitting Sites I Built

  • Mind's Eye Yarns

    Store in Porter Square, Cambridge, that sells knitting and spinning supplies—yarns (including some beautiful hand-dyed stuff), drop spindles, spinning wheels, unspun fleece—both dyed and undyed, and more.
  • Knit-Out & Crochet Boston 2002
    This event took place in Boston in October. But the site still has pertinent info on knitting resources in Mass. and on the web, plus pictures from the fashion show and info on the patterns and materials used.
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