Tag Archive | crafting

New Knitting Case

Jul20

For ages, I’ve been coveting the Namaste Maker’s Train Case from Jimmy Beans, but could never justify buying one. But they recently decided to phase out their Namaste line and put all the Namaste products on sale. I acted quickly so I could get one before the purple was gone, and it arrived Friday.

57927CD4-F699-4A5A-95B6-8571F6CDE11EIt’s gorgeous purple faux leather, with a magnetic lid, and it holds my Sea Swell Shawl quite nicely. I love the little hole on the side for the yarn!

Apparently it was designed to fit nicely underneath airplane seats, but I won’t be testing that any time soon. I’m happy enough to have it sitting on my coffee table. I can’t lie: there’s part of me that wants to order one in dark teal too!

Sea Swell Shawl

Jul16

My WIPs are down to three, and that’s after I cast on a new sock yesterday. But I’m still mostly going to continue with my monogamous knitting, and I’ve selected the WIP Sea Swell Shawl by Stephen West. (Ravelry link here) This is the mermaid shawl that I’ve been trying to make for over two years, and I just haven’t found the right pattern before now. I started this one at the end of May and set it aside shortly after, though I don’t remember why. It’s a lot of short rows, maybe that’s why, but it’s also garter stitch, which is my fave right now. I’m doing the large size with five colors and I’m just about ready to start fading in Color B.

And I know I said I cast on a sock but it’s a lace sock and I’m pretty sure I’m going to need a self-striping vanilla sock very soon!

emPower People Cowl

Jul14

With no socks to distract me, I finished my purple emPower People cowl yesterday. And I know we’re supposed to block ALL of our knitting but I’m not blocking this, so there! I absolutely love the squish of unblocked garter stitch and I’m going to wear this one as is until it absolutely needs a wash.

AED422B3-7FE5-4D19-9C7D-AB17134533C3_1_201_aThe pattern was extremely simple and has such a lovely shape and drape. I wasn’t sure how it would be seamed until I got to the end and discovered that yes, I had two short, straight sections that were designed to be sewn together. So clever!

D3E26D06-D62E-4E8A-BE69-AFE5AF0E0058The yarn is Ritual Dyes Priestess DK in the color Belladonna and OMG it is heavenly! I’d never used their yarn before and this one was so soft and squishy. If I didn’t know it was 100% merino, I’d have guessed it had a bit of cashmere in it. I’ll definitely be wanting to get more of their yarns in the future. Look at those subtle color variations!

D6D95A2F-A8F0-46D7-9EDC-4CAED2A40E69As soon as the weather cools off a bit, you know I’ll be wearing the heck out of this … I mean, as soon as we’re all safe to be out and about. And I think I want a pin to go on it too, maybe just “Vote”. Has anybody seen a good pin for this cowl?

FO Friday: Socks

Jul10

I have two Finished Objects to share today — technically four, actually — because I finished two pairs of socks today!

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One the left are Vanilla Latte socks in Orange Jellyfish Dream yarn, color Intergalactic Planetary. And the right are obviously my Christmas in July socks, also in the Vanilla Latte pattern, with West Yorkshire Spinners’ Fairy Lights. Both pairs are slightly mis-matched in size but not enough to bother me, certainly not right now. But now I’m out of socks to knit and it’s also only July 10 so I cast on the second sock of a pair of Christmas socks I started last December. These are all stockinette so it should be a speedy project.

While knitting, I’ve recently binged Pick of the Litter, Little Voice, and Lenox Hill. And I’ve read and loved The Authenticity Project, Friends & Strangers, and The Two Lives of Lydia Bird. What are you streaming lately that you love?

I almost forgot!

Jul9
Note: I am trying to use non-Ravelry links whenever possible. All Rav links will be noted.

Last month, I wrote about some Nature Spun Worsted that I reviewed for Brown Sheep Co. and one of the projects I made with it were fingerless gloves for a nephew. I chose the Maize Mitts from TinCanKnits and did the child size, since the nephew is 7, and it came out looking TINY. I didn’t want to knit a second mitt if it wasn’t going to fit, so I took it with me to a little birthday party we had and asked him to try it on. He loved it, said it was perfect, and I said I’d make a second, thinking it could wait until winter and his birthday or Christmas. Well, a couple of weeks later, we had another birthday party, and he asked if I’d brought his gloves. Friends, be glad you didn’t see the look on his face when I said I hadn’t made the second one yet. I felt like a terrible aunt and promised I’d have it done before the next birthday. Yesterday it hit me: we are celebrating a birthday on Saturday. I NEEDED to have two fingerless gloves for him. All other knitting was promptly set aside. Thank goodness he has small hands!

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I can see, and you can probably see too, that these two gloves are not precisely the same size. I don’t know why that is, and honestly I don’t really give a damn, because I’m pretty sure the nephew will NOT see that detail. And as snug as the first glove was, I’m also pretty sure he’ll outgrow these quickly and I’ll be making another pair around Christmastime anyway. There are some people for whom I will knit anything, and this nephew is definitely one of them. (I mean, honestly, pretty much any of my family and close friends fall into this category. I just like knitting for people who appreciate it.)

Now that that’s done, I’m returning to my safety knitting of Christmas socks and the emPower People purple cowl. Today’s not a great day so far: I didn’t sleep well last night, I’ve got anxiety bubbling up inside, and seeing anything on the news just makes things worse today. I was going to exercise but needed a second cup of tea to help wake myself up and now my timing is off, because I actually have something scheduled today: my knitting group has our virtual meeting at noon and I’d really like to have a shower before that happens. I do have something to look forward to: I’m seeing a friend tonight, one I haven’t seen in almost four months. (Wait, four? *counts on fingers* good grief it really has been that long!) There will be masks and distancing and as many precautions as we can take, but I have begun to miss seeing the people I love in person and really need a win. So, happy Thursday, friends. Take care of yourself.

