January

An Aran sweater
January picture gallery

 

"It is a cold and snowy January. The holidays are done with, and Twelfth Night will be any day now; what better time to embark on a long and lovely project?" - KA, p. 2.

 

 

February

Some babies' things
February picture gallery

 

"We will start with a blanket - a simple oblong one with an unusual working, which affords soothing and mindless knitting." - KA, p. 19.

 

 

March

Difficult sweater - Not Really

 

"Today is stubborn-cold, 20 degrees below at 11 this morning, but I am as stubborn as the winter, and still insist on enjoying the white landscape I am about to keep myself busy, happy, and occupied, by taking you through the workings of what I like to call my Difficult Sweater. It isn't really, but it entails a new trick, which I have yet to notice in any sweater I have ever met. I call it, rather baldly, 'Travelling Color-Pattern'." - KA, p. 33.

 

 

April

Mystery Blanket

 

"For a long time I have brooded on a fabric of identical squares sewn together, and have expressed benign interest in all such artifacts...From the beginning it had occurred to me that if the squares were started at the center and not cast off, their sides could be woven together to produce the myterious effect of the blanket having been knitted in all directions at once." - KA, p. 43.

 

 

May

Mittens for next winter

 

"Let's make them in May; let's take our time over them; let's venture into new approaches and designs; let's enjoy them...Stash them away as they are finished, and when the time comes, next winter, you can deal them out with a liberal hand." - KA, p. 53.

 

 

June

Borders: Small Stuff for Summer Knitting

 

"A good summer project is a bevy of hats. They don't take much wool, and are an excellent means of using up leftovers and oddments in the form of stripes or color-patterns...I prefer to make them in the round on a 16" circular needle, keeping a set of four sock-needles handy for the last few rounds at the top." - KA, p. 65.

 

 

July

A Shawl - with a bonus, The One-Row Buttonhole

 

"When you set out on the annual family trip naturally you have to take your knitting; something has to keep you sane in face of the possibly quite ferocious situations you will be up against in the next two weeks...A round shawl, in fine wool, on a circular needle, is my invariable companion when space is limited, waiting-around probable, and events uncertain." - KA, p. 71.

 

 

August

Christmas Fiddle-faddle in the Wilds - Ornaments

 

"This chapter will be a curiosity of literature. Exceedingly few old women of over sixty go water-camping in the Canadian north woods. Some of them write picture-postcards, some write home, but I'll bet that not one in a thousand tries to write part of a book." - KA, p. 85.

 

 

September

Nether garments

 

"Every time a new knitting-magazine comes out I scan it hopefully for a sign of truly organically-designed pants, slacks, or tights. In vain. Even baby-leggings are made in two flat pieces and sewn together. Wouldn't you think that such a very circular piece of work would bring the term circular needle to the designers' minds...Let us be the first on the block, then yea, the first in the twon, the country , the State, to make these useul garments the way I'm sure Providence intended them to be made on circular needles..." - KA, p. 96.

 

 

October

Open-collared pullover

 

"October; the month when knitting really starts coming into its own again...I am working on one of my early brainchildren - an open-collared shirt, currently called, I think, a golf-shirt...Incorporated in it you will find what I believe to be a brand-new technique - the Idiot-Cord knitted-in border." - KA, p. 105.

 

 

November

Moccasin socks

 

"Plans for this chapter have been scrapped in favor of describing the project on which I am currently and most actively engaged. I can think of little else. The item, hot from the griddle, which I now unveil is the Moccasin Sock; the Breakthrough Sock, the Not-To-Be-Ground-Down Sock; the Eventually Totally Re-footable Sock." - KA, p. 119.

 

 

December

Hurry-up last minute sweater

 

"Let us try to keep at least Christmas the way it has been for generations, and infiltrate novelty delicately and with caution. As a good start why not try to abide by the comforting tradition of handmade and homemade presents?...Embarking on a sweater at this late date smacks of madness, but it can be done, and done without using up too much of your precious December-time. The main things is to make it very thick. The thicker the knitting, the fewer the stitches; the fewer the stitchees, the sooner finished, right?." - KA, p. 129.

Clip art courtesy of Straw Into Gold .
This website designed and maintained by Jan Zlendich .