Helical Knitting ebook giveaway

The giveaway is now closed. Thank you to everyone who has entered, I'll let you know who's won as soon as I can! 

Hello, hello, it's Friday already!  I hope you've had a lovely week.

Thank you so much for all your comments on my last couple of posts and, of course, the Amory Socks which went live on Monday to help with the fundraising contribution for the Flower Power Fund.   It still feels very strange to me to put a pattern out for sale so I have appreciated your support!

In a change from the post that I had planned (I am sure you can wait for more photos of my tomato plants 😀), I'm going to write instead about helical knitting.  When I first showed you the socks that I was making using the helical knitting technique that I found on the AC Knitwear website, I had no idea that they would cause so much interest!

I finished my socks the other day and I am so very pleased with them!  The two colours blend together as if they were made for each other, and there is no way at all that you can spot where one colour round starts and the other ends - it's as if you have one ball of striped yarn!

Here's where I started back in the middle of May.  The two yarns that I'm using are a purple hand-dyed sock yarn from The Knitting Goddess which I bought at Yarndale way back in 2014, and a ball of Regia Mosaik Color 4ply in shade 05560.  I hadn't quite found the pattern I wanted to use for either of them, so I decided that I would make the most of the enforced time at home to learn something new and blend them together in helical stripes.

Helical knitting (also known as helix knitting) is a technique that allows you to work completely jogless stripes into your knitting.  This makes it perfect for stripey socks like mine where I'm working with two balls of yarn but don't want to carry a float up the inside of the sock, and also for stash-busting where you might have smaller lengths of yarn that you want to include but don't quite have enough to create a full project of stripes (there are the ends to deal with in that case, of course, but I'm going to conveniently ignore those today 😀).  

It's something that I've seen quite a lot of in various projects on social media but have never had time to really investigate.  There's plenty about the technique online and no shortage of tutorials, but I chose to use the one by Jen from Arnall-Culliford Knitwear.  Jen works with her husband Jim and is a knitting tech editor and designer who has written many articles for magazines that I have read over the years, so the decision to use her tutorial out of the extensive choice that we're always faced with online was an easy one for me.

Jen has produced several helical technique videos including one on how to knit with more than two yarns to create your stripes (I think that one is next on my list!) - and there's an ebook to accompany her helical knitting tutorials called Something New to Learn about Helical Knitting which has different projects in it.  I hadn't thought any further than socks (no surprises there, I don't often think any further than socks!) but of course this technique lends itself to hats, cowls, mittens ... I definitely had one of those "Wow, why did I wait so long?!" moments!

Jen has very kindly offered two copies of her ebook for me to give away to you so that you can learn more about the technique and try out the projects if you'd like to.  

Source: www.acknitwear.co.uk     Photo credit: Jesse Wild

The ebook contains photo tutorials and there are video tutorials to accompany them on the website.  There are four chapters covering basic helical stripes (including working them in garter stitch), adding shaping and working muti-round stripes.  That's definitely something for you to get your teeth into whilst we're waiting to get back out into the world again!

Source: www.acknitwear.co.uk     Photo credit: Jesse Wild

If you can't wait to see if you win, Jen's set up a 20% off discount code for the ebook - it's WINWICK20 - CLICK HERE to go to her website or HERE to go to the Ravelry page.  This code is valid until 30 June 2020 and can't be used with any other offer.  This is not an affiliate link.

All you have to do to enter the giveaway is tell me how many patterns (not bonus patterns) there are in the book.  You can find that information on the book website by clicking HERE, and then put that number in the comments.  Don't forget that you'll need to add your name as well (no other personal details though!) in case your comment lists you as anonymous, and don't worry that your comment won't show straight away as they are all moderated to reduce spam - they sit safely on a list until I can check them!  The giveaway closes at 8pm BST on Sunday 7 June 2020 and I'll draw two winners as soon as I can after that using the Random.org widget. Jen will then arrange to get your ebook to you if you win.

Good luck!