26 September 2007

Dear Annie--
My first contribution. And i get to admit that i'm not with it enough to understand 'meme'. I hope that my lack of with-itness is due to a shortage of coffee rather than an excess of age. BTW, i tried the Ethiopian coffee from Ten Thousand Villages this morning. It smells like heaven! Tastes pretty good too.

Too bad you're not crazy about the Cat Bordhi book. It finally came in the mail yesterday, along with the Lorna Sass book. (Recipe reviews will have to come separately.) You should take into consideration that if the book teaches you a technique that you like and shows you what one or several people have done with that technique, it is valuable. It doesn't mean that you need to copy what they've done. It just gives you an opportunity if you need practice without coming up with something original. If it weren't for Cat's book about socks on two circulars, i'd still be on four dpns. Instead i zoomed right through two circulars to the magic loop. I'm not sure i've actually knit a pair of her socks, but i do need to frog that boyfriend sweater (and buy the needles i need) and finish the felted boots. And i don't think all the moebius patterns look bad. I'm not sure where i'd where the 'beaded tresses' hat, but there's another one i might consider, and some of the scarves or shawls or whatever look pretty good (and probably aren't as high maintenance to wear as a regular scarf or shawl.
Love,
mum

25 September 2007

book reviews part 1

dear mum,
a few days ago a requested a ton (and by ton, i mean about 40) of knitting books from the olympia public library and i went and picked up the first batch, 7 of them, today. so here are my reviews of the ones i have looked at so far.

sensational knitted socks

is amazing. it's got a ton of stich patterns combined with universal directions in way of ann budd, which i think you'd like a lot, considering the trouble you go to with your barbra walker stich dictionary coming up with socks for ron. it also has really good pictures and charts; each section has 2 examples and then a photo of each stich pattern that is really clear (even if the example sock is knit in a yarn that obscures it somewhat) along with written directions and a chart. charts make me soo happy. i think you should get it because it's really awesome and then i can borrow it.

a treasury of magical knitting

is so-so. the mobius technique it teaches is amazing but the patterns are a little insipid and designed for someone with no courage or desire to design. i might just teach myself the cast-on and never require the book again.

knitting with balls

is really good and i'm considering buying it, if not for myself, then for joseph. every technique is explained and illustrated nicely. each project has the stich pattern directions in a little box for easy reference and the cables are charted! the projects are good and vary enough in difficulty that some intrigue me. an aran sweater, for example. it's also well written.

knitovation

. bleck. insipid patterns in novelty yarn. need i say more?

i hope you find this interesting, if not useful. i was buzzing with excitement over my giant stack of books on my walk from the library, all through dinner, my wait for the bus back to campus and the bus ride home.
love,
anna

20 September 2007

progress

dear mum,
my current sock projects, the pastel opal ones and the orange cable ones, progress. i've been working on them during tutor orientation and while i've been killing time at home. i've finished the first pastel one and it's pretty nice. i've also been reading a bunch of knitblogs and i got this meme from bella knitting. they seem pretty cool. so the meme, titles you've read are bolded and titles you want to read are italicized. nice, eh? i know you read me a bunch of these books when i was little, too.

1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)

4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)

9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)

14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Rowling)

17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban(Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)

22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25 . Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)

27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie(Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)

33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini

43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. Bible
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas) in french as well, but that may be a pipe dream.
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)

55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolstoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)

70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)

86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

you should do this list as well, but i doubt you know the html for it. hmmm. ah well.
happy knitting!
love,
anna

p.s. a friendly reminder to download those pictures of my knitting that we took.

09 September 2007

wip it. wip it good.

dear mum,
i thought you would like to see how all my wips are going. you've already seen

the dream sweater

in real life, but i'm including a picture anyways because i love it just that much.


my slubby jacket is almost finished. all i have left to do is sew up the under arm sleeves and weave in the ends, but who knows how long it will take me get around to it.

i really like the pockets, even though i made a teensy mistake in one. can you spot it?

my souvenier yarn from vancouver is turning into a really pretty shawl. it's like knitting the forest!


my orange sock continues apace. i made a mistake in the cables though, so i'm gonna have to frog it back some. :(

i hope all your wips are going well on your trip!
love,
anna