Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Fall 2010 classes

What have I been doing for all this time? Well, I've been working on the classes that I'll be teaching at Spirit Work for the coming fall and winter. Classes are posted on the shop's website, and as far as I know there are still openings in all of them.

This season there are two sweater classes - a Traditional Gansey pullover which I should clarify as being traditionally constructed out of a specified worsted weight yarn, rather than the fine 5-ply British gansey yarn, in the interest of students being able to finish the sweater or close to it by the end of class!

The other sweater class is in collaboration with my fellow knitting teacher, Jeannine, and is an Aran made from the bottom up with the student's choice of raglan or modified drop-shoulders, cardigan or pullover in a specified worsted-weight yarn. While Jeannine and I both love making top-down saddle-shoulder Arans, we also like to mix things up! ;)


It's been a couple of years since I last taught a vest class and have a beauty planned for this year. The Classic Vest is the basic V-neck, cardigan-style, stockinette stitch vest in a specified tweed yarn. Depending on their skill level and what they want to do, students have the choice of adding a cable panel going up and down at the shoulder, and if needed for the fuller-figured, short-row bust darts.


Colorwork mittens are always popular. Simple Two Color Mittens are again being offered, and there is a new one, the Tofta Gauntlet Mitten, also offered.

A completely new project for me is the Half-Glove. These are not fingerless mitt(en)s, but are actual gloves with the fingers ending just below the first joint, so they will be warm and should stay put. If they so choose, students could make them as regular gloves too. I'm rather pleased with them myself, and have been thinking that they'd be nice for gift-giving.


Photos have been taken of most of these items and should be up on the shop website soon.

About Cottage Craft

About Cottage Craft yarns which I used for the Blue Spruce Aran, caveat emptor or buyer beware. There have been problems with people placing orders and not getting them or having to wait for MONTHS. This is not an acceptable situation for most of us knitters because when we order something, we usually have a particular project in mind and want to get started on it.

So instead of ordering yarn from Cottage Craft, I highly recommend ordering from Briggs & Little. The Regal line of yarn is the EXACT same yarn as CC's 2-ply, and I'm as certain as I can be that Briggs & Little is the manufacturer of the yarn. If you go to Briggs & Little's website, you can request color cards for all of their lines of yarn via email. The price may be a bit higher than CC, but what good does it do to save money on something that never comes?