Sunday, February 22, 2009

Spring interweave knits and Best of the worsteds

Today I picked up my mail which included the spring Interweave knits magazine. I felt that the pages were printed on much lighter paper. Am I right? As for the patterns: There are a lot of cottons and that's great as it will help me to finish off more of my huge cotton stash. I have a lot of Tahki cotton classic so the scarf by Eunny Jang is calling. I did a shawl online by Susan Lawrence and I have the yarn called for to make the Fountain pen shawl. I have the Brown Sheep cotton fleece also (7 skeins) so the Jeff's pub sweater is another option although I'm a bit scared about sewing in a long zipper assuming I could even find one. The shawl by Norah Gaughan is worn as a skirt so I can't tell how it would look as a shawl so that's a no go for me. Omdahl has a shawl and it interests me although I have her book so probably will do something from her book before this one. I really am attracted to the scarf by Kenny Chua. I can't figure out what the yarn is. sport weight? dk? The tee by Teva Durham is quite attractive. The other items I find less interesting as they resemble so many others found in other places.

I also got the book "Best of the worsteds" edited by Bobbie Matela and published by House of White Birches. This is good again for my huge stash as I have so much yarn that knits to the gauge of 4.5 sts to the inch or thereabouts. All the patterns are easy ones and are designed by many designers new and old names to me. The patterns come with schematics which are useful just that way for me. There are 40 designs arranged by subject of baby stuff, gifts and wearables.
What I liked best are: most of the baby stuff many of which are done in cottons. The gifts section has something called shadow placemats which look great. A hat and scarf set in mitred squares. zigzag scarf, cabled hat and fingerless gloves. ribbed cap which is much more than just ribs. In the wearables, there's a nice bolero in a variegated yarn which I have (of course). A gorgeous cardi lace vest in cotton. knit from the top pullover with baby cables accenting the raglans. long vest in a rib pattern I did on the raglan sweater I'm working on now. Classic cables vest (which is why I bought the book in the first place). A very nice straight up vest in a cotton yarn (here I'm pleased to have the schematic). I like the diamond twist afghan and the modular one knit in pieces. There's a handy section at the back to help with knitting and crochet but since I didn't see anything in crochet, I'm not sure why they put it in. Those are the patterns I might do or use in some way. I also liked the editor's introduction in which she suggests you just go ahead and use up any yarn that fits the worsted weight label. Very nice book.

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