A Focused Frenzy

So there was this one time when it rained a lot and tiny ants overran my home and the kid got sick and the husband got a new job... we call these the Lost Days of Late Spring.  But what's a few weeks between friends, right?  Let us never speak of it again. 
Long story short: I've been making shawls and blankets.

There's a Maple Leaf or two!

 

Maple Leaf Knit Shawl [Rav] by Natalia @ Elfmoda; knit with half a skein of madelinetosh prairie in colorway Lowland

 

 

yarn is Wollmeise "Pure" 100% Merino Superwash in colorway Mistelzweig

And a mystery knit-along, inspired by Game of Thrones!  (my progress is far behind most people; the full pattern is now available)

Stormborn Shawl [Rav] by Kristen Ashbaugh-Helmreich

I'm beading each dragon scale, because I wanna.

And blanket squares!  Long-term blankets!  Brand-new blankets!  All the blankets ever!

 large squares: a modification of Norma [Rav] by Meghan Jones, each knit with 50yds of fingering weight yarn; blanket fish from A Recipe for Fish [Rav] by April Broken

a modification of Knitted Diagonal Blanket Square by KOGO [Rav]; this one is in Knit One, Crochet Too Handpainted Ambrosia in colorway 1934 Turkish Rug

The main blanket is a bamboo/cotton blend and it's a secret present for Punkin Q. Pie, the Small Girl Child.

 

Half Square Triangle Blanket [Rav] by Lion Brand Yarn; knit with Crystal Palace Panda Cotton Print in four colorways

That's it for now.  On with your lives, citizens!  And thanks for making a pit stop here with me.

Mot-less Monday: I'm Back

 

 

Looking Back, Looking Forward | 5KCBWDAY7

Look back on last year's Day Seven post / look forward again to one year from now.

Too many balls in the air kept me from posting yesterday -- but this one writes itself: I have officially completed 2.5 of the 3 goals I had for myself last year at this time!

WAYBACK MACHINE SAYS:
* Finish 12 Shawls in 2013, and be on track for a similar feat in 2014...  DONE!

The specifics for 2013 are here, and I'm at 50% shawl progress while at 37.5% year progress...  I wish Present Me could tell Past Me that there are definitely practical applications for math in my adult life.

* overcome my fear and steek something... DONE!

 

I steeked a thing!  It was horrible!  I'm never doing that again unless someone pays me!  With alcohol, if possible!

* Track down all of the knitting needles I supposedly have in my house and come up with an adequate organizational system...   
um, IN PROGRESS!

I've been working on this, recently and in earnest, but it's not ready for today as I hoped it would be; you can track the current status with the label "projectneedles", because there's no way that name could ever be misinterpreted.

And on that note, my goals for the next year are as follows:

* finish up what I started with #projectneedles, complete with whiteboard!  No barcodes, though, too sexy.

* publish my first original shawl pattern.  #TNOFTW   
It's about time.  Actually, it's about space.  And Hawaiian mythology.  You'll see.

* begin to teach my kid to knit.  That's a good idea, right?  #childsplay

* finish 12 Shawls in 2014, and be on track for a similar feat in 2015.

*  *  *  *  *

I want to thank the incomparable Eskimimi for organizing this fantastic intarwebz event yet again!!  Finding new crafter-writers to follow is always a highlight of my year.  Good times were had by all!
And thank you to everyone who stopped by, first-timers and familiar friends, especially those who have left comments for me this week -- it means the world to me -- and thank you, as always, to my family for sticking with me offline.  :)

To read other posts from those taking part in Knitting and Crochet Blog Week, simply perform a Google search for the tag 5KCBWDAY7, or click here.

Something A Bit Different | 5KCBWDAY5

Adventures in Yarn YOUR CURRENT WIP COLOR VACATION SPOT ADJECTIVE NOUN PET`S NAME COUNTRY VERB INFINITIVE ADJECTIVE ROOM ADJECTIVE

To read other posts from those taking part in Knitting and Crochet Blog Week, simply perform a Google search for the tag 5KCBWDAY5, or click here.

Conversations Between Workers | 5KCBWDAY4

Write a few short paragraphs from the point of view of one of the 
tools you use for your craft. Then write a dialogue 
between yourself and this item.

