Knot Knecessarily Known Knitting

Even as the year slips into the holidays and the dark and cold of winter, there are markets and festivals. Sadly, I can't be at all of them. Here's a rundown. Pick what suits you! 13-14 November 2026 Alabama Fiber Fest in Birmingham AL: I taught at this one last year but missed the deadline for teaching proposals this year. It is a super-sweet festival. Several of the vendors I know from Carolina Fiber Fest, SAFF, and other such festivals will be at this one. Once again it is at a brewery. The brewery is very nice with lots of indoor seating and space for classes or events. It worked out well last year as attendees could shop, take a class, buy food at the food trucks, get a possibly adult beverage, and sit indoors and knit. And remember craft beer can be an excellent holiday gift for the non-knitter! 13-15 November 2026 Vogue Virtual Knitting LIVE : This online event includes several of my favorite teachers including Alasdair Post-Quinn, Lucy Neat...

As I've already teased, I have an article and design coming up in issue 3 of PURL magazine, the ribbing issue. Writing the article was not difficult. I knew when I put in the proposal I could use my own handouts as a starting point. The greater challenge was designing the project. For an assortment of reasons including missteps of my own, this ended up being an epic project with about 234,000 stitches. I needed to finish it on deadline. I'm very fortunate I had left June and July mostly unscheduled for 2026. I am also a fast knitter. Even for me, this was a challenge. I had to pause and think about both how to meet the deadline and how to do it without damaging my body. Here's the approach I took. Before I start, let me insert standard disclaimer about not offering medical advice. My point is to tell you what I did not what you should do. But I also want you, dear knitter, to know that it is possible to knit a lot without pain. If knitting is causin...

Every year I am surprised when the long southern summer gives way to autumn. We're moving towards sweater weather, fiber festivals, and indoor crafting. Speaking of fiber festivals, I did not have nearly enough adult supervision at Maryland Sheep and Wool this year. After circling the Daedalus spinning wheel booth for seven years of festivals, I finally bought one. Specifically, I was sample spinning with another woman. I was admiring the wheels, as always. And just as I was about to leave, this wonderful stranger said, "I'll buy one if you buy one." I took that as a sign from the Universe that the time had come for me to acquire an electric spinning wheel. After I got it home, I played with it a bit. And the first thing I learned is I had no idea what to do! I had been able to spin on it fine at a festival. But I also realized I am used to the rhythm of my feet and hands together. Without that, I didn't know what to do. I got busy w...

I recently completed an epic versa lace project. How epic? Almost 2.5 kilometers of yarn, or about 1.5 miles. Over 550g of yarn, so more than half a kilogram and more than one pound. Size 2mm/US 0 needle long enough to hold 380cm/150 inches worth of stitches. 234,336 stitches About 225 hours over two months Designed on the needles. A win at yarn chicken — 2g leftover of 557g total.  The item is expected to appear in a magazine in early 2027. For the moment, here's a detail. I plan to write more about this when the magazine becomes available. That project took up most of my time in June and July. I am grateful to have good knitting technique. I eventually figured out that sitting at the kitchen table was not a good way to knit. Once I moved into the living room and started sitting in a padded gamer's chair, things got better. I also used a small antique footstool to keep my knees, hips, and legs comfortable. Finally, the lighted magnifying glass was ...

This year is a good time for patriotic crafting. There certainly is debate about the history of the United States. History, like any human story, is complicated. All of us have moments we look back upon and think, "Oooo. If I could have that one back, I would be better." With all its flaws and mistakes, the United States is still the greatest place on Earth in any time and place. My training is in art history and women's studies. I know enough to know how deeply fortunate I am to be alive here and now. Thus, I celebrate with gratitude. Today's craft project is yet another one that came out of the my mother's stash. Just Nan designed a series of cross stitch angels. I've already written about completing "Gloriana." "Liberty" was one design in a folder of unworked designs. The difference is "Liberty" had a small packet of beads and star embellishments stapled to it. I started with a trip to my ...

