All of us here at Knit Picks, including Sheldon, would like to wish you and yours a very happy International Talk Like a Pirate Day, mateys.

In honor of this auspicious holiday, we’re giving you a sneak peek at one of the new upcoming colorways of Imagination– Pirate King.

We hope you like it, it will be available in late February. If any of you land lubbers try to steal it before then, we’ll have to make you walk the plank!

Buccaneer Humboldt got in on the fun sporting a Kettle Dye eye patch and a stitch marker earring and protecting his booty of blueberry crumble bread.
How are you going to celebrate? Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum? …

Lately it seems like all I’ve knit are baby gifts. Since we launched Comfy this Spring I’ve made two baby sweaters from it, and while I’m sick of baby sweaters, I must say that I still love the yarn!
I knit this Pea Pod Baby Sweater (an Interweave Knits pattern) for a friend’s newborn baby boy in Comfy Honeydew. I couldn’t resist going with the light green of the original pattern. I love the little details of the pattern, like the leaf accents in the edge ribbing, though I suspect that the sleeves are too long for a baby. I started the pattern when I was home sick, which is never a good idea and resulted in several froggings until getting it right. I must say the Comfy held up like a champ.

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So, I am working through my lace yarn stash. I’m sorry I keep showing you all discontinued colors in my projects. About a year ago, when we put the discontinued lace yarn colors on sale, I bought a TON (while, not quite literally, but enough to keep me knitting for a long while, obviously). On the upside, this enabled us to bring in lots of new, delicious colors of lace yarn for your enjoyment!

I absolutely love the shape of the Curved Shawl from Victorian Lace Today. It’s the only shawl I’ve ever worn that actually stays in place during the day. I knew my hand-dyed yarn was a little busy for a lace pattern, so I decided to make a shawl in simple garter stitch, but with the curved shawl shaping. I’m going to use two hanks for the body of the shawl and …

One of my favorite tasks here at work is to proof the podcast every Friday. It’s half an hour of knitting/listening enjoyment. I bring a small knitting project to work with me every day to be on hand for meetings, lunch, etc. My current “mindless” project is the Lace Ribbon Scarf by Veronik Avery, originally published on knitty.com. I’m knitting this one in Essential for my sister-in-law for Christmas. The Essential yarn is soooo soft, it will feel so cozy on her neck and will keep her warm without being too bulky.
And what is Kelley’s podcast topic this week? Hat and scarf knitting, especially for stash busting and gift giving. Serendipity! (I listen to the podcast on RealPlayer here in the office. I don’t know why, but this funny dancing sheep is the visual that RealPlayer runs along with the audio.) …

I have to admit that I’m not the hugest Harry Potter fan in my family. My dad and my sister have both read all of the books, and I’ve only read, um, 2 chapters of Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone. BUT I have seen all the movies. Since my dad is such a big fan, I’m thinking of knitting him something from Charmed Knits for either Christmas or his birthday in March (his birthday is looking likelier and likelier as Christmas gets closer and closer!) Picking colors for a lot of the projects in the book is pretty easy since Alison Hansel used lots of Knit Picks yarns, but since we’ve introduced some new colors, I’ve been thinking a bit about which yarns I’d actually choose.
This post on Ravelry was the final push I needed to compile a list of all the Knit …

I came across this yarn in my stash (Essential Multi), and, realizing that the colors are perfect for my sister-in-law, it was decided on the spot that this Lace Ribbon scarf would be a must-knit Christmas gift for her. Does that ever happen to you – when you are struck by a flash that you MUST knit a certain item for a certain person? In my case, it’s contagious, too. Once one person has a gift planned for them, I think of someone else who really needs one too. Sort of a revolving gift list.
So, what are you knitting for gifts this year? And, how are you feeling about your time line – are you going to make it? <