Quicksilver Crafter 2.0

Weekly craft check-in #3: a little sewing project

2012-01-22T20:00:00.000-05:00

Time again for a crafty check-in! Did you make anything this week? I'd love to hear about it, or better yet, to see it — so feel free to post your blog links in the comments here or post your pictures in the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

This week, I tested out my newest sewing machine acquirement by making a simple green clutch.

A peek at the inside of the clutch
I downloaded the directions for the clutch for free from BurdaStyle, a sewing Web site where you can get free and paid patterns and share your sewing projects with the community. It's the 1, 2, 3 Sew Pintuck Clutch pattern.

The clutch came out pretty well, considering I haven't sewn for a while, I was using a sewing machine I'm not used to, and the ironing board was out of commission so I had to do my pressing on the floor. ;) (I'll probably use it as a pouch for knitting notions rather than a clutch, though. Shhh.)

More sewing projects are planned for the coming weeks. Wish me luck with my printable pattern adventure. ;)

Weekly craft check-in #2: a DIY reed diffuser

2012-01-15T11:41:00.002-05:00

That week just zoomed by for me — anyone else?

I did manage to get a little makey-makey in, though. I worked a little on a sweater that's been waiting patiently since early 2010, and I also used up some random stuff that's been sitting around the house in a DIY reed diffuser experiment.

In short, I took some leftover sweet almond oil, the dregs of a bottle of vodka, and some otherwise ignored fragrance oil and shook it all up in the sweet almond oil bottle. Then I poured it into a vase I rescued from under the sink and stuck some bamboo skewers into it. I've heard that the rattan reeds sold specifically for these diffusers work a little better, but hey, the skewers were on hand. I also would have preferred essential oils to fragrance oil, but I figured I might as well use up some fragrance oil while I'm experimenting. It'll be less annoying than using up my lovely essential oils if it doesn't work out. ;) And if it does work, I can use essential oils next time! I'm still waiting for the skewers to marinate and hopefully begin to actually, you know ... diffuse. (I'll also flip them over in a couple of hours, which should help the scent start circulating.)

Did you make anything this week? Share it in the comments if you like, and don't forget to post links to relevant pictures or blog posts if you have them. ;D

Weekly craft check-in

2012-01-08T16:00:00.000-05:00

Sunday! That means it's time to talk about what got made over the past week. (Woo, Craft or Bust!)

At first, on reviewing the past week, I thought I'd hadn't done anything creative or made anything at all. That'd be a great start to the new crafty year, right? ;) I did do a lot of cleaning, though; the Great Craft Room Rescue I've been blathering about for a while appears to finally be under way. (I'm not going to say it definitely is, though, as that might psych me out. ;) Let's just pretend it's like the economy. I won't officially declare the state of the craft room at a high or low point until enough time has passed that I can get a good perspective.)

So I thought I was going to have to say, "What'd I make this week? A mess! And then I cleaned it up."

Part of the aforementioned mess: Some of the tissue paper and wrapping paper I've collected over the years, spread out over the dining room floor so I can sort it and put it back into the craft room in some semblance of order.

A lot of my yarn is actually (gasp!) in fabric boxes now. No, not homemade ones like I wanted to make last year (and still want to make), but at least they're an improvement on random sizes of cardboard boxes. ;)
Then I realized that I took some photos of a vase of roses we have in the house at the moment, and according to my own rules, that counts as doing something creative. Ta-da! So I "made" photos. Win.

I also got my Very First roll of Swedish tracing paper in the mail this past week, which will hopefully encourage more crafty goodness to ensue. I've been wanting some of this stuff for years, as I've developed an aversion to cutting out paper pattern pieces: For one thing, pattern paper is generally wimpy and easy to tear, and for another thing, sewing patterns cost enough that I don't like the idea of only being able to use them once, in one size.

I also like to draft my own patterns, and while I don't mind doing the initial drafting on paper (usually newsprint, since it comes in large sheet sizes and is readily available at the craft store), I still don't like storing patterns permanently on normal paper, which insects like to chew on and which is more fragile than fabric-like Swedish tracing paper.

Plus, you can sew Swedish tracing paper. Like. How cool is it that you could theoretically use Swedish tracing paper for draping an item of clothing, then take it apart and use it as your permanent master pattern without having to transfer marks or cut anything else?

Anyway, now I'll be able to use the patterns that came with some of my sewing books without actually cutting the printed paper that came with the books. Ha-HA! Not that I really ever get rid of books, but it's nice to have the option of doing it ... and I'm probably not the only one who hates it when used craft books are missing crucial things like, oh, the patterns that you need to actually complete the projects inside the book. ;)

Yay! My first roll of Swedish tracing paper!
So that's what I did this week. What did you make this week, my cohorts in crafting? :D

New year, new crafty challenge!

2012-01-01T17:02:00.000-05:00

That's "new" in the sense of "renewed," really, not in the sense of "totally not seen before!" ;)

That's because I'm talking about Craft or Bust. If you don't know, it's my annual crafty challenge to myself — and to anyone who wants to join me — to create something, even if it's something tiny, every week of the year. (Maybe that sounds kind of low-key to you, but it's harder for some of us than for others! ;))

Anyway, if you'd like to join me, just leave a comment on this post with your name and goal, and if you want to be linked to when I mention you in a CoB context, also leave a URL for yourself.

You're free to join whenever, stay as long as you want, and most of all, enjoy yourself! This is a creative challenge, not a way to stress yourself out, so don't worry if you get behind. There's always next week.

If you're in a signing-up-for-stuff frenzy, you can also sign up to get e-mail reminders and updates and join the Flickr pool for sharing your crafty pics.

Happy crafty new year! ;D

Two-minute candy cane holder

2011-12-23T04:47:00.001-05:00

Sometimes, one gets tired of not finishing craft projects. Instant gratification to the rescue! I got tired of the candy canes sitting and taking up space in their original box on the counter, so I took one of the oatmeal cans we saved for occasions just like this, wrapped some of the box around the can, and taped it. Voila!

Looks pretty decent for something that uses two pieces of "trash" and some Scotch tape, huh?

That photo comes to you care of my new iPod Touch, by the way. That was an unexpected Amazon.com Black Friday score, and my way of keeping myself from pining away for an iPad. ;)

Oh, and if you're wondering why our candy canes aren't on the tree, well, this is our tree:

I think we could probably fit a couple of candy canes on there, but ... I also think the tree might arguably fit into the candy cane canister. So ... yeah. Not the most efficient candy-cane-holding tree. At least it tastes good, itself. ;)

So how's your holiday setup look? :D

MAKE/CRAFT Halloween contest 2011 is open!

2011-10-19T17:48:00.000-04:00

For all you crafty/DIY types, there's a contest running on the Makeand Craft Web sites. You can enter anything you make with a Halloween theme — well,anything as long as it fits into one of the four categories: Costume, Prop,Decor or Food.

The prizes are all crafty/makey things, of course, like aDremel tool and a Singer sewing and embroidery machine. Click here for the details.

The contest ends at the end of November 8, 2011. If youenter, drop a line and let me know!

A cool DIY wire coffee table project

2011-09-13T20:45:00.000-04:00

I've been on the lookout for DIY coffee table ideas for a while — we have a great glass top, but the curly cast iron base that came with it wasn't made for use by a piratical first mate who likes to rest his feet on everything within five feet of the futon. Right now we have two chairs stuck underneath the glass top as a makeshift coffee table, which ... is functional. That's about all I can say about that.

Anyway, since it's not falling apart or unstable, we're not in a giant rush to spend money on a new coffee table base, but it's pretty high on the list of DIY improvements I want to make to the house, since I prefer my DIY projects to be attractive as well as usable. ;) My criteria for the new, improved DIY coffee table base include that it should:

hold the glass top securely enough that none-so-gentle cats and feet atop it won't make the table wobble;
be attractive;
have storage space beneath it; and preferably
be fairly easy to move, since the room in which the coffee table resides doubles as the Wii-playing room.

Today I found a tutorial from Lowe's that looks like it meets pretty much all these criteria — behold! The wire deck coffee table tutorial!

Okay, I'm not sure it'd be that easy to move around, but it doesn't look particularly harder to move around than anything else. And one of the awesome things about this project is that it requires only three things, and no tools: wire deck, cable ties, and acrylic sheet (which you can have cut to measure at the home improvement store). I guess wire deck is what it looks like, which is some kind of shelving component. And even cooler (at least for me)? Technically, I could probably scrounge all the materials for this out of what we have on hand right now — we have wire shelving, cable ties, and that glass table top I keep blathering about.

I am so tempted to try this. But it would require disassembling some of my existing shelves and I doubt they'd make a coffee table of the height we want anyway, so I'd probably want to get some new wire deck to do it with. According to their Web site, my local Lowe's doesn't seem to have the right size of wire deck to make the bottom part (snort — that's a little perverse), but assuming I can find it somewhere locally at comparable prices, it looks like getting the wire deck would cost well under $50, including tax. That sounds like a fairly good deal on a pretty cool DIY coffee table base. So. Tempted.

Yeah, the temptation might be a passing fancy ... but then again, maybe the idea will ferment in my head with some other ones and produce an even better DIY coffee table base idea. Only time will tell. ;)

In which I acquire an alpaca (sort of), and dye some Florida wool

2011-08-22T17:52:00.000-04:00

You wouldn't think an alpaca would fit in someone's luggage, right? Well, this little guy did:

He was a gift from the first mate's parents; they picked him up in Colorado. ~~Of course I've already misplaced~~ Ha-HA! I found the card that came with him, from which I gather he comes to me by way of Alpaca Exotic Imports. Thanks, O parents of the first mate, for the pettable furry thing that requires no feeding. ;)

(That "mountain" he's climbing is the handspun I finished/made during this year's Tour de Fleece, by the way.)

I also recently kettle-dyed a sample of Gulf Coast fleece that came from my very own home state, Florida, but which went for a visit to Laura of Dew Dance Farm before it came to me. I dyed it an appropriately oceany color (it's almost like I don't know there are other colors ;)) and am now pondering what to spin it into. Voila, le Gulf Coast!

Hope you've all been up to some summery fun — I've been working on a few surprises, myself. ;D

Tour de Fleece 2011, Day 1

2011-07-02T13:31:00.000-04:00

Yep, it's time again for the Tour de Fleece, that annual spinalong so many of us do during the Tour de France. So far I'm off to a better start than I've made for the past two years, and while I'm not in any way reassured that this means the rest of the Tour will go better than it has previously, making a decent start is an accomplishment in itself. ;D Here's what I've spun so far — it's an ounce of Louet wool/mohair/bamboo rayon:

This year I'm trying to track my progress more, so I updated my super-primitive tracker spreadsheet from last year to be a little bit less primitive ... though it's still no NaNoWriMo word count tracker. ;) This is part of it, though there's a lot more to it than just this (including "yards spun" and "skeins completed" columns that are just not in this snippet of screenshot):

There's also a place where you can list your goals and check them off, and an area at the end of the spreadsheet that sums up your progress so far in total time spent, number of ounces spun, yards spun, goals met, etc. I like it a lot better than last year's tracker (which was boring and unpretty enough that I didn't share it with anyone), though I still have visions of charts and per-day summaries and such. (I just need to decide how to balance cool stats capabilities with keeping the daily tracker fairly simple to use...)

Anyway, if you're doing the Tour de Fleece and you want a copy of my progress tracker spreadsheet, the quickest way to get in touch is to drop me a line on Ravelry (I'm Silver) with your e-mail address, or you can leave me a comment here with your e-mail address if you don't mind other people seeing it. I'm planning on adding a download link for it to the Star & Crossbones Web site but I haven't done it yet, and I'd rather have the offer out there right now than delay it till I get around to poking the Web site's freebies page. ;)

FYI, the spreadsheet was created in Excel 2008 for Mac and I haven't tested it on any computer but mine. If you end up with a copy and you find some incompatibility issue, definitely let me know, and I'd be happy to poke at it and try to fix it. :D

Happy spinning of wheels, whichever kind(s) you do!

And lo, there was much finishing, and it was good

2011-05-23T18:00:00.000-04:00

Who, me? Absent?

Okay, you win. I've been quiet here for a while, but look! I've been doing things, and I have photographic proof!

I finished that gigantic pink scarf:

And I finished knitting my TwitKAL/Wanderheart shawl, which looked like this before blocking:

...and is currently stretched out on the ~~rack~~ floor, drying into its newer prettier shape:

And I finally Navajo-plied the second bobbin of Rubies and Sapphires Merino that I spun during last year's Tour de Fleece:

Hmm. That doesn't seem like much, does it?

I've also been baking and going to the beach, though not at the same time (yet — someday I'll have a solar oven, mark my words!).

Random baking pic

Random beach picture. Tiny crab waves hi!
And I've been working on my Big Black Socks and on a secret knitting project for my Santosha Swap partner (which I could probably actually post about, since only the organizer knows which partner is assigned to who ;)), but those aren't ready for photography yet. ;D

So ... see. I've been doing stuff. And there is more stuff yet to come. Think productive thoughts at me, 'cause I'm still going strong now ... but I can use all the encouragement I can get!

From fleece to fiber art: alpaca like the ocean

2011-05-06T17:06:00.000-04:00

A few weeks ago a friend of mine called me up. "Will you spin me some yarn for a Mother's Day gift? Any kind of yarn you want," she said (though, I admit, not in these precise words ;)). "I've never seen you make yarn I haven't liked!"

Once the temporary ego-swelling had subsided, of course, I had to make some decisions. My friend (hello, Ms. Friend! ;D) and her mother are both allergic to wool, so anything but wool would work. Well, I have plenty of alpaca fleeces, so off I went to the stash.

I wanted to pick a fiber good for dyeing, since alpaca doesn't naturally come in blue, green, or purple, the colors I hear Ms. Friend's mom uses the most. ;) This, a fleece from Calypso Farm, from a Suri alpaca named Glass Slipper, seemed perfect:

Suri, by the way, is a rare breed of alpaca known for having silky, warm, lustrous, drapey fiber. Only one percent of the alpacas on the planet are of the Suri breed, so "rare" isn't just hype! ;) (Check out Suri Network for more information on Suri alpacas and Suri fiber specifically.)

So the fleece visited the wash tub and the dye pot, and voila! Oceany alpaca!

Anyway, originally I thought I'd do a lightweight yarn that might work for knitting a shawl, as Ms. Friend mentioned something about a lace book for her mom. Now, maybe you know this already because you have lots of friends who are fibers, but fibers have preferences about what makes them look good and behave well. Some look good in little black dresses, some look good in jeans and a t-shirt — well, okay, I'm really talking about fiber preparation here, like combing vs. carding, but I am so not in a jargony technical mood today, so we'll pretend it's kind of like clothing style. ;)

Point is, since I hadn't worked with this particular fleece before and didn't know its preferences, I experimented with different fiber preparations. I tried preparing it on my hand cards, on my drum carder, and with my hand combs, and I tried spinning yarn from all these preparations as well as spinning the fiber straight from the cloud (meaning without doing more than picking it apart with my fingers a bit).

Some of the results I won't share with you *cough*, but I found that while the different preparations weren't radically different in results, the different processes were different amounts of pain in the butt. ;) (Suri alpaca doesn't look fluffy until you try to run it through a Louet Junior Roving Carder, let me tell you ... and then it flies everywhere. I guess I need a drum carder with finer teeth? Or maybe I need to buckle down and get those cotton hand cards I've been drooling over for years.) Anyway, in the end I end I went with the hand combs — even though I think of them as fairly slow, they seem suited to the Suri's straight, silky fibers ... and they don't make the fiber fly everywhere and stick to everything. ;)

Scary fiber equipment, yay!

I even knit up some of the sample yarn to see how it behaved.

That looks pretty decent, huh? But like I said, different fibers have different preferences, and there was just something about this preparation that didn't seem ideal. Sure, it was functional, but the Suri seemed like it wanted to show off a little more, and not be so traditional. Lots of fibers do traditional perfectly well, and the Suri does have an interesting halo to it when spun like this, but ... well, at the rate I was spinning, it also would have taken me forever and ever to finish the whole batch of fiber at that weight. And I had this possibly odd idea that a Mother's Day gift should probably be ready before Mother's Day, plus, I didn't want to think about pricing a yarn that takes 9 whole hours to spin, not even counting the combing and the dyeing and the washing and, and...

So I decided I'd spin it fatter, since the fatter yarn sample I did seemed to show off the Suri's qualities better. Then I thought again: If I spun it fat, because alpaca tends to be fairly heavy and dense compared to wool, I'd end up with a fat, short skein of yarn, an amount that would make it more of an accent yarn than something Ms. Friend's mom would be able to knit a whole item out of. And that'd be silly, wouldn't it? But the singles alone, with its decent yardage, didn't seem appealing enough — again, it was functional, but I wanted to do something special, not just a plain ol' singles.

Then I remembered thread-plying! And so I went into the part of the stash with the cones of vintage weaving yarn, and I pulled out some white thread, and went to town. Ply, ply you fools! The result:

Ta-da! A little over 100 yards of thread-plied art yarn. (Okay, it's a slightly sedate art yarn, but I didn't want to force anything too wacky on someone I can't remember meeting in person, meaning where she would be in range of my ability to sense wackiness tolerance. ;))

Yeah, I may have fallen victim to making things more complicated than they needed to be, by following my own preferences and treating this project like I would have had it been a present for my mom, but that's not such a horrible thing to do when you're given free rein to make whatever yarn you like, right?

And hey, if the recipient hates it, or if she happens to see this blog post and decides she likes it the traditional, takes-two-gazillion-years-to-spin yarn better than the arty yarn, I do have more of this fiber, and more dye. I can always call a redo! It may even take me slightly less than a gazillion years to spin it next time, since then I'll have had the practice of spinning it this time around. ;)

Of course, I do hope she ends up liking it, maybe even making something out of it that eventually shows up in my inbox in photographic form. That's one of the coolest things that can happen to your handmade stuff — seeing it in happy use, in action.

So here's hoping it's well-received. :D Meantime, I'm off again. There's still more of that gigantic scarf to knit...

In favor of hugemongous yarn, and Epic Socks pics

2011-05-03T15:59:00.000-04:00

I hardly ever knit with chunky weight yarn — it's not generally useful in Florida weather, and I tend to prefer a slim look to a "fluffy" look, if I can help it, and the patterns that are awesome enough to make me want to use the chunky yarn anyway tend to require massive amounts of it, which is, y'know, usually more expensive than things requiring nonmassive quantities of yarn. ;)

The pound of pink yarn in the last post, though, is for a custom scarf, and chunky weight was an absolute must. (There's no way I'm knitting a scarf of these epic proportions in a lighter weight of yarn — I'd be middle-aged before it was done.)

And this scarf? If anyone needs convincing that knitting with chunky weight yarn has merit — well, lights, please! I present to you my evidence:

This is the scarf partway through day one of knitting it.

And this is the scarf on day two.

That's 26 inches, people. 26 inches of 12-inch-wide scarf in two days. I've never knit that amount of fabric in such a short amount of time in my life, methinks. ;) Well, at least not before this week.

So there it is: The perfect argument in favor of gigantic yarn.

And on the far-from-gigantic yarn front, here are some of those photos of the Epic Socks, my first beaded lace socks, that I mentioned I'd take:

Lace close-up! ;D
Giant yarn, nongiant yarn ... We gots it all around here.

(We've even got yarn that isn't yarn yet, she said as she glared at the four ounces of freshly-dyed turquoise-ish alpaca fiber that needs to finish drying RIGHT NOW DANGIT. Pics of that coming once it looks less like pieces of a wet rat with a strange fashion sense.)

Coming up for air, plus a pound of wool yarn & a handspun shawl in progress

2011-05-01T21:52:00.001-04:00

So tired today, but I finally have the Epic Socks done. (Light shines down from the heavens! Golden trumpets sound! Birds fly picturesquely across the scene!) They're on the drying rack at the moment, so no photos yet, but I'll take some before I send them off to their deserving and angelically patient owner.

And hey, now I know that I can knit a pair of women's lace, beaded socks in 31 hours of knitting time. (I'd have said "women's size X" socks, with X being the US shoe size, except that I can't remember it exactly. Size 9? Off the top of my head I only remember the recipient wears a larger shoe than I do...)

Another thing that looks like it might get done in the next few weeks is that old TwitKAL shawl I started last year. I'm almost out of the blue portion of the yarn, and then there will only be purple left. Yayyyy!

Pattern is Liz Abinante's Traveling Woman shawl.
And oh, yeah. I finished spinning a pound and an ounce of big fat fluffy pink hand-dyed Blue-Faced Leicester yarn for a custom order. Behold! A pound of handspun yarn in all its glory!

As I told the person who will be receiving this yarn after its transformation into a scarf, the funny thing about this project is that I'll probably have taken longer to spin the yarn than it will take me to finish knitting the scarf, comparatively huge though it will be. (For reference? I've knit myself a sweater using less wool than is going into this scarf. Which is a reflection that a) I'm small and b) the recipient is somewhat other than small. ;))

I'm going to continue to be a slacker as far as Craft or Bust updates, by the way, since I haven't made any progress on that since my last update — but ever since the first mate and I fixed the washer/dryer, I've been on a cleaning spree, and there's nary a scrap of unwashed laundry left in the house, and I'm coming up fast on the dubious achievement of having no dirty laundry except what we're wearing at the time. Wouldn't that be a trick?

