All the cool kids are on Ravelry, if by cool kids you mean the kids who exist in the Venn diagram intersection of people who knit and/or crochet and who actively engage in social media. So maybe not so much the cool kids, as the kids you’d want around during, like, a really bad snow storm or something, because they could totally have you outfitted in a wool bodysuit before you ran out of the choice canned goods and had to move on to those weird, pink sausages.
If you’re one of the cool kids on Ravelry, you’re probably in love with all of the great Notebook tools you’ll find there. But unless you drag your computer with you to the yarn store, all that organization isn’t doing you a lot of good when it comes time to remembering whether you’ve got a set of size 4 double pointed needles sitting at home already. Putting all that good Ravelry info on your phone is Wooly, a Ravelry companion app. We’ll take a look at all that Wooly can do and see if it’s knitter’s best friend.
A Stitch in Time
If you haven’t already signed up with Ravelry, you’re going to need to do that get started. Wooly only works if you’ve got a Ravelry account, so sign up and log in. Creating a new account is a bit convoluted, and because Ravelry sends users an invitation email, signup can’t really be done in Wooly. None of this is Wooly’s fault, though, as it is an unofficial app, and this is just how Ravelry works.
Check out your past or ongoing projects.
Once you’re in, tap Projects in the bottom menu and you’ll get a list of all your current and finished projects. Unfortunately, there’s no way to sort projects, and if you’ve got a lot in there, that could be a problem. You’ll find your In Progress projects will be at the top, though, and everything else is listed chronologically. Tap on a project to edit its information, such as the title, your progress, the start and completion dates, or to add pictures. You won’t be able to change important things like needle size or yarns used, but you can write notes to yourself and others and leave reminders to change all that later if need be.
I can see all my yarns and immediately know if I’ve already got something or need to pick up a skein.
Stash will show you what yarns you already own. Sort by weight, color family or company, too. You can’t add any new yarns, but you can take pictures of yarns you’ve already added to your Ravelry Notebook. I think that’s pretty fantastic, because I’m easily pleased, but also because I remember when getting images onto Ravelry was cumbersome and terrible. Going straight through the Wooly app is so much better.
You can see your needles and friends, but both are really just lists.
Hopping over to Needles, you can’t add anything here either, but Wooly does preserve brand and material info. If you told Ravelry your US size 4 straight needles were Boye aluminums, Wooly has that information for you, too. Wooly doesn’t bundle your needles together though, so your set of five identical double pointed needles are all going to be listed individually, even though you’d never use them separately except to make tiny kebabs.
Pros and Cons
Long time users of Ravelry may be disappointed in the limitations of Wooly. Wooly is not a full-featured alternative to using Ravelry on a desktop. You can’t search for new projects to add to your queue. If you pick up a new set of needles or a couple of skeins of yarn, you’re going to have to open up the Ravelry website to input any of that; Wooly can’t help. The developers say on their Ravelry group page that this is due to limited time and resources, wanting to devote what little time they do have only to the features their users really want and to the Ravelry API.
Wooly has my queue ready at hand if I want to pick up anything for a new project.
What I do like about Wooly is that I have all my yarns, needles and projects on my phone in an easy-to-access app. Many a knitter has arrived at the yarn store unprepared, only to return home with an unneeded set of needles or five skeins of the wrong yarn. With Wooly I can check the pattern I’m working on next, take a look at all of my yarns and needles, and only buy what I actually need.
Tying Up Loose Ends
The Wooly app, while definitely restricted in what it allows the user to do, is a huge boon to knitters and crocheters who are currently using Ravelry. While it absolutely doesn’t do everything the Ravelry website does and isn’t going to be a replacement for the full website, it is a great complement for knitters on the go who just need a quick look at the yarns and tools they’ve already got.
I’m completely in love with the ability to add images to my yarn stash and my projects, and that’s enough to sell me on Wooly right there, but you can already find apps that will upload photos to Ravelry in the App Store. What Wooly does so well is everything else, giving you access to pretty much anything in your Ravelry Notebook. The developers are also currently working on Wooly, regularly engaging with their users in the Ravelry forums and promising big updates soon. With promised fixes and expanded features, Wooly can really only get better.