I’ve got a new pattern in the hopper! The ZigZag Cowl, a tubular moebius using three colors of Opal Sock Yarn, will be available this summer through Unicorn Books. I alternated the colors using zigzag stripes and a simple stranded technique. I love the close tones of the blues and grey I used for this project, but of course you can customize it to your heart’s content with any three of Opal’s 21 colors! Thanks again to Bria for styling and Asia for modeling!

If you’re in the Biz, look for the pattern at the TNNA next month. It’ll be available for purchase through Unicorn Books & Crafts – ask at your favorite yarn shop!

In other news, I’m stopping by the irrepressible Marly Bird’s Yarn Thing Podcast tomorrow morning, live at 10 a.m. mountain time – listen live (and call in!) for your chance to win fabulous prizes.

AND – I’m off this weekend to lead a full-day center-out knitting workshop at Purl in the Pines in Flagstaff, AZ. I’m so psyched!

I was swatching on the bus today, as I pretty much always am. I’m working out an idea that uses Imperial, a yarn chock full of old-school magic that I’m quickly falling in love with. Another knitter spotted me and asked what I was working on. “Swatch” is such an odd word, isn’t it? “Oh, just a swatch” – just speaking that sentence out loud sounds like you’re trying to swallow something. So I said, “It’s the prototype for a sweater I’m thinking of knitting.” Now that’s a word. Prototype: Will it fly, or will it crash? When it’s going really extra good I wax rhapsodic: O Swatch, you be the Flyer and I’ll be Orville Wright. What an exhilarating 12 seconds in the air! And when it’s going really, really well, my knitting finds itself a theme song – like this one, which has been stuck in my head ever since I said “prototype” today.

I’m off to Long Beach tomorrow before the break of dawn for my book signing at TNNA, the big winter fiber industry show – I packed a wee s suitcase to do a mini trunk-show, too! Hope to see some of you kniterati there! 

Is that an octopus in your suitcase, or….

Hi everyone! It’s been a busy time here preparing for October, which is shaping up to be Fiber Month just about everywhere at once. Just in time for my book to launch, I’ll be taking the show on the road with a whole raft of workshops, sneak peek signings, and preview parties! I’ve been joking that I should knit myself a tour sweater with all the cities and dates on the back. Here they all are – if you’ll be attending Stitches, or live near Philly, DC, Hartford, NYC, or Rochester, or right here in Portland, I’d love to see you!

 October 11: Lace and Loop Scarf Workshop, Stitches East, Hartford, CT
 October 12 (am): Eternal Knot Baby Blanket Workshop, Stitches East, Hartford, CT - SOLD OUT
 October 12 (pm): Revolutionary Knitting Workshop, Stitches East, Hartford, CT - SOLD OUT
 October 13 (12:30pm): Book Signing, Stitches East Market (In the YarnBarn of Kansas booth), Hartford, CT

October 15: Medallion Knitting Workshop, Loop Knits, Philadelphia, PA
 October 16: Design-your-own Pi Shawl Workshop, Loop Knits, Philadelphia, PA

October 18: Trunk Show/Book Signing and Center-out Knitting Worskhop, Looped,Washington DC

 October 17: Trunk show/Book Signing, FibreSpace, Alexandria, VA

 October 19: Design-your-own Pi Shawl Workshop, FibreSpace, Alexandria, VA

 October 20-21: Signing books, petting sheep, and reveling in fiber at Rhinebeck. 

October 23: Trunk Show.Book Signing, Knit New Haven, New Haven, CT

 October 27: Medallion Knitting Workshop and Trunk Show/Book Signing, KnittyCity, NYC 

 October 28: Design-your-own Pi Shawl Workshop, Yarn Boutique, Rochester, NY
 October 29: Eternal Knot Baby Blanket workshop, Yarn Boutique, Rochester, NY

 November 3: Launch Party and Book Signing, Twisted, Portland, OR
 November 3-11: Trunk Show, Twisted, Portland, OR

 TBA: Launch Party, Book Signing and Trunk Show, Knit-Purl, Portland, OR

 February 21-24: The fun starts all over again at Stitches West, Santa Clara, CA

Fun times ahead! I’d love to see you there!

Early this summer, my friend Bria and I had a photo shoot with a very special model:

Such a serious little fellow!

The Sand Dollar Baby Blanket is now available in the shop! And on Ravelry, Craftsy, Etsy, and Patternfish!