For some reason, since the washer/dryer's been fixed — and it doesn't leak, which hasn't been true for maybe a year — I've been hugely determined to finish off some of the big projects that have been on hold and taking up space not just physically, but emotionally and mentally. So even though I haven't been meeting my weekly CoB goals, well, I think liberating physical space and emotional and mental energy is a worthy trade-off for a few weeks of slackerdom. No?

Socks on the beach & crochet of various frilliness

2011-04-23T15:33:00.000-04:00

Oh, the puns. But here they are: the aforementioned socks on the beach, because yes, I have made it to the beach twice this spring already. TAKE THAT, evil procrastination monster!

Sadly, one of these socks (the one in the background) will be ripped out and reknit. Right now it's still attached to the same ball as the current, larger sock because, well, it amuses me to have two socks coming off one ball of yarn, and because you never know — I might suddenly be seized by the need to compare the old, too-small sock with the new sock, which I won't be able to do if I rip out the old one. Besides, I don't need the yarn from it until I finish the first sock. ;D

By the way: Socks apparently go faster if you knit at a larger gauge. And I don't mean they go faster because the knitting is looser and each row covers more area than it does at a tighter gauge — I mean that the same number of beaded lace chart repeats goes faster at a larger gauge. Or maybe that's just me...?

My crocheted Tulip Doily is now finished, too, except for the weaving in of tails and the blocking, which leaves me in need of another crochet project. (I've discovered that crochet is waaaaay easier than knitting when it comes to putting it down in the middle of a row and coming back to it in bits and pieces as I have time. So having a crochet project sitting out all the time is a nice way of feeling like I'm always making progress on something ... and also, if I keep crocheting, then I can't forget how to do it again. ;))

Oooooh, doily-y. I've never really thought of myself as a doily person, but this one reminded me of a mandala, and it may have given me doily fever. The first mate says I should make a bunch of these and join them together to make a privacy curtain for the front porch, and if he can find something in the homeowner's association agreement that says we're allowed to have curtains on the porch (or at least, that curtains aren't disallowed), I just might. ;D

But while I'm waiting for him to produce convincing paperwork, I need another crochet project. Suggestions, anyone? Something springy and not too frumpy (says the chick who just made a doily)? Maybe I could crochet a bikini to wear while I knit on the beach. But I fear I may have to create my own super-awesome bikini pattern if I do that, and I'm not sure I'm that confident in my crocheting skills yet...

Oh, well. Gotta go put a toe on that sock now, and finish dyeing some fiber. I need to do some finishing of various projects this month or there will be Grumping in my future.

...and yeah, I know I didn't do a Craft or Bust check-in last week. Crossing my fingers for tomorrow. ;)

Rotary cutters, baking, and the beach

2011-04-15T16:54:00.000-04:00

What happens when you have some hoarded gift cards from Christmas and your birthday, and there's a sale at Jo-Ann of something you've been thinking about getting for years, that you've suddenly had new ideas about how to use?

Well, I end up buying rotary cutters and a cutting mat, is what happens to me. I even got the mat in one of my favorite colors; I was walking away from the scissors section and turned around for one last glance, and saw this one hanging on the display on the side of the aisle:

It's even recyclable. :D Not that I intend on getting rid of it any time soon, but if I have to have plastic objects in the house, it's nice when they're recyclable. Then I have the option of trying to upcycle them myself or of sending them off so someone else can turn them into something. Options are good. ;D

And look, the other side of the mat has cute birdies on it!

In other news, I baked my first loquat pie yesterday — I failed to take a photo of the loquats while they were still on the branch, but they came from a tree that's been growing in my parents' yard for I think longer than I've been alive. When I was a kid I contrived to only eat the fruits when they were in the tangy not-ripe stage, so I've been laboring under the misconception for most of my life that the fruits are not sweet at all. Yeah, I was so wrong. These were sweet enough that I barely put any sugar into the pie.

PIE!

But I burned the crust a bit because yesterday was a Day of Incompetence. (Good thing I didn't try to make loquat jam, which was what I was thinking of doing when I clipped the loquats off the tree. Incompetence plus first-time jam-making would probably have equaled suck.) Maybe also because I've never used white whole wheat flour before, at least not that I can remember, and it doesn't seem to be exactly like all-purpose flour (why would it be? Since it's, like ... a different thing and all ;)). I was even a good girl and used up the leftover cinnamon sugar topping from some French breakfast puffs I baked earlier this week, by throwing it in with the loquats.

The aforementioned French breakfast puffs.
By the way, with the above photo, I now have photographic evidence that my baking technique has indeed changed. Generally it seems to have improved (though not consistently, as I have more Days of Incompetence now than I used to). In this case, the change appears to have made these come out out lumpy, like the ones I've seen on other blogs, but unlike the ones I used to make years ago:

See? Smooth as a baby's butt, but, I dare say, sweeter. And crunchier.
...but this is one of those cases where I actually like the way I used to make them better. I wonder what I did differently — did I over-stir the batter?

It's also moderately hilarious that that photo from like 4,000 years ago, taken with my old point-and-shoot, is better than the one taken recently with my DSLR. The lighting in the place I lived in Wisconsin was ridiculously perfect for food photography. Now, if I ever get far enough into cleaning and reorganizing around here, there's a possibly equivalently-perfect location in my current living space. But you know, there's that "getting far enough into cleaning and reorganizing" thing.

While I'm on food photography, would you like to see the fresh local yummy eggs we got while we were doing our last CSA veggie pickup?

I love that they're all different colors. ;D The lady who sold them to us says that the green ones (er, not that any of them look very green in those photos, but I promise some of them are vaguely vaguely green, kind of like if powder blue secretly wanted to be mint green) are supposed to have less cholesterol. Weird, huh?

Oh, and did you know that — supposedly, also according to the egg lady — if you store your eggs in the carton with the pointier side down, it will help keep them fresher? I have no idea whether that's actually true, and we'll probably never find out, since eggs never survive our kitchen longer than about a week and a half (we seriously need our own chickens; if I had a yard it would be done already), but maybe you can test the theory and report back. ;)

To cap off this week, we also made our first spring pilgrimage to the beach. (There, I dumped a knitting book and a Folkwear ethnic clothing book right into the sand just before we left. DOH. I told you incompetence abounds lately. But this photo is not of that.)

Last year we utterly failed to go to the beach at all during the summer. It isn't summer yet, but I have hopes that if we train ourselves to go to the beach regularly this spring (I mean, we have a beach right there not ten minutes away, albeit a small and rather rocky one), we'll get stuck in the habit and mindlessly continue into the summer. Then the first mate will be more brown than pale blue ... though I imagine his face will still be pink. Oh, and I need re-confirmation that his hair is capable of instantaneously turning gold, with, like, one full day in the sun. I swear I saw it do that one day, but it was a few years ago, and I need more evidence to make sure I wasn't hallucinating.

Also, if we go to the beach more, I will again have motivation and reason to build myself a little charkha. It's hard to spin with a drop spindle on the beach (wind and a drop spindle are not great bedfellows), but a charkha seems like it'd be more manageable. That's a good excuse for having a charkha, right? So I can spin cotton yarn on the beach that I can then turn into warm-weather clothes to wear on the beach? ;)

Happy blogiversary to the craft blog!

2011-04-12T15:06:00.000-04:00

I almost forgot: Today is this blog's blogiversary! Last year I did forget, though, so to celebrate my lack of brainlessness, I shall post a photo of my latest Navajo-plied yarn. I spun the singles during last year's Tour de Fleece and *whistles innocently* have been a terrible slacker about getting back to plying it. But one bobbin is done, and I have one more bobbin to go. (Not making any bets on how long it's going to take me to get to it, though.)

I love how it looks all round and squishy (and how it is all round and squishy, too ;)), like all the pictures of awesome hand-dyed sock yarn I see on Etsy:

Okay, maybe I'll share two pictures of squishy Merino yarn. ;)

And heck ... you know what? Through the end of the day I'll offer free shipping on anything in my Etsy shop. Just enter the coupon code BLOGGY when you check out. :D

Woohoo!

Craft or Bust weekly: getting back on track & springtime growth

2011-04-10T18:21:00.000-04:00

It's not always easy un-derailing yourself, is it? But I wrote again this week — less than I have been, but the amount isn't what counts. ;) 381 words is better than none.

And I also crafted: mostly on old UFOs that seriously need finishing, Once and For All, but I've also been researching textiles and ethnic clothing and knitted lace. Oh, and I've done a lot more baking — since I've discovered how easy biscuits are, we've been kind of addicted. ;D

The mood to get back on track is kind of in everything right now — Sunday I rewrote a old pattern for personal use, so I can finally finish a charitable project that's been stalled because I seriously couldn't make heads or tails of the pattern; Thursday and Friday I worked on the crocheted Tulip Doily I started not too long ago (by my current UFO standards ;)), finally plied TWO different yarns that have been waiting on it (and both of them were three-plies ... guess I'm going through a phase), reswatched for the above charity project, finished the hairpin lace project and the rough draft of the pattern that I've been working on, restarted a sock-knitting project in which I had lamentable gauge issues, and finally restarted knitting the TwitKAL shawl that I started last year.

So yeah, you could say that getting back on track despite the crap is my theme so far for this month — this year, even. Sure, crappy nonsense keeps interfering (and I swear it isn't minuscule crappy nonsense, either ;)), and it throws me off my stride for a bit after it happens ... but it's time to stop letting it beat me down.

Must. Get. Old projects out of the way!

Must make room for new awesome projects.

Because I'm bursting at the seams with good ideas that need more time and space in which to develop. It's spring indoors as well as out, I guess: and all the new sprouts (figurative and literal) need ample fertile ground and good care and feeding so they can grow and flourish.

Must. Grow!

Sure, and it's springtime. Anyone else out there growing with me? ;D

(Want to know more about Craft or Bust? Check out the tab at the top, or go here to read about it.)

Craft or Bust weekly: attack of the craziness! & forgiveness of self

2011-04-04T17:03:00.000-04:00

This post is a day late. You could say it's a dollar short, too — I didn't reach my CoB goal last week. Nope — didn't write at all. The most important thing I think I can do with that is to be compassionate and understanding toward myself: I didn't reach the goal, but it wasn't out of laziness or disrespect of the goal. It was because goshdarnit, there's a lot of craptasticness floating around right now, and my thoughts and energy have been taken up with those things. (It seems to be going around, a little bit, as the lovely Sarah Marie Lacy wrote about something similar on her blog not too long ago.)

I did craft this past week, though, which is something. There's proof that I didn't do nothing worth talking about last week — so this week I'll do an old-style check-in with all the crafty things I did last week. Because you know what? Things won't always go exactly as I plan, but if I do something worth doing, then my time wasn't wholly wasted.

So, this week...

On Sunday, I made griddle scones, a hairpin lace strip for a pattern I'm working on, a new fork-style shawl pin, a spiral charm pin, and a heart charm pin, and I wrapped a beaded shawl pin. Monday, I made cream scones. Tuesday, I didn't do any crafting, but I did some crafty research. Wednesday, I phtographed the shawl and charm pins from Sunday, took some photos of yarn, did some more research, listed the pins in the shop, joined two hairpin lace strips for the pattern, and made some mini notecards using the yarn photos I took. Thursday, I made some more griddle scones, rewrote part of a knitting pattern I need to use for a charity project (because it really wasn't making sense to me the way it was written ;)), and spun a skein of pink BFL yarn for plying, for a custom order. Friday, I photographed all the yarn plies for the custom order. And Saturday, I made cream biscuits.

So there it is! What'd you do this past week that was definitely worth doing, whether or not you met your goals?

(This post is part of Craft or Bust, a weekly creative endurance challenge with a sense of compassion and fun. Check the Craft or Bust tab at the top of the blog, or read more about it here.)

Craft or Bust weekly: keep on keeping on (& decluttering to free creative energy)

2011-03-27T08:45:00.001-04:00

The word count rises apace! Well, okay: not quite apace, but it does rise, anyway. ;) 658 words written this week. So far the word count is going up an average of ~~160~~ 123* words a session — and I've been thinking more and more frequently of writing in between the necessary "oops, gotta absolutely do this to meet my CoB goal" sessions, which pretty much follows the pattern of last year's Craft or Bust project. The more weeks I met my easy minimum, the more I felt capable of exceeding the minimum; and then I did exceed it regularly and by far. Cross fingers that it works that way this year, too — though I'm not even going to whisper in the back of my mind the words "finished" and "novel" consecutively right now, lest I break the fragile confidence that's trying to build. ;)

Anyway, since I've been thinking more about writing, I've also been thinking about why, if I'm thinking about it, I'm not doing it. And the answer came easily this time: I have unfinished business. I'm like a ghost who can't move on, who stays hanging about places where I should have been done long ago.

Believe me, I can put up with some amount of loose ends, for quite some time — but the thickness of loose ends cluttering up my brain is hugely greater than the amount of loose ends floating around my yarn stash. (Har har.) I've been collecting loose ends longer than yarn, after all. I have a staggering amount of loose-endage; no shock that it makes it hard to move, much less move on. But the way through, I know now, is slowly and step by step, like through quicksand.

So I'm stepping and stepping and stepping.

What about you? Taken any steps toward your creative goals lately? :D Please do share — having company on my slow journey makes it seem less lame. ;)

*Average word count increase revised to include the first week I wrote for CoB 2011 ... which I totally forgot to include because it was on a different project than I'm currently writing on. Doh.

(This post is part of Craft or Bust, a weekly creative endurance challenge with a sense of compassion and fun. Check the Craft or Bust tab at the top of the blog, or read more about it here.)

Free knitting pattern: Heel Flap Scarf

2011-03-22T17:32:00.000-04:00

I've been working on it since November, but it's finally out — my Heel Flap Scarf pattern! Woohoo! It's freeeeee, and it's a nice quick knit that you can make using pretty much any yarn, to make any size scarf you like. Just watch out: it curls, so you'll probably want to choose a protein fiber yarn that will let you block out some of the curly curling. ;)

Check out the pattern page on Ravelry, or go right ahead and download the pattern by clicking here.

I'd love to hear what you think of the design and the pattern, and of course if you knit it I'd love to see pictures, so come back and share! :D

Craft or Bust weekly: the importance of stories

2011-03-20T17:52:00.000-04:00

Today is World Storytelling Day. Since my Craft or Bust goal this year is about writing stories, you might have guessed storytelling is important to me.

When I was younger, I saw the stories in everything. Not only imagined stories based on "What if?" but also true stories that started with "I know why." Everything has a story — has multiple stories; every moment is part of a story.

Some people told me that to think this way is a sign that I couldn't distinguish between reality and fiction; I knew they were wrong, and that telling and listening to stories sharpened my ability to see both truth and fiction for what they are — including truths that people don't want to see and fictions that people believe are true.

But then I lost the thread of my own story because I started listening to the stories other people imagined for me. Little by little I forgot that a story doesn't have to make sense to anyone to be true; and I forgot that a story that convinces everyone is not necessarily a good story, especially for the characters. I forgot that stories speak most to those who need them most — that the goal is not to make sure all people understand, but to allow the right people to understand.

I am now, little by little, reawakening to my own story. This is part of why my goal for CoB this year is to write: I need back my ability to see stories, to feel them, to craft them — and to live my own story truthfully and centeredly and consciously.

It isn't easy to relearn something forgotten when one has also forgotten oneself. At least, it's not easy for me. Progress is still slow ... but progress is progress. And I wrote 482 words today. Still not above the "wimpy" threshold, but more than last week. So yes: it's still progress.

Oh, and happy equinox, too, whether yours is vernal or autumnal. I'd love to hear your stories, true or false, new or old, good or bad — so leave me a comment if you have something to say. :D

(This post is part of Craft or Bust, a weekly creative endurance challenge with a sense of compassion and fun. For more info, check the Craft or Bust tab at the top of the blog, or go here and do a little light reading.)

On creativity as an anti-negative force; and just a little bit (of tawashi)

2011-03-14T21:44:00.000-04:00

In an example of using craft as therapy, lately I've been using quick, instant gratification projects like emotional salve. Things have been stressful for the past few days (or more, depending on where you want to count from) — in a Murphy's Law, "Why am I even bothering?" sort of way.

I found myself in the contradictory position of wanting to craft to counteract the destructive powers of all the negative feelings flying around here, but knowing that if I work on anything complex, or anything that requires a fair amount of thinking or paying attention, I'm likely to create more mess — more destruction.

So rather than jump into anything and mess it up, I sat for a while and thought about why I was thinking of crafting to counteract the crappiness. And it occurred to me that while I think of (fruitless) negativity as destructive, crafting is creative — not just in the sense of "imaginative," but in the literal sense: It focuses on creating something rather than destroying something (even if technically some "destruction" is kind of necessary for creation ;)).

Once I realized that, it seemed kind of stupidly obvious, that of course people naturally turn to crafting — or to any creative pursuit — when suffering from an overabundance of negative feelings. Duhhh. ;)

So anyway, my solution to being stuck in a universe governed by Murphy's Law was these little crocheted tawashi — basically, dish scrubbies:

The back:

And one that reminds me of a sea urchin:

They're made with old acrylic yarn that refuses to leave my stash because even though I hate knitting with acrylic, there's some sentimental value attached to this yarn — it was pretty much the first yarn I bought (yes, I fell prey to the bizarrely common idea that the best thing to start beginners with is potentially squeaky, unforgiving acrylic yarn) and I have it in a wide array of colors that I really still love. That is, it's refused to leave the stash until now. Now I can expand my crochet skills and make a bunch of scrubby things!

Of course, I'm a bit iffy about the idea of scrubbing dishes I'm going to eat off of with probably non-food-safe plastic (and I don't particularly want to put more synthetic chemicals into the water supply). Then I started wondering: What the crap is the green side of a standard scrub sponge made of, anyway? Are my acrylic scrubbies better or worse than the mysterious green scrubby side of the sponge?

Ultimately I'd like to make scrubbies out of yarn that's both scrub-friendly (i.e., not overly smooth) and natural — hemp and nettle come to mind. And then I'll be left with this darn acrylic yarn again, waiting for some other non-frustration-inducing application.

Anyway, at the very least, my little acrylic tawashi helped me fight the destructive negativity monster. And hey, that's pretty good for cheap acrylic yarn from 10+ years ago.

Craft or Bust weekly: doing a little bit more (and: who won the giveaway)

2011-03-13T17:52:00.000-04:00

First off, a little announcement: If you entered the giveaway for a mini shawl pin and a hand-sewn pouch, the winner is ... Silvina Leonnetti! ;D Woohoo! Congrats to her!

Now, on to Craft or Bust. ;D

This week I wrote 320 words of fiction — that's 31 more words than last week, and on a novel project I haven't touched since last year, since before the Debacle (though I didn't realize it had been that long until I looked at my writing log for that project). Last week's writing was also on a random writing prompt, not on an in-progress piece of long-form fiction.

So even though it's still a small number of words written, I did a little more this week than I did last week, and on something a little more personally important. I'd say that's an improvement that counts — more signs of good progress, no matter how small.

Did you make progress on your creative goals this week, even just a tiny bit? Did you work more or less this week on your crafty goals, and how are you feeling about them? I want to hear about how you're doing, so leave me a comment if you feel like sharing. :D

(This post is part of Craft or Bust, a weekly creative endurance challenge with a sense of compassion and fun. Find more info on the Craft or Bust tab at the top of the blog, or just click here.)

Crocheted flower, Blings, and a pair of mystery scissors

2011-03-08T15:28:00.000-05:00

Still scratching the crochet bug's bite here. I made a double-layer crocheted flower the other day — my first ever! ;D (Instructions from The Ultimate Sourcebook of Knitting and Crochet Stitches.)

And I've started a Lily Go Tulip Doily that should be done fairly soon. The crochet hooks and yarn are getting rapidly smaller and smaller around here. Guess I just had to take years off crocheting and work on knitting to be able to understand crochet — ha. ;)

Also still working verrrrry slowwwwwly on the Bling socks.

And while organizing sewing supplies the other day, I came across this pair of scissors, inherited along with a bunch of other sewing supplies from the first mate's grandmother:

Anyone know what they're for? They look awfully familiar, but I don't seem to remember ever owning a pair of scissors like this before now, so I'm not precisely sure what to do with them. They do look like they were designed for something pretty specific. ;)

Craft or Bust weekly: taking small steps

2011-03-06T21:39:00.000-05:00

289 words. That's what I managed to write today — but it counts. It counts toward my Craft or Bust 2011 goal of writing a piece of fiction every week.

That sounds to me like a wimpy amount compared to how I used to be — but as I said last year with my "wimpy" sounding goal of crafting just one time every week, it's a vast improvement on nothing, which is what I've been doing for a while. So it's a step in the right direction, and that's all I ask of myself, because right now, treating myself with compassion and understanding works better than treating myself like a mean old boss. All I ask of me right now is a step, and then another, and then another — one step every week, and more than that if I feel like it. Which I very likely will once I get my balance again. :D

So what about you? Did you take any steps this week toward a goal you've been putting off? Did you do anything that was hard for you? Did you work on any crafty goals that gave you a sense of accomplishment?

