Not to be confused with Posh Yarn, who hand dye yarn, Posh Yarns is a blog filled with knitting and sewing, as well as gorgeous pictures of ordinary life and travels about the UK.
One of the things we love about knitting is that it helps us to find the beauty in the small details, and in making sure the small details are right – that every cable is correctly crossed, every yarn over in its place – we can make something small, special. Hand knit socks, for example, turn an ordinary part of getting dressed into something which always makes us smile.
Posh Yarns is packed with these small things, with well thought out sandwiches and hand-made clothes, and is an inspiring place to stop and rest your eyes for a few minutes, particularly if you're eating your own lunch at your desk again.
Of course, there's also rather a lot of knitting, with – of course – some posh and some definitely unsual yarns, making this a great place to pick up new ideas and perhaps inspire you to cast on a new project. And we wouldn't ever say that's a small thing, although life does keep trying to make it seem so!
Read a great blog? Write a great blog? Tell us what it is and why you like it, and you might see it here next Friday.
Thursday August 28, 2008
Rowan 30th Anniversary exhibition
Rowan is 30!
To celebrate, they've organised an exhibition of some of the iconic pieces which helped build the company we know and love today. It's a unique opportunity to see designs from past issues in real life – without knitting them yourself, that is!
The exhibition lauches tomorrow at the North Light Gallery in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire. Entry is free and you can visit the exhibition from 10-4 on Friday 29 and Saturday 30 August and Friday 12 and Saturday 13 September, after which, we've been told, it will be off on travels around the globe.
Weekend knitting workshop
Of course, the savvy folks at Rowan know knitters like to try the techniques they're being shown, so they've organised a great weekend workshop to celebrate.
As it's a special workshop, as well as making a bag or wall hanging to take home, participants will be invited to a private view of the exhibition and will have the chance to meet with knitwear designers – and perhaps even get an autograph or two!
The workshop will take place on Friday 5 - Sunday 7th September, at the North Lights Gallery. Contact Rowan for more information or to book a place, contact contact Katie Battey: email katie.battey@coats.com
or phone 01484 690823.
Wednesday August 27, 2008
Photograph your knitting: colour matters
Digital Camera magazine is running its Photographer of the Year competition and to help you get the most from your snaps, they've given us some great tips. We set Pete Gettins the challenge of seeing how well they worked on yarn.
Colour Matters
“Nothing comes close to the textile industry for the sheer range and inventiveness of its colour use,” says Pete. “Glancing through Miriam’s yarn stash throws up some interesting colour combinations. You can’t deny this shot has impact!”
Getting the colour right
Light is crucial here. Try to shoot in natural light, if possible.
If your camera has a light setting, use it. It will make shooting indoors a lot easier.
Take several shots in different lights – indoors, outdoors, lights on, lights off and see which one matches your yarn best.
Diffuse the light from a desk lamp by covering it with tracing or baking paper. Just make sure it doesn’t get too hot and start to burn!
Turn the flash off, it can make the yarn look strangely shiny and rather like all your luxury yarns are a nastier sort of acrylic!
Go macro and make the colour the main focus of your shot.
Monochrome
Even we struggle to get excited about grey, but nothing brings out texture like stripping the colour away. “This piece of a cable knit almost looks like volcanic rock,” says Pete.
Many
cameras will shoot in black and white and most photo editing software
will let you turn a shot into monochrome. Try it both ways and see
which one you prefer.
There’s a Black & White category for your monochrome shots, or if you’ve shot stunning colours, why not submit them to the Creative & Vision category? You could be the Photographer of the Year 2008!
Tuesday August 26, 2008
Mochimochi Land free pattern
Get your geek fix with Anna of Mochimochi Land's latest free pattern, Captain Capacitor. Cap'n Cap (as we can't help calling him in the office) is a knitted capacitor and Anna says he will soon be joined by a knitted resistor. They're awfully cute – I wonder if my dad would like knitted electronic components for Christmas? Beats cufflinks, don't you think?
Friday August 22, 2008
Monkee Maker
A few weeks ago we got an email from reader Emma Lamb. I'm soooooo pleased you're reviewing knitting blogs, she wrote. Little Cotton Rabbits and Black Dog Knits are two of my favourites, but there's one more... the Monkee Maker. I know she's taking a break but her archives are well worth a browse when you need a good laugh! Also if she gets plenty of hits she may come back to entertain us all...
Emma sent us a link to the Monkee Maker's old site, which is brilliant and very funny, so we were thrilled to see that the Monkee Maker has a new site and it's still just as funny and quirky. Thank you very much Emma, for letting us know about this blog! The photo stories about 007 and company are a really good pick-me-up when you're having a stressful day – although if your boss doesn't knit, you may have a bit more trouble explaining why you're laughing out loud! Monkee Maker is fast becoming a firm favourite in the Simply Knitting office, and we loved reading the latest about Pocket Monkee's adventures in Italy, as well as keeping up with the day-to-day goings on. We're rather jealous of the gorgeous weather there: we're certainly not having any!