Last weekend, The Knitting Guild Association hosted their first immersion weekend. The topic was shawls and the teacher was Tonia Lyons . The event consisted of four virtual classes, two on Friday and two on Saturday. If you wanted to ask Tonia questions, you needed to be at class when it was live on Zoom. But the classes are also recorded, making it possible to watch later if you had other things on your weekend schedule or if you want to work through the swatches at a more leisurely pace. The cost was only $25 to TKGA members, which is a fantastic bargain! During the class, a couple of us in the chat were wondering about shawl shapes and how to wear them. Which shapes lend themselves to wearing without a pin? Which ones tend to stay on your shoulders and which ones tend to embrace the siren call of gravity? I am a big fan of leaving neck space on a shawl. Having a gap allows the shawl to sit on your shoulders without a lot of fabric bunching at your neck...

Part of my mother's stash came back to me. It was no small project in 2023 to clean out the room with embroidery stash. There was a lot of give away. There were some things I kept and finished. But there were many things I abandoned. A few months ago, I got an e-mail from the person in Pennsylvania who helped me donate my mother's stash to the Thimble and Thread chapter of Embroiderers' Guild of America . She had some boxes. Could I please take them? It turned out it was only three boxes, a lamp, a frame stand, and a kitchen garbage-sized bag of metallic threads. In other words, it only took up half my car not my whole car. Not too bad. I went through that stash, organized it, and donated most of it to Southeast Fiber Arts Alliance . Their thrift shop is a fantastic place to acquire materials. You never know what you are going to find, so it is a good idea to make a habit of visiting. In fact, I did not leave empty-handed. I decided to work a ...

Over the weekend I taught for the Next Level Knitting Conference organized each year by The Knitting Guild Association . Every time I teach for this group, I rethink my swatches and handouts for whatever I am teaching. The TKGA people are engaged. They are interested in the technical details and possibilities. They ask excellent questions. It is always a delight to present material to them. At the same time, when you are talking to knowledgeable people, there's the challenge of, "Will I have anything new to say?" The point of a class is to learn things. If students already know the material, why should they spend time in class? My class this year was about reversible cables. There's a very basic version achieved by working cables on a wide-rib fabric (4x4 or 6x6) and cabling on both sides. There are true double-knit cables, which are an advanced skill. There are twist cables, which is a trick I learned from TECHknitter. (From what I can tell...

Teaching is often about human factors. How do you make something unintelligible instead understandable? Knitting patterns have this same challenge. How do you tell someone else what you did in enough detail to be replicated, but not so much detail as to overwhelm? One of the techniques I teach occasionally is two-pattern double-knitting. This technique allows you to have two different patterns on each side of your fabric, instead of a reversed negative. The most common use of this technique is to put lettering into a project. The challenge is the charts. A regular double-knitting chart looks like this: And produces this: The chart that makes the letters read correctly looks like this: And produces this: Right away, you can see the chart for this technique makes your eyes cross. You must follow the chart carefully, mindfully, to produce the desired result. I recently stumbled upon a better method for these charts. A friend had been working on this ...

Late last year my sister discovered Outlander . It is one of those book series/television series that "has legs" as they say. The first book was published in 1991, 35 years ago. It seems people continue to discover it, read it, watch it, and become enthrauled by Diana Gabaldon's talented storytelling. As for knitting, there is an Outlander Knitting official book . I do not own it. There are many, many things I want to knit. That particular book didn't have anything that caught my fancy. I haven't watched the television show, although I read the first three books more than a decade ago. In the television series there is a cowl made from large yarn in garter stitch. My sister sent me a picture and said she would like it. This was an easy knit for me; and something I was delighted to do. Sadly, my friendly local yarn shop did not have any super-bulky yarn in the color and size I sought. I ended up purchasing two skeins of Yarn Bee Effortles...

We are already more than a week into 2026. How did that happen? While I have the calendar out and am planning ahead, here are some opportunities I feel are worth elevating: The Livestock Conservancy has a "Save Our Sheep Sweater Challenge" class on Teachable. Deborah Robson is the teacher. The class is already recorded. This is similar to learning from DVDs before streaming became a thing. The class is only $20. If you have participated in Shave 'Em to Save 'Em or would like to, this inexpensive self-paced course should be helpful. With a teacher as talented as Deb Robson, I'm sure there will be multiple "ah-ha" moments. My dear friend Varian Brandon will be teaching several classes on stranded colorwork at Southeast Fiber Arts Alliance on the weekend of 6-8 February 2026. On Friday Varian is teaching beginning stranded colorwork ( knights' banner cowl , shown above with my alterations) and steeking. Saturday is a...