Right now I am working on a pair of socks of my own design, and trying to write the pattern down while I am at it. I'll post a photo of that one when I am a little further along on it.I am using my second skein of Fortissima Disco Colori, which is mostly denim blue with a bit of aqua and green in it, plus the extra special silver threads. Disco-y, yes.But here's the excitement! Lee is re-wiring the house so that we can put in a wireless booster and be able to more successfully use the wireless in the media room (it is as far away as possible in our house from the router, and we lose connection at times). Now that I have a brand-new red notebook, I'd like to be able to blog and do Ravelry up in the room with all my knitting stuff.
So he opened the closet door in the office. Um, it is a mess. So, he started to neaten it slightly, but ended up emptying the whole thing, something I had not been able to do since we moved here, 10.5 years ago. There were boxes of books way in a corner that I never could lift out. So, yes, we had lived here over a decade and not finished unpacking. Sigh. But, Lee got out the books!
First, there were all the Japanese linguistics books I'd used in my studies and dissertation work. Aww. Some very expensive dictionaries in there! Then there were a bunch of interesting linguistics and culture books. A bunch of books on cultures I was interested in. Way too many bad 80s quilt books. And. And. And. The treasured knitting books I had been looking all over the place for.
There, to my immense relief, were my Barbara G. Walker stitch pattern books. From when they first came out. A first edition of A History of Hand Knitting. A pristine copy of Principles of Knitting. Alice Starmore's fair isle book (SCORE!!!!!) all these from the 80s and early 90s. All sorts of fair isle books, a book on Cornish knit frocks...wait, wait--here are some highlights:
* Alice Starmore's Book of Fair Isle Knitting (now all I lack is the Aran book)
* Charted Knitting Patterns, by B Walker (I think I re-bought this one, oops)
* Classic Knitting Patterns from the British Isles by J. Waller (has VERY English looking people as models)
* The Complete Book of Traditional Fair Isle Knitting, by S. McGregor
* Cornish Guernsies and Knit Frocks by M. Wright (a really cool little book)
* A History of Hand Knitting by R. Rutt (first ed.)
* Knitting Around, by E. Zimmerman (yay! I knew I owned this!)
* Knitting Counterpanes, by MW Phillips (wow, I had forgotten about this--a whole bunch of cool patterns, borders and squares)
* Knitting from the Netherlands: Traditional Dutch Fishermen's Sweaters, by H. van der Klift-Tellegen
* Knitting in the Old Way, by PA Gibson-Roberts (glad to see this one again)
*Knitting Lace: A Workshop with Patterns and Projects, by S. Lewis (I had forgotten this existed)
* Knitting without Tears, by Elizabeth Zimmerman (woo! Not lost!)
*No Idle Hands
* The Principles of Knitting, by J. Hiatt
* A Second Treasury of Knitting Patterns by B. Walker (yay, so glad I didn't re-buy these, as I have been tempted to many times)
*Swedish Sweaters: New Designs from Historical Examples, by B-M Christoffersson
* Traditional Knitting: Aran, Fair Isle, and Fisher Ganseys, by M. Pearson
*Traditional Knitting: Patterns of Ireland, Scotland and England by G. Morgan
* A Treasury of Knitting Patterns, by B. Walker
* A Useful Guide to Irish Crochet Lacemaking by M. Cusson
There sure were a lot of "traditional this and that" books in the 80s and early 90s, huh. And I sure did love Fair Isle, apparently.
One good thing is, knowing what some of these books are going for on Ebay these days, we could live a couple of months on the proceeds of selling them. Not that I would. What great resources I have been missing out on since I moved to Texas! I'd been holding off on designing things until I found all my books. And here they are! I also found some interesting history of quilting books in addition to the bunch of really not-so-hot quilt books that I am not sure why I bought. Oh yeah, and there were my bargello books from my intense bargello design phase. I could never get rid of those!
Finding all these books again reminds me of my dream of running a knitting resource center, with a library of books that knitters could use as resources, back issues of knitting magazines, and pattern collections from as far back as I could get them. I have so many resources, being such a bibliophile, and I do wish I could share them with others. We could all sit around and knit, design our projects, or share inspiration. Of course, I would hate to lose any of them, so I'd have to watch them like a hawk.
I feel like I could never run out of inspiration with all these wonderful resources at my fingertips. How lucky I am! If you live nearby and want to see any of these books, just let me know. I will check to see if I have re-bought any more of them, so I can offer duplicates up for others to use.
Oh my gosh, my eyes nearly fell out reading that book list. Lee gave you an early Christmas just by opening that box! How wonderful. I have one box left unpacked in the laundry room. The writing on the side says it contains a "blinder". We've only been here 3.5 years, so I don't feel that I need to unpack it yet. I'm hoping by leaving it alone, we'll move away from here sooner.
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