slow to do anything

February 6, 2012 by 5 Comments

Sorry it’s been over a week since I’ve posted anything!  And I have more to apologize for when I tell you I haven’t done much at all since then as far as fiber arts are concerned.

One reason I haven’t crocheted/knitted much this week is because of one of my nervous habits: picking at hangnails/cuticles/extra skin on my fingers.  It’s one of those things I can just barely control, and sometimes I go overboard.  Not only is it kinda gross, it impedes me from working with my hands because my fingers get so sore and torn up.  I feel vulnerable sharing this with you because it’s like a big weakness for me, and I know a lot of anxiety is all in my head, so I feel like this should never be a problem, but there it is.

Here’s what I have done though:  I’ve taken pictures of a knitted scarf that’s been in the works for a bit.

The yarn for this scarf is a gift from a friend, who bought it at a local yarn shop.  It’s by Dark Horse Yarn, it’s 50% nylon and 50% acrylic.  It is so soft, it’s almost unbelievable.  Such a pleasure to work with!  And I love the lovely colors!

Here are some more pics of my granny blanket yarn and my blanket circles, which are coming along nicely, albeit slowly:

So that’s it for today, sorry it wasn’t more exciting.  I’ll try to hurry, I promise.

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random stripes

January 4, 2012 by 4 Comments

Sometimes I way over-think my patterns in striped objects, such as blankets.  I think “are they random enough, does it look naturally done?”  Well, it’s not a new thing but I’d still like to introduce everybody to the Random Stripe Generator, a script by Biscuits and Jam, that generates your stripey patterns for you.  You just type in your yarn colors, the thickness of your stripes, and how many rows you want your project to be, and voila, you have a stripey pattern!  A bonus is that if you don’t like it, you can just hit a button and it makes another one for you.  The biggest bonus?  It’s FREE.  Here’s an example:

It also gives you a written pattern, so you don’t just have the picture to go by.  I hope it’s useful for you!

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finished Hermione’s HBP hat

December 16, 2011 by 2 Comments

I finished my knitted Hermione HBP hat, the pattern for which is on Ravelry here.  I’m honestly a little disappointed, which is really sad since I spent SO MUCH TIME on this!  I took so much care with the cables and learned new stitches to make the holes and everything, and the hat is short.  I wanted it to come down longer — I wish I could go back and add 10 more rows of the chart pattern.  I guess one drawback of knitting hats bottom up is that you can’t try it on as you go.  Maybe it will stretch?  I hope so — It’s so pretty and I’d so wear it if it was a little longer!
          

 

Edit: It’s my fault the hat was short — I was stupidly skipping 2 rows every so often and I skipped a total of 10 rows.  I’m going to have to make this hat again sometime and do it right!

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I’ve been busy!

December 12, 2011 by 4 Comments

So the semester is coming to a close, and I have one more paper to finish up before I’m done with my second semester of grad school!  I’m so excited for Christmas break, during which I plan to both knit and crochet like mad.  Hopefully that means more posts coming your way!

I’m hoping it actually gets cold here — today it was around 45 but I’d like it to be colder so that I can model more of my creations in public!  I love showing off what I’ve made not because they’re exceptionally good (because they’re really not), but because I made them and they make me happy.  I’ve already given a bunch of simple crocheted hats to my school friends for Christmas — it’s really gratifying to see others wearing things I made!

I’ve actually got some new things to share today.  First off, my sweet baby pitbull, Zero, models her scarf/bow and her granny square sweater.  The sweater was a spur-of-the-moment creation, and it’s meant more to keep her warm than to be stylish, but I figured I’d share anyway.

I was making her sweater instead of doing the homework on the floor beside her:

And finally, I’ve been working on knitting the HBP Hermione hat (pattern available in the ‘knitting corner’ section), so this is where I am, with the real pic to compare:

 

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the Internet is my grandma

December 10, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Oh my goodness, the Internet is like the most awesome grandma ever because it teaches you EVERYTHING about knitting and crocheting!  I just learned about the magic loop method in knitting, where you can just forget about the double pointed needles (which are so cumbersome to work with) and use a giant circular needle instead for all your tubular projects, even socks!  Why didn’t I find this out before I spent my money on 3 different sets of dpns?!  Check out this tutorial video:

Even with this exciting new discovery, I can’t forget my crocheting!  I’ve got a deadline on a filet crochet baby blanket.  I had to make the chart myself, so it’s not the best looking, but for a small baby blanket, what do you think?

Ok so I’m unsure why it looks so terrible once uploaded, but you get the drift, right?  It’ll be similar to the “Noah” blanket I made and put up a few posts ago.  The grey will be the filled in spaces and the white will be the lacy part.  I started at the bottom and am at the first row that has text blocks in it, so I’m about 1/3 of the way finished.  I need to get crackin’!  (And can you believe I’m getting paid for this?  I know, right?!)  I’ll post pictures once it looks good and is more interesting than just a couple of flowers.

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