A DAY OF MAGIC

My sister's account of her experience seeing and meeting the fabulous J.K. Rowling is now over at my blog In Knitting News. Allison worked hard to get her experience into words. I hope you enjoy the read.

The JK Rowling Open Book Tour Sweepstakes

Anyone still out there knitting, reading, and continuing to enjoy all things Harry Potter?

I've mentioned my HP crazed sister in past posts. I've knitted her several hats, scarves and little HP related stuffed animals.

Well she won one of the 1,000 tickets to go see JK Rowling speak at Carnegie Hall in NYC on October 19th at 7PM. Click on the Click Here in the box to the right of the box with the picture of Jo to see the list of confirmed names. She is listed under OH, Allison, Age 27.

To say that Allison is over the moon with excitement is an understatement. You can read more about it, including who she is taking with her on this adventure sadly it's not me, over at my knitting blog In Knitting News. Please stop by and congratulate her in the comments!



Here is a recent picture of her beloved Harry Potter bookshelf often referred to as 'The Shrine.' It's filled with all sorts of fun books, toys, book boxes, pictures, a film reel of HP4, a set of the British stamps, calendars, and multiple handmade HP items, even a pillow made from a party napkin by a friend.

I'm so very happy for my sister.

Happy knitting everyone.

Karen

*UPDATE 10/23/07*
Yes Allison and Nicholas were there and they had a fabulous time. Allison is currently compiling what she has dubbed the MANIFESTO a scrapbook of sorts detailing her experience. I will be posting her write up on my blog when it is ready.

WINNERS! After a very long time... and an apology

I'm back (finally) from vacation and so can (finally) announce the winners from the Second F.O. Contest!

A big congratulations to Lindsay, who did brilliantly with her Dark Mark scarf, which she not only knitted, but wrote the pattern for. Talk about impressive! By far and away our winner, Lindsay should get in touch with me (knitter.natter@yahoo.com) for her lovely prizes.

And while Lindsay swept the contest, we couldn't ignore runner-up Just a Knit Wit, who's exciting and hilarious Woolly Voldemort series kept us tuning in weekly. If you didn't read them check here for Parts One, Two, Three, and Four. JaKW, you're going to get a little something too!

Thanks to everyone for participating in Part Two of our Harry Finished Projects Contest! All the entries were fantastic.

*SPOILER COMING*
Also, a quick apology to all Snape apologists. I should have listened. I should have trusted. I should have believed Dumbledore. "The Prince's Tale" in this final book was close to undoing me. The final chapter with Albus Severus certainly did. Much appreciation to all the Snape fans who never did believe the *hype*. You folks stood up against a world of disbelievers, of which I was certainly one, and you should be proud.

More Spoilers!

I refer you to the comments for these House Ghost spoilers!

Phoenix Feathers!

I hope it isn't too late to post here. I hope everybody isn't just going to go away and forget just because Book 7 has come out. There is so much more knitting to do, to celebrate and to remember. I, for one, will not only be finishing the Severus Snape Pomatomus Socks, but will be knitting a Severus Snape Lace Scarf too - the kind someone should have made for him, to make him feel wanted and loved.

But the last week has been spent up to the elbows in dye vats as I struggled to recreate the incredible plumage of Dumbledore's wonderful mythical phoenix, so that I could do justice to Socktopia's amazing Fawkes socks. Eventually I think I've got somewhere near.

What do you think? This is a very nice superwash merino/tencel blend which has a lovely silky texture and superb stitch definition. It should make very nice Fawkes socks. I dyed four skeins so three of them will go up on eBay this evening under the Celtic Memory label and the last is mine, mine, all MINE. The socks start tonight...

Final Contest Submissions

Here are submissions for Part Two of the Big Harry Contest.



KnitWhit's Wizard's Hat.

Cheryl's Gryffindor socks.

Treesh's Gryffindor top, Slytherin top, Hufflepuff top, her Gryffindor pets, Baby Hedwig, Trevor the Toad, and Crookshanks and her Phoenix Tears scarf, all found here.

Lindsay's Dark Mark Illusion scarf.

Janet's Hufflepuff scarf.

Just a Knit Whit's Woolly Voldemort.

Birdwell's Hogwarts House Bracelets.

Mandy's Golden Snitch.

Karen's Sheldon the Turtle.

Scarves for all Seasons (a.k.a. Karen A)'s Slytherin Socks, Gryffindor socks, or Hufflepuff socks.

Please vote for your favorite in our sidebar poll! Voting will be up from now, Tues, 7/31 through Sat, 8/4. Or, knowing this KAL host, voting will be up at least that long ;-).

