squishyknits

Don't try this at home

2007-12-16T20:01:00.001-06:00

It's picture time again.

I present to you Exhibit A:

Hooray for cell phone cameras. The earring on the right (buffalo horn!) belongs to a pair the bf bought for my birthday last year. I thought they were 4ga. So then he bought me a new pair (the earring on the left [green stone!]) for my birthday this year. I thought they were 4ga as well. Turns out the green plugs are slightly bigger than 4ga, and the spirals are slightly smaller. Probably closer to a 6ga. So, I needed to stretch my lobes a bit to fit the new plugs in.

Enter Exhibit B, which probably qualifies me for the Knitting Scouts' MacGuyver Level 2 badge: a #9 knitting needle!

After about 24 hours of on-and-off fiddling, the plugs barely fit in. As in, my ears hurt. But look! Happy ear!

Aside from the swelling, anyway.

So. It's kind of hard to write about what I'm working on right now, because it's almost exclusively Christmas presents (aside from the crappy-looking red I-cord I made to hang our stockings), and since I don't know who's all stumbled upon this, I don't want to ruin anything. Basically, I'm working on scarves, booze cozies, and I suppose I still owe the bf that pair of fingerless gloves.

Yeah. I finished one. I can't remember if I said that. A little too tight on his hand, though. So, that lonely glove sat around for a while, as my mind wandered to other projects. I finally decided last night that, hey, maybe I should frog it.

So sad. But I'll be adding a few extra stitches per row, so hopefully it'll work better. And I promise to let him try it on as I go along this time.

Oh, and then there's those socks.

I cast on about 90 stitches (for each sock) before discovering a better sideways sock pattern. As in, it includes directions for adapting the pattern to different foot sizes, gauges, and yarn weights. Brilliant! Before, I was just going to fudge it and hope for the best, but now I had written guidelines to help me not fudge it quite as much.

So, math blah recalculations blah realize that even with the small amount of colorwork I wanted to do, knitting both socks at once would be a horrible tangled mess.

One was bad enough.

So, that's frogged, too. I plan to try the Thuja socks, two at once. But first, I need to free up my #6 DPNs; luckily, the project currently owning those is speeding right along.

In other news, I've been yarn shopping when I really shouldn't be. I'm trying to plan a design for a cat bed/tunnel in my head, and I've picked up a few skeins of Red Heart any time I see a color scheme that would go well with what I already have.

...I can't tell if this is going to look awesome or terrifying in the end. I do know that I'm planning for some intarsia, and perhaps some double-knitting and/or fleece action. It'll rock.

And then I caved in, went to a yarn shop, and splurged.

Just a teaser for now. :)

(P.S. Don't worry - I washed the #9 needle thoroughly.)

Thoughts

2007-12-16T14:53:00.000-06:00

I went downhill again yesterday. Long story short, I lost my temper at the cats, then instead of just sitting there and staring at the wall and being numb (okay, I did that for a little bit), I forced myself to knit. I got another row done on the sideways sock before realizing it'd be easier if I just started over (I'll explain this in a post later today), then worked on a wine cozy (it's another Christmas present).

And I felt a little better. Not just because I was knitting, but because I was knitting for someone else.

And that got me to thinking. I haven't really found my knitting niche yet, except that I tend to gravitate towards things that don't take too much yarn, like hats and scarves and cozies. But maybe my niche is meant to be charity knitting. Y'know, like knitting chemo caps and donating them to hospitals. Just thinking about doing that, about helping someone else in need, made me feel so much better.

...I think that's all I have to say on that subject right now. I didn't realize it'd been so long since the last time I posted, though... I have some pictures, I just need to organize them, and I'll update in a little while. Should probably do a bit of cleaning first, though.

Pattern: Cell phone cozy for him

2007-12-05T21:13:00.000-06:00

I suppose I could finally get around to posting this pattern. Like I said, the bf started complaining that the back of his phone was falling off, so I made him a cozy... of my own creation, because I couldn't find a single pattern that was suited for a guy. The concept kinda weirded him out at first, mainly because he says he's the only person he knows who owns a phone cozy, but he's come to love it. The back stays on now, and he reports that it keeps his phone warm. So, yep.

Size: to fit your average-sized flip phone (i.e. not a Razr). You could always take measurements of your phone and knit a cozy to fit, though. The rib pattern's kinda stretchy, so keep that in mind.

You’ll need:
Cascade 220 – you won’t use anywhere near the whole skein. I used leftovers from a hat, and I still have a bunch left over. (Any worsted weight yarn will do.)
US #6 DPNs

Base: (worked flat)
CO 12 sts
P 1 row (WS)
Next row (RS): k1, m1, k to last st, m1, k1 – 14 sts
Work 3 rows in st st
Next row (RS): k1, ssk, k to last 3 sts, k2tog, k1 – 12 sts
P 1 row (WS)

K 1 more row on base. With a second needle, pick up and k 4 sts from side of base and 6 sts from the first half of the bottom of the base; with a third needle, pick up and k 6 sts from the last half of the bottom and 4 sts from the other side. 32 sts. Place marker to indicate beginning of round.

K 1 row

Tweed Mock Rib pattern: (from KnitPicks’ Scarf Patterns - scroll down to "download free pattern" for a whole pile of simple stitch patterns all bundled together into one happy .pdf)
Row 1: *sl 1 purlwise, k1, yo, psso k st and yo; rep from * to last st
Row 2: k all sts
^repeat these two rows for 3.25” (or desired length)
BO all sts; weave ends in. Be careful; don't screw up like I did (you can see the "seam" in the photo above). I suck at this step. If you suck too, go read the Fall '04 edition of Techniques with Theresa.
Put phone in, and tadah!

If you'd like to adapt this pattern to a phone that's a completely different shape, just make sure you have an even number of stitches when you're knitting in the round. If you have one of those creepy flat phones (or even a Razr), you could skip the base and seam the bottom shut... or, if you prefer knitting flat, just purl all stitches in Row 2 of the pattern, the way the KnitPicks pattern is written.

Another option is to make the cozy a wee bit larger - i.e. pick up five stitches from each side of the base instead of four - and felt it a wee bit. Not too much, though. Enough to shrink it a bit while still keeping the stitch pattern visible. Just make sure to use 100% wool yarn if you go this route.

So, there you have it... my first pattern! It's not much, but you gotta start somewhere...

(Comments would rock.)

(And I suppose I should note the usual copyright crap: I made this, don't copy it [except for your own personal use], don't try to pass it off as your own, don't make one of these cozies for profit, etc. Play nice. I know where you live. Okay, no, I don't. But still.)