Tell me about what you did this week that nurtures your creativity, and let's celebrate little steps together. ;D

(If you didn't know already, Craft or Bust is a weekly creative endurance challenge with a sense of compassion and fun. Find more info on the Craft or Bust tab at the top of the blog, or just click here for this year's relaunch post.)

A quickie giveaway: Win a mini shawl pin + Eleven Hills hand-sewn pouch!

2011-03-06T18:42:00.000-05:00

It's time for another giveaway! Woohoo! ;D

This one's a quick one, compared to my usual: The deadline is Sunday, March 13 at 5 p.m. Eastern time — or rather, that's when we'll be doing the drawing for the winner, so get your entries in before then.

I'm happy to announce this is my first joint giveaway, with the lovely Agnes of Eleven Hills! Yayyy! One winner will receive a lovely hand-sewn sun, moon and stars pouch from Eleven Hills, and one star-shaped handmade copper miniature shawl pin from Star & Crossbones. Here they are, in all their celestial goodness:

A close-up of the star charm pin (a.k.a. the miniature shawl pin):

And the front and back of the pouch:

How to enter the giveaway:

Visit both the Star and Crossbones Etsy shop and the Eleven Hills Etsy shop and pick a favorite item from each shop — then post your picks in the comments on this blog post for one entry!
You can also enter by posting your picks as a comment on the giveaway announcement here on the Eleven Hills Facebook page.
And you get extra entries for posting about the giveaway on Facebook or on Twitter. Just post a comment on this blog post saying you tweeted or posted on Facebook. :)
Don't forget to leave contact information with each entry so we know how to reach you if you win. :D

Remember, the drawing for the winner will happen at 5 p.m. Eastern time on Sunday, March 13!

And feel free to share this with your friends ... Maybe you can split the winnings if one of you wins! ;)

Craft or Bust Redux: Now in even less formal flavor

2011-03-05T00:11:00.000-05:00

Craft or Bust 2011: BUST!

Until now. Rarrrr! I re-declare Craft or Bust season open. (I was waiting to get used to the Year of the Metal Rabbit, or until spring sprang, or something. Yeah. Sure. That's it. ;))

Anyway, here's the deal: Rather than be a slacker any longer — because that is Against the spirit of Craft or Bust! — I hereby declare that CoB check-ins from here on out are open to anyone who wants to check in. No sign-ups necessary (but if you want to sign up, you can do it on this post, how about that?). And I hereby declare that my personal 2011 CoB goal is to write a piece of fiction every week.

If you're new to the Craft or Bust thing, here are the official rules from last year, and I will excerpt the most relevant part:

The Craft or Bust Project is a weekly creative endurance challenge. The rules are simple:

1. Join whenever.
2. Stay as long as you like.
3. Create, check in, be inspired, show off your craftigoodness, feel good.

Any art or craft (with one exception) counts: knitting, sewing, wire wrap jewelry, mail art, writing ... Heck, if there are creative bakers, gardeners, or sky-writers out there who want to play along, join up! If you have something creative you'd like to do every week, I'd be happy to have you. :D

You can work on any art/craft projects you want. You can work on a different one each week, or the same one the entire way. The heart of this challenge is to learn to craft regularly; finishing stuff is icing on the cake (and a fairly likely side effect even without trying too hard, I think).

The exception to "any craft counts" is blogging, by itself. While blogging can be a creative act, my intent is not to turn the weekly update into a list of who posted what to their blogs. ;)

You can find more info on CoB 2010 on the relevant tab at the top of the blog, if you so desire. ;D

Starting this coming Sunday (March 6) I will be checking in once a week with my own progress. If you want to play, come and tell me about your progress on my check-in post. The next Sunday, I'll mention you in my weekly post.

If you want to be kinda formal about it and sign up somewhere, you can do it using this form. (You may be able to avoid checking anything at all for the "What kind of stuff do you want to hear about?" question, though I haven't tried it.)

Other than that, if you want to play, please please please do join the Flickr pool and add photos (I am Seriously Not Amused by having to stare at my own crap there all the time ;)), and you can leave your name, a relevant Web link, and your CoB 2011 goals in the comments on this post, if you want.

Sound good? :D

New shawl pins in the shop!

2011-03-02T11:32:00.001-05:00

Did you see? I finally listed some new shawl pins in the Etsy shop! Yayyyyy!

I really wanted to share pics with you guys earlier — not so much because of the pins themselves, but because the new camera takes photos that are So. Much. Better. than the ones I have of all my previous shawl pins. OMGcameralove. I mean, look:

Anyway, go check the new shawl pins out, if you like, and let me know what you think. The new designs are refinements of past one-of-a-kind designs, so they may look familiar ... but what's neat about these is they're part of a permanent line of shawl pins that will stay in the shop and be made fresh with every order. Do you like? ;D I know I like.

There are more shawl pin ideas bubbling in my brain, too — and a new shawl-pin-related giveaway is coming up Very Soon, hint hint. Keep watching, 'cause it's going to happen in the next couple of weeks, and it'll be a quicker one than my normal month-long giveaways, with extra goodies, too!

A little bit of art on the sewing table

2011-02-28T21:45:00.000-05:00

My little sewing table is in use again as something other than a photography surface (which it has served as admirably, being the only flat white surface in the house before I finally got my jewelry-making cutting boards out of storage): Today I worked on some ATCs. That's artist trading cards, for anyone who didn't know — now you do. Hopefully I'll be making more of them in the coming months so no one will be able to forget. ;)

The ATCs in question are actually for a fiber arts art group, so it seemed natural to make them on the sewing table. Plus, I have a chair that's the right height for the sewing table, and if I'd tried to use the crafting table I mentioned in the last post as having been cleaned off, I'd have had to stand. We can't have that! Well, maybe when the area under it is organized enough to be interesting instead of tiresome. For today, the sewing desk was happy to be used again for actual craft work.

The theme for this ATC swap is "lost and found," which translates to: Use found objects on your cards. I ended up using old yarn scraps, old fabric scraps, and a piece of ribbon saved from some gift packaging. Originally I wanted to make three ATCs, but making art degenerated into fighting with the sewing machine, which is still not quite up to snuff even after I cleaned all the accumulated sewing dust out of it (was that last year?) — so I ended up just making one. I ... need to make more ATCs. I am sadly out of practice. But here's the one that came out fibery enough for me to feel comfortable using it in the swap:

Incidentally, no, I have not yet figured out the correct white balance setting for this particular lighting situation. ;)
The first mate says it looks like a decorated jeans pocket, which I think is appropriate for a fiber-arts-ish ATC. And did you see that I made a tiny little loomy square and wove my green yarn scrap into it? If you want to be nice, that's three fiber arts techniques in one spot: I sewed the gold loom warp threads onto the card (I don't want to call it warping, since I did it with a needle ;)), plied the leftover green cotton thread, and then needle-wove it into the warp. There's also some machine stitching on the rest of the card, which was where I got sadly derailed into fighting with the machine.

Alas, my poor machine. I do love it, and I need to take it in to the shop — maybe the arts and crafts fairies will leave money in my shoe tonight so I can take it to be looked at.

Anyway, I did end up finishing the other two ATCS as non-fibery-themed ones. Someday I may feel brave enough to offer them up for trade. Anyone else out there do mail art? :D

A craft room clean for spring seems like a wondrous thing

2011-02-27T08:23:00.000-05:00

So. I have not been crafting up a storm since my last update, but I have been decluttering the crap out of the craft room. I've never noticed that I have much of an internal clock for spring cleaning, but I guess it was time, and goshdarn if it doesn't feel something like spring here, so maybe my internal clock just took a really, really long time to set itself properly. Or maybe this is a coincidence.

And ha — "it was time," I say. Considering that I tried to tackle the Craft Room Rescue project in May of last year, maybe it's long past time.

See, I shared a teeny weeny photo of a shelf last year. That was all I was brave enough to share — the secret horrors of the rest of the craft room will remain known only to those of us who lived through it. ;)

About a day after my last blog post (or maybe that same day; I can't remember now), I got it into my head to crochet something. I can't remember what now, because instead, I ended up literally cleaning and reorganizing that entire bookcase.

Perversely, it looks just as cluttered now as it did last year. See?

Though this shelf doesn't look so bad — and all the pretty colors lined up so neatly inspired me to keep organizing:

The important difference between this bookcase last year and this bookcase Right Now is that it (and a small space on the floor in front of it) now holds all of my non-handspun yarn, and it is sorted by fiber type and weight, with an entire shelf just for projects in progress. There are no longer stray irons, knitting looms, or arbitrary plastic bags haunting said shelf. Last year there were just a bunch of disorganized bags full of assorted bits and scraps of projects and balls of yarn and notions and who knows what shoved onto all the shelves just to keep stuff off the floor. Then the floor got taken over by boxes and piles of fabric and such anyway.

Now, I can see the floor.

And that's only the beginning. In the past week and a half or so, I've also pretty much organized all my fiber tools, cleaned off my craft table so there's actual space on it (...a little...), and done a pretty thorough inventory of the slightly horrifying amount of raw fleece and random wool I have sitting and waiting for me to spin it.

I even excavated (and that is a technical term! ;)) my long-suffering serger from the double-decker fabric sandwich in which it has been waiting patiently (in its original box) all these ... mumblemumble — let's just say it's been a while since I tried to watch the video and it got stuck in the VCR, leaving me clueless about exactly where to start with this tiny-seeming sewing-machine-type-thing with teeth and multiple spools of thread. Lest you think it's been in hiding for even longer than it has, though, I'll say this much: The VHS format was absolutely not in vogue when I got the serger. I would have much preferred a DVD ... not least because it wouldn't have gotten stuck in the crappy VHS/TV combo I tried to watch it on, and then I might have actually used the thing right away. ;)

Anyway, being able to actually see the serger box suddenly made me want to peek at it. Upon opening the box, these thoughts passed rapidly through my mind: 1) Wow. It's a lot smaller than I thought it was. 2) Holy crap this thing is much heavier than it looks. 3) Why does the inside of this box smell like wool?

Bearing item #1 in mind, after wiping off the strange thin layer of woolly-smelling dust from the serger, I installed it happily on my vintage Singer sewing machine/table.

It seems to make more sense to have it taking up less space in a vaguely usable position than to have it inside a space-hogging box between a stack of thrift store fabric and a pile of clothing that needs various modifications. I haven't dared to plug it in or turn it on yet, much less applied foot to pedal, but maybe when no one is looking, I'll sneak in there and see whether it'll stitch for me. As long as no one watches me too closely — a watched crafter never serges, or something like that.

Besides, now there's fabric on the floor and — again, if nobody looks at me too hard or expects too much ;) — having the serger and the sewing machine both patiently waiting for me in plain sight may prompt me to spontaneously sit down and turn fabric into objects shaped like things that would be useful outside of a pile. There are tons of things in this little condo that would improve with judicious application of textiles ... and I've just realized that the massive amounts of questionable-for-spinning wool I have might make good pillow stuffing. Which means I need to make some pillow forms to stuff.

Just go ahead and have a cup of tea and read a book and pretend you're not watching me for a moment, will you? Of course I'll take pictures of any sneaky craft attacks that happen, I promise. I just don't want to frighten away my delicate, re-budding seamstress self, so I have to go quietly and carefully for a little bit. ;)

A fancy shawl, a simple headband, a wee heart and some epic socks

2011-02-17T16:53:00.002-05:00

Time for another crafty photo update, me hearties. ;D

Finished: Hairpin Lace Shawl
Pattern: Woman's Hairpin Lace Shawl from Coats & Clark

So I finally! Finished! My first hairpin lace shawl! As UFOs go, this one wasn't too bad — less than a year old when I finished it off. Ha. ;D And it also conveniently illustrates the fact that with a camera that I can actually change stuff on (you know, like the aperture! And the shutter speed!), I can finally take photos of my projects draped on random other stuff. (I can also fail to remember to take the cluttery porch crap out of the first few photos I take, and then end up liking one of the early photos.)

Finishing this shawl made me want to go crochet other stuff — but most of the hairpin lace projects out there that I want to make involve paying for patterns, and right now I don't have any spare pattern money ... sniffle. I may be forced to design my own hairpin lace something-or-other just to get a fix.

Finished: Three-String Headband
Pattern: Simple Crochet Headband from Creativeyarn

If I want to design my own hairpin lace, though, it'd probably be useful to actually kind of know how to crochet. (Since hairpin lace is a kind of crochet and all. Yeah, yeah. You know it already, right? ;)) So I'm sloooooowly re-teaching myself to crochet by doing easy things, instead of jumping straight to hard things I don't understand that will confuse me and turn into UFOs sitting on the mountainous pile of temporarily abandoned projects. Here's one of the easy things in question (and look! I can take pictures of my own head with the new camera! ::hugs camera::).

Finished: Heart Coaster
Pattern: Heart Sachet from Lily/Sugar'n Cream

One of the things I loved about crochet when I first started doing it is that it's fast. And it's pretty easy to make cute shapes if you actually understand what you're doing (which I didn't then and kinda-sorta do now — a few years of knitting seems to have helped out with my understanding of things like increases and decreases ;)). So having no money + needing a Valentine's Day gift for B = crochet to the rescue! Voila, crocheted heart coaster!

In Progress: Epic Socks
Pattern: "Bling (Arkansas)" by Adrienne Fong, originally published in 50 Socks (50 States & More)

And I finally cast on the second pair of socks I'm knitting as a trade for yarn — officially the pattern is called "Bling," but I'm calling them the Epic Socks because of a comment someone made about how they sound. ;) They're lace and beaded, and can I tell you a secret? Shh — I've never beaded lace before. In fact, I can't remember beading my knitting before ... at least not successfully. Unsuccessfully, sure; I have a bunch of yarn and beads sitting in a basket in the craft room that were meant to turn into a beaded shawl. But both the lace and the beading on these socks are turning out to be way easier than I expected. Is my knitting mojo high this month, or was that just a contrast to the fact that it took me almost three hours to knit the hemmed beaded cuff? Yeah, that's the thing in the photo right here. Three hours, 'cause it's folded in half and knitted to itself with multiple sets of double-pointy objects that had to interact with each other in friendly ways.

So there it is. That's what I've been doing lately. Let's pretend this is a Craft or Bust update and you guys can tell me what you've been making now, too — right? Right??? Talk to me already! ;)

Pics: Crafty Projects I Have (Very Recently) Known

2011-02-10T17:45:00.001-05:00

Because I keep sitting down to write blog posts and they keep turning into massively epic expositions on human nature and my experiences as a human being, and then I keep going back to edit them and turning them into almost completely different expository epics, and it has thus far been an endless cycle that's kept me from posting anything here, today I am Buckling Down and just posting some photos of crafts I've been doing. HA! You now have proof that I exist! Feel free to report the discovery to the local newspapers. ;)

So, ahem, to get to that crafty stuff...

Finished: ChiChi Tea Towel
Pattern from Yarnplay at Home by Lisa Shobhana Mason

I finally found the crochet hook that I needed to finish the edging on the ChiChi tea towel, so I went ahead and finished it. Yay!

And here's another photo of the full towel. Please excuse the fact that I kinda sorta made the photo obscenely bright when I was tinkering around with it in Photoshop, and also the fact that I am Too Lazy (or maybe Too Impatient) to go back and fix it right now. Or maybe ever. (I got a new camera for my birthday, and this was taken with the new camera in iffy lighting on a not-quite-white background. Too many variables = wonky photo adjustment. I'll get better, I promise. On future photos. ;))

Finished: Crocheted Organizer Basket
Pattern: Stash Baskets from Bernat (You need to have a free account to see the pattern, by the way.)

Apparently finishing the tea towel put me in a crocheting mood — and why not? I went through a crocheting period right before I started knitting regularly, even if I gave up crocheting for the most part because I couldn't figure out how it Really Worked. ;) I am also in dire need of storage solutions uniformly across the house. So I crocheted an easy little basket to help me organize the bathroom, and — wonder of wonders — to match the tea towel. (Matching bathroom decor may not be miraculous to you, but I don't think I've ever owned two towels that matched each other, much less owned bathroom accessories that match. It's, er, my eclectic style, right?)

One ball of the cream-colored yarn didn't manage to be enough to finish the sides of the basket, so my basket has a racing stripe. (The bottom is also blue.)

In Progress: Brigit Socks
Pattern: Brigit from Monkey Toes (Link leads to a Ravelry page where you can download the pattern.)

I've also made some amount of progress on the first Brigit sock, which happens to be the first full-fledged sock I've ever knit for myself. The other socks I've knit for me have been missing bits: One pair has no toes and the other pair has no toes and no heels (because they're yoga socks).

That's a good way to psych yourself into doing socks, by the way ... Or at least, knitting socks with the scary bits missing made me ridiculously aware that a sock is basically two tubes joined by a fiddly bit, with some decreases at the end of one tube. As the decreases aren't any scarier than the ones in a hat, the only scary bit remaining is the fiddly heel bit, and if you slavishly follow the heel directions in a good sock pattern, even the heel isn't very scary.

See, look! I knit this heel differently from the way the pattern said to and I wasn't scared at all! ;)

In Progress: Hairpin Lace Shawl
Pattern: Woman's Hairpin Lace Shawl from Coats & Clark

Finally, I've picked up this poor old abandoned hairpin lace shawl that I started with some recycled yarn last year for the first HPL-Along on my Ravelry hairpin lace group.

The crochet hook for the tea towel was hiding in the hairpin lace project bag (because hairpin lace is actually a form of crochet, even though I forgot that while I was puzzling over where the Size G hook had gone), and after I borrowed the hook to use for the tea towel, I couldn't just leave the poor shawl alone again. Only one more strip to go ... or maybe two. And then more joining. Uh ... I should stop thinking about that or the shawl might end up in the UFO mountain again. ;)

And ta-da! That's it for the stuff I've been doing that has to do with yarn. I do have about 4,000 photos of food I've made and/or consumed in the past couple of months, though. To post another photo-riffic post, or not ... That is the question. ;)

On the relationship of physical and emotional clutter; and on loving both

2011-01-21T19:27:00.000-05:00

Last year I tried to clean the craft room. It was an abortive attempt.

Does that make the craft room sound like a hopeless wreck? (Are you thinking, Holy cow, she didn't clean it at all last year?)

Hold those horses! ;) It's not exactly a hopeless wreck, and I didn't not-clean it at all last year. I did have a few spastic bouts of rearranging and occasional miniature spasms of actual cleaning. Realistically, though, I didn't get much organization done, and, okay ... it is kind of a wreck. But I promise it's far too lame of a wreck to show up on a reality TV show about messes or hoarding. ;)

Last year I also bought myself a tiny little copy of the Love That Room clutter-clearing workshop from Lisa at Zen at Play. I made it about as far into the workshop as I made it into "fixing" the craft room: not terribly far.

(By the way, the above link to Zen at Play is an affiliate link, just in case you love Lisa's philosophy so much you feel compelled to buy her current offering ... but Love That Room doesn't appear to be available any more. So feel safe in the knowledge that this isn't a sales pitch. ;) Moving on...)

My failure to organize the craft room probably meant I wasn't ready. Ready for what? Frankly, for a lot, and I'll talk about that in a bit, because maybe I'm ready now, or getting close to it. I hope so, because I'm going to try again to clean the craft room this year. Decluttering in an honest and non-judgemental way seems to go hand in hand with casting off the negative self-bindings that were keeping me from truly expressing myself, don't you think? One is emotional decluttering, and the other is a physical decluttering ... but they're both related to creativity and safe space and letting myself be me.

And here's a funny thing. I know that's all true. But it's nice to have someone else say it independently of my prompting, which Lisa does in Love That Room. Some of the points she makes on the very first page:

There will be no declaring war, attacking, or whipping into shape. If that worked for me, it would have worked already.

Clutter clearing is an act of self-care: It means creating an environment that supports me and contains space for me to be me, to express what I want to express.

Clutter clearing is letting go of what doesn't serve me any more and making way for what brings me joy. In terms of emotional decluttering, like I mentioned in my last post, I am letting go of self-denial and making room for being honest. I like how she puts it: "You're clearing away everything that obscures your view of what matters most to you." I totally know that my half-abandoned, messy craft room is a direct reflection of my neglected self-expression and the repression of my self.

Another quote I like: "Clutter clearing is a journey of self-discovery because you learn about yourself through the decisions you make, and explore your past, present and future through your possessions. Your history, your hopes, your struggles — they're all expressed through the things around you." So my objective when I organize the craft room isn't just "to have a clean space." It's also to reflect on my identity and my journey, and that helps me feel like I don't have to rush it to get to an end result. Reflection takes time and reflection is an objective of its own; there is no Big Thing at the end of reflection that I need to rush toward.

"Clearing can be an opportunity to practice kindness and mindfulness." I have been very, very neglectful of self-kindness and mindfulness for the past few years. If cleaning the craft room is an opportunity to get better at those things, then it's worth doing for the practice of those things alone.