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emPower People

Jul8

There’s a new initiative I found on Instagram called emPower People. The website describes it as a “craftivism project aimed at uniting crafters of all mediums to engage people across communities to spark conversation, engagement and action in the political process to uphold social justice and human rights.” Right now they are encouraging people to make a purple bandana/cowl that you can wear when you attend gatherings, protest, march, and vote. There are free patterns to knit, crochet, or sew that you can download directly from the website. The project was founded by four crafters, with several others contributing. I chose to participate with the free knit pattern designed by Casapinka. Luckily, I had plenty of purple yarn to choose from, including the perfect Priestess DK weight from Ritual Dyes in a color called Belladonna.

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This is a simple, soothing pattern with lots of garter stitch and I expect it will fly off my needles. So far it’s even better than socks!

 

Sock It To Me Monday

Jul6

Apparently it was a three-day weekend for a lot of people, but it didn’t feel much different for me. The husband spent his extra day off in his workshop, and I puttered around making masks and knitting. We’ve seen family pretty recently and didn’t have any plans for gatherings, so it was a very quiet holiday, and I’m okay with that. I finished one Christmas in July sock and am ready to start the gusset on the second now.

96A4CCDF-2D55-49A3-9289-23F7B1586ED4I also did another fast project, a drawer liner out of leftover sock yarn. I’d made a little one before, for my Kaweco pens, but this is a full-sized version for the drawer. It has the purl ridges to keep pens separate, but I’m going to make one more that’s all stockinette. They’re fast and fun and I love using up the sock yarn.

Happy Monday, friends. Here’s hoping we can all find a bit of happy this week.

FO: Olive Pink shawl

Jun29

Yes, it’s Monday and that’s supposed to be sock day here in Blogville, but weird monogamous knitter me doesn’t have any sock progress to share. I finished my Olive Pink shawl on Saturday morning, blocked it that day, and yesterday took it out for a photo shoot. It was a challenge because it is so BIG.

4B30C783-12CA-4886-821F-C4A75A6725A6This isn’t even the whole thing. From tip to tip, this baby is over eight feet long. I have no idea how that happened, except, you know, gauge. If you don’t count the angled ends, it’s about 70″ long, which is much closer to the pattern’s 73″ length. Also, I used less of Color B and more of Color C than the pattern said I would, and again, no idea. Whatever. That’s kind of what I love about this pattern: it works really well with “whatever”. I made some mistakes? Whatever. I added an extra two rows to that section? Whatever. I did the final border wrong for the first two rows? Whatever. It’s all good!

F380335C-1B98-4D4E-9A7D-013983651758_1_201_aBecause it doesn’t really matter! There are so many patterns and textures and colors that no one knows what it’s “supposed” to look like, and no one is going to look closely to try to find mistakes. And if anyone where to do that, that would be weird and I don’t really care what they think anyway.

This was a fun pattern to knit, at least for the first 75% of it. By section 16, I was getting a little tired of it, but it was fun to use so many colors and stitches. The yarn is SoLo from LoloDidIt and I really like it. It’s 100% and has a little bit of a halo, which was only a problem when I was knitting with two colors and the yarns would get wound around each other and stick together. But it’s super soft, doesn’t bleed, and blocks out beautifully.

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The original pattern was a collaboration between Casapinka and Lolabean Yarn Co. and you can find it here on Ravelry. Note: I do have Classic Ravelry turned on. (Side note: I’d had NuRav on since they switched and it didn’t bother me, though Rav’s reaction, or lack thereof, to all the issues others were having bothered me a lot. This morning I turned on Classic Rav before adding the link here, and it was like a sigh of relief. I hadn’t realized how much I preferred the look of the original!)

With this done, I’m off to finish an almost-complete cowl now. Hope you’re all staying mostly well and happy!

Happy Mail

Jun26

Here’s the thing: when you only knit on one project, and it’s a bigger project, that means you don’t have interesting progress to report on your blog all the time. So it is with me and my Olive Pink shawl. I am on the last section, with just the border after that, and I know I will finish this weekend. But rather than share another photo of that, instead I’ll share my happy mail from yesterday.

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This beautiful set, called Stained Glass Menagerie, is from Show Me Yarn, a Missouri dyer whose yarn I love. They’ve done these collaborations with Willow Island before, with matching yarn and bag, and I just couldn’t resist this one. I needed those bright colors in my life.

WIP Wednesday: Olive Pink

Jun24

I recently read that one of the things that comes up a lot in discussions of managing mental health is having a sense of accomplishment or achievement. That really resonated with me, and explained why I needed to jump into a big painting project right after I was furloughed. At the time, I was feeling kind of lost and aimless, and finishing something as obvious as painting a room was exactly what I needed. After I moved on from painting, I switched to finishing knitting projects. First it was my Penny sweater, then my Pride socks. I knit on them almost exclusively, maybe obsessively, until they were done and I could check them off. Now my focus has switched to my Olive Pink shawl and I’m determined to finish this darn thing.

CFF628CF-7A6D-4A15-8B8C-00D727A55380 It’s something like 20 sections and I’m on section 15b and OMG I’m ready to get to the next section. The first 12 sections were great, changing colors and stitches so often that I wanted to keep knitting to see what was next. But sections 13-15 are much the same, all with the pink, and I’m tired of that. As cool as it looks, I need a new texture! I’m hoping I can power through this section today and get to something different. And when it’s all done, who wants to weave in all the ends for me?