A twiddle of wire, that's all I be
And nobody knows what to do with me
My true purpose hides until you are needing
An easier method to do all your beading.

I really don't know why I keep you around.

I'm useful, admit it! ...when I can be found.

But when I can't find you, it's really frustrating!

Then make a new model, it's faster than waiting.

Ugh, stopping to put all the beads on is slow.

But once they're all loaded, it's go-go-go-go!

And what if you stretch out, you silly old scrape?

Just pause work and crumple me back into shape!

Alright, I give up, you can stay on my desk.

Ooh, look, a dust bunny on the floor!

What?  .....hello?
...
(Honey, have you seen that wire thing?)

        (wah waaah  wah waah-wah?)

(The beading gadget, it's like a curly wire thing...)

        (waah-wah  wah wah)

(I swear I haven't moved, it was just here!)
(Let me know if you see it.)

Dagnabbit.

To read other posts from those taking part in Knitting and Crochet Blog Week, simply perform a Google search for the tag 5KCBWDAY4, or click here.

Experimental Photography And Image Handling For Bloggers | 5KCBWDAY3

Photography takes a key role.

My usual photography for this blog is serviceable at best...

• Show the knitting!
• Make sure there isn't tacky stuff in the background!  
• Adjust everything for inconsistent lighting conditions!
• And always watermark your images because the internet is full of dead-inside digital thieves who steal shawl photos just to feel something!  (HA!)

the usual (undoctored except for watermark)

But this photo challenge inspired me to try some new angles.  My wedding photographer told me about the photography golden hour many years ago, so last night, armed with my current WIP (yes, Maple Leaf #3), I took the guesswork out of the lighting situation and focused (!) instead on the macro setting on my tiny point-and-shoot.

Macros in computer science terms means mapping input to a transformed output -- this is not that.  Macro-, the linguistic prefix, means "large" or "inclusive" -- this is not that.
Macro photography is just a fancy way to say super close up....

MACRO POWER!

undoctored -- ooh, so textural

I took some photos of the yarn ball itself and messed with some of the settings...  what I lack in imagination, I make up for by zooming way in.

Single-ply laceweight can look vaguely like a bale of hay:

right side is "desaturated" AKA grayscale

 A punch of color adds a little bit of zing to the zoom:

right side is "color balanced" with extra cyan and green

 Lightening up the center of a center-pull ball reveals hidden depths:

right side has both the brightness and contrast pumped up

My favorite photo of the shoot happened when a strand of curly green ribbon got unceremoniously plopped onto my head:

undoctored

Lesson learned:
Yarn is pretty and everybody needs to take pictures at dusk!
Exeunt.

To read other posts from those taking part in Knitting and Crochet Blog Week, simply perform a Google search for the tag 5KCBWDAY3, or click here.

Dating Profile | 5KCBWDAY2

Write a dating profile for one of your past finished projects.

Are You My Companion?  Allons-y!

Jaunty, adventurous traveller seeks same.  Must love bowties and fezzes (and I wear feathers now.  Feathers are cool).  I think jelly babies are fantastic and I'm not afraid to be a little rough-and-tumble as a means to an end. So if you're ready to leave Gallifrey in your rear-view mirror, stick your thumb up at the sky and give me a sign!  No Daleks.

To read other posts from those taking part in Knitting and Crochet Blog Week, simply perform a Google search for the tag 5KCBWDAY2, or click here.

A Day In The Life | 5KCBWDAY1

Describe a day in the life of a project that you have made, or are in the process of making.

With apologies to Douglas Adams...

Ahhh! Whoooa! What's happening? Who am I? Why am I here? What's my purpose in life? What do I mean by 'who am I'?

Okay okay, calm down, calm down, get a grip now.

Ooh, this is an interesting sensation. What is it? It's a sort of tingling in my... well, I suppose I better start finding names for things.
Let's call it a... tail!

Yeah! Tail! And hey, what's this shiny object, whooshing past what I'm suddenly gonna call my stitches? A needle!
Is that a good name? It'll do.

Yeah, this is really exciting. I'm dizzy with anticipation!  Or is it the needle? It's working awfully fast now, isn't it?