"Rather than just chucking stuff out, you can be interacting consciously with your physical environment, your belongings, and the stories behind them." This is something I've felt is missing from other approaches to decluttering — the respect for your past decisions to keep these things that have now become clutter and blockage, and the respect for the stories behind the things you have kept.

Tossing things indiscriminately, to me, is like performing surgery without respect for how you affect the bits and pieces around the piece you're taking out, or fixing. Uhh ... I wouldn't do that to my physical body, so why the crap would I do that to my emotional self? Maybe that suits other people out there, but the fact that I can tolerate the pain doesn't mean I should inflict it.

And I know that most of the things I've acquired have emotional value to me. If they didn't, they'd be gone already. Duh. If I just had a problem throwing anything out I'd have every single cereal box I've ever emptied still sitting around the house. Sure, I have some things that some people would consider trash, but they're not — they're things that have at some point had emotional value (an idea Lisa also addressed in a blog post at one point). To treat those things like they have the same value as a piece of junk mail is disrespectful of myself. That's part of why it was so traumatic last year when someone came in and threw out a bunch of my belongings while I was on vacation.

So here's to treating myself, my things, and the stories behind everything with respect. No wonder I haven't been able to write effectively for years. I've been ignoring and devaluing stories left and right. How silly of me. ;)

Wouldn't it be funny if cleaning the craft room made me a better writer again? ;)

One thing it probably will do is bring me closer to being a happy, comfortable, self-aware person again.

So hey! If anyone else out there is trying to declutter their own space and you're thinking along the same lines as I am, feel free to clean along with me and post comments on your own progress! As is pretty obvious from the success of the Craft or Bust project, it does help me to have like-minded people along with me for the journey, even if there's baton-swapping and tagging in and out. ;)

On the loss of self and emotion; or, how honesty, pain and creativity are intrinsically related

2011-01-16T10:33:00.000-05:00

So what do you do when you're so angry you're almost physically incandescent? Or when you're so disappointed, so disgusted by someone's blindness or self-righteousness or selfishness, that you're surprised the feelings aren't transmuting magically into radioactive sludge and oozing out your pores?

Some people do their best to hide their feelings ... even from themselves. Some of them are visible to the naked eye as emotional wrecks and still hide their feelings from themselves — just not from anyone else who bothers paying a wee bit of attention. I've seen cases of this that make me wonder where the stick could be shoved in so far that I can't see it.

I am not a fan of the "hide your emotions because it's more seemly" approach.

I am a fan of honesty — with oneself, at the very minimum. Honesty that isn't just the flip side of self-indulgent, fear-driven silence. I'm fairly against people running rampant at every tiny insult, screaming at length about their enemies and their enemies' ancestors and their enemies' future progeny and the unavoidable end of the world if people like this continue to exist; and by "fairly against," I mean I'm as close to dead-set against that kind of behavior as I can get without becoming a mindless zombie slave to the opinion.

But I'm in favor of honesty with that same intensity. And the most important person to be honest with is yourself. That comes before everything. Because seriously. When people can't be honest with themselves about themselves, chances are good that they have a problem being honest with themselves about large chunks of the rest of reality. And I'm kinda sorta a gigantic fan of that whole "being able to deal with reality" thing. It helps with solving all kinds of problems. ;)

So what do I do when I'm so full of negative emotion that the energy is barely short of perceptible to human senses?

What I do these days is, to be honest (See? I'm being honest with me and you! ;)), pretty much completely crap for me. It is perilously, soul-endangeringly close to the opposite of what I should do. I don't actively try to hide emotions from myself, but frequently, I suppress expressing my emotions to avoid hurting someone by telling them what a completely hurtful git they're being. (Yes. I have people hurt me and then consciously avoid hurting them back even by being straightforwardly honest.) That's a pretty appalling thing to do to myself, and anyone who's known me for longer than five years or so should probably be about as appalled as I am.

Because one of the other things to which I am devoted almost to an obsessive level is truth. And one of the things I used to do was call people out as soon as I noticed their hurtful behavior, if I was face to face with them at the time. And "as soon as I noticed" was really really soon. Because I had a lot of practice paying attention and smacking. That. Crap. Down. Before it could get out of hand.

Obviously people who are determined to be gits really hate it when you do this. But people who don't devote themselves to being assholes (and that's often, though not always, their word for it) are often surprisingly grateful when they finally realize they really were being horribly disrespectful and that you stopped them. Even though I saw it many, many times, it was always a little bit surprising to have people tell me "You weren't rude. It was totally justified, and I'm glad you did it" when I was, uh, yeah, quite arguably being rude. Even if it was justified and for the honorable purpose of making someone stop hurting someone else.

The other thing I did when I encountered something that absolutely incensed me, or depressed me, or wounded me intensely in some way, was that I would write that crap out. If the person who did the dastardly deed was not immediately accessible for me to stop them, I'd open a fresh ClarisWorks (or AppleWorks, those being things that existed on Macs before Microsoft Word for Mac ;)) document and spit out a lightning-fast rant poem. Or an opinion essay. Or a fantasy story. Or a letter (never to be sent) to the person who was acting horrible. Or I would get out the sketchbook and draw pictures of huge, awesome dragons spitting fire at tiny silhouettes that I imagined were the people I hated.

Then the anger (or fear, or depression, or whatever) had a home. It had an expression that treated it with respect.

What the "smack down" approach and the "write/draw it out" approaches have in common is just that: They both treat emotions with respect and recognize them for what they are. What they are is reasonable reactions to reality, not made-up, invalid pieces of mental/emotional trash. By regularly acknowledging my emotions and handling them with respect, I had control over them, rather than them controlling me, or them doing things beyond my control. I could choose how to use them.

Whether or not you agree with how I use(d) my emotions, emotional self-honesty has the same potential for everyone. If you have control of how your emotional energy gets used, then you can have emotions (you know, like, you can be a whole human being), but have them affect you in ways that are in line with your values. If you ignore your emotions, they do things you can't see. If you suppress them, you risk them running around in your heart secretly doing things you don't agree with. Because pretending they aren't there doesn't actually make them go away. It just makes them go underground. Until they burst out like the man-eating scarabs in The Mummy and terrorize random people. ;)

An important thing to explain at this point is what I said earlier about my devotion to truth. I really, really care about the truth. More than I care about being right for my ego's sake. I want to be right so I can deal with the cards that are actually on the table — not to be right for the sake of feeling good or superior. I fully admit that when I first started my campaign to Know Truth, it was largely for the sake of preserving my ego. I hated being wrong. When I was like ten years old. By the time I was thirteen or so, I was pretty much over the ego-driven thing and into the idea that truth is useful because it's useful, not just because it keeps me from being embarrassed.

So by the time I was thirteen, I had spent significant time and energy on making sure I could distinguish truth from illusion. I felt (because I had tested this repeatedly) I could trust my emotions were based on things that really existed. If I thought someone sounded condescending, then I could say exactly why I thought that, which proved it was a sound decision, not a random one. (And I was, and still am, very open to changing my opinion based on new information.)

That doesn't mean my perceptions were always accurate reflections of what was actually going on, of course, and I knew that — but I could trust that I wasn't seeing things in order to feel what I felt. I wasn't feeling something first, then creating a reason out of thin air to justify the feeling. (We all know someone who alters their idea of reality to justify what they feel, and gets all self-righteous about it ... right? Yeah. I hate that. I've hated it since I was thirteen.)

I was very young when I started losing trust in emotion, but learning to trust my judgement and perceptions allowed me to trust my emotions again. (Emotions are part of Self, so really, I'd lost trust in me and then earned it back. Yay. ;)) Even if I mistakenly got upset over something that I didn't quite understand properly, I knew I wasn't merely emotional. I was emotional with reason. I also knew that if my perceptions and understanding were wrong, there was an easy way to stop me from being upset: Giving me information to change my understanding.

This is not the same thing as telling me I'm wrong and expecting me to believe you. Presenting me with factual, reasonable information acknowledges that my initial perception deserves to be treated with respect, as if I might be (OMG! Noway!) a rational but non-omniscient human being with reasons for having emotions, but who merely doesn't have all the information. Basically it's the opposite approach from telling me "You're wrong, your emotions are pointless and if you don't take my word for it that makes you a selfish, irrational, overemotional freak." (What, I should believe you because you're just that much smarter and better than I am? Because you have no emotions and you're never wrong? I should just bow down to your battle aura because you're so cool you don't need to give evidence as to why you're right? Yeah, no.) That's the kind of thing that gets you targeted for a riled-up smackdown.

Soooooooooo. This has to do with crafting because, oddly enough, once I got broken a few years ago (I keep referencing this and not explaining it, don't I? ;)), I stopped being able to write and draw with any real inspiration or emotion. I'd spent so much energy on disrespecting my emotions, had suppressed them for so long, that I lost the heart to give creation life. Now, when I tried to write or draw or make any kind of art, what I created was a pallid glance at a badly-shot black and white photo of life. Technically, my slide out of true creative ability was a long, slow, painful process of losing pieces of myself and my passion, and I fought it as hard as I could...

...short of fixing the real problem. Which was that I was disrespecting my own emotions for the sake of not hurting other people. I was hurting myself to avoid hurting them. That's not only really, seriously unfair, it completely kills your ability to make art that means something to you.

Because art is emotion. Creation is emotion. Any emotion. Good ones, bad ones, whatever. Art and creation aren't about judging your emotions; they're about expressing your emotions, for better or for worse. The better you get at any art, the better you are at expressing what you really mean, what you really feel.

For more than a decade, yes, more than a decade, and that is more than a third of my entire life, I have been slowly destroying my own ability to create. By pretending that my emotions are not important and not valid, and that expressing them is bad.

I am going to stop.

If you are afraid of emotions, I apologize, and I expect you'll probably be leaving, and I wish you well. I also think you should consider exploring ways to stop being afraid of emotions, but really, that's not my business (unless you make it my business ;)). And everyone proceeds at their own pace, and I expect someday you'll understand where I'm coming from.

As for me, I have been the weight on my own wings that has kept me from flying far and fast as I once did. I really, really, really want to fly again, you guys. Not flying is killing me.

And while I used to write and draw out the pain to take that weight off, crafting (almost my sole creative expression for the past five to seven years) has never served that purpose for me. I can't remember ever letting myself "taint" crafting by expressing negative emotions with it. The closest I can remember coming is with sewing costumes; the idea of wearing a "negative" character's costume never bothered me. But most of my costuming happened before I got broken. So maybe there were other things I did back then, that came closer to using craft as emotional expression, but that was a long, long emotional way away, and I don't remember it.

With the crafts I've learned more recently than sewing — knitting, weaving, spinning — I've kept to this inane idea that crafting is sacredly connected to the ideas of hearth, of nourishment, that it should always be positive and wholesome. I've been consciously avoiding ever associating it with negativity, which is probably because when I first starting knitting, I was using it specifically to avoid thinking of the negative situation I was in. That was the first of the fiber arts, sewing aside, that I really learned. Weaving and spinning came after, like offshoots, and inherited the same imagined sacredness, the same rule that it was taboo to be negative through them.

Unconscious habits, anyone? Oy.

It's time to let that one go. It's bad for me. I don't know yet if that means I'm going to cut down on knitting (and maybe the other fiber arts — *cringe*), or if it means I'm going to have to experiment with transforming knitting and the other fibery things I do into an art form that's allowed to express negative feelings without being pathetically self-indulgent or tasteless (and the idea of creating evocative but beautiful fiber arts products has a lot of appeal — that's what I was going for to begin with, starting my little crafty business). What I do know is: Something's gotta give.

To answer my own question again: What do I do when I'm so angry I can almost breathe fire?

I take the clamp off my pointy dragon snout and I point the flames where they can do the most good.

By God, Goddess, the Tao, or Whatever you believe in — pick your Powers That Be — it feels good to be honest again. Even if it means 2,000+ words of blog post at once.

But ten years of feelings takes a long time to write.

In which I, like, babble about yarn, Craft or Bust, gratitude and snow — in video!

2011-01-12T23:02:00.003-05:00

Everyone take a deep breath with me; I ask you for moral support! I'm doing something brave that I have literally never done before, even though I've been on the Internet for oh mumblemumble years. And I've videotaped myself and other things for years (though of late I haven't had a real video camera, just the one in my computer and the one in my phone, which has dampened my enthusiasm somewhat...).

Maybe you can guess by that last sentence that What I've Done is make a video. GASP! Yes. I'm live-ish here on the blog at last.

I give you fair warning that this video was the last one made in several hours of taping and it is unedited (except to take out the two seconds of me holding up a piece of paper as a pseudo-clapperboard — meaning to visually mark the beginning of the video clip). I also say "like" a lot, which bothers me, largely because I took acting classes in high school (and I did actually go back and start to count the number of "likes," but I stopped once I got to a number I forbid myself to think about because it will irk me seriously ;)), but also because I promise I do not say "like" that much in person (though I do say it a fair amount — it's fair!), and because it seems to be the most "like"-ful video I recorded today. HMPH.

But while the earlier videos were less full of "like," they were also more full of tangent. That will probably be hard to believe when you watch the video, but believe it. Someday I will post a video that is not the final one in a long series, and you will see ... oh, yes, you will see! Besides, you should be used to my tangents my by now. Right?

Next time I will consider writing an outline for myself and going off that so I don't repeat myself so much, too. I hope it at least entertains you.

Without further ado, here it is. My video debut on the Internet — may it not come back to bite me. ;D

Edited to add: Duhhhh. I forgot to actually link you guys to the mailing list I keep talking about at the end. Maybe recording four hours of video eats your brain. Here's the link to the mailing list sign-up for Craft or Bust. Go forth and craaaaaaaft!

Edited again to add: And here are the links to Velma's blog (on which she has not indeed posted in a while, but you can always leave her comments begging for her to come back), and to her shop on Etsy. Ta-da!

Baking binge of dooooom! (and the best pie crust recipe ever)

2011-01-08T20:34:00.000-05:00

The baking bug bit yesterday. The final tally: two loaves of bread, a blueberry pie, four cookies, two pastries and a kitchen strewn with bowls, spoons, baking pans and cookie sheets. Oh, yeah, and two happy crafty pirates. Let's start with the two loaves:

If you read along with my captions on Flickr, you'll know that I got a copy of the book The Bread Baker's Apprentice for Christmas (and I love its scholarly obsessiveness; now, if only I could find an equivalent book for making Asian-style noodles, or pasta in general...). This bread is emphatically not made using the formulas in that book. I started to browse it yesterday and quickly realized I would get sucked into trying to absorb all the important but technically-not-essential-for-making-edible-bread details if I attempted to use it for immediate baking purposes. So rather than fail to make bread because I was too busy reading about bread, I basically glanced at the recipes on the back of the flour package and kinda-sorta-but-not-really followed them/made something up.

The result was a little flat, but it's definitely better than not getting to eat bread that night. ;)

And now I have an admission, and a rather reluctant one, but I share it with you for the sake of all those out there who have done what I did: I made pie crust dough mumblemumble ago and then left it languishing, wrapped in plastic, in the fridge until it (for shame!) got a very very few telltale specks of mold on it.

Now, I am not advising that you do what I did. However, I will tell you what I did, and since I am sitting here now typing this post, clearly I did not die from it. ;) This is what I, horror of horrors, did yesterday: I cut off all the outside bits of the pie crust dough, rolled it out, and baked it anyway. With some questionable also-languishing blueberries that I combined with the juice of one questionable and languishing Kaffir lime. The result was probably far better than I deserve for disrespecting my ingredients.

That, folks, is my first double-crust pie ever. I used a star-shaped cookie cutter to cut out part of the top crust. Conveniently, this made star-shaped leftover bits for me to bake with my mangled but unbelievably good jam pastries.

What's that you say? There are only three cookies and I said there were four? Hmm, wonder where the fourth one went ... ;)
Breakfast this morning? PIE! The best blueberry pie I have ever eaten. I share with you now the God of All Pie Crust Recipes, courtesy of Smitten Kitchen. Try it at your peril — it may provoke incurable urges to conquer pie-crust-based recipes you have never tried before, and you may never again want to eat pie crust from any other recipe. (At least, it was that good for me. Just the leftover bits with a bit of jam smeared inside them were so good I swear to you I teared up.)

So now I'm a-gonna go have me some dinner, and for dessert? You guessed it.

It's Roc Day again! So have some llama yarn + LED sheep art

2011-01-07T17:09:00.001-05:00

This year, once more there will be no traditional Distaff Day fire-setting or water-throwing in the Star & Crossbones studio (crossing fingers as I type this — at least mentally ;)), and I'm not even sure I'm going to make it to the spinning wheel, as I'm knitting some Brigit socks — but I can at least post photos of some yarn I spun earlier this week.

A whole 8+ oz of chunky llama yarn (it's the yarn that's chunky, not the llamas ... as far as I know) spun out of some of the first fiber I bought when I started spinning, which has been sitting in my stash waiting for the right project:

Pretty sure most, if not all, of the fiber is from Bahr Creek Llamas and Fiber Studio. (Half the fiber was actually labeled as such, and if the rest is from elsewhere, I can't think of where it came from.)

And actually, right now the yarn exists as two skeins of two-ply that I don't have photos of yet. Eventually it will be a Capucine hat, hopefully to come with me to Vogue Knitting Live later this month.

If you look closely, you can see that the center of the light-colored ball is beige rather than off-white. I used four different bags of fiber to spin the yarn, but I'm reasonably sure it's all llama. It's definitely camelid and not sheep's wool, at least. ;)

Edited to add: Shout-out to Linda for sending me this kinda hilarious video called "Extreme sheep LED art." Because everyone needs to see sheep wearing Christmas lights and playing Pong. Happy Roc Day. ;)

10-minute semi-homemade wrap chips

2011-01-06T22:09:00.001-05:00

Let's say there are times when you have a craving for a food that's not in the house. And maybe, like me, you try to ignore it for a while, but the craving just keeps coming back. And then finally, after staring desperately into the pantry (or the fridge), you throw some likely-looking ingredients together, apply your current best level of kitchen skill, and hope for the best.

Sometimes this leads to miserable failures. (Remember my jury-rigged desperation noodles?)

And sometimes you pull off a win. :D This is one of mine:

The craving: crackers.

The result:

10-Minute Semi-Homemade Wrap Chips

Ingredients:

wraps — the kind you stuff with sandwich-type fillings and roll up to eat (I used a leftover Toufayan wrap)
olive oil
sea salt
freshly-ground pepper
garlic powder
paprika

Now, I don't want to make this seem more complicated than it is. Really, you need only three basic ingredients: something resembling a wrap or burrito skin (soft taco shells would also work), some form of oil you don't mind baking and eating, and your seasoning of choice.

How to make them:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Spread some olive oil on the wrap. This doesn't need to be very precise; I poured some on one side and used a spoon and the wrap itself to spread it around.

Sprinkle seasonings on.

Cut up the wrap into chip-shaped pieces. (I cut mine into wedges.)

Place wrap pieces on a baking sheet. Bake for 10 minutes (or a little less — check around 8 min to make sure they don't burn).

Remove from oven, let cool a bit, and EAT!

Mine were super-crispy, and good both by themselves and also with lemon hummus. Bet you can come up with your own awesome seasonings ... and you could even make dessert chips. Nom nom nom.

Craft or Bust 2010 Roundup!

2011-01-02T20:36:00.000-05:00

Holy crap, you guys. The end of Craft or Bust 2010 slipped past me like water under a sailing ship under way, and here we are in a new year. And yes, we're doing Craft or Bust again in 2011. At least I am, and you're welcome to join me again (or for the first time!) if you're so inclined.

So how was your 2010? :D

Mine was ... well, it was. There were, as there always are, good times and bad times.

I kept an entire year's worth of accomplishments lists. I met my Craft or Bust goal — to craft every single week, yes! Yes, I did! And that was a huge win, especially since I crafted through thick and thin, through all the crap times as well as when things were going well enough that I was tempted to just ride the wave of goodness instead of crafting at all.

I learned some new recipes and new foodie techniques, met a lot of crafty people, sold more items on Etsy than I've ever sold before, and got some solid craft show experience under my belt. Although I definitely didn't meet all of my goals for the year, it wasn't for lack of thought or effort — it was mostly because on top of last year being craftier than any other year in my recent history, it was also more full of bizarre nonsense, which is, y'know. Kinda distracting. ;)

Anyway, I'm glad I did Craft or Bust, and I'm glad I had people to craft along with me — I'm glad for everyone who showed an interest, from the people who stuck by me to the people who said it sounded cool but they didn't dare sign up yet. You all helped me feel like my goal was feasible, and hey! It turns out it was! :D

If you want to do Craft or Bust 2011, feel free to mosey on over to the mailing list sign up form and add yourself to the list. We'll use the same rules (well, really guidelines) as last year except that sign-ups will be through the mailing list for now. Maybe I'll update and revamp the guidelines in another post coming up soon, or maybe I'll do it on the mailing list ... I'm not sure yet how I'm going to do things this year. ;) I just know that I have plans to streamline the process on my end a bit, so that hopefully you won't have to wait on my blogging schedule to check in or read about other people's progress. And there are ideas for some new features percolating in my head — nothing against the freewheeling spirit of CoB, but things that will maybe make the process more fun and interesting for all you lovely crafty people who choose to come along this year.