Read a
great blog? Write a great blog? Tell us
what it is and why you like it, and you might see it here next
Friday.
Thursday August 21, 2008
Photograph your knitting: up close and personal
As we already mentionedDigital Camera magazine is running its Photographer of the Year competition and we thought we'd join in the fun and perhaps learn a bit more about photography while we were at it. We got some tips from the Digital Camera team, and set Pete Gettins, production editor Miriam's infamous husband the challenge of seeing how well they worked on yarn.
Macro – Up Close and Personal
“The closer the better as far as I’m concerned,” says Pete. “As long as it’s sharp and well lit you can get really nice pattern details without much effort.”
Top tips for close up shots:
Keep the camera absolutely still. Rest it on a table, a box or a chair if you haven’t got a tripod.
Even lighting is key. Shoot in natural daylight but out of direct sun, outside if possible or near a window.
Large sheets of white paper make a good backdrop.
If your camera has a “macro” mode (often symbolized by a flower), use it.
If the camera’s wobbling when you take a shot, use the timer so it snaps the picture once you’ve moved away.
Take lots of shots – some will come out better than others.
Change things around, try different back drops. Did you knit wristbands to wear at the gym? Why not shoot them with your trainers, or show your latest on-the-go sock on the bonnet of your car.
“One of my favourite techniques is reversing the lens,” explains Pete. “By turning it backwards the lens magnifies stuff to an extraordinary degree.”
“The great thing with this is that you don’t even need a clever camera to do it. All you need is a cheap second-hand lens that you can pick up for £10 or £20 and hold it backwards in front of your built-in lens. The only problem is that you can now focus only by moving the whole camera backwards and forwards.”
The Creative & Vision category is ideally suited to interesting close-ups. Have a go – you could be Photographer of the Year 2008!
Wednesday August 20, 2008
Saltaire Arts Trail knitted river
The
Saltaire Arts Trail takes place from 11-21 September, and this year
includes an ace knitted river. The Saltaire
knitted river. We mentioned the river in issue 43 of Simply
Knitting, when we featured the Saltaire Knitterati, the people behind
the river, as our club of the month. They mentioned at the time that
they could use a few extra hands to help the project come to fruition –
and of course, you turned out in force!
"Please
allow me to complement you on your readership!" wrote Knitterati
organiser, Maria Crimmins. "Our River has been contributed to by people
the length and breadth of the country. One lady said that she
knitted her squares whilst watching Wimbledon!"
To keep things moving, the knitters are holding a knitting picnic on August 24th, from 12-2pm, in Roberts' Park, Saltaire and on the weekend of 13-14 September, the beginning of the two-week festival, they are organising an embellishing workshop, which is aimed at helping children to make fish, frogs, ducks and other creatures, to put in the river. Adults will also be encouraged to knit a square or two to include in the River itself.
With
a bit of help, the river should be ready in time for the Trail.
"Squares or rectangles of whatever size in shades of blue or green will
be gratefully received," says Maria. They've already got the first 25 feet (7.62m) crocheted together, and there are pictures on the Saltaire Arts Trail website (click the image to go straight there) so if you've contributed a square, or would like to, you can see what you're getting into!
Of course, there will be lots of other great events making up the Saltaire Arts Trail, and the village itself is a world heritage site, so if you think you might be in the area, have a look and see if there's anything else that takes your fancy!
Tuesday August 19, 2008
Turn your iPhone into a row counter
If you've jumped on the iPhone train, then we've got a tip for you: you can turn it into a row counter.
The widget is free, and has been been put through its paces by knitter and iPhone owner, Megan Reardon who blogs at Not Martha and sells gorgeous handmade needlecases at The Organized Knitter. Click on the image to read the full post and find out if this one's for you!
We're iPhone-less here at Simply Knitting Towers, so until we think up a really convincing reason for charging one to expenses (any suggestions?), we'll have to keep watching from the sidelines.
Design floored
I've been trying to design something. Any sort of something. I'm fairly new to knitting, having only been doing it for a few years (it's not essential to what I do on Simply Knitting) and have finally reached the stage where I fancy designing something. Kirstie gave me a stray ball of Rowan Damask, which is really a beautiful yarn, soft and silky without being completely smooth. I had an idea, sat down with my knitter's graph paper to work it out and then… nice idea, but it didn't work with Damask.
Back to the drawing board, or at least the knitter's graph paper, to come up with another stitch pattern. Idea 2 didn't work either. I'm either going to have to take the idea to another yarn, or keep on with the Damask and try new things. As I like the Damask, I'll probably keep plugging away with that. Kirstie, meanwhile, has come up with all sorts of beautiful things to do with the ball she has, and she makes it seem so easy! My friend Claire is also now writing her own knitting patterns, and I'm really impressed with her creativity.
