Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Wednesday Review: More Last-Minute Knitted Gifts


Time to punch out today's Wednesday Review while I'm still on my sugar high from yesterday. (I think I ate about 239 cupcakes and other sweets and then topped it off with a giant bowl of ice cream and a cocktail...I'm going for HEALTHY here people.) More Last-Minute Knitted Gifts by Joelle Hoverson is the follow up to Last-Minute Knitted Gifts, which I don't own and have never seen. So while I can't compare it to the first book I can say that I really enjoy the sequel.

What I like:
·         The book is divided by the time it should take to make the gift - 2-4 hours, 4-6, 6-8 and longer.
·         When I knit I usually think clothes, but this has other fun things like hot coffee-cup sleeves, ornaments, baskets, bookmarks (not sure I'd ever make a knit bookmark - but good for a beginner)
·         Each pattern tells you the exact yarn that was used in the photographs and has a little intro paragraph that elaborates on the gift.
·         There is a section on wrapping hand knit gifts - great ideas for using yarn to embellish the wrapped present.
·         There is a glossary for techniques and abbreviations as well as a step by step tutorial (with pictures!) for a few of the techniques.  I used this to learn the Kitchener Stitch when I was making socks.

What I don't like:
·         I think the time sections are if you already know how to make the item. The socks I made using the pattern in the 2-4 hours section took me about 3 to make one sock. This is mostly due to the fact that I had to look up a lot of the stitches. Now that I know what I'm doing it'll be interesting to see how long it takes me to make a pair.
·       Like all craft books - it's rare that I like 100% of the ideas in them. This one has a few that I know I'll never make - a plush house, seat covers, and the bookmarks.

I like this book and am excited to time myself when I make something out of it. 

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