Knitting Rules

Knitting Rules: The Yarn Harlot's Bag of Knitting Tricks by the Stephanie Pearl-McPhee

I just finished reading this book last week. I'd been reading it for quite some time. I always have a knitting book by my bed in case I wake up during the night and feel the need to read.

It's a GREAT book! I love that the patterns are more like schematics as to how to do something yourself. I think often times we get kinda tied to patterns and when looking for the pattern that does exactly what we want it to do doesn't exist we either give up or wait for another pattern to come along. The Yarn Harlot really describes the anatomy of hats, socks, scarves, wraps and sweaters in a way that makes them a bit more approachable. The only weak point, I'd say was the sweater section. In the sweater section I got the impression that your first sweater is going to suck no matter what, but I never really understood what I could do to make it better or what the basic anatomy was even of a sweater. She seems to have so much knowledge on the other subjects, I kinda feel like she should do a whole book on the anatomy of a sweater (that might even be a good title).

The hat and sock chapters were so good they made me want to knit a hat and a scarf of my own (I actually did pick up that Jaywalker I'm still in the process of knitting)! She writes amazingly well (we all know this from her blog), and in an extremely approachable style. I can't help but wonder if she's our generation's Elizabeth Zimmerman...