Anyway, for those of you who played last year, feel free to post comments with ideas for this year, for how you feel about how you did last year, etc. :D I'm all ears!

Safe journeys into the new year

2010-12-31T18:44:00.000-05:00

New Year's Eve is always a time of reflection for me.

There are those who say this is a forced time to do this, and there are those who refuse to participate in the symbolism of the changing of the calendar year. To them, I say: Do what you will for yourselves. But pooh-poohing the efforts that others make to inspire themselves is pointlessly negative. It makes no difference what day of the year, or what specific moment, people choose to be inspired and begin anew. I commend people for doing it at any time, and if people choose to do it in the company of others on a date that has cultural significance, then so be it! Power to them, and more power to them for trying to draw inspiration from the world and the people around them. I like to take my inspiration where I can get it, and if others do that, too, then cheers to that. The effort is the important part, not the date, and that's true whether people are on a bandwagon or not.

This year has been pretty tough for me, but — of course! — I did accomplish some things worth appreciating, too. I'm probably going to do my yearly review tomorrow, after this year is officially over ... After all, there are still a few more hours of 2010, and who knows what they'll bring? ;)

One thing this year has taught me is that there's no shame in taking baby steps — they aren't merely small steps, they're also new steps, steps of exploration, of growth, each one a beginning, an experience. I don't have to run to progress (even if I want to run, faster than the speed of light), and I don't have to leap to grow (even if I want to leap — no, to fly!). To move at all is still to move. To do what I can is better than to do nothing.

A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step. — Lao Tzu

I wish you all a safe journey into your new year, or just into tomorrow, whether you celebrate the changing of the calendar year or not. Peace!

Sunset on December 25, 2010 from Madeira Beach, Florida.

Craft or Bust Week 51 Check-In and Roundup (Dec 19-25)

2010-12-26T12:57:00.001-05:00

Hope all the applicable crafty Christmases out there were lovely. ;D

Roundup of Week 50: What We Crafted From Dec 19-25

Last time, on Craft or Bust:

Linda made some jewelry, added another store to her "jewelry conquest" (sounds scary ;)), and made spices and bath salts and such at (I assume) Sweetwater Farm.
Jessica knit three out of four sock monkey limbs ;), made dinner on Wednesday, made two batches of bake sale cookies and a batch of party cheesy bread (at least it wasn't a cheesy party ... or maybe it was, and that's a good thing!) — except that it got eaten by the dog (dude!).

Check-in for Week 50: What Have You Done Lately? (December 12-18)

My week went like this:

Sunday, I knit some of the unending size 12 socks and made miso soup with CSA vegetables. Monday, more sock. Tuesday — guess! — more sock. Finished the first one of the pair. Wednesday, I knit an obscene amount of the second sock. Thursday, I baked some beer bread (which I don't think I got any photos of, at all ... ack) using a bottle of pumpkin beer left over from Octoberish, finished the second sock!, and knit on an old abandoned capelet UFO just to do something other than knit socks. Friday, I knit an entire cloche, to cleanse more of the sockiness from my system. ;) I also made an embroidered soap sack for the first mate, and did the first part of making sparkly pomegranate cranberries. Sunday was Christmas, on which I managed not to do any crafting, although I almost knit some of my Wisp. Oh, well. It was a good day anyway.

Sunday, my computer also stopped turning on. Oops. I took it to the shop and they had to send it away for repairs ... but I managed to get it back on Christmas Eve. Yayyy! ;)

So what did you do? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Craft or Bust Week 50 Check-In and Roundup (Dec 12-18)

2010-12-19T18:04:00.002-05:00

Can you believe there are only two weeks left in the year? The end of CoB 2010 is in sight. Scaaaary. ;)

Roundup of Week 49: What We Crafted From Dec 5-11

Last time, on Craft or Bust:

Jessica, my stalwart companion in CoBing, finished the first mitten of a pair except for the thumb, wrapped all the presents she currently had to wrap, and applied to three graduate schools. (Oh, that makes me feel kind of like a slacker. Maybe next year I should start "Get into Grad School or Bust"...)

Check-in for Week 49: What Have You Done Lately? (December 5-11)

This past week for me:

Sunday, I bought yarn for the uberscarf I'm knitting for a friend in NYC and knit on said scarf for about an hour. I also knit on a secret gift project for the first mate (who doesn't read this blog, but I'm going to be secretive anyway — if I don't, he'll start reading it, because my luck works that way ;)). Monday, I swatched for a Wisp with some commercial cashmere singles and killed it just doing that. Yeah. That's why on Tuesday I plied the singles, washed the skein, and, when the skein was finally dry, I cast on the Wisp and knit for several hours. I also made some jury-rigged coat-hanger sock blockers and blocked the Lighthouse Gansey socks. Oh, and I made another batch of wheat noodles for ramen. Nom. Wednesday, I knit more of the Wisp, and then went to the party that I meant to have it finished for, although not with the unfinished Wisp. ;) Thursday, I knit yet more of the Wisp while waiting on the delivery of some yarn for an Insanely Fast Sock-Knitting Quest. Friday, I received said yarn in a clandestine exchange at the local Lush store, and that evening cast on the socks and knit 2 inches of the cuff of sock one. Saturday, I knit all but one inch of the rest of the sock cuff.

So what did you do? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Cashmere, multicolored marshmallows, a pin cushion and bread

2010-12-17T00:46:00.000-05:00

(Not that those things are really related, except that I have photos of them all from fairly recently. ;))

It's finally winter here in Florida — it's been cold for the past couple of weeks, enough that we've sometimes covered our soft Florida-loving plants with sheets overnight for fear the freeze will get them. ;) (Bet the condo association lady who hates porch decorations loves that!)

That also means it's time for winter foods! Nom nom nom! Here's some awesome bread I baked a while ago and stuck in the freezer while we ate the more sandwich-bread-shaped loaf first:

Look, you can still seed part of the cute "X" I put in the top of the round loaf...
And lately I've been drinking my exceedingly amusing instant hot chocolate with multicolored marshmallows — not as yummy as the not-so-instant stuff, but luxury cocoa has never made me laugh in the grocery store aisle.

At this time of year the sunlight comes in from the side windows a lot more than it seems to during the summer, so when I spotted this pin cushion looking like it wanted to be photographed, I had to be obliging:

Yes, it has fuzz on it, probably from getting too close to something fiber-related. One of the dangers of living in the craft room.
Finally, I had this holiday season's spastic moment of "I wonder if I can knit an entire [insert knit object here] in [obscenely short amount of time]?" which of course takes on ridiculous proportions when my stash includes yarn and fiber objects that aren't even ready to knit. This time I tried to knit a Wisp in about two days, but I spent one of those days waiting for my freshly-plied cashmere yarn to dry. See, I bought this cone of cashmere singles and my spinning mojo has not been strong enough for me to ply it successfully until apparently right before the latest holiday party. But then my drying mojo was not strong enough — alas, the Fan of Stubbornness refused again to be fixed, and so I was relegated to hanging the skein from a ceiling lamp and waiting for it to dry ... until I got impatient enough to stick it by the fire. (Ha-HA! Because we have a fireplace that contains actual fire sometimes at this time of year!)

So anyway, this is what the yarn looks like:

There are as yet no photos of the Wisp that are not blurry due to being taken impatiently in low light without a tripod. Speaking of the Wisp, however, I really should go knit some more of it. Otherwise it will slide into that nefarious category of Stuff I Started For a Specific Event and No Longer Have Motivation to Finish Because the Event is Past.

So the knitting needles call. Ta! ;D

Craft or Bust Week 49 Check-In and Roundup (Dec 5-11)

2010-12-12T19:51:00.002-05:00

How are the holiday preparations going with you guys? I'm ... behind but busy. Which is not only probably reflective of where tons of other people are, but sadly, describes my life as well ... ;) But send positive vibes. I'm stewing over a new way to do Craft or Bust next year, and I hope everyone will like it ... but first I have to, you know. Finish it.

Roundup of Week 48: What We Crafted From November 28-Dec 4

Last time, on Craft or Bust:

Jessica finished Leah's socks, cast on some mittens, cast on some baby booties and knit one, redid the edge of Markell's hat and received a box of yarn from said Markell (sounds like a good trade-off ;)), finished more than half her headband, and danced to "Dancing Queen," which we'll call creative. ;) Wooo! Have you caught up with your Christas knitting yet? ;D
Susie graced us with her divine presence last week, to let us know she made a test design for a skirt made of recycled shirts and is continuing to improve it, made an art quilt, worked on some Christmas cards for a swap, and knit some "possibly the most unattractive slippers in the world," a designation too amusing to not quote verbatim. ;)

Check-in for Week 49: What Have You Done Lately? (December 5-11)

This week was primarily a week of Sock for me. Or maybe a week of S — soap sack, soup and socks? Just ... not all at once.

Sunday, I made a soap sack, knit some of the second Lighthouse Gansey sock, baked a small strawberry pastry using leftover pie crust dough, and put away some random stuff in the chaotic vortex that is the craft room. ;) Monday, I unsuccessfully hunted for yarn for an uberscarf for a friend in NYC, and knit some more of the sock. Tuesday, I made egg drop soup for the first. Time. Ever!, organized some photos on my hard drive, and knit yet more of the sock. Wednesday, I knit more of the sock (pant pant pant) and made, yes, another bowl of egg drop soup. Different broth this time, though. ;) Thursday was apparently a No Craft Zone. Friday, I made wheat noodles for ramen and dough for two pie crusts. Saturday, I finally finished the Lighthouse Gansey socks. Yayyyyyyy!

So what did you do? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Craft or Bust Week 48 Check-In and Roundup (November 28-Dec 4)

2010-12-05T16:25:00.001-05:00

Okay, it's December, so I officially declare this the Redemption Round! It doesn't mean much, except that anyone who's done less this year involving CoB goals than they wanted to — as the magical CoB head wizard, I absolve of your CoB laxness! Feel free to come on back and try to keep your goals (or meet new ones) during this, the busiest time of the year. Hey, if you can do it now, you should be able to do it any time, right? ;D

Onward...

Roundup of Week 47: What We Crafted From November 21-27

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica finished Markell's hat, started knitting a beaded, cabled headband that's her original pattern, got to two inches away from toe decreases in Leah's socks, and helped cook Thanksgiving dinner. Nom nom. ;)

Check-in for Week 48: What Have You Done Lately? (November 28-Dec 4)

What I did this week:

Sunday, the most actively craft-related thing I did was putting together graphics and the listings for my shawl pin clubs. Monday, I wrote a buttload for NaNoWriMo, though not a big enough buttload to win. Hmph. I also cast on and knit most of Brian's cup cozy. Tuesday was Brian's birthday. I finished the cozy and didn't do much else that was crafty. Wednesday, I apparently did a bunch of admin-type stuff that isn't crafty. ;) Thursday, I edited the templates for the S&C newsletter in MailChimp. That counts, right? Friday, I made a new graphic for the S&C site and made hot and sour soup. Saturday, I published the free cup cozy pattern and added it to Ravelry.

That was an odd week. Looking at my personal list of accomplishments, I did a ton of stuff. But not a lot of it was directly crafty. Hmm.

So what did you do? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

A quick free knitting pattern: cup cozy, bottom up version

2010-12-04T15:16:00.001-05:00

Free knitting pattern, anyone? Here's a quick little one for a cup cozy, knit from the bottom up. It's designed for a tall, handleless (handmade ... nom nom nom) cup because that's what my boyfriend uses all the time, so it won't work for a standard coffee mug — but hey, you could starch it and use it as a pencil cup? ;)

Simple Cup Cozy - Bottom Up Version
Design and pattern by Crystal Calhoun
A Star & Crossbones Knitting Pattern

This pattern is extremely adaptable to whatever yarn and needles you have, and to whatever cup you need to cover. Use whatever yarn and needle combo makes a fabric that you like; you could even use this project as a stashbuster, or to practice knitting in the round — whatever! It'll come out fine in the end, and if it doesn't, you can rip it out and start over without feeling too bad — it's a tiny project, after all. ;)

As you may have guessed from the name, I intend on knitting a top-down version of this cozy in a commercial yarn, which should help me figure out the real yardage. Stay tuned for that...

Materials

Worsted weight yarn - or whatever yarn you like
Size 5 dpns - or whatever size gives you a fabric you like
Yardage — This will vary depending on the weight of yarn, but I used probably less than 30 yds of approximately worsted weight, 2-ply, handspun alpaca/wool blend.

Gauge

I didn't bother with a gauge swatch, since I was measuring my knitting as I went. In fact, you could use this project as a gauge swatch that actually does something functional at the end.

Preparation

Measure the diameter of the bottom of your cup. Also measure how far up the cup you want your cozy to go (that is, take a height measurement). Follow the below instructions only as far as they apply to your desired measurements.

You might want to knit to a bottom cozy diameter that's slightly less than the diameter of the bottom of the cup, since the knitting will stretch, and it's better to have it be a bit too small than to have it be too big and fall off your cup, right?

Go forth and knit!

Cast on 4 sts. Divide over 3 or 4 dpns. Join in round without twisting cast-on.

Place a stitch marker to mark the beginning of the round, if you like. (I always cheat and use the yarn tail hanging out of the cast-on as my "marker." When the knitting gets longer and kind of "swallows" the yarn tail, you can pull the tail up between the last stitch of the round and the first stitch of the round, so that it sticks out of the knitting and you can check where the round starts.)

Increase in every stitch (kfb) for three rounds. (If you have trouble controlling the needles at this point — I know I did — you can lay the needles on a table and knit using the table for support until the needles stop flopping around so much.)

Knit 3 rnds plain (all knit stitches).

Inc rnd: Inc in every st.

Knit 2 rnds plain. (Designer's note: I stopped after these two rounds for a bottom diameter of 2.75 inches. Stop wherever you reach the desired diameter, as directed below.)

Knit inc rnd again. Knit 3 rnds plain.

Continue repeating the inc rnd and knitting plain in between each inc rnd, increasing the number of knit rnds after each inc rnd by 1, until you reach the desired size for the bottom of the cozy.

Then, count the number of stitches you have on your needles, and choose a rib pattern that will fit into the number of sts you have.

I ended up with 64 sts, so I could have chosen any rib pattern based on a multiple of 2 or a multiple of 4 sts, like 1x1 rib, 2x2 rib, 4x4 rib or 3x1 rib. I chose 3x1 (k3, p1, and repeat to end).

You can just start knitting away in your rib pattern, or you can work a "turning ridge" of purl stitches before starting the ribbing. I just went straight into the ribbing.

Knit in your ribbing pattern until you reach your desired cozy height. I knit for 3 inches, then knit another half-inch of 1x1 ribbing to create a tighter top edge, since the cup I was knitting for gets bigger as it gets taller. (You may want to try the cozy on your cup while knitting and adjust your target height as seems reasonable.)

Bind off using a stretchy cast-off. I bound off in pattern (k1, p1).

Weave in the yarn tails and enjoy your cup cozy. ;D You can embroider it, sew on it, and otherwise make it awesome, of course. And if you do, I'd love to see pics!

License/copyright: This pattern and items created from it are intended for personal, noncommercial use only. You're welcome to redistribute the pattern for noncommercial purposes as long as you leave the credits intact. :D If you're interested in using this pattern or the products of this pattern for commercial purposes, please contact the designer at crystal@starncrossbones.com.

The Unguilted Crafter: fighting the urge to feel bad about old projects

2010-12-01T21:31:00.000-05:00

Let's talk about abandoned project guilt, shall we? ;D

CJ asked me on a blog post in October if my UFOs (a.k.a. unfinished knitted objects) make me feel guilty. I answered, "They used to make me feel a bit guilty, though I tried to ignore it, because that wasn't really a useful kind of guilt." Then I explained: Now that I craft (including knitting) way more often, I've stopped feeling guilty about my UFOs, because I have reason to believe I'll get to them eventually.

But that doesn't mean unfinished stuff doesn't make me feel bad. What does weigh on me: The abandoned parts of my to-do list. That shadow part of the list that I keep ignoring (but that I refuse to take off the list) even though I rotate the active part. The things that have been sitting on the list so long that if they were knitting projects, they would be UFOs.

Photo © Koalazymonkey
You know ... things like Like reorganizing the craft room, or cleaning the papers from the Debacle, or sending e-mails I promised to send but that have been languishing in the back of my head instead. Those things, I feel bad about. I wouldn't call it guilt, but they do make me feel antsy, pressured, and unhappy about my slackerdom. (Maybe that is what you would call guilt, but I usually think of guilt as a more distinct feeling, full of actively negative reproach. ;))

Anyway, the other day, when I wasn't looking for it, I stumbled across a way to stop feeling as bad about the Shadow To-Do List. I was doing an exercise to rebuild my belief in myself, and the instructions were basically:

Make a list of everything you've been putting off doing. Everything. Don't leave anything off. Now choose seven of those things — things you CAN realistically do within the span of one day, and they don't have to be difficult things, or even important things — and assign them, one a day, to the next week of your life. On those days, DO THEM. Don't let anything stop you. Don't go to sleep that night not having done your daily task. It doesn't matter what you have to do to accomplish them — do them. Not because you "should," because this isn't a traditional to-do list. Do them because you are rebuilding your ability to DO.

As I made my list, I started to feel oddly better about the entire thing. My list was five typed pages long, but that was okay. Because I saw things on the list that I knew I could do. I could do some of them in five minutes. I could have chosen seven super-easy things — e-mail so-and-so back, put the books by the bed back on the shelf, dust off the tea cabinet — and done them, and it still would have gotten seven things off my back, seven weights off my conscience. Seven. Whole. Things! In a single week. This from a list full of things that have languished without progress for an indeterminate amount of time.

Looking at the list actually made me want to get started right away. But I didn't — because part of the point of the exercise was to do what I said I would do, and if I said I would do something on a specific day, I would do it that day, not a day early or a day late.

And I did it. :D I did one thing a day for seven days, on the days I said I would do them. At the end of it, I felt so encouraged about my ability to do things that I wanted to do it again. I mean — imagine if I did one item from that five-page list every day. I could burn through the entire list (which has been accumulating for years, even!) done in just about eight months. And every one of those days would be a relief.

But in reality, the exercise worked better than I'd hoped. :D Because I did more than seven things. I did the seven things I said I would do on the days I said I'd do them ... and I also snuck in some extra things that I hadn't said I would do. So I actually got eleven things done from the list in a week. If I kept doing that I could finish the entire list in less than six months.

Less than six months to catching up with my life! :D

Of course, the extra things every week would be optional, because adding too much pressure to myself is just transferring the Shadow To-Do List over to the daily to-do list, and that won't work. I've tried it. Doing it the way that works and waiting eight months until five pages of monkeys are off my back is perfectly fine with me.

And okay — I admit that's not exactly realistic, either. Some of the things on the Shadow To-Do List are multi-day tasks. Like reorganizing the craft room — that's not something I can do in one day. So I have to break it down into things I know I can do in one day. (Holy crappity, it's that old "break up larger projects into smaller chunks" thing I never had to consciously do before my productivity got all gunked up. ;))

But isn't it odd? Making a list that's basically a litany of my failures somehow freed me to be productive. I guess it's kind of like when they say the first step to fixing a problem is admitting you have a problem. And being able to see my put-off stuff in list form makes it look tackle-able. Then I can see that the list has an end. It is finite.

And because, while listing, I knew the next step was choosing easily-doable items to definitely do, I had no psychological urge to pressure myself into working on the list.

So, all around, making a list that highlights my slackerdom actually worked out to be a positive thing in the end, because I followed it up with definite and doable action.

It also not only gets stuff done so I can stop feeling bad about it, but it also helps me trust myself more. Because, like I mentioned at the beginning of the post, when I know that I can trust myself to eventually finish a project, I don't have to feel overly bad about putting that project on pause.

Craft or Bust has worked for me on that principle, and making this Shadow To-Do List has worked (so far) for the non-crafty stuff.

So, fellow crafters, maybe the list will work for you, too. Even if all you list is crafty stuff, and you promise to work just a little bit on one crafty project a day — or a week? Like in Craft or Bust? ;) — as long as you make absolutely sure you follow through, I bet it will help get those guilt-monkeys off your back, too. :D

Or maybe not! Everyone is different. And maybe you've tried something like this already? Maybe you've found your own way to refuse to feel bad about your unfinished projects and Shadow To-Do List?

Craft or Bust Week 47 Check-In and Roundup (November 21-27)

2010-11-28T19:17:00.000-05:00

Hope everyone's Thanksgiving was lovely (assuming that you celebrate it, and if you don't, I hope your Thursday was lovely). I think I might do a Craft or Bust Redemption Round right at the end of the year for people who are feeling behind on their CoBing duties — as a reminder that CoB is about doing what you can, and being positive, and enjoying yourself. Any crafting is better than no crafting.

Roundup of Week 46: What We Crafted From November 14-20

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica cast on some self-striping socks for her friend Leah and knit about two inches, made it halfway through Markell's snake hat, and finished the toy elephant she started earlier this month. Woohoo!

