Waxing Needles

I love love love knitpixs needles.

I have the interchangeable set and use them almost exclusively.

They have several finishes to choose from. My default choice is the Harmony wood ones. They feel so nice in my hands, smooth, they are really beautiful, they have wonderful pointy tips and you cannot beat the price!

The smaller sizes, size 3 and under, don't come in the interchangeables so you have to buy them separately. The needles are too small to fit into the screw join on the interchangeables.

Most of my fellow students have these needles and we all love them.

The smaller wood ones are prone to splitting and breaking. I find that any wooden needles in the thin sizes have this tendency. They are like knitting with toothpicks!

But all you have to do is call knitpicks and they will send you new ones. No questions asked and you don't have to mail your back!! What a deal.

We were talking about this issue some and Christine (Unraveled) commented that waxing them before you use them could help them not break. The wax will fill the in pores and that should make them stronger.

So I have a beeswax candle that I am going to use. I suppose you can use any kind of wood wax or candle wax. I will report back in a few months and let you know how it is working.

Year of Color

I have been putting together the classes for the next few months. Almost everything I am drawn to right now has a lot of color in it. There are so many things to choose from it is hard not to just start one project after the other.

Luckily I have friends to help me make my choices. Because I teach knitting I am able to pick out some of my favorite things to knit and then see if there are others who want to learn to do the same thing.

I used to have to guess at this. But now there is a great online site, "survey monkey" that allows me to send my ideas out to my mailing list and see what everyone thinks about my choices before I schedule them. Of course I still knit things that are not on my class list. But I love that I can knit some wonderful things and share the joy with others.

Here are some of the projects I am really excited about.

Byzantine Scarf by Susan Pandorf
(thanks Debra for finding this one)

The magic of these beautiful colors are accomplished by using a technique known as Mosaic knitting. Only one color is used per row along with some slip stitches. Looks much more involved then it is. Love that!

Then there is this lovely Rainbow scarf. (rav. link)

Double knitting and one skein of yarn used from both ends is the magic behind this color wonder. Another very impressive scarf for such a simple technique.

The one project I am really going to sink my teeth into is the "Mona's Shawl".

This is going to be a KAL with some of us knitting the shawl and then several people have opted to knit the "East meets West" bag. Knitpicks

Both projects are what color knitting is all about.

This is the Year of Color for me. I want to really push myself and see where it leads me. Want to join me?

Harika Socks by Stephanie van der Linden
(thanks Lisa for pointing these out)

What are some of your goals for knitting this year?