News of all kinds

2007-12-04T14:34:00.001-06:00

First, some good news: I received a magical box in the mail last week!

Yup, I finally cracked and placed a KnitPicks order. $53 (with free shipping!) for 25 skeins of yarn that I was totally not expecting to fit in a box that small. But anyway, here's the breakdown.

^16 skeins of Wool of the Andes for the Doctor Who scarf. I probably won't start it until after Christmas, due to all the other projects I have going right now, but at least the yarn's in my possession.

^Four more WotA skeins for a Christmas present.

^...and three skeins of Swish DK (two in Nutmeg) for another Christmas present.

^And, because a girl's gotta treat herself, two skeins of Telemark in what may be the Coolest Shade Ever. I'm so making fingerless gloves.

Now for some not-so-good news. I went way downhill yesterday. I've been dealing with depression for the past year+, and it keeps me from getting things done on my days off. Like dishes. Or knitting. Yesterday I zoned out and read a bunch of back articles on Knitty, and stumbled upon one about a guy who had a breakdown and found a way to use knitting to inspire himself to keep going, even if he couldn't actually pick up the needles. I was almost in tears as I recognized some of the same symptoms in myself. I don't want drugs or the subsequent side effects, though. I want to get through it on my own. I should note that I also read an article yesterday about zen knitting (although I don't think the word "zen" was used once in the article), as well as an article about a crazy way to knit two socks at once that made me actually want to knit socks.

Anyway, I found myself so numb at one point last night that I basically went full-circle: I was itching to knit. I wanted to prove to myself that I had been inspired.

Well, I didn't get much knitting done, but I did a lot of prep work. See, I want to knit a pair of socks. I found a few patterns I liked, but there was always something wrong: I wanted to use a different weight of yarn, I wasn't sure the recipient would like this stitch pattern, I don't even know the recipient's shoe size (and would feel kinda weird asking). So, I settled on a sideways pattern, took measurements of my foot and the bf's foot and averaged the numbers, and made gauge swatches. At first I thought I could use DK-weight yarn with size 0 needles.

It totally would've worked, except that common sense sinked in: there was no way I had enough yarn to knit at that gauge. (Not to mention that needles that small kinda scare me, because it would take so much longer to finish a project. Maybe that's why I haven't used them yet?) I was too lazy to look for my #3's, so I pulled out my #6's. Perfect. Measurements blah math blah find waste yarn blah blah. Time for the provisional cast-on:

I didn't think about how badly the white would photograph, so it's hard to tell, but you might be able to see how much of a pain this is. Knit one cast-on stitch, rotate the needle, knit one cast-on stitch with other yarn tail, rotate the needle back. Eek. No wonder I didn't get more than 20 stitches (for each sock) cast on before bedtime.

I should mention that my only previous experience with sock knitting is that I made one pedicure sock before I came down with second-sock syndrome, got bored, and moved on to something else. And now I'm knitting two at once, sideways, using a pattern adapted for a foot size I'm not even sure is right. Yikes. I'm up for the challenge, though. I'll keep my progress updated.

In what may initially seem like unrelated news, I'm also working on this scarf (from the same book as the Linked Rib):

It doesn't look quite as dramatically wavy as the scarves in the book, but it's still cool. And I'm learning about short rows while I'm at it. Score.

I think I'm going to keep working on those socks now - especially since I called in sick to work (again). My hands and brain need something to do.

Got some catchin' up to do.

2007-11-27T23:04:00.000-06:00

Holy crap. Well, we actually have internet now. And then the camera cord went missing, and then I got a job I greatly dislike and haven't felt like blogging... yeah.

Anyway, I finally forced myself to sit down and finish the Marigold hat last week. I had started the Clapotis hat after freeing up a row counter, then realized I needed more stitch markers - most of which were sitting on my Marigold hat.
Ignore the bad hair; I had the day off and didn't feel like going out (not to mention that I just kinda shoved the hat on my head for the obligatory picture without making sure my hair looked okay).

Yep. Not as lacy-looking as the hat in the pattern, but I guess that's what happens when you use a furry yarn. I also tried blocking it to the right size (8" high), since it came out looking short, and it still ended up being kinda short. Not sure if that's due to the yarn combos or not, too. I still like how it came out, though.

And, like I said, I started the Clapotis hat. I realized that I like making/wearing hats more than I'm able to wear them. Stupid work. But anyway.

This yarn (Joann's Angel Hair) is kinda hard to knit with. It's definitely not the hardest - that award probably goes to Fun Fur being used by an inexperienced knitter - but the little angel hair strands like to knot together. Kinda like Fun Fur, actually. So, although I generally like the yarn so far, it's definitely something you'll want to use when you're sure of what you're doing, cause it's not getting unraveled.

Next project: the Linked Rib scarf.

And, you can clearly see (in both shots, no less!) where I screwed up and slipped stitches purlwise instead of knitwise. Or vice versa. I can't remember right now. That's probably a bad thing. I'm pretty pleased with how the color scheme is turning out on this, though. For some reason, I couldn't tell how crappy the variegated shades of Paton's would turn out, but after seeing this, as well as a knitted sample of another shade made by one of my coworkers, I have good faith in them.

Now for my other current project: what I'm calling the Paw scarf. A while ago, I started a scarf loosely based on another pattern, and the bf said it looked like Grover's paw, etc. Here's a reminder.

Well, ignore that, because I ripped it all apart. To make this!

It's a scarf, but with mitten-y ends! It came out quite a bit more paw-like than I was expecting, and I'm pleased with that. Once I finish, I may post the pattern here.

But first, there's another pattern I may post sooner, because I started a new project today (sigh) and finished it within a few hours. The bf came home on his lunch break and said the back of his cell phone was starting to fall off, so I decided he needed a cozy for it (even if he didn't seem that thrilled with the idea of having a phone cozy). I looked at a few patterns online, and very few were meant to fit flip phones, much less meant for a guy. (I did like the Poptart Razr cozy, though, even if I hate Razrs.) And, using some of the leftover green yarn from the hat I just finished, here's what I came up with:

Basically, a phone sock. That's not a seam at the bottom, though. That's where I somehow narfed up while weaving one of my ends in. And didn't notice until after I'd already cut the yarn tail, of course. Grr. Anyway, the bf liked it more than even he expected, except that he was the only person he knew who owned a phone cozy. I replied that that's what happens when you date a knitter, duh. But yeah, I wrote the pattern down, so I might post it sometime tomorrow.