Check-in for Week 47: What Have You Done Lately? (November 21-27)

What I did this week:

On Sunday, I finally finished knitting the first Lightjouse Gansey sock, cast on the second one, and knit some of the original scarf pattern I've been working on. Monday, I made lemon poppy seed muffins (from a mix, boo ;)), finished the scarf (yay!), and knit a swatch to test edgings out on. Tuesday, I knit test edgings on the swatch, blocked the scarf, and knit more of the Lighthouse Gansey sock. Wednesday, I baked two loaves of white bread, made some whole wheat noodles from scratch, made two sweet potato pies, and made fried rice. (Guess it was food day...) Thursday, I scheduled an Etsy shop sale and had Thanksgiving. Isn't that enough? ;) Oh, I wrote for NaNoWriMo super-belatedly, too. Friday, I wove on the tails on the scarf and photographed it. Saturday, I wrote a cleaned-up draft of the scarf pattern and wrote for NaNoWriMo.

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

A holiday gift for you! And happy Thanksgiving. :D

2010-11-25T13:14:00.000-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving to my American brethren (and to anyone else who happens to be celebrating today ;)) — and happy Thursday to everyone else! Regardless of what holidays you celebrate, here's a gift to start them off right: Get 20% off all handwovens in my Etsy shop through the end of November!

On this day of gratitude and appreciation and yummy yummy noms, I wish you a crafty one. ;D Most of my crafting lately seems to have been food-related, but I guess it is that time of year.

Happy happy!

My Thanksgiving baking: Two sweet potato pies and two loaves of bread. 'Twas an epic baking day.

Will you help me do the impossible?

2010-11-23T02:13:00.003-05:00

This month is National Novel Writing Month. If by chance the rumor-mill of the Internet hasn't bludgeoned you with that idea till you're sick, and if by chance you don't know what that means, it means this: Those of us who are crazy enough are trying to write 50,000 words of novelish fiction in the 30 days of November.

I've written 3,354. That leaves 46,646 words to go ... in seven days.

Sound crazy? It absolutely is.

But I have another goal — a less crazy one. And you can help me with this one AND with the crazy one at the same time.

This is how: My NaNoWriMo fundraising team needs $65 to reach our fundraising goal for the month. The money we raise goes toward free creative writing programs held all over the world by the people who run NaNoWriMo.

For every dollar donated through my page before December 1, I will absolutely commit to writing 100 more words before the end of the month. The more you donate, the more I write. And the more you donate, the more creative writing gets done out there somewhere in the world.

Your donation will be tax-deductible, because the Office of Letters and Light, NaNoWriMo's parent organization, is a registered nonprofit.

How about it? You can help me, my team, and other people all over the world who dream of being great writers — just make a donation, however small. To donate, go to my page and click the "Sponsor me!" button near the top right.

As a bonus, if you forward me a copy of your donation confirmation e-mail, I will send you a coupon code good toward anything in my Etsy shop. Send your donation confirmation e-mails to crystal at starncrossbones.com (replacing the "at" with the @ sign in your e-mail).

If we reach our fundraising goal — and we can raise $65 in a week, right? ;D That's just 13 people donating $5 each! — before December 1, I'll send an extra surprise to anyone who forwards me their donation confirmation.

So if you're a supporter of creative dreams, of great writing, of having fun, and of challenging limitations — please make a donation, even just a tiny one. Every dollar counts — for 100 words and quite a bit more. ;)

Thank you muchly! ;D

Craft or Bust Week 46 Check-In and Roundup (November 14-20)

2010-11-21T15:44:00.000-05:00

Less than 10 weeks to go till the end of the year. Wow. What do you think — should we do CoB again next year? ;D

Roundup of Week 45: What We Crafted From November 7-13

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica got a box of yarn in the mail and started a hat with snakey cables for her friend Markell. She also worked on her Mom's socks all week and finished them on Saturday. Ooh, and she made bread! What kind of bread? Any recipes to share? ;)

Check-in for Week 46: What Have You Done Lately? (November 14-20)

Me? Well...

On Sunday, I knit on the original-pattern scarf I've been working on. Monday, I worked on spinning a custom art yarn order, knit more of the scarf, and played with my slightly-abandoned Drupal test site. Tuesday, yet more scarf, and I also attempted to start a wild yeast sourdough culture, and baked two loaves of whole wheat bread. (Practicing for Thanksgiving, for which I have volunteered to contribute bread...) Wednesday, I made soup. Thursday, I spun some more of the custom yarn order and made ramen noodles from scratch. :D Friday, I knit a tiny bit on the scarf. Saturday, I finished the art yarn and knit more on the scarf. (End already, scarf!)

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Gratuitious noodle photography!

2010-11-18T23:18:00.000-05:00

I admit it. I've been feeling down in the dumps lately, which is why I've been so quiet. But today I cheered myself up by making my very own ramen noodles, from scratch!

Some of you may be aware that this is my second attempt at homemade noodles. My first attempt was made of pie crust that had been sitting in the fridge for a while. I figured that it was dough, and noodles are made from dough — so I could probably turn it into some form of edible noodle, right? And if a little half-Asian girl is desperate enough for a noodle bowl that she turns to pie crust, who's to point fingers? This is what I made the first time:

...before I ruined them, or maybe they were born ruined, their tempting noodley appearance just a falsehood to lure me into trusting them. They tasted like soggy, sweet glue. (That's about on par with what happened when I tried to use nori sheets as a ramen additive. Yeah. Um. Unless you really like the taste of oceany oceany seaweed — like REALLY — I don't recommend doing that.) I have a suspicion that I may have neglected to actually get the water all the way to boiling before I threw them in ... or maybe there's just something in pie crust that makes it not work as pasta.

Anyway, I tried again from actual scratch tonight. You know. Like, I mixed flour and egg and water and salt, and kneaded it until I was sure I was going to pound it into mush. Then I flattened it out with a rolling pin, cut it up, and boiled it — harsh, I know, but it turned this:

...into this:

Which obviously has a couple of extra things in it. ;) And it was very nom.

I basically used these directions on Instructables, although my measurements weren't very precise. The only thing I bothered measuring was the flour; everything else, I just guessed at. Which meant I had kind of soggy dough to start with and I'm not sure if that's what supposed to happen, but I kept throwing flour at everything that wanted to stick, and kneaded and kneaded and kneaded, and eventually the dough looked kind of like a very small lump of rather elastic bread dough.

And while I did attempt to use parchment paper at first, it didn't get along well with the initially-super-sticky dough ... so suffice to say the kitchen counter now basically has swathes of dried glue on it.

But hey, it'll come off. And hey! I made pasta! Noodles. Same thing. Next time I need to figure out a way to boil the noodles IN the broth with the vegetables and tofu, because I miss the broth flavor being in the noodles. That might just amount to using an obscene amount of broth (so there's room for the noodles to move around in the pot AND room to fit the other ingredients), but someone who can make noodles from scratch should be able to find a use for some extra broth, right? ;D

I know what I want my next noodley leap forward to be ... but I'm not telling until I'm more certain I can actually do it. Wahahaha! The noodle-maker has a noodle mystery. ;)

Craft or Bust Week 45 Check-In and Roundup (November 7-13)

2010-11-14T16:40:00.002-05:00

Oops. I had another quiet blog week, didn't I? Get on the ball, me!

Roundup of Week 44: What We Crafted From October 31-November 6

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica started to lose track of her days, and so did I ... Are we syncing our craft cycles? ;) She thinks, though that she knit the heels and started the gusset decreases of her Mom's socks; cast on a pink elephant toy for a friend's daughter; finished Karl's gloves, wrote up the pattern, and put it in her Ravelry store, and bought beads for a headband and wrote a pattern draft for it.

Check-in for Week 45: What Have You Done Lately? (November 7-13)

Last week...

Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, I suffered from slackerdom. Uh-oh! But Wednesday, I jumped back on the ball and answered a Craigslist post about spinning some alpaca fleeces and bought wool yarn for a scarf pattern I'm writing. Thursday, I cast on the aforementioned scarf and knit about eight inches of it. Friday, I skeined two bobbins of singles and knit another eight inches or so of the scarf. Saturday, I acquired a new-to-me vintage sewing book from my friend Debby's estate sale, and bought some more baking yeast. ;D

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Semi-wordless Wednesday: two loaves and three knits

2010-11-10T22:05:00.002-05:00

A pictorial tour of what I've been up to lately:

Swatched for a new knitting pattern. Can you guess what it'll be when it's done?

Almost finished this Lighthouse Gansey sock. Must ... keep ... knitting...

Finally wove in the tails on this long-unfinished vest. Yayyy for finishing five-year-old projects!

Baked a super-flat but tasty loaf of bread. Note to self: Use fresh yeast.

And then baked a less-flat but also slightly less tasty (though still good) loaf of bread. Fresh yeast = taller bread. Who'd've thought?

Here's the inside. Nom nom nom.
I also read a book and went to a birthday party (thing), but those aren't crafty ... they're just things crafters do sometimes to be able to say they don't always have their heads in a pile of yarn or a box of beads. ;)

Craft or Bust Week 44 Check-In and Roundup (October 31-November 6)

2010-11-07T20:18:00.000-05:00

Almost to the end of the year! How many days left till Christmas? ;)

Roundup of Week 43: What We Crafted From October 24-30

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

My stalwart CoB companion Jessica sewed together the pieces of her Fair Isle pillow, finished the soakers for Courtney's baby and knit a matching hat — this is a DUCK outfit! ;D — and retook the GRE with greater success. Yay!

Check-in for Week 42: What Have You Done Lately? (October 31-November 6)

And last week?

Well ... On Sunday, I knit on the Lighthouse Gansey sock. Monday, I listed some items in a new shop that maybe I'll unveil later. ;) Tuesday, I wrote for NaNoWriMo and finally registered for Vogue Knitting Live! Yay! Wednesday, I made some bread, swatched for and cast on a new pattern, and knit some more of the Lighthouse Gansey sock. Thursday's notes appear to have disappeared into oblivion. Friday, I knit some more on the new pattern, made English muffin bread, and made hot and sour soup with our new CSA veggies! Saturday, I knit some more of that darn sock.

Guess it's been a somewhat laid back week in the aftermath of the Hallogreen, huh?

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Are you one of October's giveaway winners?

2010-11-03T22:27:00.000-04:00

In October, there was indeed a giveaway.

And yesterday, I did indeed generate random numbers using the ever-reliable generator at Random.org.

So here, indeed, are the results:

Etsy winner: ksgoad
Ravelry queue winner: luckhappens (guess it does!)
Ravelry favorites winner: LoverofallEmo
Blog comment winners: Kjo & Heather

Hurrah!

But wait! If you didn't win the wish list giveaway, the crafty pirates still love you! Here's my gift to you: If you buy something from the Star and Crossbones Etsy shop before November 11, and include the message "I wish you would give me free shipping!" in the "message to seller" area when you check out, I'll refund your shipping cost. Or if you like, you can send me a convo with which item(s) you're going to buy and I'll take the shipping cost off the listing(s) for you.

So...

What do you guys want to see in the next giveaway? ;D

Live at the Hallogreen

2010-11-01T13:58:00.000-04:00

So this past weekend we did the Hallogreen in Daytona Beach, a Green Halloween event. It was a nice day, bright and sunny without being sweat-inducing, even if we didn't sell much. One of the hazards of doing craft shows is ending up in an odd place on the site, which we did this year, through the wonder of last-minute changes. Eh. It happens.

The event is done in the same location as the Saturday farmer's market — nom nom nom veggies. I didn't get a chance to wander around much, though. I was too busy spinning two whole bobbins of yarn. All in all, it's a fun event, even when I don't sell too much. (Le sigh.) I'll give it another year and we'll see what happens — the third time might just be the charm.

Here's the photo tour of the Hallogreen this year.

Handspun yarn on the table in the booth.

Another angle on the yarniness.

Shawl pins! On my first handwoven triloom shawl.

Handwoven thingies.

The first mate's lovely chain mail glow bracelets.

And my knit bracelets.

Drop spindles for spinning yarn...

Or you could just watch me spin on my wheel instead. ;)

The booth, with the first mate in residence.

And here's Tampa on the drive home. Nearly back!
It's always nice to get out of the house and meet new people, anyway.

Now ... to schedule the shows for November!

Craft or Bust Week 43 Check-In and Roundup (October 24-30)

2010-10-31T18:44:00.001-04:00

Happy Halloween to all. :D

Roundup of Week 42: What We Crafted From October 17-23

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica finished Michelle's hat, knit four Karl glove fingers, knit about two inches of the Christmas socks for her mom, knit a coffee mug cozy, and started knitting some soakers for her coworker Courtney's son.

Check-in for Week 42: What Have You Done Lately? (October 24-30)

Last week...

On Sunday, I skeined and washed the red/black Corriedale singles, picked up the neckline stitches on the vest UFO, photographed and frogged an old UFO scarf, wrote a quick little knitting pattern draft, and knit on the Lighthouse Gansey sock to the beginning of the gussets. Monday, I washed the frogged UFO yarn, made a new front page graphic for the S&C Web site, finished knitting the UFO vest neckline ribbing, and knit a little more of the sock. Tuesday, I knit the stem and vine for a UFO pumpkin, spun a skein of rainbow organic yarn and a skein of yellow variegated yarn, wove a triloom triangle, and almost finished knitting the Chichi tea towel. Wednesday, I wove, embroidered and sewed together a soap sack, wove another triloom triangle, spun and dyed a skein of wool (it ended up aqua), dyed some wool for a custom order, spun another skein of Corriedale, and finished knitting the body of the Chichi tea towel. Thursday, I crocheted aroun the edge of the Chichi tea towel, then went to Busch Gardens Howl-O-Scream and rode roller coasters. ;D Friday, we packed up the car and went to Daytona for the Hallogreen craft show. Saturday, we did the show, and I spun two bobbins of variegated blue-green wool yarn.

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Evidence of pre-show madness

2010-10-28T04:28:00.000-04:00

I always go a little nuts right before a craft show, and start cramming lots of production time into the last few days before the event. Time creeps up on me now like it never did when I was young — younger? — and I'm always like, "Man, I meant to make 3,000 more things before this show! Now I only have time to make 300!" ;)

Here are pics of some of my most recent 300. There are actually more finished things than I have photos of right now, as most of the newly-finished stuff is in various states of drying. (I've actually spun more yarn in the past two days than I have in the past two months, I think.) Maybe my quicksilver side comes back in fits and starts ... that happen to coincide with the last three days before every craft show.

Proto-yarn, waiting to be spun.

Yarn in progress, still on the bobbin. (Pardon the blurriness. I didn't want to stop long enough to set up the tripod.)

Finished rainbow yarn!

And my first embroidered soap sack. Embroidery depicts ... uh ... a free-form weird thing — but don't laugh too hard; it's not bad for a first try. ;)
There will definitely be photos of the other things I've made, but I'm not sure I'll manage to post them before the Hallogreen on Saturday. I may be totally absorbed by the pre-craft-show madness.

The UFOs are coming alive!

2010-10-26T21:26:00.000-04:00

No, I'm not talking about the latest UFO scare in New York. I'm talking about all the unfinished objects in my knitting queue that have suddenly reared their heads and demanded to be worked on.

Just today, while I was rebelling against the idea of starting a large project I'll need to finish before the Daytona Hallogreen this weekend, I pulled an old knitted, felted pumpkin project out of the UFO pile, thinking I could motivate myself into a larger project if I finished something small — like one or two of the little wedge-type sections that are going to be the pumpkin's body.

(The pattern, by the way, is Jordana Paige's pumpkin pattern from Knitty.)

This color of orange is not the orange you're looking for. Move along.
But then I realized the pumpkin sections were all done. All that was left to knit were the stem and the vine. Well, sheesh. I knocked those out in well under an hour. Ta-da!

Trust this orange more than the other. I remembered to switch the camera settings for this photo. Good orange. Good.
Now I just need to weave in the tails, sew the thing together, felt it, and stuff it. Maybe it'll even show up at the Hallogreen this weekend, so that I can justify having worked on it this week instead of making product. ;)

I also recently excavated an old knitted vest I tore through when I was originally knitting it, except that I got stuck on picking up and knitting the ribbing. See, I started knitting it back when I was first learning, and I had virtually no experience with pick-up-and-knit, and I'd decided I was going to do the main body of the vest in a completely different weight of yarn than the pattern called for. We did all the math so I could knit the body, and that came out fine, but then when I got to the ribbing, I had no clue how to pick up the right number of stitches to make sure the ribbing — which I was doing in the original weight of yarn that the pattern called for — came out right.

The other day I was staring at the remarkably cluttered craft room, in which said UFO vest was sitting underneath my spinning chair, and I realized I could just arbitrarily pick up stitches along the armholes and neckline however I wanted, and knit the ribbing, and if I didn't like the result, I could rip it out and redo it. Duhhh.

This tactic worked, and the vest is now sitting and waiting for the ends to be woven in. No pictures yet ... but send knitwear-photographing vibes, and maybe I'll take some soon.

Craft or Bust Week 42 Check-In and Roundup (October 17-23)

2010-10-24T18:07:00.002-04:00

Next CoB check-in will be the last day of October — Halloween! What are you doing that day?

Roundup of Week 41: What We Crafted From October 10-16

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica got a big box of Knit Picks yarn in the mail — yay! Yarn! She also finished Kelsey's hat, started another hat for her friend Michelle and made it almost to the crown decreases, knit more of Karl's gloves and rechecked the math to make sure the fingers will be okay ;), and worked on her grad school application materials. Go Jessica! (How do you calculate whether you're behind in your Christmas knitting, anyway?)

Check-in for Week 42: What Have You Done Lately? (October 17-23)

This week, on Sunday, I sorted some of the mess that is the craft room, spun a little bit of lumpy rescued Merino/silk fiber, and finished knitting the test-knitted sock. FINALLY. Monday, I sent comments to the designer of the test-knitted sock, knit some more of the tea towel, and knit more of the Argante shawl (still stuck in that second increase section). Tuesday, I spun a skein of (I think) Corriedale singles, and finally added the ribbing to one armhole of a long-abandoned UFO vest. Wednesday, I did some general shop maintenance stuff, tweaked the blog, etc., but nothing super-crafty. Thursday, I prettified the gallery page of the Web site, finished the ribbing on the second armhole of the UFO vest, got yarn in the mail for a Will Work for Yarn swap, cast on a Lighthouse Gansey sock for the WWFY swap, and knit almost to the end of the lighthouse chart. I also bought a new domain name, started playing with Drupal, and read an entire (young adult ;)) book. Friday, I replaced the photos on a shawl pin listing and wrote up a knitting pattern design schedule. Saturday, I knit a tiny bit of the Lighthouse Gansey sock and spent the afternoon and evening volunteering at the Sweetwater Farm Planter's Ball — chopping up salad vegetables and then taking entrance fees.

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Help us get famous!

2010-10-20T19:11:00.000-04:00

Or at least featured. ;)

Want to help me fight off the evil encroaching poverty-monster? You can help us get featured on the Florida Etsy Street Team's blog for all of next month — the big huge holiday shopping month! — by going and voting for my shawl pin in the current monthly challenge contest. It's even the top item, so you don't have to scroll at all. How convenient is that?

Just go here and click "Copper shawl pin" in the voting box at the top right, in the sidebar. My shawl pin looks like this:

And yes, that is a new style of shawl pin that I've been making lately! Thanks so much for asking! ;) I need to restock the shop with a few more colors, so if you have a favorite semiprecious gemstone or a favorite color, leave me a comment here and let me know what it is ... and maybe you'll see it in the shop soon!

And don't forget there's a giveaway going on right now, too. Check out the knitting pattern wish list giveaway details here if you haven't already entered!

Craft or Bust Week 41 Check-In and Roundup (October 10-16)

2010-10-17T17:32:00.002-04:00

Anyone else out there have the sniffly-coughy bug that's going around? For once, the first mate and I both have it. Oh, for some elderberry syrup...

Roundup of Week 40: What We Crafted From October 3-9

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica cast on a Brambles hat for a friend named Kelsey, and knit about half; finished the cuffs of her mom's socks and started the lacy legs; and made it through the gussets of Karl's gloves and almost ot the base of the fingers. And even though she thought she did more than that, that sounds like a lot to me! ;)

Check-in for Week 41: What Have You Done Lately? (October 10-16)

Sunday, I did the SaSS Bash with the Disco Dolls, at which I spun a whole bobbin of fattish red yarn. Yay! I also knit one more repeat of the second increase section of the Argante shawl. Monday, I transferred my semi-abandoned test-knitted hooded shrug off the broken circular needle cable and onto a new circular needle, then finished the ribbed edging. Which I am probably going to have to rip out and re-do because it looks ruffly. HMPH. Oh, well. Tuesday, I wove a triloom triangle with the red yarn from the SaSS Bash, and discovered that lo, it is fuzzy like mohair and likes to stick to itself. Oy. I also made a new Project Wonderful ad, made three shawl pins, and knit two reps of the leg pattern on a test-knit sock. Wednesday, I made another new PW ad, knitted on the Argante, and finally got out of the test-knit sock's leg and into the heel flap. Thursday, I picked up copper wire and beads at Jo-Ann, knit through the heel flap, turned the heel and made it into the gussets of that sock, and cast on a ChiChi tea towel. Friday, I knit more of the tea towel, made a new shawl pin, entered the Etsy FEST monthly challenge, finished another shawl pin and a charm pin, and spun some black BFL singles. Saturday, I knit yet more of the tea towel, finished another shawl pin and two charm pins, got out of the gussets in That Sock and into the foot, knit on the Argante shawl, and skeined, measured yardage, and center-pull-balled the black BFL. Whew.