Good luck!

Late Entry

here are my Gryffindor socks made for a swap...

Dateline! J.K.! Spoilers Galore!

Hello everyone! Instead of posting a huge spoiler, where your eye might accidentally run over it, I thought I'd take a page out of
Birdy's book and write my Spoiler in the comments instead and continue discussion here, especially after watching the Dateline interview with J.K. Hope to keep the talk alive!

Pick a Winner

Here are submissions for Part Two of the Big Harry Contest.

KnitWhit's Wizard's Hat.

Treesh's Gryffindor top, Slytherin top, Hufflepuff top, her Gryffindor pets, Baby Hedwig, Trevor the Toad, and Crookshanks and her Phoenix Tears scarf, all found here.
(I think each top will be counted as its own entry but the pets will be grouped together as one on the poll- how does that sound Treesh?)

Lindsay's Dark Mark Illusion scarf.

Janet's Hufflepuff scarf.

Just a Knit Whit's Woolly Voldemort.

Birdwell's Hogwarts House Bracelets.
(I grouped these as one- does that work for you, Birdy?)

Mandy's Golden Snitch.

Karen's Sheldon the Turtle.

Scarves for all Seasons (a.k.a. Karen A)'s Slytherin Socks, Gryffindor socks, or Hufflepuff socks.
(These I grouped together as one- is this alright, SfaS?)

Also, as I was pulling pictures of Karen A's socks (and I'm so sorry, Karen, for your troubles this year- I'm glad we still had some of your pictures here), I saw many completed projects that weren't put for submissions in the last two weeks. If you have something you would like added to this list, I ask you to do a new post, with a picture, with a few lines about pattern and why you did it. Right now it's Saturday in the AM, so why don't we say all these submissions should be put up by Sunday night? So when Monday morning comes around, I'll make sure everyone who should have a submission is on here and we'll put up a poll. How does that work?

And if you'd like to change how you're submissions are grouped you can: 1)comment here 2) email me at knitter.natter@yahoo.com or 3)comment on my blog.

Hope this looks good to everyone!

Entries for Contest

For those who have been to my blog you know that life has been very active. With the loss of our grandson and our computer the only pictures of my submittals are here on the blog.
Hufflepuff Dress socks
Gryffindor Dress Socks
Slytherin Dress Socks
started Ravenclaw Dress Socks.
These were all in various extra large mens size (15 double e, 11, and 10)

Thats for a wonderful time and fun blog.

karen a
hufflepuff house

For Your Consideration

As reading the book (amongst other things) has kept me off the Internet for almost four days straight, I've been incredibly lax about doing anything I said I would (remember a contest- end of the KAL kind of thing?). Anyhoo, that all changes in the next day or two.
I will be putting together a final blog with all the submitted entries. If you've not posted (in the last ten days) your submission for the second half of the KAL, please do so at once!
In the meantime, here's a new poll for your voting pleasure. And please, get busy on Birdwell's brilliant discussion post. Thank you Birdy!

Most Dangerous Stunt

So I was at the Renaissance Faire this past weekend, watching one of the shows, a group that does "stupid and dangerous" stunts with fire and knives and what not.

So towards the end of the show the girl steps forward and announces "I will now perform our MOST DANGEROUS STUNT!!" Walking off stage, she returns with Deathly Hallows in hand. "I will read... the last page!"

It was a joke, of course, and everyone did exactly what they were supposed to do, scream and cover their ears and yell and stomp.

The head of the group runs forward, grabs the book away and says "Umm... that one's a bit TOO dangerous. Lets just juggle the knives again."

HP Boxed Set

In September a boxed set of all 7 books is coming out. The box looks wonderful! Since I don't currently own the books I thought I might get a boxed set of all books.

But...

What I really want is the British versions of the books. So I've been checking Amazon.co.uk and I see that in October a boxed set is also coming out, but they don't as yet have any pictures.

Does anyone know what the differences are between the adult versions and the children's versions? I didn't see any references to those differences on the HP Lexicon so I was wondering if they just had different cover art.

So I'm Curious...

Did anyone read the 'spoilers' that were up before the book came out?

Were they real?

Book Discussion

SPOILERS in the COMMENTS.

If you have already read the book and ARE DYING to talk about it: reply in the comments. If you're not finished--don't read the comments!

Let us begin!!

