Sharpen your needles, steal your granny's best wool (we recommend a hearty 8-ply) and get ready to cast-on. Hot off the heels of the extravaganza that was the annual Stitch & Bitch Knit Crawl in June, the next few weeks are set to be a haven for lovers of all things craft. Here we have listed the best of the best so that you can organise your life accordingly. Be warned though – if......

It's windy and wet again, so those jumpers inching towards the bottom of the wardrobe are back to the top of the pile. Ahead of the trend in woollens is the Great British Sheep, child of I Knit London, the city's shop and sanctuary for knitters. It is a project by our friends to promote UK sheep, wool and handknitting. Its first outing was at the Alternative Village Fete, part of the National Theatre's......

Stitch & Bitch weren't the only knitting collaborative out and about flaunting their needles in public on Saturday. Oh no. Knitters from I-Knit London were knitty treasure hunting. Our roving reporter reports back: Looking for clues at Leake Street Kick-off started at 11 am, with the teams leaving in batches til 12.30. I Knit had helpfully laid out a good selection of brownies which put the teams in a properly competitive spirit, or at least......

Knitters of London, grab your needles with pride! Tomorrow, Saturday June 14th, is Worldwide Knit in Public Day. Yes, it's your opportunity to show the world what you can do with two pointy sticks and some string. Gather with like-minded handicrafters and rustle up some mittens, perhaps, or a nice stripy scarf. Can't knit, I hear you wail? Fear not. The Stitchettes are hear to show you the way. Stitch & Bitch, "your friendly......

We all know about the imperilled rainforests, but the world's coral reefs are also disappearing faster than you can say "So long, and thanks for all the fish". Artists Margaret and Christine Wertheim from LA's Institute of Figuring bring this wonder of nature to the Hayward Gallery via the medium of crocheting (a craft a bit like knitting, with looping stitches and a single hooked needle). The exhibition mixes together handicrafts, mathematics and ecology......

It may be 40 years since the Abortion Act legalised terminations but a BBC Radio 5 Live investigation suggests that modern day "back street abortions" are easily found in London. Thankfully, we're not talking struck off doctors and knitting needles but Chinese herbal remedies from shops in Dalston and illegally obtained abortion drugs: an undercover investigator was able to get their hands on 14 abortion pills for £30 from an entirely unqualified bloke in......

This weekend column is brought to you by the founders of Niceties Tokens, Liz and Pete of Team Nice. 18. Social Revolution? When I was a kid, television was dominated by the game show, like The Price Is Right or Bulls Eye. I think the appeal was through empathy of that elated feeling of winning something great… Bully’s special prize. Then our society changed. Reality television took over, we became more interested in how......

Curated by Kevin Quigley, The Way I See It is a new festival of performance and live art which caught our eye as something a little different for the weekend. While the weather remains glum and grey, it's up to us to find the things that will bring a smile back to your faces - so how about this? The Way I See It is a series of performances and artworks that allow the......

Every so often we meet up with people who are doing things a little bit out of the ordinary for a little chinwag. This time round meet Helen who's rapidly gaining status somewhere you'd probably not expect to find anyone born after the '50s anywhere near - she's a sexy, sassy 23 year old and a member of the Royal Legion band. Hello Miss marching lady, introduce yourself. My name is Helen, I'm in......

It's Valentine's Day and if your cold, bitter heart has not been melted in a furnace of love by this point, then why go on? Your sneaking suspicion that there is, in actual fact, nothing warm and fuzzy in the world is true. Or is it? There is a small pocket of the universe that will soon be wrapped in a few hundred metres of woolly scarf, all knitted by hand, with love and......

We've walked past a lot of cupcakes over the last year. Walked past, hesistated for a very long time, and then kept walking, pulling a sad face while thinking of our waistline. But like it or not, ditch the knitting - cupcakes are the latest essential accessory to make yourself look cool, or at least to make your friends love you long time. With that in mind we caught up with one of London's......

Day One - London I pack. Video camera, tripod, still camera - check. Stage clothes, day clothes, enough socks and underwear to get through the whole time in case we don't do a laundry run - check. Books to while away the hours waiting to load the gear in to the venue - 'Teach Yourself Japanese' and Michael Palin's 'Himalaya'. Various knitting projects, sketch pad and pencils, diary, notebooks and laptop. Hair dryer, towels, toiletries.......

It's a bit of a mixed bag this week, to match the weather and the annual wardrobe meltdown that we are facing as we try to cover all potential weather situations. It's been a bit of a scramble to bring the Culture Crawl indoors after such a great summer of outdoor pursuits but inside we go... and there's plenty to see and do... Shunt, the people who brought us Tropicana and Amato Saltone in......

Well, once we've recovered from the excesses of the Chap Olympics, we shall be embarking on the next part of this week's Cultural Crawl. There's so much to see, so much to do, the sun is out and anyway, sleep is for the weak... get out and about and let us know what you got up to on Monday. Take your pick and plan your schedule around the following: Friday 14 July Waterloo Carnival......

As my copy of 'The Eraser' still hasn't arrived from Amazon I've been trying to distract myself with other things. Work, seeing friends, and other bands...ironically what's been very successfully distracting me is Muse's brand new album 'Black Holes and Revelations'. Ironic because of all the lazy comparisons between Radiohead and Muse over the years and ironic because they're nothing like each other. I never really understood that comparison aside from the fact that......

Another hearth warming story from the Newham Recorder today. Twenty three community centres have opened their doors to the over 50s as part of Newham Council's Warm Centre's scheme. There they can get advice, health checks and take part in various activities: reading, arts and crafts, movies, and of course indulging in a good old sing along. And the best of the singers are being gathered into a choir that is hoped will be......

The Victoria and Albert's storming Late Night series is a much anticipated monthly event: every last Friday of the month sees the museum being taken over by specially invited organisations who use the space and sometimes the existing exhibitions for their own creative business. One memorable Late Night saw the whole ground floor covered in wool - loops of yarn were draped over statues pilfered from abroad and the textiles exhibits seemed to bleed......

Looking ahead, there is the Christmas season of bloat and binge just around the corner for most of us, and beyond that, the traditional New Year period of fasting, repenting and reduced calories. Most popular of all items to give up for the New Year is smoking - and the business of quitting is almost as lucrative and controversial as the business of smoking itself. Should quitting smoking be a publicly funded issue? What's......

Just think what you can do with fifteen quid. You could buy a CD or a couple of paperback books. You could place a bid on this fabulous gothic front door bell, or you could just go and treat yourself to a McDonalds banquet. Or you could buy a ticket for an Audience with George Galloway at the Bloomsbury Theatre. Now we know what you're thinking: aren't politicians supposed to do regular Q+A's with the......

The Guardian this morning tells us something we didn't know about the Circle line: "There is a group of activists that stages knit-ins on the London Underground, occupying a carriage and knitting around the Circle line." This fantastic little nugget of knitting trivia comes from an article on 'guerilla knitters' and an exhibition at the Crafts Council Gallery next month. The exhibition, entitled Knit 2 Together: Concepts in Knitting, celebrates the fact that the......