And what's this thing coming toward me very fast? So skinny and pointy, it needs a thin name like snip, spin... 'pin'! That's it! Pin! Ha! I wonder if it'll be friends with me? Hello, Pin!

Sweetie❤KNIT❤Heart [Rav] designed by Jackie Loewen

To read other posts from those taking part in Knitting and Crochet Blog Week, simply perform a Google search for the tag 5KCBWDAY1, or click here.

Winding Down, Gearing Up

I'm tired, you guys...
today I weeded 20% of our front yard with a dinner fork.

The ongoing saga of Project Needles has been trucking along during HPKCHC break month and I've been hatching plans for the next three months (including thoughts about Knitting & Crochet Blog Week).  For the past five "terms" (a year.5 in real life), I've been on blog staff for Ravenclaw House; this term marks a break for the blog and brings a new staff position, for myself and for Ravenclaw:  
Spreadsheet Sorceress!!  I am indeed a nerd among nerds, folks.

April's hearts are finished a couple of days early:

Sweetie❤KNIT❤Heart [Rav] designed by Jackie Loewen

and I've been messing around with some more yarn dyeing... more on that soon!  It's officially spring for realsies, you guys!

Project Needles: Classification

or, How I Assigned Call Numbers to My Knitting Needles

A Librarian's Tale

If the titles did not trigger red flags,
you have now been officially warned: NERD ALERT.

After completing a survey of priorities for the user population (in this case, just me), portability will factor into the storage of the collection, with a minimum of repackaging and an option for decentralization (AKA I will continue to keep my needles in two specific locations for convenience, and relabeling all my needles would be super insane).

Crafting equipment comes with its own controlled vocabulary, so it's a natural step to use this vocabulary when creating an organization hierarchy for knitting needles... things like:

• Needle size: US sizes for user comfort
• Needle type: circular, double pointed, straight
• Needle length: 6", 8", 16", etc.
• Needle material: metal, wood, bamboo, plastic, etc.

can translate to a call number for relatively easy recognition of the object:

In my opinion (and I may be the only one hanging out in this paragraph -- hello, brave souls who are still reading!), this structure can be easily extended, so that no matter how large this specific collection gets, the chances of running out of unique identifiers is slim.  I will not be assigning Cutter numbers! (cataloging humor, stop me plz)

How a user population can use these assigned call numbers for search and retrieval is its own issue.  I may need to get a whiteboard...

**This post is dedicated to my husband; he met me before grad school and he's stayed with me, even though I talk like this now.**

Project Needles: Inventory

We have reached The Reckoning.

Step 1: print out handy-dandy list of knitting needles and crochet hooks already input in Ravelry.
Step 2: resist urge to procrastinate with data (SCATTER PLOT!)
Step 3: profit  fail miserably at Step 2.
Step 4: attempt to find the listed equipment anywhere in my house.

for funsies wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

After the first pass, there are four pairs of needles that I have no idea where they are AND four pairs of needles that I actually need to add to Ravelry for a full account of the facts.

The labelled resealable bags are leftovers from my old system of organization.  Notice that there are no bags for needles sized smaller than US5 -- at that time, I didn't own any AND I didn't anticipate falling in love with finer yarn and lace knitting!

All the straight needles in my collection were added prior to 2006, I believe.  Why stop buying straight needles?  Several reasons:

• they only work for flat knitting, which limits their reuse
• projects get heavier as they go along, and it's easier on the joints to keep the bulk of a project centralized (on a cable, for example) rather than side-to-side shifting
• I drop things.  A lot.  Drop a needle attached to a cable, it goes nowhere! Drop a straight needle--
  CLANG clink clink click-click-click roll.

Now to track down those missing needles... time to comb through the long-term Works In Progress.

Mot-less Monday: A Touch of Sparkle

Merrily We Roll Along

The sun is so bright this morning, I had to stand in its way just to get a clear shot of April's hearts so far.

I've got lots of non-knitting plans this weekend, but I realized that you haven't seen much (any?) of the progress I've made on the second Maple Leaf shawl:

It's about 80% done and I'm trying to weave in the ends as I go.  With all the breaking and reattaching involved in creating the corners, there are so. many. ends and it gets a little tricky with laceweight at this ethereal gauge.

Okay, yay then!  Off to sing now, bye!