As a knitter, it's easy to dismiss simple patterns because they're so trouble-free to knit, but I'm quickly learning how hard it is to manage even a simple design!
Have you designed a pattern? Did you begin with the idea or the yarn? What sort of modifications did you have to make (if any) as the design progressed? I know the overall idea I have for the Damask will work, it's just finding the right pattern in which to execute it that's the problem.
Monday August 18, 2008
Broken needles
Oh woe! My husband sat on one of my beautiful Lantern Moon needles and snapped it. (In case you're wondering why I'd left my needle where he could sit on it, he'd put it on the chair himself while he took photos of the other one. We've got some great features on photography and knitting coming up for you on this blog!) Aside from the damage to the needle, though, no harm has been done, so things could have been worse.
According to ROSPA, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, knitting needle-related injuries have been declining, with 231 recorded in 2000, 179 in 2001 and 103 in 2002. Knitting started becoming fashionable again around 2003-2004, so it'll be interesting to see whether there's a rise in injuries again when the statistics for those years are released. My guess would be that a lot of the injuries involve eyes, as it can be tempting to stick needles in a basket along with yarn, or have them sticking up out of a jar. If you need an excuse to get a beautiful needle roll or some cute point protectors, do it for safety's sake!
Friday August 15, 2008
Fiona's Knitting
Working in the knitting business, we do get to see a bit more of what goes on behind the scenes than most knitters do, but that doesn't mean we're not curious about the bits we don't see – or that we don't enjoy reading about how a new season's yarns knit up!
Fiona's Knitting is written by a Rowan design consultant, which means that the Fiona behind it has to knit up samples of the new Rowan yarns, for work. It's part of her job. (It's a hard life.) She's generous enough to share them with her readers – as well as the other gorgeous things she's knitting. Stop by to see what she thinks of Rowan's new Colourscape yarn (hint: Kaffe Fassett designed it for Rowan...) or find out how her latest cardi is coming along, and stay to read one of her handy tutorials – we recommend the two about lifelines, particularly. They won't save your life, but they might well save your knitting!
Read a
great blog? Write a great blog? Tell us
what it is and why you like it, and you might see it here next
Friday.
Thursday August 14, 2008
Issue 45 on sale today!
The September issue of Simply
Knitting hits the shops today, and it's the one with the yarn tidy!
Click for a larger
image.
As you probably know by now, we designed this handy ball holding yarn bag and were all set to give it to you as your gift on issue 40, but the ship they were coming to the UK on was severely delayed by really bad storms (apparently some of our readers caught the tail end of it, while holidaying in the region. We hope the rest of your trip was sunny!) We were pleased to report that the ship eventually made it safely to the UK, and here the yarn tidies are, at last!
We hope you'll enjoy using yours. You can use it to keep up to three different balls of yarn separate while knitting, so it's great for stripes, Fair Isle, intarsia – or even knitting two sleeves or two socks at once.
Let us know how you get on, and do drop us an email if you find any uses for it we haven't mentioned!
Of course, we've got lots of patterns you can try it out with straight away:
Knit a yoga mat/rug and learn instarsia at the same time!
Pretty summer dress with three coloured trim.
Little girl's cardigan with dancing Fair Isle ballerinas.
Cotton and linen blend men's cardigan.
We've also got lots of other things for you to enjoy, including Alan Dart's stunning scarecrow, an easy crochet bag, quick-to-knit belts – oh, and an interview with the Yarn Harlot herself, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee.
And
don't miss any
of your usual
favourites. This month, we've got a round up of World Wide Knit in Public Day, three great cable patterns for you to try, and lots of great
books, patterns and websites for you to check out.
Golden oldies
Do you like vintage books? I bought a copy of the 1953 Boys' Book of Cricket the other day, and was amused to see in one story that the schoolboy batsman hero was most ashamed to see his mother knitting while watching the match. Kirstie and I both have stashes of vintage knitting patterns. Mine go up to the 1960s - having lived through the 1970s and 1980s, I have no desire to revisit those fashions just yet, although I may inflict a crocheted kipper tie on my husband at some point!
Anyway, there seem to be plenty of knitters about who love vintage patterns, whether they're young beauties hoping to unleash their inner Lana Turner or 'classic' ladies looking for the sort of thing they've always enjoyed wearing. Converting patterns is tricky because you need to convert the Imperial needle size to the metric equivalent, unless you have a stash of vintage needles, and the yarns most older patterns recommend are invariably no longer available. Of course, you should make a tension square before starting any project, but it's absolutely essential if you're substituting yarns.
