A happy holiday week to all. I report knitting-related developments here at the world of String. First and foremost, we had a wonderful holiday, full of of friends, immediate family and food. Not necessarily in that order. All cookies and tamales were well received, as were this year’s various knitted gifts. I in turn received a couple of knit-related gifts from The Resident Male.

His first gift was a universe of Clover needles and accessories – a trove he scored on eBay.

There’s one of every size 10-inch and 14-inch straight, plus a good sampling of the larger diameter circs, mostly in the 24 inch length, and a couple of crochet hooks and two kinds of stitch markers. A princely gift, and I am looking forward to using some of them in the very near future (see below).

His second gift was a bit more esoteric – three knitting leaflets from the 1940s, also found on eBay:

The two in front are troop knitting compendiums, each containing sweaters and accessories for men. The Minerva one has excellent instructions for several types of shooters mittens and marksman’s gloves – some with separate trigger fingers, some with convertible flip-tops. One pattern – a simple garter stitch v-neck vest in worsted weight – has already been bespoken by the giver, and will be knit on my new bamboo needles (see above). Since bidding was hot and heavy on his eBay finds, he asks me to extend apologies to anyone reading here whom he may have inadvertently trampled.

The third booklet contains several very simple but elegant sweaters knit in fingering weight cashmere. While I doubt that I’ll be stumbling across fingering weight cashmere in quantity any time soon, the shaping on the patterns is particularly flattering. Also because sizes are small (typical for the era, when an 18 is the equivalent of a modern 10), adjustment to a slightly larger gauge than 8 stitches per inch will enable easy production in larger sizes.

The final item is a bit of a lagniappe. I did most of my stocking-stuffer shopping at American Science & Surplus. I got all manner of inexpensive silly things for the kids – small flashlights, magnifiers, craft supplies, and the like. (For the record, this site is worth keeping an eye on for measuring tools, scales, calipers, scissors, bags and containers of all types – all things that knitters can use.) While I was there I also got myself a full page magnifier and two packs of military type assorted metal shank buttons. Each pack contained 10, of mixed styles and sizes. Two packs are needed to make up a usable quantity of the larger size buttons. Between two I received enough buttons for four sweaters, the majority bearing Soviet star with hammer and sickle motifs. I also got four Canadian Air Cadets buttons. At under $2.00 total for the entire lot, the price can’t be beat:

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