Last year, we had a series of posts about the best gifts for knitters. Let's face it. It can be hard to shop for knitters especially if you are not a knitter yourself. We'll be featuring great gifts throughout the 2011 holiday season. For now, check out what we recommended last year:

Slippers - sure knitters can make them, but they're busy knitting for everyone else. Get them something to keep their feet comfy through the winter.

Tech Gifts for Knitters 2010 - Some knitters love to document their knitting with cameras, laptops and smart phones.

The Baa Humbug Sheets from Garnet Hill - Sheep related items are awesome :)

For good measure, here's our FREE guide to organizing your holiday knitting if you are knitting gifts for the people you love this year.

I saw Interweave's new publication Jane Austen Knits in stores a couple of weeks ago, but I didn't realize it was an Interweave publication and my initial reaction was a little less than desired. When I first saw it, I was like, oh jeeze yet another knitting magazine and one for Jane Austen of all people, what will they think of next? Charles Dickens Knitting?.

I suppose my slightly negative reaction came from a few places.

1) I am so sick of mainstream fiction targeted towards women to be Jane Austen based. You know, the books about the children of the Darcys, the continuing stories of Mr. Darcy, blah blah blah. I love Jane Austen, but I dislike it when I'm so blatantly marketed to.

2) I love knitting magazines. I have tons of them. I have a hard time organizing them and filtering out the unwanted ones. Okay, it could be said that I hoard knitting magazines. However these days when I'm not making much money it's hard for me to justify purchasing all of teh knitting magazines. So I suppose part of my reaction was. Oh man, another knitting magazine I can't really afford.

However, now that I've seen the projects I must have this knitting magazine. Sigh. Gorgeous, some of them great for costuming.

What's your knitting magazine stash like? Will you be buying Jane Austen Knits? What makes you buy a knitting magazine? Let me know in the comments.

Twitter is one of my favorite things right now because it's one way I discover lots of fabulous new Etsy sellers! Today's awesome find is knitandcurl, a purveyor of handknits and felts tea cozies. Many items are thoughtfully embroidered, bringing the simple handknits from the everyday to the fashionable. Each items adds a cozy handmade vibe to your wardrobe and home. Here are some of the gifts that caught my eyes:

I really want one of those tea cozies!

If you've been on Ravelry, then perhaps you've been one of those people who desperately want a Ravelry app for your iPhone or Android. I can understand the appeal. Imagine getting to organize your stash, knitting books, notions and needles all on your smart phone and having it link up with Ravelry's comprehensive database. That was the expectation I had when I found that there was a new Android app for Ravelry.

I was hoping that I would be able to manage my entire stash on my phone. This would be great. I could take pictures and link them to the stash. Alas this is not the case with Ravulous. As of right now you can only view and edit your current projects, which is great, but I want more. I don't know if this is on the agenda of the programmer, but any additional functionality would be worthwhile. I would pay more money for more features. Otherwise, it's easier to just use the web browser to hang out on Ravelry.

The bottom line: if you want an easy way to show off your current knitting projects. Ravulous provides a quick way to download your current projects to edit as you knit and to show your friends.

Happy Anniversary to A Verb For Keeping Warm in Oakland. They're celebrating a year in their Oakland location with some fabulous events -and a sale! Can't beat that. Well, yes you can! Ysolda will be there -maybe you can check out Little Red in the City!

Here's what's new in knitting For Monday, November 7th 2011 and no more of those cold penguins, huh?

Joe Strummers daughter is a knitter. Not really news as much as she's published a craft book. Read all about it here.

Whipup has a lovely post about what it is to be a machine knitter. I've always been curious about these contraptions.

The Designer Studio has an interview with knitting designer Marnie Maclean.

Some of the unemployed are sticking to their knitting per the Wall Street Journal.

Purlbee has some felted oven mitts for you to make as a host gift for Thanksgiving.

Sadly, the Chicago area has seen a rash of local yarn shop closings.