{"id":461,"date":"2010-03-07T22:53:27","date_gmt":"2010-03-08T06:53:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/?p=461"},"modified":"2010-03-07T22:59:05","modified_gmt":"2010-03-08T06:59:05","slug":"and-the-golden-knot-goes-to","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/?p=461","title":{"rendered":"And the Golden Knot goes to …"},"content":{"rendered":"

Well, another night of Oscar has come and gone and with it a few surprises. Congrats to Katherine Bigelow for being the first female director to take home the Oscar and to everyone else that won and\/or was nominated. Yes, my accolades to the Academy is a bit brief, kinda like the show itself. Is it just me, or does it seem to suffer a bit with them shortening the nominations in order to get a show under 3.5hours? I mean, if they want to shorten it, why don’t they ditch those stupid speeches for best Actress\/Actor (although I imagine that having Oprah speak on your behalf must have been better than being nominated for Gabourey – who I think should have won)? Anyway, that’s my little bit about the Oscar ceremony and truthfully all I can really say seeing as I didn’t watch the whole thing. Oh, one last thing – I was thoroughly impressed by Sandra Bullock’s acceptance speech – especially after her nonchalant look when they announced her as the winner. Did anybody else see that or was I imagining things?<\/p>\n

So my idea is that we create our own Academy for knitting and have our own awards. This is totally off the cuff right now, so I reserve the right to do this properly and then adjust it later on. For now, we’ll call it a pilot. If you like it, we’ll do a formal one and you can send in nominations and we’ll have voting and everything. That’s if you like it. For now, I’ll pretend I’m Quinton Tarantino. You’re in my church, I’m God, and heresy is punishable by death! So with that, here are my categories and winners (based on my limited knowledge so get your comments in so we can increase the database and have some real fun with this). By the way, the awards are called the Golden Knots … just cause!<\/p>\n

Best Knitting Software:<\/span> Sweater Wizard v 3.0 – Although this only come in a PC version (I hear they are working on a Mac one too) this is a great tool to help you design or alter a sweater. It allows you to design a sweater from top-bottom, bottom-top, in the round, back and forth, sideways, or whatever. It really does everything you’d expect in creating a pattern and even does teddy bear sizes! It gives you measurements in metric or imperial and also stitch and row counts so even machine knitters can use it!<\/p>\n

Best Bamboo Needles<\/span>: A few years ago I discovered Crystal Palace circular needles and have salivated ever since. I got a few pairs but since they were coming from the states the prices were quite high (the Canadian dollar wasn’t doing so well then). With the dollar being on par with the US, it’s definitely time to look into stocking my collection. The needles are super slick but the best thing about them is that the join has a ball-n-socket swivel so the nylon never twists! It’s attention to details like these that make these needles the winner!<\/p>\n

Best Circular Needles:<\/span> If you don’t want bamboo circulars (they can break in the smaller sizes) then your best bet is Addi Turbo Circulars. I’m sure you’ve heard about them by now and if your LYS doesn’t stock them, find one that does. A word of warning though, these needles are not for knitting in the slow lane. Move over and let a real knitter by as you will fly through your stitches while using these. The only drawback to these needles is that the nylon between them is nylon coated steel wire. While this makes them durable, if you crease them they will stay that way and you’ll have to replace them or deal with it. So be careful if you’re using them to do the magic loop!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Best Straight Needles:<\/span> Brittany Needles. Made of birch from properly regulated forested areas in the US, these needles provide all the benefits of wood, with an artistic look that makes you almost want to display them rather than knit with them. Both their knitting needles and crochet hooks are made to the same standards and are exceptionally beautiful – both to look at and to use.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Best fiber:<\/span> Wool. I think it’s only fitting to give this fiber the first Golden Knot in this category. For years wool has been one of our most used and versatile fiber. While in the beginning we could only get the raw, itchy, form of the fiber, with proper breeding (Merino amongst others) and processing, we can get wool that rivals silk with its luxurious feel and drape. Add to that that wool doesn’t lose its insulating properties when wet, can be mixed with a variety of other fibers, takes dyes very well, and is readily available, well, I think wool gets the nod this year.<\/p>\n