In other news, I found a "pattern" for a car cozy, and I swear there was another link I wanted to share, but I can't remember. Shh, it's getting late for me these days.

Lastly, learning to knit is apparently hard work.

(Is this worthy of submission to Stuff On My Cat?)

Ah, internet leeching

2007-11-06T19:21:00.000-06:00

I'm back! Kinda. We still don't have internet. Argh. $50/month is a ripoff, even for high speed.

Anyway, a quick update while we wait for laundry to finish so we can get away from the wood glue fumes. I've been trying to knit a bit here and there, in between unpacking (or lack thereof) and trying to keep the kittens from breaking things. I did buy a book, though.

I had started getting some crap for reading Stitch'n'Bitch over and over so many times that the edges were totally going curly, so I decided it was time for a new book. Pretty patterns! This is the main one I'm digging right now:

I dunno, I've been kinda getting into the idea of skinny, decorative scarves lately. Maybe not the best idea for Minnesota winters, but we'll see. Anyway, I was thinking of sacrificing the pink variegated yarn I had in mind for fingerless gloves and donating it to this project. Here's a reminder. (Hint: it's the one on the right.)

I also started working on another scarf, because I got bored with the other projects I'm working on. Again. I kept starting and ripping and restarting and reripping because I couldn't decide what I wanted to do or what yarn I wanted to use. But, I finally settled on something I based off of the scarf book's cover pattern:

You can kinda see how it gets skinnier at times. The bf said it looked like Grover's paw at first, so I thought about calling it the Paw scarf or something, but I might actually make a scarf with paws on the end. Like, little mittens or fingerwarmers or whatever. We'll see.

Okay. So then I went back to Joann's to pick up yarn for the Clapotis hat.

So I was about to start it, and I started looking for an unoccupied row counter. No luck. After a quick head count, I realized that all four of them were stuck in the middle of projects. Yikes. Maybe I should finish something? So, I tried finishing my Knucks.

Look at that crap. Totally doesn't fit me from the thumb down. For the thumb gusset, the pattern says to decrease stitches every third row; but if I did every other row instead, that would eliminate seven rows, which I think would do the trick. So, eventually I'll rip it out back to the thumb join. But for now, I think it's hat starting time.

Oh, and I picked up some Red Heart today to use for cat beds. The kittens seem to like hiding when they sleep, which means they sleep on the floor under the futon. The poor things need a comfier spot. So, I'm trying to think of ideas for a bed with a roof that won't flop over. And something that will be big enough to grow with them, and allow them to cuddle together like they always do when they're not mauling each other.

Okay, I think that's all for now. My goal is to find more time to knit coming up... and to actually get internet, so I can get a website started.

S

2007-10-24T23:05:00.000-05:00

Dang! It's been a little while. I'm not always the greatest blogger.
I've been working on a bunch of related things in my blog-absence, though, so I'll split this into three categories: stuff, stash, and sites.

Stuff

For starters, it's beginning to look a lot like Knuck-mas:

Forgive my lame attempt at a song. I'm not planning on these for Christmas presents, anyway. I'm just hopped up on my first cappuccino in months (seriously, it's been that long.)

Anyway, these are an incredible pain! The pattern, at times, call for all the stitches to be placed on two needles. Anyone who's knit in the round knows that's nearly impossible to begin with - but then when you're asked to do K2tog's and ssk's at the same time? Holy crap. It might be easier if I had a set of five needles instead of four, like the pattern calls for. I'm really hoping I can get the pair done by Sunday, so I have a warm pair of gloves to wear at the train station before work, but I'm kinda thinking that won't happen. I may have some time at the bf's family dinner on Saturday, but I still need to finish packing and, y'know, move.

In other news, I restarted my Marigold hat. I thought I had previously posted a picture of at least the two yarns on here, but I guess not. So, one skein of Cascade Heathers in 2446 (scroll down about 2/3 of the way to see it) and one skein of Symphony in Mystic Purple (even though the picture looks almost nothing like the actual shade). Once upon a time, I had 3/4 of this hat done, but I kept screwing up the lace pattern somehow, so I would keep finding one less or one extra stitch in some of the repeats. I don't know if I was dropping stitches or forgetting to do yarn overs or what. But, once I found a repeat that was short two stitches, I was done - unraveled the whole thing and put it off for a while. I didn't want to discover later on that there were a ton of dropped stitches, because that would suck. Quite a bit, in fact.

But, anyway, I restarted it. I'm not far enough in for the lace pattern to really be visible yet, but at least you can see the colors:

Mmm. Pretty.

And, I already screwed up! Majorly! I did a [k2 p2] rib instead of a [k1 p1]. Yeah. Big difference in appearance. That's what I get for paying more attention to a movie than a pattern, I guess. Luckily, I remembered the way to reverse stitches, and I had a crochet hook with me. Unfortunately, I was five rows in at the time, and had to fix exactly half of the stitches, which meant 265 of the little jerks. It's all better now though.

Stash

I bought things. For cheap!

Walmart clearance bins. You can clearly see the savings. I don't know what I'll use this for yet - probably sweater trim or something - but it was too pretty to pass up.

Dollar store. Incredible and Trellis. Normally retails for $6 or so each. In other words, $12 will normally fetch two skeins. I got twelve skeins for that much. I've never knit with ribbon yarns before, so I might as well give it a shot, for that price. Look at my color combos! I'm so making scarves.

I also stopped by Joann's. I haven't been to one since I really started getting into knitting, so I figured I'd stop to see what their selection was like. Overall, I wasn't thrilled, although I did see a sock needle set - a pack of needles in sizes 000, 00, 0, and 1 - that I might need to get sometime. And some really cool yarn that came with no visible price tag. (Edit: Good thing I went back and tested that link, because Joann's apparently forgets your session and deletes your link. Rrr. So, go to the Joann's home page, search for "sensations angel hair," and choose the one that's not boucle.) I sometimes wish the internet had feel-o-vision so you could feel how soft. And I have a project in mind! Which brings us to the next section...

Sites

What started my web crawl: Knitting Pattern Central. Because I was told they had a pattern for a knitted Dalek. I totally need to make that.

From there, I also stumbled on a bunch of other sweet sites. Like the Anticraft. Holy awesome. Lookit: a hat, wire knitting, monster glasses, creepy gardening, and a tampon-holding robot. Okay, those last three have almost nothing to do with knitting, but still. I need them. I think I'm going to make a cat grass garden with a leg sticking out.

The mass pattern site also had a link for a Clapotis hat, which is based on the scarf/wrap of the same name. I need that the most! Hence the previously mentioned soft pretty yarn. Yes. Go back to the Joann's site, look at the pink/grey shade, and tell me that doesn't rock.