A lot of vintage patterns use lighter-weight yarns, with many lacy designs requiring 4ply. There are some good 4ply ranges available nowadays, including Stylecraft's new Life 4 Ply and Sirdar's Country Style 4 Ply. With all those nice colours to choose from – plus dozens more when Biggan Design launch their 4ply merino yarn – I could end up making something out of the Woman Week-End Book (1949) yet!
If you've already made something from a vintage pattern, we'd love to hear about it. How easy was it finding an appropriate yarn? And how easy were the instructions to follow? If you just like collecting vintage patterns, tell us about your favourite.
Tuesday August 12, 2008
Use up your yarn scraps to make funky balls
Not a Purl has a great suggestion for using up your scraps of pure wool (or other feltable animal fibres) to make funky yarn balls. She recommends needle felting them a bit, before and between washings – oh, and putting them in a laundry net, the first time through the machine. Looks like a fun project for the kids, too.
Monday August 11, 2008
Subscribers get more!
Loyal readers are really important to a magazine like ours, and for a while now we've been wanting to say a big THANK YOU! to you. As we can't come round to say our thanks in person, we've been working extra hard to give subscribers two bonus pages of content each issue. From issue 45, as a subscriber you won't see our subscription offer – after all, you've already got one – but instead you'll get two more pages of your favourite magazine. We've got lots of ideas for the page, so look out for patterns, offers, giveaways, interviews and more! And don't forget, we love to hear your ideas too, so subscribers can find out how to make suggestions on page 35.
If issue 45 has already landed in your letterbox, turn to page 34 for a peak behind the scenes at Simply Knitting HQ and our special subscribers only competition. Once you've found your key word, come back here and follow the link for your chance to win 30 of our favourite yarns.
Zesty Lime, issue 44
There's a bit of a problem with the abbreviation for tw2 in the Zesty Lime cardigan pattern from issue 44 of Simply Knitting. Two abbreviations have got conflated, and the tw2 instruction doesn't seem to be clear enough. The abbreviations should read:
tw2 sl 1, k1, then pass the slipped stitch over, but don't take it off the needles, and knit into the back of the slipped stitch.
m3 (K1, P1, K1) all into front of next st, thus making 3 sts out of 1.
Please note: m3 is a completely separate abbreviation. You don't need to m3 as part of your tw2.
Friday August 08, 2008
Knit and tonic
It's rather nice to find a knitting blog which expresses the balance between striving for knitted perfection and accepting mistakes as well as Wendy Barnard does in Knit and Tonic.
Of course, ripping something out three times just because you don't quite like the way the yarn knit up isn't the only thing she talks about. As an American knitwear designer with busy hands and a lot on the go, there's always another interesting project to see or even to buy.
Wendy has generously written up some of her patterns for free download, and you can buy many of her other designs to download directly from her blog, which makes tempting knits very hard to resist!
Between the stunning designs, there's plenty to keep a knitter entertained and her lovely photos and musings on life, yarn and knitting keep us coming back again and again.
Write a great blog? Read a great blog? Tell us
what it is and why you like it, and you might see it here next Friday.
Competitions Simply Knitting issue 45
Simply Knitting
issue 45 hits the shops on Thursday 14 August. Enter our great giveaways
and competitions by using the links below.
For a while now, you've been able to tick a box on the competition
entry form to say if you'd like to get our newsletter. Well, as the
first edition is due to go out the week of the 11 August, if you haven't already, now is the
time to tick that box! You can also sign up using the link at the top left of the screen. As always, you can leave us a
comment to let us know what you
think or email
us with your
view.
Today is the last day to sign up for the Ravelympics 2008. Not to be confused with the Knitting Olympics, hosted by the Yarn Harlot during the winter games, the Ravelympics is a summer event, organised on the knitting social networking site, Ravelry.
The challenge – should you choose to accept it – is to knit one or more complete projects during the 17 days of this year's summer games. Cast on (if you're in the UK) at 1pm tomorrow and cast off by 5pm on Sunday 24 August. It's a tough challenge, but a fun one and there are events ranging in difficulty from the Hat Dash to the Afghan Marathon – an event of truly olympic proportions for even the fastest knitters, we reckon.
If you're among the thousands of knitters already signed up, do let us know: we'd love to see how you're getting on!
Wednesday August 06, 2008
Simply Newsletter
We're always looking for new ways to spread the latest knitting news, so we've decided to start a regular newsletter, packed with tidbits we couldn't fit in the mag, exclusive offers, and as many other goodies we can fit in!
As a newsletter subscriber, you'll also get a sneak preview of the upcoming issue delivered direct to your inbox, so you can start planning your next knit before you've even had a chance to take the wrapper off.
And, of course, any newsletter we send you will give you the option to opt-out and we promise not to pass on your details to anyone else.
We're hoping to send our first edition out in the next few weeks, so sign up today to make sure you don't miss it. We'll be looking for your feedback to help us develop the newsletter to make it more fun to read, so do let us know if you've got any suggestions.
