Daily Review - Brioche Knitting e-book

Hope you all had a good Thanksgiving.  Sorry I've been so quiet - we were pretty busy and had a nice time with family in town.  PLUS - I had the opportunity to meet my 5 week old nephew (so small, squishy and completely adorable!)

Given the extra day off work, this finally gave me a chance to review an e-book tutorial for Beginner and Intermediate Brioche Knitting.  I was excited to review this as it's something I've been meaning to try and I'm always happy to learn a new technique.  Thank you to Liat of KNITFreedom for providing a copy of this e-book for me to review.

[NOTE:  This e-book does require the latest version of Adobe Reader to view, although there is a handy link within the e-book that you can follow to download an update (which I needed anyway!)]

This e-book lesson is a wonderful collection of step-by-step Brioche knitting videos with written direction.  The videos are nice and clear, and I found I was able to knit along at the same pace as the video was going even though I was learning.  They compliment the written directions well as I think that trying to learn this stitch using written directions alone would have me completely lost.  The videos are also presented in both American and Continental knitting styles so you can follow on no matter which way you prefer to knit.  By a half-hour in, I was comfortable with the cast on, set up, had knit about 10 rows of my swatch, and even learned a new bind off technique.  

Although just starting out, I did try the section regarding brioche knitting in the round, which I know I'll want to be using for hats along the way.  This involving learning both the brioche purl stitch and joining in the round.  I also tried Brioche knitting with two colors - which makes for beautiful scarf designs that I've seen but never known how the patterns were achieved.  Following along with the video, it didn't take long before my little swatch started taking shape and I'm thrilled that I was able to produce this just by following along with the videos.  [I was using a bigger needle than necessary for my yarn, so my stitches are super wonky in the swatches that I did below, but you get the idea.]

Plain one color Brioche stitch.

Two color Brioche.

This is definitely going to take more practice and I'll probably stick with the one color Brioche working flat for a little while until I get the hang of it.  While I'm learning though, this e-book is a great reference guide and the table of contents is really nicely laid out so that I can jump to whichever section is needed as I want to learn new things.  There's also a variety of helpful links throughout, plus tips for blocking techniques and fixing mistakes (which I know will be coming in useful at some point!)  It's like taking a knitting class, except you can refer to it over and over!

The e-book is selling for $34.77 on Liat's website, or through Ravelry.

This is what it's supposed to look like....with a little practice!