I also did some searching after seeing a cat with a Jayne Cobb hat. Voila, a pattern!

In completely unrelated news, we did a final check on our apartment today, and it rocks. New carpet, new fridge, new tub... yay! And I scored an interview for a job I actually feel qualified (and therefore comfortable) for. Rock on. The move is on Saturday, though, so I'll try my best to get some posting (and knitting) done in the coming week. You're cool if you read everything to this point. *cookies* And now I'm off to attempt making my own ringtone of the Fruity Oaty Bar song.

Hats and gloves and scarves (oh my)

2007-10-18T16:51:00.000-05:00

As promised... a view of the hat!

It's knit with Cotton-Ease, which is incredibly soft - it almost feels like suede, in a way - but it's not quite as cool as I thought it would be. My yarn tends to twist itself up as I knit, which ordinarily I could kinda deal with, except that this yarn splits very easily. Especially the brown, for some reason. It seems like it'd be a good yarn for socks, if I purposely split it and knit with only two of four plies.

After obsessively knitting that, I started my Knucks! I had done my test swatches a while back, and thought that I would be knitting a medium. A thumb, half a pinky, and 40 minutes into Heroes later, and I realized I actually needed to knit a large. It helps that, not only am I knitting these with needles a size smaller than recommended, I'm using worsted weight yarn instead of the recommended DK weight. And that I just realized the latter last night. Lesson: if you're unfamiliar with a type of yarn, look it up in order to get the best substitution.

These gloves are still going to rock, though. I'm back to having two fingers done!

The only problem is that this yarn is tweed, and I tend to pick at pills, and tweedy things remind me of pills. Maybe this yarn will help me get over that.

Speaking of gloves, I finished the first of the bf's gloves, and I may have to pick apart the bound-off edge to make it a bit larger. That should be interesting...

In other news, I've been asked to take on a large project... my first client (sort of)! A friend of mine found a website that has patterns to knit the famous scarf from back-in-the-day Doctor Who, and wanted me to knit one as a gift for someone. Rock on. Luckily, it doesn't need to be done for quite a while, so I have some time to get a job so I can buy the yarn. Not to mention pick the colors. This scarf's got some odd colors to match up...

Oh, and we're not moving until next weekend now. Drat. More time to knit (and pack?), I guess.

Speedy Knitzolas

2007-10-14T00:43:00.000-05:00

I have seriously never been so excited to knit something before. I was itching to start the Maze hat since my #3 needles freed up, but couldn't start until Thursday night, because I was at the bf's house and the yarn I bought for it was at mine. When I got home, I took as little time as possible getting my stuff reorganized (read: dumping it all on the floor) and started right in. I knit from 10pm-2:30am that night, then a good chunk of the day yesterday, and finally "finished" at 3am yesterday. I say "finished" because I still have to tidy up - adjust some stitches so they look even (color knitting is fun like that), weave in ends, and toss it in with a load of laundry. And the stitch adjusting is taking forever.

Even so, I don't think I've ever knit one thing in this short of a timespan. I also tried some new things! This was my first time doing color knitting. I learned that there is a indeed a right and wrong way to twist the two strands together in the back; at the bottom half of the pattern, I don't have any actual holes, but there's enough space between stitches at the end of every round that you can see the yarn twisting behind it. If that made sense.

This was also the first time I knit something where I had to change needle sizes partway through. No lie. When I first heard of this needle-changing technique, I totally didn't get it. I thought "change to larger needles" meant you had to take all your stitches off the smaller needle, then somehow shove the larger needle through each loop. I've gained some common sense since then.

Anyway, I'll get some pictures of this hat once I (a) totally finish it, and (b) get camera access sometime this week.

In other hat news, check out the hat in the "About the Designer" section. Holy awesome. I don't think I could ever pull it off, though - and I'm not just saying that because I don't have dreadlocks long enough to make pigtails. Even if I did, I don't think it would look right on me. But A+ for creativity to that girl. (And the yarn is pretty, too.)

I got myself into an experimenting mood tonight. I've been eyeing Modular Knits for a little while now, and thought I could figure out how to make that basic square shape on my own. After a couple tries, I got the basic setup down - except I had a line of gaping holes running diagonally down the middle. I thought I needed to slip stitches to do a short-row shaping kind of thing, but for some reason, those stitches always wriggled themselves loose. Maybe I don't need to slip stitches at all; maybe I just need to knit/purl in short row form? *shrug* Don't get me wrong, though, I still want the book; I just had a burst of creative energy [/cliche] and needed to do something about it. (I also apologize for not having a picture of this one. I reeeeally need my own camera. Hmm, there's something I should put on my holiday list...)

In completely unrelated news, the bf and I are moving on Saturday! So, posting may be sparse in the next couple weeks, as we clean, pack, move, unpack, train kittens, and attempt to find affordable high-speed internet. I'll try my best, though.

A hat, and another hat.

2007-10-11T18:05:00.000-05:00

Try as I might have, there was no way I was going to finish my hat the other night. Last night was gaming night, and I barely finished in the 5.5 hour span. But, it's done!

...Eh. I think it would've looked better with the ribbon (as written in the pattern), just not on my head, as I've mentioned. I think part of it is that the yarn I used was stiffer than what the pattern called for. And it's cotton, not wool, so I'm not sure how blocking would work. (And yes, I'm aware there are some stretched stitches... that always happens when I knit in the round... I'll be fixing those.)

But, now that my size 3 needles are freed up, it's new project time! I'm going to start with the maze hat, since I just need the size 3's for casting on, then I'll move on to the Knucks I've been eyeing since I first contemplated teaching myself to knit. Yay!

In other news, the picture doesn't do it justice. I want to make it myself. I also want to make an awesome hat I saw yesterday: an earflap hat with really long earflaps. I can't even describe how cool it was.

I really need a sketchbook, so I can work out some of my ideas.

Gauge sucks

2007-10-09T22:47:00.000-05:00

I hit a roadblock on that sweater I had planned to make. I tried casting on with size 11 needles... and the gauge totally didn't match. So I tried size 13's. Closer, but still not right. So, I'm left with a few choices:

Knit the larger size sweater on 13's and hope for the best
Buy a pair of size 15's and hope for the best
Design a new sweater and hope for the best

The second option is out, because I really want to start knitting a sweater and can't afford to buy new supplies right now. I would love to make the third option work, but like I've said before, I know almost nothing about sweater construction. Grr. Maybe I'll just go with option #1, cause I still really like this pattern.

