A month ago I received a sample of 3 new yarns from Debbie Stoller of Stitch and Bitch fame and Red Heart yarns. These yarns are all affordable at less than $5 a skein. The bright colors are definitely right up my alley.
There are three lines - Full of Sheep (single ply), Alpaca Love (an alpaca wool blend) and my overwheming favorite Bamboo Ewe - 55% bamboo and 45% wool. Bamboo Ewe has a lovely shine and is quite soft (the softest of all three) although I'd probably use it for something other than colorwork because it isn't as elastic as the others. For more information on these yarns, go to Stitch Nation Yarn.
I'm working on a simple spontaneous scarf with a skein of each type. To make a spontaneous scarf, cast on enough stitches on a long circular needle for the length of the scarf and knit in seed stitch. Each row is a different yarn with about an 8" tail to knot for fringe. I'll donate the resulting scarf to our local House Rabbit Society group to sell at a yard sale.
TODAY'S COLOR KNITTING LINKS
Drops and Garnstudio have a really cute free colorwork sock knitting pattern for Valentine's Day HERE.
Schoolhouse Press is the first to offer Ron Schweitzer's beautiful Fair Isle sweater patterns in standalone booklets. (You can also order them in kit form from Yarns International.) I own Appalachian Portraits and his designs are even more spectacular considering he only uses naturally-colored wools.
The Smithsonian is teaching color knitting through their Resident Associate program. Go HERE to sign up.
Karen's Variety is a web site selling some fun vintage knitting patterns.
This beautiful free mitten pattern combines Nordic and Islamic motifs - Andalus Mittens.
If you buy a lot of digital knitting books, here's a good article called The Archaic Art of Printing E-Books from Home.
HERE are some upcoming colorwork books to look forward to: Estonian Mittens All Around the World, Norwegian Patterns for Knitting by Mette Handberg, and Poetry in Stitches is being re-released (for a whopping $45).
I hope to have a free pattern for a colorwork scarf to offer you soon; I just need DH to model it for the photo shoot. Happy Valentine's Day!