Everyday Lace is, as its subtitle states, a collection of simple, sophisticated knitted garments, very much in keeping with the promise of that first (for me anyway) design. Like Dahlia, the garments and accessories of Everyday Lace incorporate lace in clever and unpredictable ways. My favorites are the Ephrata camisole (cover design), with its gorgeous all-over lace and a fun sideways-knitted border; and the Kirkwood vest, a simple and completely reversible vest with great drape. I’m also in love with the two lace berets – Salunga and Murrell.

The book contains 18 designs – 9 accessories (including wraps, hats, socks, and gloves) and 9 garments; and is divided into three sections – warm, transitional, and cold – corresponding to the seasons and climates appropriate for each design. The warm section is made up primarily of tanks, camisoles, and small light accessories. The transitional section is populated with those items of clothing we reach for when the temperature starts to cool – wraps, vests, socks, long mitts; while sweaters, hats, and a cowl occupy space in the cold section. These sections really highlight the versatility of lace – how it can be used sparingly in larger gauges for winter sweaters or in an all over pattern for light, airy, summer camisoles (worn over some sort of undergarment of course!).

Other things I liked:

The knits are photographed in what looks to be an unfinished, rustic barn. The peeling paint and rough hewn wood is a nice contrast to the delicacy of some of the lace pieces.

Like many of Interweave’s single-designer collections, there are informative side bars covering useful techniques and hints. Heather guides the knitter through the unique challenges of knitting lace. Sidebars include hints in chart reading, swatching, blocking, and lifelines.

This is a solid collection that builds upon Heather’s existing body of work. Release date is Sept 11, 2014, but Amazon is accepting pre-orders now.

Standard Disclaimer: I was provided a complimentary copy of the book for this review.

Since turnabout is fair play, I thought I’d give you guys a peek at the non-book knitting I’ve been working on recently…

Here’s Carrie’s super cute Camilla Babe pattern in progress, worked in Blue Sky Alpaca Skinny Cotton:

And Carrie was kind enough to include two skeins of Lark to make another Camilla Babe in a package Quince sent me recently (their Osprey will be turned into a scarf for one of my book projects). I just adore the delicacy with which Pam and Carrie wrap their yarns.  It makes opening it and discovering the lovely, yummy, yarn goodness inside doubly sweet!

First up is Hannah Fettig’s Effortless Cardigan in Madelinetosh DK. I love Hannah’s designs. They’re easy to wear and have interesting details. Her newly released and aptly named Effortless Cardigan is no exception. She was wearing her sample at Rhinebeck so I got to see it up close and now I want to make it even more than ever. Plus, it’s in Tosh DK!:

Next up is Cecily Glowick MacDonald’s Coveside in Quince Osprey. Cecily has been producing and releasing designs at a dizzying pace. And every one of them is a winner. Her designs are as spare and elegant as the designer herself. It was hard to choose which of Cecily’s recent designs I wanted to include, but I picked Coveside because of its subtle lace detail and pretty lines:

I’ve had baby knits on the brain lately – it seems like my entire knitting group has either just been pregnant or is currently pregnant. Baby knits should be simple and relatively quick to knit and super adorable. Carrie Bostick Hoge’s Camilla Babe certainly succeeds on both fronts. A smaller version of her equally gorgeous Camilla pullover, Camilla Babe is that perfect baby sweater that you’ll just whip right off the needles. I have two in progress:

Everyone who knows me knows my predilection for cardigans. I find them easy to wear and endlessly adaptable to a variety of environments – especially when they’re knit in a fine gauge yarn. So, when my friend Melissa Wehrle pre-released her Idylewylde, I pounced on it. She knit the sample in a variegated colorway of Madelinetosh Sock, but you can easily substitute one of her more solid colors for a monotone look. As a professional sweater designer by day, Melissa imbues her work with subtle details for that polished finish. I’m a huge Neoknits fan:

To round out the selection, the last two giveaway patterns are wraps.

Laura Nelkin’s Winterlude somehow manages to have both pretty lace details and be very cozy at the same time:

And Angela Hahn’s Ondo Scarf/Wrap, features her trademark ability to play with texture to great effect. I just want to wrap that loveliness around my neck:

The rules are simple. Leave me a comment telling me what kind of things you’re itching to knit now that fall has come upon us in earnest and I’ll choose 6 comments at random to give away a pattern to. Of those I choose, whoever gets back to me first will have their first pick of patterns. I’ll gift the patterns to the winners through Ravelry.  You have until midnight next Sunday (November 6th) to leave a comment.

Well, the promise to post more about Alexandria went from “later today” to “later two weeks from now”…one of the hazards of a full time job I guess (especially one that requires travel to Virginia 4 days out of the week for the foreseeable future).