I'm Very Pleased with Book 7

I went to the Union Square Barnes & Noble (NYC) for the release. While all 4 floors were amazingly decorated, and the people who showed up in costume were also amazing, the staff weren't prepared for the hordes of people who showed up, and it was a disorganized nightmare. As we left, and took a taxi to the Penn Station Border's, we saw at least three blocks of people lining up to purchase the book. Border's wasn't as crowded, but they also had some neat decorations, people also showed up in costume, and they had a much better handle on organization and crowd control. We were out of there with our books by 12:40.

When I got back to the hotel I stayed up reading til 5:30, took a nap, and and finished the book by 10:30. I LOVED the book, it answered so many questions and was really brilliantly done. I read as slowly as possible, savoring every word, and was sorry when I finished it. So I read it again. I'll probably read it yet again, soon.

HP Sheldon

Pattern: Sheldon The Turtle
Designer: Ruth Homrighaus
Size: Just Right for My Sister's Harry Potter Gallery
Yarn: Knit Pick's Wool of the Andes in Hollyberry and Daffodil.
Needles: size 3 dpns and size 4 circs
Started April 3, 2007
Finished April 14, 2007

I would like to share the HP Sheldon I knitted back in April for my HP crazed sister but did not post to the KAL for Contest #2. His nose turned out a bit pointy but in person he is quite adorable. It's so cute how his shell is removable. He lives with the other HP inspired knits showcased in my sister's bookshelf of HP artifacts.

Just finished the book about an hour ago. You will find no spoilers here. Really looking forward to reading what everyone has to say about the book.

Happy reading and knitting everyone!

I'm Not Spoiling, I Promise!

Okay, you all know my Harry Potter mania. Well, I'm so happy to say that I'm not the only dweeb in the family! I managed to escape complete and total "dweebness" by maturely skipping the midnight book selling at Bookworld, but I just had to get up early and purchase the book as soon as Wal-mart opened at 7:00 this morning. Guess who I ran into there?

Brother-in-law Tom, who was there to purchase not one, but two books; one for himself and one for my MiL. Hee hee! Tom is very tall, and hates to be seen in the company of other dweebs, so this was the best picture I could get of him. . . . I thought it rather funny that he headed out of Wal-mart a few minutes later with his books under one arm, and an ENTIRE pack of Mello-Yellow in the other. (The man is addicted, I tell you! People really shouldn't form addictions . . . . ah . . . right . . . must continue . . .where was I? Ah yes, Harry Potter!!!)

After standing in line behind a sizable number of people who were all as excited as I, we managed to file into the store without any shoving or fighting to pick up our coveted tomes. I was pleasantly surprised to see a fair number of gray heads in the queue. The elderly lady who checked out ahead of me said that there was "no way her grandson was going to get to read it before she did; he'd just have to wait another day before getting his present!". Wonderful woman; displayed a true sense of priorities.

After barely suppressing the desire to giggle with glee, I headed to one of my favorite guilty haunts, Amigos, where I ordered breakfast and read for an hour or so (much to the waitress's amusement!)

Yes, I realize you can't see me very well in this photo. It's 7:00 in the morning, and I haven't fixed my hair. Deal with it.

After that, I had to head home to watch the kids for an hour so Andy could finish up a tile job. Not to worry! I put on a handy-dandy movie, and read on!

Now, Andy and I had made an "agreement", that he would watch the kids all day so I could read. I have suspicions that Andy has some goblin blood, because he "watched" the kids all day by playing 10 games of settlers (on-line game) while the kids climbed in my lap as I tried to read. Thankfully, as family members will attest, I have an amazing ability to ignore catastrophic happenings while engrossed in a book. (My brother once piled all the dining room chairs over me while I was reading; when I finished my book, I looked up to discover I was trapped in a mountain of furniture. Never noticed a thing.)

When I finished the book at 3:30 this afternoon (yes, it took me a little longer than the last book that came out. I was trying to savor the story . . .) I looked up to discover . . . .

This. (Look at all the toys piled under the piano).

And this.

All in just 7 short hours. When Andy emerges from reading the book I'm gonna kill him. It's a good thing he bought me more bottles of gin and tonic while he was "babysitting".

Avada Kadavra!

Anyone Finished Yet?

I finished reading this morning...and I am all antsy--I want to talk about the book so bad but everyone is still reading...i.e. all the forums are down. I stayed up most of the night--I had a 2 hour nap at 5 and finished the book this morning before 11.

I am sitting here groggy and tinking back my MS3, pondering if I should re-read The Deathly Hallows just for kicks.

Contest #2

I would like to add my Golden Snitch this was a fun knit I have knit a few up for the kids! I can't wait until this weekend! The move was good and I am excited and sad for the book! I hope everyone has a great weekend reading and knitting!