Here Penne is giving her opinion of the thread color Bethany came to me recently and said let's make this pinafore for Penelope, so of course I was all over it!! It's a fantastic pattern from 'Smashed Peas and Carrots' and the designer is Maggie who is the brain child behind this fun blog. Laying out the pattern was easy peasy! The pattern is clearcut with a PDF template and great step by step tutorial. Thanks Maggie. Bethany had fallen in love with Tim Beck's Apple Jack collection, so she chose her fabric in about two seconds!! For her outer fabric she chose the ABC's in cream and for her lining she used the Apples in Ivory. The one thing that was a little challenging was cutting both pieces (4 layers) of fabric at once, so when I make this again, I will cut...

We've loved working with Dora Ohrenstein over the last year. She has spent a number of hours composing thoughtful Crochet-related blog posts for us and her take on Crochet is not only well-informed but expertly expressed. When Dora told us about her latest book, we absolutely had to do a post about it and offer a giveaway. It's absolutely stunning! Here is what Dora had to say about The New Tunisian Crochet: I'm thrilled to announce the release of my fourth book The New Tunisian Crochet: Contemporary Designs from Time-Honored Traditions (Interweave Press).  It's chock full of interesting stitches, techniques and fabulous designs by Vashti Braha, Doris Chan, Lily Chin, Lisa Daehlin, Andrea Gracierena, Margaret Hubert, Charles Voth, and li'l ole me! If you think this...

When I was asked by the gals at Kelbourne Woolens to review their latest book: Kelbourne Woolens Vol. 1, I absolutely jumped at the chance! Not only do I love their patterns, but the yarn that they distribute from The Fibre Company is simply stunning and a delight to work with. (I even used Terra for my latest Free Pattern on the Jimmy Beans Wool site: Ruby Crest Hat and Mitts.) What was also neat about this blog tour is that all of the participants were asked to pick our favorite item from the book and create a couple of different outfits or "looks" with it using Polyvore. I love that this format was something new and different for us so we jumped at the opportunity! Now, it seems particularly fitting that I ended up with the Springtime Bandit pattern. Not only is it one of my favorites...

We just got some of the coolest retro style fabric in the shop and I am all a twitter!! Felicity Miller's Charleston collection is so, so cute and I am thinking that I need some kitchen curtains out of the Sampler in Parchment. Sampler is calling to me!! I think that the Farmhouse, Rhythm Stripe in Night would make a lovely lining and I can use Terry's article on how to make curtains! Retro is all the rage and this reminds me of my grandma's kitchen. My grandmother and I would get a whole crab at the local fish market once in a while and sit at the chrome, blue kitchen table and chow down!! I was pretty young when she passed, but this is one of those fond vivid memories. I love this Farmhouse Stripe! I remember the charming curtains in the kitchen and the...

Well hello everyone! Welcome to the final week of the Downton Abbey MKAL! It's funny, when I set out to do this, I didn't realize that PBS was planning to shorten the DA season by combining episodes 6 & 7 to make last week's mega episode and then airing the Christmas special (this week) as the 7th episode. In any case, the season was actually a week shorter than anticipated, but luckily, I planned to wrap up a week "early" so it all works out in the end! Check out Rachel's finished gauntlets! That said, I would like to thank you all SO much for joining me in this journey. It's been a blast and I've learned a lot and I hope you all have too. I am already cooking up the next KAL so hopefully you'll join me there as well. So here is our final bit of knitting for the DAMKAL! Thumb Gusset...

Want to create vertical stripes of color in your knitting?  Love Fair Isle but feel daunted trying to knit with two colors at the same a time?  Then slip stitches are just the thing for you!  Sometimes called Color Slip Stitching or Mosaic Knitting by some authors, this is an easy technique using 2 or more colors but only one color per row of knitting to create color patterns. If you've knit a striped project you're half way there and if you've knit a ball band washcloth then you already know how to do it! The technique can be worked the in the round or flat. To work a flat practice swatch very much like a ball band washcloth choose two contrasting colors, one light and one dark. To begin, cast on normally and work two rows with your dark color. Join light color yarn *With...

Phew so much is going on in my sewing world that I truly don't know where to begin, but since I love learning I should start there! Now to most of you binding a quilt is old hat, but to me it was a little scary and so I had been avoiding it...sad but true! Have you ever decided that you just are going to have a horrible time trying to learn something and because of that you just won't dig in and give it a try? Well that's how learning to bind a quilt with mitered corners has been for me. I have been working on a small quilting project using the Sandy Gervais Flirt Collection panel and yardage. All went well with piecing, basting and the quilting portion of the project, but then came the binding and I about went to pieces!!! I read books about it and asked other quilters to give me tips...

Hi everyone and welcome to Week #6 of the Downton Abbey KAL! By now, you should be pretty sure what will come next. Some of you may have even figured it out already! In any case, this week, I will take you all the way up to the thumb gusset and next week we will finish up the left gauntlet. Here are the directions for week 6: *You should have just finished up your 4 rows of straight knitting. The next set of directions will be broken down by needle just like the directions in Clue #1. Divide sts onto needles same as for right gantlet with 14 sts on Needle #1, 25 sts on Needle #2, and 13 sts on Needle 3. Needle #1:  Knit every round. Needle #2 (Rosebud Lace Panel, 25 sts wide, OPTIONAL): Rnd 1: k10, k2tog, yo, k1, yo, ssk, k10 Rnd 2 (and every even rnd): Knit Rnd 3: k9, k2tog,...

addthis_pub = 'laurazander'; addthis_brand = 'Jimmy Beans Wool'; addthis_logo = 'http://www.jimmybeanswool.com/images/headerlogoSmall.gif'; addthis_options = 'favorites, digg, delicious, email, google, myspace, facebook, reddit, newsvine, live, more'; I hope you all are having a great week!  Sounds like some of you will have lots of time for knitting this weekend with more winter weather hitting parts of the country.  I'm so pleased so many of you have chosen to participate in the Truckee Shawlette KAL!  I've been helping many of you pick out colors this week.  I can't wait to see all the beautiful shawlettes! If you're just hearing about this KAL for the first time, check the last two Friday blogs and the Truckee Shawlette KAL thread in our ravelry group. ...

Hi everyone! Welcome to week #5 of the Downton Abbey Mystery KAL! I hope everyone's projects are coming along ok. From what I've been observing on Ravelry, most of you are doing just fine and have been great about helping everyone out as well. Thank you to all of you for creating such a wonderful and positive community! Elegant and functional! I asked in the comments on my last post for folks to weigh in about what to knit next and I've decided to do a little of both. Many folks chose to reverse the pattern on their own and knit two at a time. I decided to address the lacing for the gauntlets as the main topic for this post. After the lacing, I'll include instructions for casting on and getting started on your second gauntlet. Hopefully this will cover both sides of the spectrum! My...

So are we ready?   Today is the day to start (or resume) knitting your Truckee Shawlette!!!  If you're not yet ready, no worries! I'm not quite ready to start today either!  I've gotten a little behind in my Downton MKAL knitting and haven't yet wound my yarn for my shawlette into balls.  That will be my homework for tonight! In case you've missed the pertinent information, we will be starting this KAL today, February 1st and it will continue until March 8th, so you have plenty of time!  This a great project for working on when you need a break from your other projects because you can just cruise. If you aren't familiar with this pattern it is the Truckee Shawlette, our free pattern from December 2012 and it features Malabrigo Lace Superwash. We are the only...