Where does your yarn come from?

As much as I find the word locavore over-used, I do eat that way. Mostly, by eating local meat,

I not only know and support local farmers, but I know the animals: how they lived, what they ate, and how they were slaughtered. It's all important to me and I talk about how important it is to know more about your food in my book REAL FOOD HAS CURVES.

And as much as I can, I also like to know where my yarn comes from. Some factory in China?

Good to know. A native artisan in Peru hand spinning baby alpaca? Even better to know. What about tracing the yarn all the way back to the flock of sheep? Incredible -- and doable with Mountain Meadow Merino.

I discovered this at Stitches East in Hartford this past Autumnyarn from Laurel of www.handknitting.com. She offered me a skein of Mountain Meadow to try out and

I couldn't refuse. It's the merino of my childhood. The kind of yarn that my grandmother

would have loved, natural colors, soft and bouncy, and it just calls out to be knitted.

But best of all I know it comes from this flock at Camino & Sons KID Ranch.

I had one skein to play with and came up with this adorable cabled Yurt Hat.

To purchase this pattern, simply click the button

Sweater Give Away - Enter by January 13th

Are you a member of ravelry.com? If not, now's a great reason to join - and remember, it's completely free and and incredible resource. Think of it as facebook for knitters. Anyway, I've started discussion group on ravelry.com called KNITS MEN WANT. And I've posted a great new sweater give away to celebrate the fact that we have 600 members in that group. Here's what you can win.

It's the green sweater from my book KNITS MEN WANT. The very one you see here, worn by our adorable model and photographed by Jared Flood, Brooklyn Tweed himself.

What do you have to do to enter? Well, as I said, go to ravelry and sign up. If you're already a member or once you sign up join our group KNITS MEN WANT. Look at my notice for the give away. Find a knitted garment thats owned by someone else, something you really love. And take a picture of yourself wearing that - what ever it is. Post that picture and the story behind it as a reply to by notice of the give-away. On January 13th I'll put all the names of folks who entered into a computer program and get a random winner. I'll pay for shipping to wherever the lucky winner lives.

Good luck!