Also, it's getting cold out now. My goal is to finish my hat tonight. It's not the warmest hat, since it's just crochet cotton, but it's still a semi-warm hat. The problem is that it's on size 3 needles, so it's taking forever.

Also also, I really need to start writing down my pattern and design ideas... there are sooooo many kicking around.

Okay, it's hatter time.

Born-again motivation

2007-10-07T00:56:00.000-05:00

The cat beds were a bust. I kinda-sorta forgot that cats, especially kittens who don't know any better, like to eat things. I also forgot that fun fur sheds easily, and realized that it's only pretty to look at before it tangles itself inside a feline intestine. Considering I've already vowed to only give these cats food that does not use the words "artificial" or "by-product" in the first three ingredients, I should probably avoid all other possible damage to their pooping cycle. Lesson: fully consider your intended recipient before fully considering a project.

So, I frogged the nearly half-bed I'd already made and started again with new yarn combos: run-of-the-mill worsted weight acrylic with worsted weight cotton, both in whatever colors I had sitting around that seemed to have potential together. Still wasn't happy with it. So, the beds are probably a no-go, and the toys are on hold until I find out how violent and gnaw-happy these kittens are during playtime.

And this was after I bought the fun fur, another set of needles, bells, stuffing, and catnip. Crap. I'll think of something to do with all of them.

The blue/fun fur was a really nice color combo, though. Future scarves!

Speaking of scarves, round 1: the bias-knit scarf is [almost] done! I finished the third skein, then checked the length before adding the fourth, only to discover I totally didn't need the fourth. Insert many rows worth of unknitting, grumbling, and reknitting so I could end the scarf properly. I still need to weave in the ends and block the whole thing, so once that happens I'll get pictures up, and perhaps a pattern**. Now I just need to figure out what to do with that pesky fourth skein, especially since it looks like the yarn may be discontinued so I can't get any more. Discount shelves are a great indicator.

**even though the stitch pattern has been published on the internet so many times that it's probably made it into the public domain by now

Speaking of scarves, round 2: Aah! I have ideas! I need to get an extra notebook or something so I can write this stuff down.

Oh, and I got like 25 rows done on Glove A tonight. It's amazing what happens when I sit down and actually put my mind to work. (Or when I try to create a random stuffed monster pattern and get bored after three rows. Born-again motivation, I guess.) Unfortunately, I still have another 22 rows to go - and that's just until I get to the thumbhole. These puppies are long! Luckily, [k4, p1] rib is easy to remember and goes incredibly fast once you get used to it.

Bedtime, peeps.

Know what I hate?

2007-10-05T23:45:00.000-05:00

Answer: going to a store, seeing all the pretty sweaters, thinking "I can make that!", then realizing... no, I can't. At least, not yet. Once I actually knit a sweater or two, I'll have a much better grasp of sweater construction. Plus, once I have a job, I won't feel quite so bad about buying 10+ skeins of yarn at once. (Look how pretty.) So, I'm not trying to doubt myself. I'll make a sweater like that eventually. Goal: have one at least started by Christmas.

Another goal: one of these days, I'm going to sit down with some leftover yarn and play around with different stitch patterns. I'm a self-taught kind of gal. Who knows when I'll get that day, though...

Today, I was bad and bought yarn. The bf and I are getting kittens soon, and as I was perusing the pet aisles of Walmart (shush, they're open later than Petco), I noticed the pet beds and almost bought one or two. Then I remembered: Stitch'n'Bitch had a pattern for a cat bed! Insert a quick run back to the craft department for one of the rare occasions you will see me purchase fun fur (not to mention one of the only times you'll ever see me buy yarn from Walmart).

The pattern calls for one strand worsted weight something-or-another to be held together with one strand fun fur. I remembered I still had a tooooon of blue yarn sitting around that was a hand-me-down via the bf's stepdad's crocheting late wife. I appreciate the gift, don't get me wrong, but it's one of those shades that you can't really do much with. I normally love blue, but for some reason, I can't stand this shade. Think Red Heart's Amethyst for the time being, since I can't get on Caron's website. And I finally thought of something - at least one thing - to do with it! Anyway, I grabbed a skein of Red Heart (probably Amethyst, heh), did some color comparing, and settled on making one bed with Citrus and the other with Fiji (color samples are here). Fiji actually looks pretty decent so far... I'll update later on how the Citrus looks. It also seems to be a pretty sturdy-slash-squishy surface, so yay. (Oh, and I'm knitting this on size 9 needles, instead of the 10.5's the pattern calls for. Kittens are small like that.) I'll probably end up needing another skein of each color, but oh well, that's what Michaels 40% Off coupons are for.

And then I remembered that Knitty has a pattern for making adorable cat toys out of scraps. Rock on. I want to make some eggrolls for the kittens, because I like watching kittens wrestle with toys just as big as they are. (I'll be nice and make some wontons too, don't worry.)

Add two more projects to the sidebar list, then. I really need to finish something.

Updates may be relatively sparse coming up, as we may be moving as early as next weekend (!), but I'll try my best, yo.

Should I talk?

2007-10-03T11:53:00.000-05:00

Well, I've been meaning to post, but I can't decide if I want to. See, I got this really cool idea for a pattern that I'd love to talk about. Problem is, I don't know who's all reading this now - or who will be reading this soon - and I have a weird fear of someone stealing my ideas and publishing this pattern before I can.

Rrr I don't know what to do.

Anyway, I've made a bit of progress on all my current projects, but nothing to write about right now. Hopefully I'll have a more productive update soon.

I have gloves!

2007-09-28T21:53:00.000-05:00

I got my gloves done! Here's a few lessons for you kids:

Don't let projects sit around for several months, especially if you're a beginner. Not only did my gauge change - I was an obsessively tight knitter to start, so the left glove is snuggish while the right glove is obscenely loose - it turns out the cables on both gloves are twisted in the same direction, which is a no-no in the pattern.
Learn a new stitch the right way - the first time. I'm not sure I did the cable cast-on the right way for the pattern. But, with one glove already done, I was more concerned with making sure they looked at least somewhat similar.
Stitch'n'Bitch doesn't lie: if a pattern says to "pick up and knit x stitches," just pick up said stitches; don't knit them until the next round. My right glove has nearly nonexistant holes at the thumb join because I remembered this.
Even if you're told to do a picot bind-off, you might still want to bind off in pattern when you can.

But, hey. At least I learned. And at least I have something to keep my hands warm until I get my own pair of Dashing gloves completed. (I just started the bf's pair; I'm only three rows in and already I'm jealous.)