Most desired fiber:<\/span> Qiviut (ki-vee-ute). I’m rather lucky living in Vancouver because we have Qiviut available right now in a special display brought here because of the Winter Olympics. This fiber has some amazing properties and is truly spectacular. It is literally the down or under hair of a Musk Ox and seeing the temperatures they have to withstand it’s no wonder this fiber is so warm. It has very few and smooth scales and is as soft as cashmere. The natural softness of the fiber makes it a delight to have next to your skin and most people can bear it with ease. Unfortunately, like cashmere it takes a while to process enough high quality Qiviut for commercial use, so it is quite expensive.<\/p>\n

Best Knitting Magazine:<\/span> Interweave Knits. Remember, heresy is punishable by death. Yes, I know there are lots out there, and Filatti Handknitting was a close second to this one. The thing that gave Interweave the Knot was its instruction and depth. Filatti consistently has some of the best designs that I have ever seen, but Interweave goes that extra step. Their articles are very educational and informative and they spotlight up and coming designers that you may never hear of any other way.<\/p>\n

Best Online Pattern Site:<\/span> Garnstudio.com. If the 30,000+ FREE patterns aren’t enough to convince you then I don’t know what would do. Needless to say, if I ever need an idea on how to construct something or want to find something unique, this is the first (and often only) site I go to. I could sing their praises for quite a while, but I see the red light flashing for this acceptance speech. Just go check it out yourself and bookmark it!<\/p>\n

Best Online Knitting Community:<\/span> Ravelry.com. Again, this was a close one but Ravelry has a few things that put it over the top and got it the knot. You can put your stash online to keep track of it and you can also categorize your yarn under stash or willing to sell\/trade. That way anyone looking for yarn can do a search and find out if it’s out there. They also allow you to sell your patterns online as well and return over 95% of the money to the designer! I also like it because you can meet people and make new friends as well. There’s lots more to it so if you’re not a member, go sign up. You can find me on there as Mr. Hugzzz.<\/p>\n

Okay, I’m going to leave it at this for now, but there will be more, I promise. I didn’t realize how many categories we could get! I guess I know what the Academy goes through. So tell you what, if you have an idea for a category and\/or a nominee, just put it in a comment and I’ll go through them and post the winners. Just to get you going here are a few I thought of but didn’t put up yet … Best New Fiber, Best Knitwear Designer, Best Knitting Blog, Best Knitting Video, Best Knitting Instruction Site, Best Knitting Book, Best LYS, Best Sock Yarn … As you can see the list can be endless. I’ll select the Best 25 categories and go from there. With this though, it really is an honor just to be nominated.<\/p>\n

Hugzzz \ud83d\ude0e<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, another night of Oscar has come and gone and with it a few surprises. Congrats to Katherine Bigelow for being the first female director to take home the Oscar and to everyone else that won and\/or was nominated. Yes, my accolades to the Academy is a bit brief, kinda like the show itself. Is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[108,71,110,87,111,118,115,116,107,114,117,971,109,113,56,112,976],"class_list":{"0":"post-461","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"tag-awards","8":"tag-bamboo","9":"tag-brittany","10":"tag-circular-needles","11":"tag-crystal-palace","12":"tag-designer","13":"tag-drops","14":"tag-garnstudio","15":"tag-golden-knot","16":"tag-interweave-knits","17":"tag-knitwear","18":"tag-needles","19":"tag-oscar","20":"tag-qiviut","21":"tag-ravelry","22":"tag-software","23":"tag-wool","24":"pmpro-has-access","25":"czr-hentry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pNDS0-7r","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=461"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":467,"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461\/revisions\/467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ittakesballstoknit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}