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Wholesome knitting for the home

2010-10-15T15:36:00.001-04:00

There's something refreshing about knitting a simple, straightforward, pretty item that's going to get used in a practical way. It's sort of — wholesome and nourishing, and re-energizing in a not-overstimulated way, like a knitter's Master Cleanse. ;) (Of course, I've never done the Master Cleanse, but it reminds me of what people have said about it. Moving on...)

I call it the Palate Cleanser because it's helping me get my taste for my larger, more complicated projects back, but it's really a ChiChi Tea Towel from Yarnplay at Home.

A super-simple knit in what They like to call "dishcloth cotton," and it's strangely addictive. I may end up knitting a whole drawer full of these.

And the bash was a blast

2010-10-12T12:41:00.000-04:00

It's inevitable: Every time I have a craft event coming up, I end up doing it on virtually no sleep. It's not nerves, either; it's cats. I don't know how they know there's going to be an event the next day (sure, I move boxes around before an event, but I move boxes at other times, too), but they invariably go nuts the night before a craft show or other vendy event where I'll need my wits about me. This time the upstairs neighbor's cat even got into the act by climbing up our window screen at six a.m. I guess it's like when I was in high school, and every time an audition was coming up, I'd get sick just in time for it — even when I didn't know there was one coming up, I swear. I'll just have to accept that when I am doing any event as a vendor, I will always be slightly crazier than usual and more than slightly sleep-deprived.

Other than the apparently compulsory lack of sleep, the SaSS Bash went reasonably well. Sales were slow, but socializing was not, and I met a ton of great people, listened to good music, and ate my first pear champagne cupcake and my first red velvet cupcake (courtesy of Frostings, Inc.). As I told the organizers: It was probably the most fun I've ever had making that little money. ;)

We set up in the old 1910 streetcar barn on the river while it was still sunny outside. Have to say, I loved the lighting in there in the afternoon. Wish I could have that lighting all the time for my product photography.

The first mate crafted away on his chain mail stuff while I wrapped up the last of booth setup. Oh, yeah, and took his picture.
The spinning wheel got some exercise.

Yes. This is my lap. Plus fiber.
Then the wheel got tricked out with glow sticks, and let me tell you, I've been wanting to do that for a while, but this is the first nighttime event we've done. Finally.

Is this a little disco-esque? If so, it's appropriate, considering the event was organized by the Disco Dolls.
And with that red fiber up there, I spun an entire bobbin of yarn without even trying (which is officially the first time I've done that at any event). Here's the yarn after I got it home:

I even made a sale on Etsy while I was away, which was pretty amusing (and luckily, I didn't sell something out of the shop that I also sold at the event ... though that would have served me right for forgetting, in my sleep-deprived state, to put the shop on vacation ;)).

So all in all, it was a pretty productive time. Woo to that.

On to the next!

Craft or Bust Week 40 Check-In and Roundup (October 3-9)

2010-10-10T23:23:00.001-04:00

And Jessica the Steadfast is my sole companion for this week again ... Hey, it's nice to have the company. ;D

Roundup of Week 39: What We Crafted From September 26-October 2

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica finished knitting part of the sheep pillow but hadn't sewn the pieces together, started a pair of Christmas gift socks for her mom (which also serves as a project for Sock Knitters Anonymous), and ripped Karl's gloves back to the cuffs and restarted (send her good vibes for not having to redo any more :D). And gave her dog a bath because she got skunked. Just FYI. ;)

Check-in for Week 40: What Have You Done Lately? (October 2-9)

Sunday and Monday, I didn't do much but clean and grump and read. ;) Tuesday, I wove a triloom triangle and knitted several repeats on the second increase section of the Argante shawl. Wednesday, I hung out with a friend, went to Jo-Ann, and cast on and knit some of the leg of a sock for a test knit. Thursday, I wove another triloom triangle, knit some more on the sock, knit some more on the Argante, and baked a chocolate cake. Woo! Cake! I also organized some of my craft supply boxes. Friday, I did a pre-craft-event inventory, photographed a shawl pin, wove a triloom triangle, and knit a bunch of bracelets. Saturday, I knit more bracelets, sewed together my triloom shawl, took a bunch of product photos, and prepped for the SaSS Bash!

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Soft blue, prickly green: a quick check-in

2010-10-07T18:08:00.000-04:00

Still cleaning, still reorganizing, still crafting (particularly in preparation for the SaSS Bash this weekend).

We recently harvested all the lemongrass from our front "yard" under the imminent threat of the homeowner's association president removing it for us. I would have appreciated having more of a warning than an offhand mention while she was complaining about how "junky" it looks when people have decorations on their porch, but I guess I should be thankful that I got a warning at all.

On what I hope is an up side, we have an obscene amount of lemongrass in the freezer now. Last year the lemongrass tea went through an interesting (not actually bad, but not really good, either) taste-morph as cold weather came on, so maybe having a huge stock in the freezer will mean summery-tasting lemongrass tea all winter.

Also: Lemongrass loves Florida. One tall plant gives a truly serious amount of tea-making leaves. We had two. This is maybe a third of what came out of the larger of the two:

For scale, that is a bed the lemongrass is on, and it takes up about a third of the bed. The leaves are on the order of three feet long.
In a bright spot, today the yarn I won from the Grad School Knitter giveaway got here. It's a lovely squishy skein of superwash Malabrigo in my favorite color.

Nom nom nom.
Now I need to figure out what to do with about 200 yards of Malabrigo. Suggestions, anyone? ;)

Craft or Bust Week 39 Check-In and Roundup (September 26-October 2)

2010-10-03T18:20:00.002-04:00

We have a new member joining us for the crazy holiday crafting season! Everybody give a warm CoBer welcome to Echo M, who says: "I hope to accomplish each week at least 3 crafting goals, these will coincide with my deadlines and school assignments. In each post, I will put up the project, and deadline, and the progress the project thus-far."

Roundup of Week 38: What We Crafted From September 19-25

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Echo sewed six burp cloths, attended a baby shower, and started planning for another one. She's been working on her Cropped Cardigan, but her speed been foiled by school stuff, and she has 42 coffee cozies to make by December 25. As of last week, she was on #3. Holy whoa. Read about it on her blog.
The ever reliable Jessica had a birthday recently! HAPPY HAPPY to you, O Wonderful Jessica! I hope it was a lovely one. In crafting news, she ripped out That Mitten because her sister didn't want them (gasp!) and the mitten didn't fit Jessica. But no worries, because she wasn't enjoying knitting it anyway. So there, Mitten. She also started a Fair Isle pillow with sheep on it (that sounds ridiculously cute), and went to the fabric store for pillow-back fabric and a zipper. She also knit two pairs of tiny cable owls and attached them to hair clips (I loves me some owls), and finished(?) Karl's bag by sewing the pieces together, embroidering numbers on, and sewing in that zipper she got at the fabric store. Go Jessica — sounds like a good week. ;D
Lesley, as of last week, was nearly done with another Christmas gift — hurraaaaayyy! She was five rows from finishing her Sprout Blanket and ran out of yarn, even though she bought more than the pattern said to. Oops. She ordered more from Knit Picks and was, as of last week, waiting for its arrival. (I know how that goes. Waiting for some Cotswold locks here.) She almost finished another sock during the wait, which is, yes, another gift. Such a giving person, Lesley. ;D

Check-in for Week 39: What Have You Done Lately? (September 26-October 2)

It's been a busy week here at the S&C headquarters. But that's the way it should be leading up to the holidays, right? This is what I've been up to: Sunday, I researched photos for shawl pin inspiration and did some brainstorming/sketches for autumn shawl pins. I also made a couple of new shawl pins, picked some yarn for knitting a Buttonhead hat, cast on, and knit about half of my Buttonhead. Monday, I went to Jo-Ann to pick up a new circular needle for finishing the hooded shrug test knit, and did some creative redecorating of the post-Debacle house. Tuesday, we cleaned some more of our ex-trashed belongings rather than crafting. Wednesday, I washed the yarn that was formerly a sweater, photographed some shawl pins, listed a shawl pin in the Etsy shop, did a bunch of crafty business admin stuff, and knit an inch or two of the Buttonhead. Thursday, I went thrift-storing for white sheets to make into curtains (and found some actual white curtains, too), went to Jo-Ann looking for candle wick but found it at Michaels instead, and went to the health food store for supplies to make bread. I even found some sourdough starter to replace the stuff that got thrown out in the Debacle. Yayyy! Also finished the Buttonhead hat — I even sewed on the buttons and wove in the tails rather than procrastinating. Friday, I wrote a draft of a new free knitting pattern, took pictures of the Buttonhead, divided my yarn into halves for an Argante shawl, cast on said shawl, and knitted to about half of the first increase section. Saturday, I made it through the short rows and into the second increase section of the Argante shawl (I'm going so fast on this one that I can't wait to see what interrupts me for a month and keeps me from finishing! ;)), made a bunch of shawl pin bases, actually finished two new shawl pins, listed one of them in the shop, and wove a triangle on my triloom with the recently-recycled sweater yarn.

WHEW.

Your turn — share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here. Don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page, and you can also add your photos to the Craft or Bust Flickr pool!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

I'm a Buttonhead, knitting an Argante

2010-10-02T12:39:00.002-04:00

I finished knitting my first handspun hat! Yayyy!

Too bad it's hard to take photos of things that are on my own head. If it weren't so, I'd have a decent photo of me wearing it. (Okay, okay. If you really want to see it, there's a photo of me wearing the Buttonhead on my Flickr account.)

I also cast on an Argante shawl this week. The shawl is designed by Corrina Ferguson of Picnic Knits, who did a shawl-knitting demo at the Florida Fiber-In this year, and who is doing her first Susan G. Komen 3-Day Walk for the Cure this year. Aside from both happening this year, these two things are related in that if you go this week and buy a Picnic Knits pattern (say, a shawl?), you get a discount and the proceeds go toward the three-day walk.

I am super-enjoying knitting my Argante shawl so far, so if you have any inclination to support the fight against breast cancer and get a pretty pattern to boot, check out the Picnic Knits pattern shop and pick something up. You'll get to say you participated in the Boobie Blitz, too — bonus. ;)

The beginning of my Argante shawl. It is much bigger than this as I type.

October goodies: the knitters' wish list giveaway

2010-10-01T18:45:00.004-04:00

It's time for another giveaway! This one is for all the knitters out there who are gearing up for cooler weather (or maybe it's already arrived where you are?). It's the First Ever Wish List Giveaway, and it's a winning situation for everybody! You have a chance to get free stuff, and I get to have people ogling my pattern, which will help motivate me to finish the ones in my design queue. (Oh, yes ... I have manymany plans for more patterns. No way I'm going to finish designing everything I want to this autumn/winter, but I can sure try.)

Anyway. Remember these fingerless gloves?

I'm giving away FIVE copies of the pattern PDF. Because everybody needs toasty hands.

You get one entry into the drawing for doing each of these things:

1. "Heart" the pattern in my Etsy shop. (Make sure your favorites are publicly visible so I can see you, or you can heart the pattern and post a comment here if your favorites aren't public.)
2. Add the pattern to your Ravelry queue.
3. Add the pattern to your Ravelry favorites.
4. Leave a comment on this blog post telling me what sorts of things you like to do best in autumn.
5. Tweet, ~~post on Facebook~~* fan S&C on Facebook and post a comment about it here on the blog, and/or blog about the giveaway using this link: http://bit.ly/9T7T6Y, and comment about it on this post. If you tweet, please also mention @starncrossbones so I can see you! ;)

Entries close after October 31, and shortly after that date, I'll draw five random numbers, and five lucky knitters will get to download the pattern from my Ravelry store. Yayyy! I'll actually be drawing one winner each from the people who have the pattern favorited on Etsy, from those who have the pattern queued on Ravelry, and from those who have it favorited on Ravelry — and the last two winners will come from the comments on this post. So you have a ton of ways to win, and yes, you can enter through every method you can, to maximize your chances. How cool is that? I think it's pretty cool.

And if you're not a knitter, you can even enter on behalf of someone else. (Like if you know a knitter who's not online, or one who doesn't like to enter contests ... I'm sure there's someone out there like that, right? ;)) If you win, and you don't knit, but you want to gift the pattern to someone you know who DOES knit, just let me know and we'll make sure it gets to them. :D

And in the meantime, I'll work on finishing the pair of Princess in the Wilds gloves I started knitting in January out of ridiculous sparkly blue handspun wool.

"Finish me!" whispered the bright and sparkly handspun fingerless gloves...

*"Posting on Facebook" is no longer an option for entries because apparently Facebook doesn't like people talking about giveaways there without permission. Nice.

Knitting away: the finished Bainbridge Scarf and a Buttonhead

2010-09-28T16:47:00.000-04:00

My knitting mojo is in, for the moment, like a tide of creativity. Sometime, it'll go out again, and the shore will be bare, and all those sea creatures that live in the boundary zone will be exposed for a little while, visible to us land-dwellers ... er, where was I? Oh, yeah. For now, the knit stitches are swelling. When they recede, they'll leave behind lots of new knit projects for all to see. Does that make more sense? ;)

Of course, let me ruin my cute little metaphor by prematurely showing you what the waves have brought in. No need to wait for the tide to go back out. It's the finished Bainbridge Scarf!

Is it ridiculous, or what? You really need to see it on me — it can be tied a couple of different ways and it's really ridiculous (in a good way) when worn. But you may have to wait for cooler weather to come down southward before I feel like taking a picture. Or maybe I'll get impatient and snap a horrible mirror photo. ;)

I also cast on a Buttonhead hat with some handspun, for the knitalong on the Leethal Knitters group. This handspun, to be precise:

You can see another view of the yarn here.
This is the beginning of what promises to be a very texturey, colorful, personality-ful hat.

It looks like it's going to be a quick knit, too. Look for the finished hat in the next week or two, depending on what happens with my life, universe, and everything.

Craft or Bust Week 38 Check-In and Roundup (September 19-25)

2010-09-26T15:21:00.002-04:00

The holiday season's coming up — where are you, CoBers? Surely you have gifts to make that you could count toward your CoB crafting ... ;) In the meantime, it's back to me and Jessica, neck and neck!

Roundup of Week 37: What We Crafted From September 12-18

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica worked on Karl's gloves some more, and witnessed the invaluable power of the lifeline when she noticed the thumb gussets just weren't coming out the way she wanted. She also knit the pieces for a D&D themed bag, also for Karl, and knit some more of That Mitten.

Check-in for Week 38: What Have You Done Lately? (September 19-25)

My crafty gears are a-grinding ... Last Sunday, I was at the Florida Fiber-In in the morning and back here at S&C headquarters by afternoon. We went to the park to refresh our brains after the stressful and sleep-deprived drive home, during which I was uncharacteristically worried about something having gone wrong at the house. (Thankfully, nothing did go wrong. That I noticed. ;)) I took pictures and some video at the park, which I still need to upload. I also baked chocolate cookies. Monday, no craftiness, aside from buying some lobster claw clasps. Tuesday, I photographed some of the first mate's jewelry and sorted ex-trashed belongings. (Does the latter count as creative?) Wednesday, there was more sorting of ex-trash and more chain mail jewelry photos, and I also cast on the Bainbridge Scarf, my first continental knitting project. Thursday, I put together a craft show application (yayyy!) and did a bunch of research on fibers for some handspun yarn. Friday, I knit some more of the Bainbridge Scarf, baked beer bread, and ordered some Cotswold locks. Saturday, I did more research on fibers and dyes for handspun yarn, and sacrificed a thrift store sweater to the Fiber Recycling Gods. Apparently as a reward, I won some yarn from the Grad School Knitter (and that's a link to her blog)! Then I finished the body of the Bainbridge Scarf and added green leaf-shaped ties — done! ;D

Your turn! Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here, and don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Adventures in Recycling (or, So Begins the Death and Rebirth of a Sweater)

2010-09-25T18:33:00.001-04:00

I had a problem: My sense of yarn is not as good as my sense of fabric. I mean that quantity-wise; I tend to add yarn to my stash in increments of one or two balls (or skeins, or whatever), not knowing what on earth I'm going to do with it. Then, when I do figure out what the yarn would be great for, I never have enough yardage.

This is not a problem I have with fabric. I can find a great fabric, buy one or two yards (for probably the same amount of money it takes to buy one ball of yarn — sigh ;)), and know that when I finally decide it should be a skirt (or a shirt or a tote bag or a pillowcase or a sharktopus stuffed toy), I will have enough fabric to make what I want to make.

But notice! The first sentence of this post is in the past tense. I admit that the problem isn't solved completely, but I have found a solution, and occasionally I even remember that it's already in my stash.

The perfect-fit cheap solution: Recycle old sweaters into yarn. I get cool, unique yarn, and it inherently comes in yardages high enough to make, say, a whole sweater. ;)

The one thing this solution isn't? Quick. But you know that saying about fast, cheap and good ... You get to pick two of the three. This is a case where that's true.

And my stashing habit is also easily fed by sweater collection. I have boxes of thrifted sweaters waiting to be transformed, phoenix-like, into cool new yarny things. Meet today's victim:

Rarr! I am sweater ... but not for long!
It's a soft, cuddly cabley thing that I would honestly love to turn into something for me. But the joke's on me, because I can't. And this is why:

Oh, the bunnanity!
CRAP. I am allergic to angora.

Another reason I really meant it when I titled the post "Adventures in Recycling." ;) I'm not deathly allergic to angora (though I don't know anyone who is...), but it's enough to make me itch and sneeze and generally be uncomfortable. The last time I tried to recycle an angora sweater, I did all three of those things. This time will be different ... oh, yes, this time will be different. At least, I'm going to do everything in my power to make it different.

Weapon Number One in the Battle of Fiber Artist Vs. Angora: over-the-counter allergy medicine. Because my allergy is mild, I'm hoping a mild allergy medication will help. Cross fingers.

Weapon Number Two: a bandana. For tying over my face, specifically, to minimize the amount of angora fluff that makes it into my nostrils.

Weapon Number Three: gloves. I doubt I can knit or weave with gloves on, but who wants to bet I can't rip out knitting with gloves on?

Bonus Secret Weapon: sheer force of will! I don't think it'll actually make me stop itching, but if I can wear my pretty angora-blend sweater (which a well-meaning family member gave me for Christmas) all day because I Goshdarn Want To Wear It, I can spend an hour or so ripping apart an angora sweater and another hour or two weaving it ... right?

If I don't post again for a while, let's hope it's not because I've suddenly gotten so allergic to angora that my hands have swelled up too much for typing. ;) (Doesn't seem that likely, does it? I really hope not...)

Learning to knit continental with the Bainbridge Scarf; also, bread

2010-09-24T18:16:00.000-04:00

Post-Debacle recovery continues apace. My broken knitting needle cable is keeping me from finishing the last bit of ribbing on my hooded shrug (arrrrgh!), so I cast on a quick new project while I'm waiting for the cable replacement to arrive (or for myself to get impatient enough to just go buy a new circular needle). Also, new project = because I really needed to practice continental knitting before what I learned at the Florida Fiber-In wore off.

My chosen pattern for the First Continental Knitting Project is the Bainbridge Scarf (which you can find as a free PDF download on Pepperknit). So far:

Yelllooooooowwww...
In case you're wondering what the crap happened to the corset project I was working on right before Dragon*Con, I really would have liked to get back to that immediately after coming back from Atlanta, but the pattern pieces and the mock-up corset were among the things that got rearranged and/or thrown out in the Debacle. I actually found the corset mock-up when we dug through the trash last Friday (so THERE to the person who threw it out to begin with!) but it's currently awaiting its turn in the washing machine, so I haven't been able to bring myself to work on that again. Plus, the craft room is a bit of a mess, since the person who rearranged part of the house decided to use that room as a holding area for nearly everything that didn't get thrown out.

Anyway, today I also made bread.

Beer bread, to be specific. It was from a mix someone gifted us a while ago, but after the sad loss of my sourdough starter (yes, another casualty of the Debacle), it helped remind me of exactly why I need to get off my butt and bake more. Besides, it smells just as good as bread made from scratch, and I'm sure it'll taste yummy, too. Maybe I'll go find out right now. ;)

Stash and knowledge enhancement at the Florida Fiber-In and beyond

2010-09-21T12:36:00.000-04:00

Fiber, fiber friends, and fun — that's what the Florida Fiber-In is about! And now the cheesy alliteration is out of my system, and we can all move on with our lives.

This weekend past the first mate and I headed out to the Florida Fiber-In, held in Orlando this year. (The earlier part of that day was taken up by our visit to the local landfill to rescue what we could of our Trashed Belongings — but that's a topic for another post.)