Another weekend of crazy work schedule coming up. Ta until after that.

I guess I'm on the right track

2007-09-28T15:17:00.000-05:00

I had one of those 40% Off Any One Regular-Priced Item coupons for Michaels that I forgot to use on my last excursion, so I had to stop today. (Sigh. I really need to lay off the shopping until I get a job.)

I picked up a set of #8 double-pointed needles, a bottle of varnish, a pencil sharpener, krazy glue, and a block of Sculpey. But the coolest thing came when I was searching the store for dowels (yup, to make my own needles). I finally found them, then came across packs of 10+ dowels in various diameters, already cut to 12" lengths. I almost bought at least two packs, due to my inability to choose sizes, when I saw this:

...okay, I can't find an image, and no camera stealage today, but Forster's had this lovely tube of 50 dowels, in assorted sizes from 1/8" (approx. size 5) to 5/8" (approx. size huge). For $10! And, when I handed the cashier my coupon, I sighed about how it was probably going towards the cheapest item. She looked at me, kind of bewildered, and replied, "No, it applies to the most expensive item." Score! 50 dowels for $6... can't beat that.

I also came thisclose to buying Craft, Inc. at the bookstore today. It mentioned things I've never thought of before - like business licenses and taxes. Yikes. I took the quick entrepreneurial quiz in it, though; it was one of those ten-question quizzes where if you get more than five answers right you're entrepreneurial material, and I got nine.

...Hmm.

I think I'm on to something here.

Gods of knitting

2007-09-26T13:35:00.000-05:00

The bf found this, laughed heartily, made me look, and now I'm sharing it with you.

So... bunnies!

More yarny pictures!

2007-09-25T21:49:00.000-05:00

Aah! I'm finally blogging again! I come in peace, with pictures in tow.

Okay. So I've gotten more work done on the scarf and hat; I don't have any new pictures of the scarf, since it essentially looks the same except longer, but here's my hat so far:

The brim is done and it's [mostly] stockinette stitch from here on out, so I'm speeding right along now. Oh, and I attempted a shot of how I clipped stitches together (see #2 in this link):

It's hard to tell how it works since I'm pretty far along, and the lighting sucked. But at least I tried.

And then I decided to frog that bag I started making long ago. Here's a reminder:

It's knit on the bias, so I decided to knit a scarf in the same fashion.

I love knitting complicated patterns, but at the same time, it's quite relaxing to be able to mindlessly knit. Not to mention that I enjoy using needles that actually fit my hands (size 13). This'll go into my things-to-sell pile.

The chilly weather lately has been making me wish I had gloves to wear while at the train station in the morning. I tracked down a picture of the Fetching gloves I started once upon a time:

The glove in the pic didn't work out, though; I mainly just took a picture for my old class blog to brag about something I'd kinda finished. I had a few issues with the pattern:

I tried making the thumbhole larger, since I have gigantic toe-thumbs and figured the pattern would be written for normal-sized thumbs, but the adjustment was actually too much.
I wished the gloves were a little longer in the hand, fingers, and thumb (and, if I remember correctly, a little at the wrist, too).
I ignored the picot bind-off instructions in the pattern, and just did a regular bind-off instead. It was too tight. Lesson learned.

I completely remade that glove - adding a few rows where necessary, making the thumb the size written, and taking the picot bind-off into account - and it fits a lot happier now. The second half is in the plans, and it should be much easier now that I actually own a cable needle.

I've also been eyeing the updated version of those gloves, Dashing, for several months now. So, I went shopping today and picked up some yarn (surprise):

The yarn on the left is for the bf - he saw it and loved the color (it's a forest green, which is probably hard to tell from the pic) - and the yarn on the right is for my own pair, as I've been eyeing that skein for a while now. I don't normally like pink, but occasionally I find something I love that I just have to have in pink. Like that skein.

I also bought five skeins of yarn. For a sweater. Woo!

See, I chatted with someone on the train a few nights ago, and she was wondering what kinds of things I knit. She asked if I knit sweaters, and I replied that I haven't yet, citing lack of money and ambition. On my drive home, I rethought my answer. I have the ambition to take on complicated lace patterns, but I don't have the ambition for a sweater? That's crap! So, I settled on a pattern, picked out some substitute yarns (I don't know about you, but whatever type of yarn this is just isn't me - or, at least it isn't my idea of sweater yarn), then just had to decide on colors. I finally settled on this combo:

...which looks much better in person than I could capture on camera. I was hoping for a nice, soft green or blue shade - kinda like the one pictured in the pattern, but I couldn't find a decent color match between the two yarns. There was a cool brown color match, but I suddenly got the feeling it would look like poop, even though the yarn shade was called Chocolate. I do like this orangey shade, though. Orange is like pink for me: I don't wear many bright colors, so an occasional change to my wardrobe is welcomed.

And then I also picked up a #9 circular needle and a #D crochet needle. They'll be used.

Much knitting must be done now, though. More talky later.

Quick updates abound

2007-09-21T13:09:00.000-05:00

Probably won't get much updating done this weekend... I'll definitely be at work all weekend:

3:30-11ish today
7:30am-midnight or 1am tomorrow
9:30-5ish Sunday

...Yeah. Fun. At least we'll get a couple hours of downtime tomorrow, so I can knit. Or maybe I'll bring Super Munchkin and try to teach everyone how to play. Or how much of a geek I am.

I have figured out how to knit this hat without a ribbon band thingy, though. (Don't get me wrong, I think it's cute; I just think it'll end up looking not-so-cute on me.) By doing some math, I would end up with 108 stitches (for the small size) before doing the crown decreases. By stopping at row 13 in the pattern, though, I had 132 stitches. A 24-stitch difference? Yeah, that'd be several inches off. But the crown decreases are repeated 12 times through the row. Perfect! So, just do a couple rows like the crown decreases, except with a row of plain knitting in between. Yay! I'll get a picture up when I can.

Grr, time to start getting ready for work...

Color ideas... when I'm not ready for them yet.

2007-09-19T12:43:00.000-05:00

I've said it before, and I'll say it again.

I need a camera.

Okay, so I have a camera on my cell phone. But that one sucks, and I don't have any way of transferring those pics to my computer anyway - unless I emailed them, and that costs $1.something, I think. I could always borrow a camera, but I need to have one for whenever the inspiration strikes.

See, yesterday, it was rainy and dreary here. But in the front yard, there was this lone tree - both the only tree in that area of the yard, and one of the only trees that has its autumn colors. There were green leaves on the outside, and some bright oranges and yellows in the middle; it was a nice contrast to the bleakness surrounding it, and I thought, those colors would look great as a ball of yarn. And those colors aren't going to be there forever. Crap.

