Seen in bookshops

Hi Mirjam: I've noticed that too, there aren't many embroidery books anymore where there used to be shelves full. I do see many knitting/crochet books out as well as books that specialise in certain aspects of knitting/crochet: a book of socks, a book of fairisle sweaters, a book with just hats. I've also noticed how many of the books are becoming quick and easy projects using super bulky yarn and size 35 or 50 needles! Personally I don't care much for these giant looking things, I like the smaller stitches and detail work. Maybe the yarn companies (red heart and Lionbrand come to mind) would like to encourage people that don't have much time (or patience) to try their hand at these crafts. Marie and the cats

Hello Mirjam and Marie plus the cats...LOL

When I googled Amazon.ca I got three pages of great embroidery books to pick from. That is not bad at all I think. My Dutch magazine "Handwerken Zonder Grenzen (BTW Mirjam, this magazine has now been taken over by a big Dutch publisher and is much more sophisticated than it was when it was a Mom and Pop's run publication), includes long lists of embroidery books, and most of these are in English, some in German and a couple in Dutch. There are many knitting books, but I find that some of these are very repeditive. Just like the times when there were lots of weaving books. They also started to overlap as well. Now we do get new weaving books, but they are very specialized and sometimes they bring old ideas in new techniques. I just got the book of Shibori weaving. It is a gem. You do the tie dyeing, by weaving in the extra threads to do the shirring of the woven materials. Now you do the dying. It gives the weaver great controle over the end product. Tie dye was also very time consuming, having to put all those tiny stitches by hand in large pieces of material.

Els

Hi Pamjam,

Quilting has taken over here in upstate NY too. It's not for me as I hate to sew, even with the help of a machine. My girlfriend loves it and has made some beautiful quilts and laughs when I say, no way am I sewing one. It's bad enough when I have to hem something.

Hugs,

Nora

My sister is a quilter and has given me several small quilts - a lapghan sized flannel quilt that is just the thing for the comfortable chair by the living room fireplace and doll quilts of appropriate eras for my two American Girl dolls, Addy and Molly.

Good morning Marie , sorry to have delayed my answer. Yesterday i got a reminder that the "Car org. Will have a sale besides the Masks Exhibtion , as well in passover, Thus my services are enlisted ....... Entering book shop after book shop .... Knitting books everywhere , but i still think they aren`t as good as the knitting mags. Like you i see those Specified books as well as those Fancy threads. No this isn`t us ,,,, yesterday had another `encounter` with "when did you start knitting again?" as i had a very neat sweater on i got `nasty` thought maybe i should say i learned it the day before and knitted this Sweater [ cables and all] over night ,,,, but no i breathed and smiled and said NOTHING. But the shop helping lady ,, mirjam is an expert knitter ....woman ; OH , i didn`t know one could expert in this ancient old ladies craft , it is so easy , and doesn`t need much IQ .... [ should i hang her by the threads or let her eat her wool ??? ] breath , Now she insulted both me and the Shop help , ,,, but Lo and behold ,,, she asks the help for some instructions ,, Shophelp had to explain it 3 times ,,,, of course her high iq didn`t grasp it .... So my new lesson ,, DON`T react to those people .... mirjam

Thank you Pamjam i have some quilting books i got from a friend who cleaned her shelves ,in exchange for some old books i wanted to move out from mine .. Quilting seems to gain popularity here as well , their Guild is one of the biggest handcarft guilds in the country and the most active , they also travel abroad and participate in workshops and exhibtions outside Israel. I can`t [ and won`t ] be a member since i mix `some` quilting with other techniques ,,,, :>:>:> mirjam

Pamjam,

Funny you should mention the Amish. I just booked a hotel there for two nights in April. I absolutely love to wander around Lancaster and surrounding towns. Great food as well!

Diane

who lives about 3 hours away.

Such restraint, Mirjam. ;-) What a snooty woman. IQ my eye teeth! (I don't think I could have stopped myself from saying that out loud if I'd been standing there!)

-- Carey in MA

Some Amish furniture is now being carried by other furniture shops. We have a local chain that started out selling "finish-it-yourself" furniture. But, when we needed a bookcase last year, we saw a beautiful line of Amish work in an expensive "wholesale" showroom, and it turned out the local distributor is now that chain that started out selling finish-it-yourself furniture. Now, they even carry beautiful Amish spinning wheels (Working, but sold as decorative items, at higher price$$$ than the yarn shops.) The Amish are marketing more aggressively.

