This year I heard Fay and Lynne from the Crochet Circle podcast interview Erika Knight, their "icon", followed by Vickie Howell interviewing Erika for her Craft-ish series and realized just how famous and talented Erika is. It was time to have a look at that book that was sitting on my bookshelf still unopened. I hadn't even realized Erika was British like me!
The book, written for complete beginners, has three main sections: Materials and Techniques, Stitch Library and Project Workshops. There is a fantastic personal narrative running through the book giving advice and tips from Erika herself. I particularly like the pages on controlling the yarn in the technique section by the Index Finger or Middle Finger method and the note on tensioning the tail. I will use this information for my students.
The choice of stitches to put in the stitch library is pure genius. I own a number of stitch dictionary books containing hundreds of possible stitch patterns to choose from but Erika has picked her favorites (and they are fantastic) and then given examples of the types of yarn and projects that suits the specific stitch pattern.
There are twenty wonderful projects in the final section varying in difficulty. The color choices for the projects are fantastic. I'm sure everyone would find several projects that they would like to make. I made a modified version of the fingerless mittens for my sister in law as a Christmas gift in festive red.