I still need to move first, though. I would be strangled if I tried dyeing yarn in this house.

Knitty/book discussion...

2007-09-16T22:24:00.000-05:00

...they're coming. I promise.

I spent tonight searching for jobs amidst a crashing browser. AOL + Firefox + 56k + careerbuilder.com = no. After that, I have no energy left to write cover letters - not even to edit the company name and job title into the same ol' letter. And certainly not to plug in my jump drive and wait five minutes for it to be workable. Argh.

In knitting news, nothing too new right now - I got quite a bit of that scarf done on the train, thanks to (a) my post-game northbound detour and (b) a couple short delays because someone thought it'd be a good idea to do a u-turn in front of a train. Sigh. And then I messed up one of the rows somehow, so after some unknitting and retrying, I ended up with either one stitch too many or too few at the end. Sigh again. Luckily I have another piece of yarn strung through a row of stitches, but it's way back, cause I was starting to get cocky about how much I really needed it anymore. Hint: never get cocky. Anyway, I hope I don't have to unravel all that, cause that's like, sixteen rows. Ew.

I got some shopping done in the past couple days, though. I finally tracked down sandpaper at Walmart (meh), plus I picked up a few bottles of paint, as well as some head pins and jump rings. Yay for random knitting accessory making... now I just need time to make said random knitting accessories, and I'll be set.

Enough of my off-topic-ness for today, though. Time for some pre-sleep knitting.

Just so you know.

2007-09-14T12:26:00.000-05:00

Off-topic: I finally created a Monster profile last night, since that's the only way I could apply for a job I was interested in. Anyway, I listed that I was ONLY interested in jobs in Minneapolis and St. Paul, and that I was NOT interested in relocating. So, does this mean I want to receive job offers from Madison? NO! Especially when you don't mention your name anywhere in the email ("I work in HR" doesn't count), and you don't even mention my name (i.e. "Dear Rebecca, [...]").

Argh.

Anyway, I just wanted to let my readers (all two of you right now :P) know that I may not update much this weekend, because I work through Wednesday. Except tomorrow - I called in so that I could help a friend move, and I'm sure the boss will complain, but y'know what? This is the second time I've called in all season, so whatever.

...I seem to like tangents today. Anyway, I'm hoping to update soon about knitting books I may or may not need, as well as a review of the new issue of Knitty (it's finally here!). And a review of how my first efforts at making chopsticks goes (time permitting). And perhaps interject a bit about the weird looks I get for knitting on the train. We'll see.

Pocky run! (It's related.)

2007-09-13T18:49:00.000-05:00

I'm getting better at knitting while distracted, I think. Yesterday I successfully knit while receiving job hunting advice from a pastor, and today I knit in the backseat of pre-rush hour traffic. And, of course, knitting while role-playing last night, although it was one of those sessions where I had pretty much no idea what was going on anyway... But yeah, another five rows on the hat, and a few inches on the scarf. I'd post pictures of the hat so far if I had some. I need a camera.

Today's adventures led a few of us to United Noodles, an oriental grocery store in Minneapolis. What does this have to do with knitting, you ask? Chopstick shopping. I've come across several tutorials on these here vast interwebs for making chopsticks into knitting needles, so I thought I'd jump in and give it a shot. 100 round chopsticks for like, $3. Good deal. (Plus I got some Yan Yan out of the deal, mainly because it was cheaper than Pocky.)

The only problem is that I like to think I'm better at certain things than I actually am. In this case, decorative painting. Luckily, chopsticks are small enough that the extent of the painting that can be done is with like, toothpicks.

Oh, yes, not to mention that all my crafting stuff is packed away in a box somewhere. Wonderful. I need to move already.

Update: woohoo!

2007-09-11T21:47:00.000-05:00

Good news! I restarted the hat mentioned at the bottom of this post. This time, I did two things differently right from the start:

One) I used point protectors at the end of every needle. The first time I started, I had naked needle ends, and my stitches fell off and probably added to the accidental twisting. I don't own point protectors, though, and I was really wishing I did. But then I remembered I still had some old hair elastics sitting around, from way back when I went through a hippie stage and made hemp hair extensions. Anyway, slap one of those on the ends of your needles, and those stitches are going nowhere. Okay, it's a really cheap solution, and I've already snapped one elastic, but it works for the time being.

Two) Clipping a couple stitches together at the DPN breaks did indeed work.

The only bad thing was that I had to cast on three times. Again. Because I seem to have issues with finding the correct length of yarn needed to cast on the required number of stitches. But I'm already three rows back in, so woohoo.

The bf was nice enough to take me out for some knitting shopping today, too. I went to a yarn shop, picked up a couple of circular needles, and drooled over all the pretty yarn that I wanted to snatch right up. I didn't have any specific ideas in mind, though, so I had to leave it at the needles. Same deal with yarn at Michaels, although I also got some great ideas for making some beaded stitch markers to possibly sell eventually. And then I almost bought a couple books at Barnes and Noble, but it was the same deal: nothing really stood out. Oh well, it saves me money.

I think I'm going to play Katamari now, though. Ah, randomness.

A tour of a timeline.

2007-09-11T18:27:00.000-05:00

Okay, another introduction. This time, to the things I've made (or lack thereof).

The first non-practice, non-swatch thing I ever ever made was actually not a pattern:

I had just started role-playing at the time, and needed dice storage that wasn't the cheap plastic cube they came packaged in. I had some leftover fun fur from a couple Halloweens before, when I tied strands into my hair and went as Red Fraggle, and decided I could use the rest to make what was quite possibly the most obnoxious dice bag ever. It's just a garter stitch rectangle that I sewed up, and since the gauge was large enough, I was just able to weave some black cord between stitches. I learned that fun fur is kind of a pain to knit with (especially if you're a beginner), and doesn't really stay sewed up that well, as my seams started coming apart about a month later.

By that time, I had started working on this bag with Rag Doll yarn. Here's a teaser:

I've grown to dislike how it's come out, though. Don't get me wrong, I still think it's a great pattern, I just don't like how it looks with this yarn. Not to mention that my gauge was supertight at first, until I got the hang of it and relaxed my stitching a bit, so two pieces are knit at different gauges. It's probably not that noticeable, but I'm slightly OCD about some things, so it stuck out like crazy to me. I think I'm going to rip these apart and use this yarn to make a scarf with a similar stitch pattern.

