Sue Whiting (1)

How could you make an entire book of baby socks without being repetitious, you might wonder. Apparently, the answer is that you can't. A lot of the socks in this book are more of the same trying too hard to be different and not succeeding. A basic sock with a flower sewn onto it - or dots duplicate stitched onto it -- or hearts duplicate stitched onto it - or stars embroidered onto it -- don't need to be presented as four different projects (and there are a lot more of the same sort). Then show more there are the ones where the additions actually render the socks dangerous and come with warnings. Really. "Parts of the sock may become entangled in peddles [sic] or wheels" of riding toys "thus causing injury". The extremely big ears on the elephant sock should also elicit a warning against allowing the child to wear it while walking or standing. A toddler is bound to step on them and fall on its nose.

Another slightly annoying feature of the book is that it uses only Rowan yarns -- which is okay -- but some are not labelled with equivalent weight, so in a year or a decade when the yarns are discontinued, it will take a wee bit of trouble to find out that "Rowan Cotton Glace" really was a DK weight and Rowan Wool Cotton was -- whatever it is.

That being said, there are several practical and attractive patterns. I bought the book for the woolly tights pattern. At the current price of commercially made toddler tights, the book pays for itself with the first pair knit! show less

One for someone looking to knit something for babies, a lot of them are quite twee, there's a christmas stocking in the mix as well as leggings, so a good variety. If this is your thing this is probably the book for you.

Personally I found that a lot of the patterns for boys were quite impractical (snake socks and duckbill socks) and the patterns for girls involved a lot too much lace and ribbons. A few basic "my sister-in-law/friend/whatever is having a gender non specific baby and I'd like show more to knit her something" patterns would be a nice addition to this one. There are a few but I found them uninspiring. show less

I really like the patterns in here, but all call for very expensive yarns and some (like the jacket calling for the Rowan Denim) are so tailored to the specific yarn, they're not amenable to substitution. As a result, the book isn't quite as useful to me as it might be.

I've made one sweater from it (the "Sam" striped sweater) using a worsted acrylic. It's almost definitely not as soft as it would have been had I used the Rowan the pattern called for, but it turned out pretty well.

I had a show more little trouble assembling it as there was very little guidance on how to join the different pieces. Having not made this type of sweater before, the way the sleeves joined to the body of the sweater was not immediately apparent to me. I managed to figure it out with some trial and error, though, so it all came out fine in the end. I'm looking forward to cooler weather when my toddler might actually let me try this sweater on him. show less

While this is mostly a stitch dictionary, like the other Anchor books, unlike them, it includes complete directions for making several Hardanger projects. I wouldn't want this to be my only Hardanger book when beginning, but it would make a useful second source. If you already know how to do Hardanger and want a stitch dictionary with some excellent examples of color use in non-traditional ways, this would be a good book to pick up.