In my career as a senior scientist at a large engineering firm, I banged my head against some really hard technologies. In some ways, knitting is harder even than the fancy stuff we did for US DOE. I really admire those old time knitters that could work out all the patterns for a fisherman's gansey without having paper or ink.

Aaron

CN> Such restraint, Mirjam. ;-) What a snooty woman. IQ my eye CN> teeth! (I don't think I could have stopped myself from saying CN> that out loud if I'd been standing there!) -- Carey in MA

I get attitude from time to time because I'm a male knitter.

Very close to where I live there are two yarn shops. Whenever I go into one of them, I get looked at like a thug or a shoplifter. The most helpful they've ever been is "does your girlfriend shop here?" (No wedding ring - funny how they notice things like that, but don't notice that I'm picking up balls of yarn and reading the labels like they mean something to me.) I've asked about specific yarns, and gotten one-word answers.

In the other shop, there was a bit of confusion at first -- they were

You can probably guess which shop I haven't been back to in over a year and which one I visit every 2 or 3 weeks....

Charlton

Sorry elsje to answer you do late , I am barely buying from Amazon ,, and if i do i preffer the English one whose prices +post are less than the Usa Amazon at least for us ,,, it is closer ,,, And since i do my own patterns i am not really looking for Embroidery books as such ,, I like to go leaf in the book and if it `attracts me ` than buy it ,,,,

That is very interesting , when the first ones came out My Great uncle still publishes Ariadne, thus i felt no need to buy another mag. Later ariadne lost it `charming ways`. and than ,,,, i don`t know never got the idea to buy that one , i had a year of Handwoven , But stopped , my favorite is Piecework , because it tells me so much background material and gives `tastes` of techniques which i than can use further, i also like Fiberarts as a source to know what is happening in the Fiber world.

thank you for telling me , maybe in my Next brussels visit i will look at it in one of the shops .

Yes and becomes annoying , you pay much money for something you actually already had ....

because of my allergies and lack of time i decided not to die , but have to work more on designing with the materials i do have .... mirjam

You would be surprised to iknow that quilting has been done in the east many ages ago , and probably was brought to Europe from the east But the New world sees it as `An American craft` interesting . mirjam

Thank you Carey !!! I have learned that some persons aren`t worth answering anymore , Esp those who make this Public announcements about IQ ,,,, I don`t want to socilize with them anyway. Lately I find i want to work on waht is important to me , if i feel like Coffe Klatching i do it with somebody whose Kalatch is interesting,joyful or useful. Everytime when when we/succeed with something i get `new Friends` , who are eager to be near us me .... But who really don`t vare much ,, i stopped reacting to them as well ...When i guide in exhibitions [ which i intend to do to next one,.there are always Those persons who ask questions, that You wonder about ..... and i learned part of what you call restrain in those guidings,,,, Some of my Non Favorites; "Why do you use colors ? so many colors? Why do you use more than one technique? My mother/sister /daughter can knit /crochet .embroider much Better than you she makes whole tablecloth and not so many small parts , why are you an artist and she isn`t? Why do you do it ? Where can i buy the patterns ? How much did you pay for the patterns ? Now Carey if i didn`t PRACTICE some resrtaint ,,, where would i end ,,, Not that i haven`t gone home and thought about some ANSWERS ,,, i could give ..... but my bathroom doesn`t snitch :>:>:>:> Another group are women who never or barely knit at all ,,And either are afraid to try it now , that they maybe have more time, or really don`t care ,, in all cases they aren`t happy to see us do it and have this NICE remarks .... Again i could answer unkindly or smile and wipe it away ,,, mirjam

LOL Yes, I can figure that out. Welcome to RCTY, Charlton. Now that you are here, come back and tell us what you have been doing.

Higs, Katherine

When my DF was in college, he had a roommate that was putting himself though school, knitting a pair of fancy "lopi" ski socks. He knit a pair a day. He knit in class, and in the evenings he went to the movies and knit. He gave a pair of those ski socks to my father. That would have been in

After he brought the topic up at their 50th wedding anniversary, I knit each of them a pair of fine lopi ski socks and told them that I did not want to hear the story again.

This story makes 3 points: Men knit. Knitting is an act of love. Do not try to wash lopi with your cottons.

Aaron