Editor’s Note: We’re excited to introduce Franklin Habit’s monthly column for our Weekly Stitch Newsletter as a regular feature here on the Lion Brand Notebook. Stay tuned for stories, insights, and laughs. My grandmother, a mostly sensible woman who nonetheless cultivated a small garden of superstitions, taught me early that to begin a new year…

I’ve noticed that in December knit and crochet types divide naturally into two camps: Those who have finished their gift-making. Those who have not. If you’re in Camp One, congratulations. You might want to keep quiet. If you’re in Camp Two, what are you doing reading this? Have you looked at the calendar? The calendar…

1. Guest list. Fifteen. 2. Dining room chairs. Eight. 3. Chair deficit. Seven. 4. Number of guests who will not be horribly put out if asked to eat turkey while sitting on milk crates.Two. 5. Chair deficit. Five. 6. Number of guests who will likely not attend due to influenza, based on World Health Organization’s seasonal forecast. One. 7. Number…

Writer, illustrator, and knitter Franklin Habit joins us for his monthly column featuring humor and insights into a yarncrafter’s life. You might think a nervous type like me, who has palpitations during especially intense action sequences on Curious George, might shy away from the shrieking tomfoolery associated with Halloween. But you would be terribly, terribly wrong.…

Are you a fan of our popular Weekly Stitch newsletter, which goes out every Friday? Do you love the stories and patterns that it features? If so, you’ll want to check out our newest monthly newsletter, Pattern Journal.  If you’re someone who wonders about the stories behind the patterns, then this is the newsletter for…

When I lived in Boston I held among my acquaintances a heavily starched woman who, in the best New England fashion, lived for eighty-six years without ever once moving her upper lip or her eyebrows. She didn’t need to. Surprise and enthusiasm had been carefully bred out of her in childhood, so the entire universe…

My knitting is sticking to my fingers. As I write this, it’s ninety-four balmy degrees outside the workroom. The plants in the window box are rioting–I abandoned judicious pruning in mid-July–and just below so is a gaggle of inebriated baseball fans, lurching homeward en masse after an afternoon game at nearby Wrigley Field. Sure signs of high…

I’m sure many of you are enjoying the summer sun and the opportunities to take your homemade goods with you outdoors.  Picnics and BBQs are summer traditions that I personally love to take advantage of! So if you’re heading out for a picnic or bbq, or simply just having a fun get together in your…

I was a bookish kid. Not studious–schoolrooms and chalk dust made me itch–but bookish. The way other kids had teddy bears, I had books. I read them, hugged them, toted them about, hid them under my pillow, and kept them to hand while I took baths. I spent so much time raiding the stacks of our tiny…

1,000 Knitters is a photography project developed by Franklin Habit, a Chicago photographer and knitter. He is in the process of creating individual portraits of 1,000 people knitting the same scarf. Some of them are famous knitters and authors, but most of the photographs are of individual knitters who will ultimately become part of a…