Annie Modesitt in the House!

On Friday morning, we were happily surprised by a visit from knitting designer, author, and teacher Annie Modesitt (who'd taught several classes at the shop back in April).

Annie Modesitt "models" some of Lonnie's hand-dyed yarn

Annie spent the morning kibbitzing with us. She showed us galleys for her two upcoming books -- Men Who Knit & the Dogs Who Love Them (coming in early 2007) and Romantic Knits, due out from Clarkson Potter in spring/summer of next year. Both books blew us away! Men Who Knit very wisely includes smaller sizes (for teenage boys, but more importantly, for wimmins) and is full of basic sweaters with a twist. Romantic Knits absolutely lives up to its name and is a potpourri of imaginative, sexy, sophisticated designs, many of them lacy. As someone who oftentimes has to order boxloads of books sight unseen for the shop, I will quite happily place orders for both of Annie's books.

It was fun to get all the "behind the scenes" tidbits about putting together a knitting book from Annie. While she felt that the styling on Romantic Knits was too pirate-y in some cases for her taste, all assembled thought the photography and layout were quite beautiful, and that the pirate element was infrequent and subtle.

Annie designed one of the sweaters in Romantic Knits with worsted-weight Malabrigo -- and being an avid Malabrigo lovah, nothing could make me happier. The Malabrigo pullover is cute as can be, and very wearable -- I will most definitely be knitting it (once I decide which three colors to use . . . hmmm . . .).

It was delightful to see you, Annie -- please stop in any time!