I then started working on fingerless gloves and pedicure socks - both with Sugar 'n Cream yarn, because cheap can be good - but still have yet to finish the second half of both. Yeah, I'm not that great at finishing projects.

At this point, I bought some soy wool on impulse and decided to make a new dice bag out of it:

My own pattern! Kind of. I borrowed part of the cable pattern from these socks and used my knowledge of hat construction - without ever having knit a hat before. After some changes to the math and needle sizes, I had a dice bag again. This yarn's pretty tough to knit with, too, because if it gets detwisted it tends to fray apart pretty easily. But it is soft and pretty.

I also made a skull scarf for the bf. I don't have pictures since it looks essentially the same as the pictures in the pattern. I learned that felting by hand is quite painful; my hands blistered like crazy, and I was sore for days from sitting on the edge of the bathtub. The scarf was much enjoyed by the recipient, though, considering the bf wore it out of the house. In August.

I then made a hat from Stitch and Bitch, with yarn so acrylic it squeaked, in a color that kinda reminded me of a braided rug. I'm not sure I like how it came out, but hey, that'll happen sometimes.

After that, I turned to Knitty for more ideas. I didn't really like this lacy scarf at first, but it really started growing on me, so I picked up some sock yarn and went to work.

This is mainly what I've been knitting on the train, and now that I pretty much have the pattern memorized, it's going pretty fast. I can't wait until it's done, especially now that it's starting to cool down outside.

While working on that, I found some super soft fluffy yarn and picked up a skein of purple, figuring I could make a hat with it. I found a pattern I liked, but the gauge with that yarn alone would have been too small. Enter some green heathered wool I still had sitting around, combine the two, and yay! Except that I kept screwing up the pattern somehow - finding a stitch or two too few or two many in some pattern repeats - and, fearful that there were some dropped stitches that would make the hat suck later on, I ripped it out, and decided to put this hat on hold until a warmer hat is more appropriate.

So, I decided to make another hat by the same designer. I bought three skeins of #10 crochet thread - two in blue, and one in a pastel-ish variegated pattern - and wound the three strands together into a ball:

And, yes, I ended up ripping this hat apart too. That's what happens when you knit in the round with double-pointed needles and let it get twisted. There would've been a few huge holes in the brim, and no. I'm going to start it again, but maybe use stitch markers to clip the piece together where the needles meet. If that made any sense at all. I just don't want to spend $16 for a circular needle that I probably won't use much, so that's why I'm being irritatingly insistent on using DPNs.

So, there you have it! I feel like my writing in this post was eight flavors of drab, but oh well. The yarn is pretty, so pay more attention to that this time around.

Iiiiiiiiiintroduction

2007-09-10T13:15:00.000-05:00

Well, I decided to create a knitblog, so I should probably, y'know, start it. FAQ format, go!

Just who the crap are you?

I'm Becky. Or b.mro, as some call me. I'm one of the few people whose fly girl name actually works, so I go with it. I don't have any decent current pictures of me, especially since my hair is at that ugly awkward growing-out stage, so here's a picture of a cow with some stuff on its head:

I graduated from college in May with a degree saying I know my crap about advertising, marketing, public relations, and writing, and am still on the search for a job that will hire someone with just-above-entry-level experience. For now, I live in the Minneapolis area, and I work in food service management at Twins/Vikings/Gophers games, which isn't always as cool as it sounds. But it means I take the train to work, which gives me downtime to knit.

What's this about knitting, now?

Well, that's simple: I knit a lot.

I started knitting in January 2007. I went back to collegetown right after New Years, because I needed money and my two off-campus jobs were whining about winter break being a whole month long... and then I was only scheduled a couple days a week. Very few of my friends were back in collegetown with me, and I was bored out of my mind. Then, one day, I remembered watching my boyfriend's friend's girlfriend knitting while role-playing at the gaming night I was dragged to. I decided, hey, I want to do that! and immediately went out to buy some acrylic yarn and the cheapest set of needles I could find.

I found a learn-to-knit website, picked up the basics like that *snaps fingers*, was referred to Knitty by another knitting friend, and started obsessively looking at patterns. I was in awe with all the cool stuff that could be made by knitting and purling. And, as much as I hate to use a cliche, the rest is history. *bows*

The main things I enjoy about knitting are:

Stress relief
Creating awesome stuff for myself and others
The weird looks I get from fellow train riders

So why a knitblog?

In my last semester of college, I took a class called Weblogs and Wikis. We learned about blogs and wikis (duh), got a little experience writing for both, then had to pick one with which to create a long-term, focused project. I chose a personal blog. I had great ideas for more researchy blogs, but I didn't think any of them could hold my interest for the whole semester, so I decided that by calling it a "personal blog" I could get away with writing a little about everything. The thought of a knitblog crossed my mind, but I was still new enough to the craft that I was afraid I'd lose interest partway through the semester, and thus be screwed on my project. For a while, though, I was going through some really personal stuff that I didn't exactly feel comfortable letting my classmates and teacher read about, so I was mostly blogging about knitting.

I vowed I'd keep up on that personal blog after the semester ended, but that, um, didn't happen. I didn't even log in to blogger for like, three months. I got bored and logged in recently, and discovered that my teacher had posted a bunch of links on the class blog about freelancing and professional blogging. I read most of it and was inspired to start blogging again... this time, about knitting.

Okay. So you're just another fly on the raccoon carcass, blathering about the things you're making?

Sure. But that's only part of it.

My blog class taught me that focusing is a good thing. So, here's a blog with a few different yet related focuses:

Knitting on a budget (i.e. finding ways around spending $20 for a few yards of yarn without shopping online)
Doing yarny things without the standard things (i.e. making new yarn without spinning equipment)
Being a decent knitter who still has much to learn (i.e. coming up with my own patterns)
And, for the time being, running a knitblog without owning a digital camera (I seem to keep breaking them, so I have to borrow either my boyfriend's camera or my mom's scanner)

I also hope for this blog to be an outlet to improve my HTML and online writing and marketing skillz, as well as a starting point for a business venture. I wouldn't mind making scarves/hats/etc. to sell, and I hope to get into dying and spinning, so I can make yarn like crazy and sell that as well. And maybe branch this blog out into a full website with techniques and patterns and such. We'll see what happens.

Why "squishyknits"?

Um... I don't know. I was trying to think of names that were random and amusing, but could also work as the name of a professional company (read: something I can put on a resume). The name "squishyknits" randomly came to me one day, and it just seemed right. So, there you go.

If you have any more questions, feel free to leave a comment or shoot me an email (milliebmro[at]gmail[dot]com). Happy knitting/reading!