Historically, I've been pretty bad about hard-core socializing at the fiber-in, even though that's a large part of what it's about. I just have this separation in my brain between stash/knowledge acquirement and socializing. At Dragon*Con, I socialize while I'm waiting for one of the other two things to happen — I don't go primarily to socialize (any more; arguably, socializing was more important to me when I first started attending). And I treated the fiber-in a similarly antisocial way for the first two years I went, but this year I was determined to be one of the Cool People chatting it up in the knitting/spinning circles.

Wearing name tags is a good way to encourage people to find you accessible. Wearing a knit name tag at a fiber event is an even better way to provoke interest and random spurts of conversation from passersby.
And I win! I did what I set out to do, and there's even a small amount of photographic evidence. ;) (For instance, I am the spinner with her back to the camera sitting closest to the table in the foreground of this photo. You can also see a bit of me in this photo.) I met a lot of new people, hung out, had fun, and learned some new skills: First, how to make a skein on a niddy-noddy (I had until then used chairs, a swift, and been spoiled by my skein winder), then how to knit continental — without twisting my knit stitches. And I even got to spin on a neat Pipy Wendy spinning wheel, which has a crazy metal flyer frame and a lovely, addictive spinning rhythm. I got to see the inestimable Ginger spin on every kind of spindle under the sun, including a trindle, a Navajo spindle, a takhli, and a Russian spindle. And I had two yummy new kinds of tea served up by the knowledgeable and pleasant Pat.

I admit I did a wee bit of shopping as well.

Clockwise from top left: Yellow vintage mohair yarn and tatting shuttle, two balls of Cascade Fixation and a lace shawlette pattern, five skeins of ladder yarn, a skein of superwash Merino, some blue roving (or is it top?), a large cake of rose-colored Merino roving with a skein of bison/cashmere/nylon yarn, and, in the center, most of three skeins of dishcloth cotton. At the far left edge of the photo, you can see the corner of a knit handbags booklet.
The two bits of spinning fiber, I bought from official Fiber-In vendors. The rest of it I acquired at the auction to raise funds for running the event and at the "destash" garage sale on Sunday morning. I also bought some purse handles and other handbaggy accessories that were supposed to go to the garage sale, but that I got late late Saturday night (or early early Sunday morning, depending on how you demarcate your days ;)) from the person who was meant to bring said items to the garage sale.

I imagine I'll make some kind of shawly thing out of the yellow mohair and put it up in the Etsy shop. Come to think of it, I bought something nearly that same shade of bright yellow at the Fiber-In last year, so maybe I was actually compelled to bid on the mohair out of some awareness of a yellow-buying theme. I also now have a tatting shuttle, which will hopefully inspire me to figure out how the crap tatting works.

Oh, and yesterday the first mate and I went to a local thrift store to check out what was there in case some of our Trashed Belongings were actually Donated Belongings (the person who "cleaned" our place while we were at Dragon*Con has been known to donate things to a specific local thrift store, sometimes even with permission ;)). We didn't find any of our stuff, but I did pick up a miniature easel that I'm hoping to use with my triangle loom, and a vintage book of men's sweater knitting patterns that has some wonderfully cheesy photos in it.

So while there has, indeed, been loss this month, there have also been fresh gains. And the space once taken up by the belongings I lost is quickly being filled up by new ones. So there, evil Loss! Fie on decluttering! At least, fie until I decide to do my own decluttering. I do want a clean space in which to exist. I just want to clean it myself, rather like I want to do my own learning and growing rather than having someone else's learning and growing agenda foisted off on me. How weird of me. ;)

Craft or Bust Week 37 Check-In and Roundup (September 12-18)

2010-09-19T20:05:00.000-04:00

I have a lot of non-CoB-related stuff to say this week, so watch the blog for more updates (and pics!) soon. As far as CoB goes, let's just get blathering!

Roundup of Week 36: What We Crafted From September 6-11

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Lesley has recently started back at university and is thus Quite Busy, but she has indeed been crafting! She's been knitting her Sprout Blanket, has one sock half done, and knit a hemp washcloth for a knitting group member who's moving to Halifax.
Jessica cast on and ripped out Karl's gloves two more times (no one should ever say knitting isn't work ;)), and finally got the cuffs right, so she safeguarded her achievement with a lifeline. (One of my favorite knitting "tools"!) She also cast on a mitten and knit about three inches during a defensive driving class — a good use of time, huh? (And she has also corrected me on my sloppiness from last week's check-in — she's only actually working one job, but she was offered more than one recently, which is where I got confused. :D)
Susie knitted a Citron (awesome — I saw someone working on a Citron this past weekend, too), deconstructed capitalism, and ordered a spindle.

Check-in for Week 37: What Have You Done Lately? (September 12-18)

Me? On Sunday, I put together a little guide to the Florida Fiber-In for personal use and preregistered for the fiber-in. Monday, I didn't craft, but I did catch up with my Etsy messages. Tuesday, I went through my fabric stash looking for t-shirts to reconstruct and fabric for making a bag; bought some brown cotton seeds; called a local bead shop and put a chasing hammer on hold; and knit 10 rows on the hooded shrug. Wednesday, I took a bunch of wildflower photos on the way back from the post office and whipstitched together my handwoven one-stripe bag. Thursday, I picked up the chasing hammer from the bead shop, uploaded and organized my Dragon*Con Flickr set, and started organizing a list of craft shows to do in the next few months. Friday was "dig through trash for our lost stuff and, once clean again, drive to the Florida Fiber-In" day. Saturday, I attended a bunch of fiber arts demos at the fiber-in, took some video of the fiber-in on my phone, shopped for spinning fiber, knit on the hooded shrug up until my cable needle decided to come apart while I was doing the edging increases, finished spinning the purple sparkly batt I started a while ago, used a niddy noddy for the first time, and learned how to knit continental. Yay!

So what about you? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here, and don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Summer reflections, and the one-stripe bag lives!

2010-09-16T19:08:00.000-04:00

It's almost the end of the summer. How was yours? Mine was full of far more trial and tribulation than I'd hoped for (of course, who hopes for trouble? ;)), with golden moments fewer than I'd wish (but that's frequently true, too, isn't it?) ... and yet I still haven't fallen off the Craft or Bust wagon, which is a pretty darn notable achievement. Crafting despite crazy times and negative experiences isn't something I've been able to accomplish in recent years — until this year. So yay. That's my big positive accomplishment for the summer.

There's a smaller positive thing happening here at the end of the season, too. Summer's end is apparently inspiring me to dig out old UFOs (Unfinished Objects, in case anybody's going "What?") and work on them. One of them is the "one-stripe bag" I started last November — and hey, picking it up again before its anniversary is an accomplishment, too! ;)

Here it is on the loom, with various blue stripes of warp and sparkly silver and white crochet cotton as weft:

One of the things that took me forever was weaving the warp ends back into the fabric, which I did because I didn't want fringe, and at the time when I started this, I was still afraid of zigzag-stitching my handwovens.

Weaving in all those ends by hand got pretty tedious, but it does make a nice, clean, sturdy finished edge.
Even after I finished weaving in the ends, I was vaguely afraid to trim them off — as if the handwoven fabric would suddenly unravel if I did. (I know, it won't ... but the first time doing a thing is often a time of uncertainty. ;)) I wasn't entirely sure how I wanted to to sew the stripe together to magically turn it into a bag shape, either; the proportion between the handle and the bag depends on how you arrange the strip. (It sort of "spirals," with the two ends of the strip becoming the sides of the bag, and the center of the strip becoming the front and back of the bag and the shoulder strap.)

But with the Florida Fiber-In looming on the horizon, I kept thinking thoughts of bringing a handmade bag to show off. And so I got off my butt and just loosely whipstitched the thing together, telling myself, "I can always take out the stitching if I don't like the way it turns out!" So here's the result.

It looks a bit better on a person than on a door handle, but you get the idea. It's a little smaller than I wanted it to be, in my head, but that's okay, too. It's a good size for a casual walk — it'd fit a book, a small notebook, and maybe a small knitting project, which ain't bad.

More UFOs coming to a blog near you soon, maybe. And then maybe, in the newness of the new season, I'll feel inspired to start some new projects. :D

Exercise in contrasts: a wildflower walk and a sordid tale

2010-09-15T18:16:00.000-04:00

I mentioned in the last Craft or Bust post (conveniently, the last post in this blog, so if you didn't see it, it's not far off ;)) that something traumatic happened, and oddly enough, although I've posted about it on some of my Yahoogroups and on Facebook, I have a strange reluctance to post about it here on the blog. I even have a blog post written (two versions of it, in fact), but I can't quite bring myself to post it. I guess the idea of having my trauma indexed by search engines is a little much at this point — which probably has to do with my natural inclination to avoid putting too many gory details out for just anyone to find, as well as with the fact that the Great 2010 Dragon*Con Debacle was basically a huge violation of my privacy and rights — not something that makes me feel like sharing myself with the public.

But I can't just leave you all hanging, since I've mentioned it — and hey, you lovely blog readers deserve to know about the trials and tribulations of my life just as much as, or maybe even more than, the people on Facebook and Yahoogroups ... I mean, you come here and actively seek out my blather! ;) So let me say what I can.

Basically, when we went on vacation over Labor Day weekend, the person who was watching the house decided to "clean" for us. Which of course means much worse than that.

Imagine coming home from a vacation to find your inside cat wandering around outside, no food in the cat food dish, your garden torn up selectively, and large chunks of your possessions missing — but not just the high resale value stuff; yes, your vintage furniture is gone, and your original artwork, but what's left of your furniture has been rearranged inexplicably and while most of your linens were thrown out, some of them were replaced with "more appropriate" ones, and the not-particularly-valuable-to-anyone-else missing items include your curtains(??), your financial and personal records, most of the decorative/kitschy items you bought to make your house into a home, your mementos, silly cute gifts from friends and family, years' worth of greeting cards, nearly the entire contents of your bathroom and a lot of what was in the fridge, a large chunk of clothing, a box of costumes you made yourself (including some you made ten years ago with your mom before you even knew how to use a sewing machine), and your sketchbooks and notebooks, containing years' worth of ideas and inspiration.

Oh, and the person who removed your belongings left you a morally righteous note that basically says you should be thankful that so much of your life has been thrown in the trash (and it was — in the sealed trash compactor 20 yards from your front door), because it was for your own good, to help you see that you're a horrible, unethical, valueless person — an alcoholic, a drug addict, and a devil worshipper — who clearly has no taste and whose time and financial investments have clearly all been a waste. Oh, and everything missing from your house was a manifestation of Evil and moral backwardness. (My purple vase, my sage plant, that package of white card stock and the first mate's smiling Buddha were so eeeeeeevil! :P)

That's basically what happened to me and the first mate, except that there was no note. We were told those things to our faces by the person who was supposed to be feeding the cats and watering the plants, when we confronted said person about where the heck our stuff had gone.

So ... that's the story so far. Nice, huh?

But it's not over yet. (Why make it quick if it can't be painless? :P) On Friday, we get to cross our fingers that the trash people let us dig through the contents of the trash compactor when they dump it out at the landfill, even though Friday is a busy day for them — and then cross our fingers some more that some of our stuff is somehow salvageable. If you'd like to cross your fingers with us, your added positive vibes are very, very welcome.

I've been pretty stressed out about the possible outcome of Friday. I mean, last week I spent a huge amount of time calling around, trying to figure out who picks up the trash and if they would even let us dig through it, then I was literally one step away from having everything settled so that I could dig through the trash last Friday — an entire week early, which would be one less week of trash piled up on our belongings in the trash compactor — and the property manager at the condo management company said they couldn't give the trash company permission to pick up the compactor early because it would somehow be a liability. Most of the people I've talked to about it, including the person at the waste management company (who would probably know if people were prone to suing each other as a result of being allowed to dig through trash for their lost stuff), one lawyer and one soon-to-be-lawyer, are pretty sure that the company just doesn't want to pay the early pickup fee, which is a massively lame excuse for a hugely uncompassionate act — I offered to pay the fees.

Unfortunately, it didn't occur to me in time to call their bluff and offer to sign a waiver of liability so they can't hide behind that excuse any more; by the time I'd thought of it on Friday, their office had closed. (Stupid me, I had other things on my mind, like inventorying the gigantic amount of stuff I lost...) And our personal schedules would have prevented us from going to dig through the trash until today at earliest this week. That's if the waiver of liability offer worked, and we could get the paperwork done quickly (ha!). So we just decided to wait until the normal scheduled pickup this Friday. Sigh. Which is the day we're supposed to leave for the Florida Fiber-In. Sigh again.

(Side note to the property manager: I honestly think hiding behind a supposed liability is despicable behavior. Every single other person of the many I talked to last week went out of their way to help us get our stuff back as soon as possible. You, on the other hand, appear to have been hiding behind your assistant and overhyping an irrational fear of extremely unlikely legal action rather than choosing to be a human being and to help two fellow human beings in pain and need. I wish this were The Mummy, where "nasty little fellows such as yourself always get their comeuppance." Rest assured that if your happiness or success ever rest in my hands, I will very clearly remember your irrational lack of compassion in what has been the most emotionally trying time in my adult life so far.)

Before everyone starts asking about legal action and involving the authorities, let me say: The person who did this to us is ... a family member of sorts. So ... another closely-related family member — let's say "the Responsible One" — will be replacing as much of our stuff as is replaceable. And since we're reasonably sure the person who did all this to us — let's say "the Righteous One" — isn't exactly ... mentally and emotionally stable ... it wouldn't really help much to drag the Righteous One into court; meaning it wouldn't necessarily prevent future bad behavior. So we're leaving it to the Responsible One to figure out how to set right the Righteous One's emotional and mental stability, if you know what I mean.

...and that was a lot more than I thought I would say about that.

I know this is my craft blog, but oh my heck does this fall right into the "safe space is necessary for creativity" theme I've been harping on for a few months. I mean, my craft stuff was miraculously mostly still here — the Righteous One did this on purpose, claiming the "business stuff" was important, but the effectiveness of this statement is diminished by the failure to remember that handmade costumes and business records are also business stuff — but a lot of it was rearranged, so that I wasn't sure where much of it was. (We did also find some relocated non-craft-related stuff that we originally thought was missing, but a great deal of the missing things are large enough that they would still be visible if they had been moved elsewhere in the house.) And, er, having someone come into my personal space and literally treat my treasures like trash is a huge drain on my emotional energy.

On the other hand, I do have a new source of inspiration: I can now make sure every replacement item I buy is something the Righteous One would hate but that I love. Yes. I can make my house even "worse" than it was before. I could even make sure my new craft projects and knitting designs are as "offensive" as I can make them (that is, creative, nonstandard and interesting — you know, evil!). I'd love to make my home so "morally wrong" (like it might have colors in it, and candleholders, vintage furniture, souvenirs of trips, handmade objects, and gifts from my friends and family) that the Righteous One can't stand to come through the door. Not that that will ever happen again anyway, if I can possibly stop it.

WHEW.

So there it is. You know the story, and I hope you can empathize, or at least not judge me harshly for being angry and hurt and honest (and long-winded ;)). Though my plans for post-Dragon*Con crafting are totally shot, I can't let this defeat me. I have to rebuild, and keep crafting, and put even more of my heart and soul into the business and into creating new treasures and mementos. And I'll start keeping new records, sketchbooks and notebooks. (EVIL!) That's the only way I can heal the gigantic hole in my life.

Which brings me back to that wildflower walk that's in the title of this post. Today while I was walking back from the post office, I made myself take a moment to look at everything that's blooming right now. It's kind of like spring here in Florida in late summer — and our growing season is, after all, backwards from the growing season in many places. (Our organic farm CSA runs from November through May, for example.) Almost everything is in bloom, and I've actually never noticed before today how many different colors of flowers we have just among the (probably) native species. Some highlights are below — I hope you enjoy, and that the sharing of my "roadside nature walk" photos balances out the negative thoughts I shared with you earlier.

More nature pics, including some more from today, in my Florida set on Flickr.

And thanks, as always, for reading along. :D

Craft or Bust Week 36 Check-In and Roundup (September 6-11)

2010-09-12T16:40:00.000-04:00

Sorry for the lack of posting, all ... I had a pretty traumatic week last week (and when I say "pretty traumatic" I mean it was possibly the most traumatic week of my adult life so far). I had so much planned — but eh. I'll post some details on what happened once I get my head a little clearer. Now, back to CoB:

Roundup of Week 35: What We Crafted From August 29-September 5

Last time, on Craft or Bust...

Jessica the Steadfast

another

Check-in for Week 36: What Have You Done Lately? (September 6-11)

In the past week, despite Traumatic Events by the name of the Great Dragon*Con Debacle of 2010, I did do a little bit of crafting. Sunday I was still at the con. Monday, I shopped at the con and bought a neat "transitional stone" cabochon to wrap someday. Then we got home to ... ridiculousness at the house. More on that in a later blog post. Most of Tuesday through Friday was taken up by trying to undo as much of the Debacle damage as possible. On late Friday I dug out some gift knitting needles and some gift yarn and started trying to knit a face scrubby to replace the one that got thrown out in the Debacle. Saturday, I tore out, reknit, and finished the face scrub, updated the CoB RAK list and sent it out, knit a few rows of Brian's long-abandoned Duel sweater, and knit and mucked up about half a wedge of my long-abandoned Perfect Pie shawl. Maybe today I'll unknit it stitch by stitch, since I was stupid enough not to put in a lifeline ... sigh.

So what about you? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here, and don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Craft or Bust Week 35 Check-In and Roundup (August 29-September 5)

2010-09-05T04:06:00.002-04:00

Check-in coming to you from Dragon*Con 2010 in Atlanta, GA! All things considered, it's slightly amazing I'm managing this check-in at all. ;D

Roundup of Week 34: What We Crafted From August 22-28

Last week...

Jessica finished some socks, started a crafty journal, finished a pair of Fair Isle mittens aqnd swatched for the gloves redo, "reinvented garlic bread" and made macaroni and cheese and a raspberry cream pie, knit several inches of her dad's sweater, and spent time cleaning her bedroom.
Meredith C. has checked in again after a while, and has since her last check-in been planning her first handspun sweater and working on a pair of Noro striped knee-highs.
Lesley finished a pair of wool socks — her first homemade Christmas gift of the year. She also played with paper crafts by making "Homemade for You" tags with her knitting-themed stamps.
Susie wrote up a "non-pattern" and put it up on Ravelry due to Blogger technical obstinacies, started her blog interviews, knit some of her Citron, crocheted, and worked on her Loopy Cowl, an original pattern by her.

Check-in for Week 35: What Have You Done Lately? (August 22-28)

This is what I did this week, interrupted by Dragon*Con, during which I stood in Many Lines: Sunday, I sewed an apron and knit 20 rows of the hood of my hooded shrug. Monday, I tried on a bunch of costume stuff and took photos. Tuesday, I put together a PDF of the costume pics from the day before and sent it off to the approving body at Robot, Monster and Ghost. Wednesday, I did some more costume trials with photos. Thursday I knit some of my hooded shrug during the 8-hour drive to Atlanta. Friday, I did Dragon*Con. What more can you ask? Saturday, I knit some more of my hooded shrug while waiting for the How to Make Booze panel.

So what about you? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here, and don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Craft or Bust Week 34 Check-In and Roundup (August 22-28)

2010-08-29T17:41:00.000-04:00

I know I said I'd have a corset update yesterday at latest — yeahhh. Yesterday was another one of those days that was supposed to be helpful but that ended up the opposite. SIGH. But anyway. ;) Let's CoB.

We have a new member! WOO! Welcome to Lesley, whose ultimate CoB goal is to make as many of her Christmas gifts as possible this year, and whose mini-goal is to knit every day, which should help with her Big Goal and also help her relieve stress as she begins a new program at school. Yay! Thanks for joining us, Lesley!

Roundup of Week 33: What We Crafted From August 15-21

Last week...

Jessica the Steadfast wrote up two patterns, one of which went to Knitty and one of which is now on Ravelry. Yes, that's a link to the one on Rav. Go forth and see! She also frogged and reknit 10 rows of a Fair Isle mitten, made it to the toe decreases of the socks she's currently knitting, started writing up two new patterns, and GOT A JOB! Go you, Jessica!

Check-in for Week 34: What Have You Done Lately? (August 22-28)

Here's my li'l update: Sunday, I sketched the "crazy" version of the steampunk Princess Peach costume, researched men's Victorian clothing for the steampunk Mario costume, and did a sketch for the Robot, Monster and Ghost Co. costume (but I'm not showing it to anyone yet ;)). Monday, I picked up some cotton twill for the Peach corset, and a pad of newsprint for drafting patterns. Tuesday, I took my measurements for the Peach bodice sloper (and had the first mate take the ones I couldn't take) and (with some difficulty) drafted the front bodice sloper pattern. Wednesday, I hunted down stash fabric for the bodice sloper muslin, knit one repeat of the ice princess capelet (Rav link) I've been working on forever, rearranged some of the living room to make room for costumey activities, and drafted the back bodice sloper pattern. