Donna Druchunas's Blog

I forgot to mention that I have a free Norwegian Knitting article and pattern in Black Purl Magazine, the latest installment on my World Knits column.

The article is a brief overview of Norwegian knitting with a review of two terrific new books.

The pattern is for this cute headband, which uses a chart from one of the books.

I was looking for the marketing description of my next book, Ethnic Knitting Discovery: The Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, and The Andes, and I found that the book has magically appeared on Amazon. (OK, there's nothing magic about it, it's all part of the book release process that my publisher goes through.) At any rate, the book is coming out in October and it's about to go to print as soon as I write the acknowledgments section and send my editor a new author photo. The nice thing about printing in the US and Canada is that you don't have to have a 6 month lead time for getting files to the printer, because they printed books won't have to spend 3 or 4 months on a boat coming back from China.

Anyway, Amazon told me that I could by Ethnc Knitting Discovery with Cables, Diamonds, & Herringbone: Secrets of Knitting Traditional Fishermen's Sweaters by Sabine Domnick today! for just $28.50. As many of you know, Aran sweaters -- and anything with cables -- are my favorites. Yes, lace has obsessed me for the past few years, but I always find myself coming back to the original attraction to cables that began in the 1970s when my grandmother was knitting "Irish Pattern" sweaters nonstop. There's no description of this book on Amazon, but the title and the cover pretty much say it all for me, so I've put it in my shopping cart. I will probably buy it from my local yarn shop or from Needle Arts Bookshop when it comes out, but I use Amazon's cart as a reminder of all of the books that I want to buy.

I clicked through some of the Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought.... links and stumbled onto another book that looks really interesting, Knitting America: A Glorious Heritage from Warm Socks to High Art by Susan M. Strawn. According to Amazon, "The patterns and fabrics of American knitting are an intricate, and intimate, part of the nation’s history, reflecting the styles and the interests, the concerns and the comforts that touched every homebody, every newborn and newlywed, every homesick patriot in the field. This is the history that Knitting America celebrates. The first fully detailed, full-color, comprehensive history of knitting in America from colonial times to the present, the book conveys the social and historical realities that the craft embodied as well as the emotional narrative that unfolded at the hands of the nation’s knitters. With vintage patterns and designs typical of each era, Knitting America comprises a knitted history of American society. Here are the trends and the shortages, the historical happenings and the social movements, the advertising and economic developments that affected knitting and style. Also included are twelve historic knitting patterns for today’s knitters."

If you've been reading my blog, you probably know that I'm kindof bored and disillusioned with America, but I will definitely read this book anyway, because I am a history junkie. Oh, and I almost forgot! I have a short piece in this book about the Oomingmak knitters in Alaska. I got to read one chapter of the book to see how my piece would fit into the whole, and it is full of fascinating facts and tidbits. I would call this a must-have for anyone interested in the historical significance of knitting.

A couple of other books that caught my eye are:

Folk Style: Innovative Designs to Knit, Including Sweaters, Hats, Scarves, Gloves and More by Mags Kandis (the genius behind Mission Falls wools)

and

The Twisted Sisters Knit Sweaters: A Knit-to-Fit Workshop by Lynne Vogel (the genius behind the Twisted Sisters Sock Workbook)

Sorry I'm so far behind on blogging, especially about charity knitting stuff, but I'm still catching up from my trip and I have one more big work deadline coming up. So I hope to get the workload under control soon and get some interesting posts finished and uploaded.

For those of you who missed my Europe Trip blog posts about Woolfest, here's a slide show:

Oooooh!!! Needle Arts Book Shop has recently started carrying Japanese knitting books!

Go for broke, guys, these things are often hard to find in North America and they're just gorgeous. Here's a small sampling of photos from the books Marsha is carrying:

From Let's Knit Series 10:


From Let's Knit Series 11:


From Nordic Small Knitting:


From New Style of Heirloom Knitting:

You Are 96% Non Conformist

You're incredibly strange. And a weirdness like yours takes skill to cultivate! No one really understands you. And you're cool with that. You just hope you never have to understand them!

For those who haven't been reading about my trip to Europe, I'm back, sadly. I wanted to stay in Lithuania for another month, but I guess that will have to wait for next year. After three long flights, three bus rides, and a short drive in a car, I arrived home and have since (I hope) caught up on sleep and gotten my laundry done. So starting today, it's back to the regular schedule. My life is perfect, except that I have to work. Dom says I really should stop complaining, because I work at home and only spend a few hours a day on "mercenary" work (jobs that pay the bills instead of providing personal satisfaction), and I guess he's right. But today I can't help thinking that I'd rather be having coffee in a cafe on Pilies gatv? in Vilnius than heading out to my local Borders.