1. Alexandria, photo copyright Parikha and Hemal Mehta, 2. Alexandria, shoulder detail, photo copyright Parikha and Hemal Mehta 3. Alexandria, front neck detail; photo copyright Parikha and Hemal Mehta, 4. Alexandria, sleeve detail; photo copyright Parikha and Hemal Mehta,

I’m super excited about this pattern. After stubbornly resisting for years, I decided to try my hand at making a nearly seamless sweater. Knit from the bottom up in one piece, then separated at the armholes for the fronts and back, the only seam this sweater has is the 3-needle BO at the shoulders. The sleeves are picked up directly from the armhole and short rows are worked to shape the set in sleeve cap before the remainder of the sleeve is worked down to the cuff in the round. Like several other designs of mine, Alexandria was done in conjunction with the wonderful folks at One Planet Yarn and Fiber, who donated the lustrous Woolie Silk 3 ply the sweater requires and on whose website you can find the kit.

The path to the cardigan started out a little rocky. Originally, I was going to work this in the DK/Sport weight Sheep Shop 3. But after working up a swatch and knitting halfway up to the armholes, the company abruptly closed up shop, and we were forced to find an alternative. The Woolie Silk is a little heavier gauged than the Sheep Shop 3, but some quick swatching confirmed it would still be possible to work the rather large texture and eyelet motif and not have it swallow up the entire sweater. I had used the Woolie Silk in my Varese Hoodie and loved it. It’s a subtly dyed yarn, available in nearly solids (for those who like their yarn color conservative like me) and in more variegated palettes. But best of all, I love how the Woolie Silk, with its 30% silk content, really glows while at the same time retaining all the wonderful properties of wool.

I started working on the Woolie Silk version of this cardigan while visiting Gudrun in October. The fabulous Ysolda also happened to be visiting and both she and Gudrun were absolute lifesavers when it came to figuring out the collar.

In my head, I wanted a cardigan with wide bands that flowed into a generous scoop neck. The focus of the sweater would be on that dramatic band and collar (and cuffs); with the rest of the body in plain Stockinette. But I hadn’t thought through exactly how I would ensure the collar wouldn’t be too floppy. Obviously, I couldn’t just pick up sts for the collar and knit straight to the width desired and then bind off. Since the lower edge of the collar would have a much greater circumference than the topmost edge, decreases had to be worked somehow. Ysolda and Gudrun suggested mimicking the decreases you’d make for a yoked sweater (a garment I’ve never attempted before and therefore was a little leery of). But they were so clear with their description of how yoked sweaters generally worked as well as some specific suggestions pertaining to the stitch pattern I was using; that when I got home, it just took a little bit of geometry before a plan was hatched.

The other little wrinkle that happened around this time was that my model, the lovely Jess, became pregnant and I wasn’t sure when she’d be up for modeling for me again. I had grown so reliant on her and her husband’s unfailingly excellent photography and modeling (at one point, I was even thinking of roping Vitaly into modeling a men’s design for me); that her sudden unavailability left me in a slight panic.

Several emails later, Parikha was kind enough to agree to model and photograph my knits for me; and from the results, I think it’s quite evident that I really lucked out big time. I’ve long been an admirer of Parikha’s photos on her blog and her flickr stream. She has a keen eye, a talent for composition, and as a knitter, she really knows how to photograph knits to show them off to their best advantage. Plus, she’s a rocking stylist. Just look at the gorgeous photos of her completed Demi or Central Park Hoodie, the latter piece inspiring Eunny Jang to tap her for a modeling gig in the Summer 2008 issue of Interweave Knits.

I’ll leave you with a few more of Parikha’s wonderful photos. Used here with her permission.

1. Alexandria; photo copyright Parikha and Hemal Mehta, 2. photo copyright Parikha and Hemal Mehta

Yesterday, Mary Jane was in NYC unexpectedly and luckily for me, I was free to meet her. We decided to meet at School Products. I haven’t been there in a while, but I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to get anything. My stash is embarrassing as it is and I’m busy enough with design projects that I was fairly certain I could resist the siren call of new yarn. But this came home with me:

I hadn’t factored in the enabling influence the presence of another knitwear designer would have. We both left with some cashmere. Me with a tweedy yellow laceweight cashmere that I’m hoping will work for the Geodesic Cardigan, my newest Knitscene design; and Mary Jane with some deliciously cheery and soft fingering weight cashmere that she was already winding into balls on the subway:

By the time we made our way to McNally-Jackson in SOHO for some caffeine fortification, she had already cast on for a pair of mitts.

I’m afraid I gushed on a little too much about MJ’s work. I hope I didn’t come across too fan-girlish – even though I’m a total fan! I’ve long been an admirer of her fearless and fun sense of color. And I’ve been in love with her Super Soul Cardigan since I saw it in Veronik Avery’s inaugural issue of St Denis magazine. I’m hoping to be able to tackle it someday. I’m a timid color knitter and my fair isle tends to be too tight.

Mary Jane is as vivacious and friendly in real life as she is in her blog and work. Her passion for knitting, design, and style is plainly evident. Not content to rest on her already remarkable design achievements, she constantly pushes herself to learn new techniques and skills. I was so happy to have finally met her and hope to see her again soon!