It’s a quick, addicting knit worked in luxuriously squooshy cotton from Woodstock Knits. I hope you’ll find it as fun to make as I did!

I think I’ll let the pictures do the talking here, ’cause I really love them:

The Iris Shawl is now available in the shop. And on Ravelry, Craftsy, and Etsy, too!

If you’re in Portland, you can stop by Twisted to see the original – I’ve got a trunk show there of my whole individual pattern line.

Check out the first review of Knitting from the Center Out from this month’s Vogue Knitting!

…. In this beautifully designed and rendered hardback, Yuhas makes a case for starting in medias res to create jewelry, socks (from the heel up), toys, blankets, shawls and sweaters (from the hood down). The idea to start from the center and knit outward isn’t new by the author’s own admission, but his wholesale — and contagious — interest in the technique takes it to new and delightful places. (If the toy octopi don’t shake a smile from you, it’s time to see a doctor.) Yuhas wisely includes a healthy tutorial chapter with advice on cast-ons and knitting in the round to help knitters with projects including the drop-dead thigh highs and pretty-as-a-petal Isosceles shawl. Though he delivers almost thirty projects in this premiere volume, Yuhas is just warming up. We’ll be hearing more from him: Someday we’ll look back and say, this is the book that launched a thousand cone hats.

Cone hats, you say? Here’s a sneak peek:

photo: Jody Rogac yarn: Morehouse Merino

Guess what the UPS man brought me today?

a very happy Daniel

I just got my author’s copy of Knitting from the Center Out from STC! I can’t even express how beautiful it is – all the hard work, the breakthroughs, the struggles, the aha! moments, the sleepless nights, the writing, the knitting, the editing, the re-editing, one gargantuan year of my creative life all wrapped up in a neat little rectangle of 160 pages.

In my very first conversation with my editor, she asked me if I already had a vision for the look of the book, and all I could come up with in that first flustered moment was “well, just… pretty!” And that it is. Every stitch pops right off the page, and each project cries out “make me!, make me!” The photography, styling, and illustrations are all dripping-off-the-page gorgeous. I can’t wait to share this book with all of you and see what you make with my ideas.

The book hits the shelves November 1, and I’ll be talking about it lots more in the meantime here and on Facebook and Ravelry and Twitter. You can get your very own copy here, or check out my new sidebar at the left.

Order your copy today!

I owe a huge debt of gratitude to everyone who made this book possible, to everyone who made it so beautiful, and to everyone who supported and encouraged me along the way. You know who you are, and you rock my world.

Over the next couple of weeks I’ll be releasing a batch of new patterns. Here’s the first: The Starflower Baby Blanket that I published in KnitCircus last summer, re-photographed with the most adorable model!

Starting with just a few stitches at the center and swirling around and around, the unique center-out construction forms the shape of a spiraling pinwheel with 15 “spokes.”  You’ll continue the shape of those spokes as each of the fifteen sections narrows down to become a star.

It’s the perfect gift for the newest star in your world – A star is born!

Complete details are here on the pattern page.

And of course, stay tuned for more!

Magic Loop

Two Circulars

Double-Pointed Needles

It’s been a busy time here in knit-land… Here’s a quick announcement of another new class that’s coming up next Monday at Twisted in Northeast Portland:

Magic Loop, 2 Circulars, or DPN’s … which one is right for you?

When knitting tubular things like socks, sleeves, or hats, or when you’re knitting from the center out, you can knit seamlessly in circles or “in the round.” But how? Just like the hotly debated difference between “picking” and “throwing” your knitting, you’ve probably heard your fellow knitters sing the praises of the Magic Loop method or the Two Circulars technique. And don’t forget good old double-pointed needles!

All three of these methods are great tricks learn, so in this two-hour crash course, we’ll try out all three methods and figure out which one you like the best.

Materials – What we practice on in class can be finished into a pair of mittens or fingerless mitts. Bring 200 yards of worsted weight yarn (I love Malabrigo Worsted or Brown Sheep Lanaloft for learning, but use whatever you like), and the following needles, all in size 8 or 9: one set of 4 or 5 double-pointed needles between 6 and 8 inches long; one circular needle at least 32″ long, and a second circular needle at least 24″ long.

Monday, July 16, 6:00-8:00 pm

Twisted, 2310 NE Broadway, Portland, OR 97232

Sign up here at twistedpdx.com or call Twisted at 503-922-1150

Hope to see you there!