HPANA has pictures from the 2006 Harry Potter calendar. Check out this photo, destined to make young hearts flutter:
I love Ron’s garter stitch blanket. It looks like Molly made it from swatches or left over yarn. 
Tiger Beat Knitting September 28, 2005
Beginning Socks September 27, 2005
I cast on for my very first sock today, and it was quite a shock to realize just how thin fingering yarn is. As I said a couple of days ago, in my year of knitting I’ve never worked with anything thinner than worsted, so this is a definite experience. I initially tried to use Elann’s toe-up pattern, but there were a lot of bits of the pattern I wasn’t sure about. It also called for size 1 dpns, which I have but in bamboo. I always find the first few rounds on bamboo dpns to be a nightmare they’re so slippery, and with the tiny needles, tiny yarn and numerous M1’s, I just freaked out. I couldn’t do it. So now I’m using The Knitter’s Handy Book of Patterns which looks like exactly the same sock but done top-down. I also switched to #2 and #3 dpns which are Surina wood and not half as slippery. At the moment I’m just trying to get used to working with this yarn. I’ll worry about gauge later.
Fall Knitpicks Order September 24, 2005
Moving from left to right, on top we have Wool of the Andes (Cranberry, Cloud and that’s Evergreen cut off at the top), Merino Style (Vanilla and Nutmeg), Andean Silk Twist (Sunset) and Shimmer (Stained Glass). Below that is Dancing (Swing and Two Step). On the bottom it’s Essential (Ash), Simple Stripes (Vineyard) and Palette (Lilac).
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Win ‘Alterknits’ September 17, 2005
Organic Style magazine is sponsoring a contest where you can win one of 5 copies of Alterknits by Leigh Radford. One grand prize winner will receive a blanket made by the author from recycled sweaters. The deadline for entering is October 15. The rules even allow you to enter daily for more chances to win.
Goodwill Willpower September 17, 2005
For the first time since the notion of unravelling sweaters for yarn popped into my head, I left Goodwill yesterday empty handed. There was some minor excitement, though, over spotting the first yarn I’ve ever seen there. It was 2 skeins, both 100% acrylic of course, but one was sport weight! I’ve never seen sport weight acrylic that wasn’t in baby colors. It’s sad what I’ll get excited about. However, it was in a terribly painful neon red sort of shade and, IMO, even a quarter was too much to ask for it.
From Goodwill it was to Walmart where I found 14″ Balene II needles on clearance for $1 each. I normally hate 14″ straight needles, but the bendiness of these makes them kinda fun to work with. I bet their double-point needles would be wonderful to work with.
I did still buy a sweater yesterday from, of all places, Dollar Tree. They had half a dozen raggedy sweaters looking for all intentions like rejects from a yard sale. Not very promising prospects, but I did find a black silk/angora number that had been cruelly bedeckled with rhinestones and sequins. Said rhinestones were attached after the fact with white thread (!) so they will be a piece of cake to remove. And it was just $1.
Blog Searching Options September 14, 2005
Google has just added a Blog Search. Blog searches can be really good for anxious knitters because they can help you find what other knitters have said about certain patterns or techniques, or for FO pictures. For example, here’s a result for A Good Bias shrug from the Spring IK (which I’ve actually finished now, pictures are forthcoming). At the moment the results lean overwhelmingly toward Blog*Spot, but hopefully it’ll diversify in time. [via Kottke]
Other blog search options include LJ Seek for LiveJournals (communities too!) and Bloglines.
A Little Vocab, I Think September 14, 2005
Check out Wordsmith’s word of the day:
skein (skayn) noun1. A length of yarn wound around a reel.
2. A flock of geese, ducks, or other similar birds in flight.
3. Something suggesting complex twists and tangles.
[From Middle English skeyine, from Old French escaigne.]
When in flight, geese are called a skein; when not in flight, a gaggle; and when flying in a V formation, they are referred to as a wedge. Ducks take a number of terms too: while in water, they are called a paddling.
“The article, described as a tale of ‘bank fraud, oil trading, and bombs,’ prompted Norman to follow a tangled skein of connections to a second, much broader, story.” Linda Grant; Newstrends: A Story You Won’t Read in Forbes; Fortune (New York); Oct 2, 1995.
“Arrowhead skeins of geese fly northward and land at Walker Bay to breed.” Bruce Thorson; Boom and Bus; Canadian Geographic (Ottawa); Mar 13, 1998.
This week’s theme: collective nouns.
Geese, huh. Who knew? I confess that I still to this day pronounce it “skeen”. Some habits are hard to break.
Mail Call September 12, 2005
The Fall Patternworks catalog arrived today, just one day after I saw it on their website and began to panick wondering where mine was. Nice timing there, PW.
Also in the mail today was a free trial issue of Crafts ‘n Things that Mom ordered. For no reason in particular I had gone through one of her catalogs of catalogs and checked those I’d like to have and X’ed those I definitely did not want. How was I to know she’d then go and order every catalog that had any kind of mark at all on it? Naturally, it was the August issue without any knit or even crochet content at all. There is one mildly informative article on cross stitch – a hobby I’ve all but given up. I had hoped they’d send the more recent September issue that the library’s had for weeks. It contains a rather run-of-the-mill poncho pattern and a few other knitty pages, but at least it has some knitting stuff. In any case, I won’t be subscribing.
Yarnware $4.95 Shipping September 11, 2005
Yarnware now has a $4.95 flat shipping rate for any US/Canada order. Their site is buggy (browsing it in Opera is all but impossible – IE’s not much better), and I’ve heard from others that they can be slow to ship, but they do stock a wide selection of colorways and at a good price. Plus, they’re one of the few online retailers to offer color cards for popular yarns. I’ve fallen in love with Brown Sheep Nature Spun while knitting my Azkaban scarf. I definitely want a color card in that!
Netflix has a knitting DVD! September 9, 2005
Netflix has The Art of Knitting DVD! I’m a completely self-taught knitter without any LYSs or Stitch ‘N Bitch groups nearby, so I can’t wait to use this DVD to reassure myself that I’ve been doing it correctly all along. 
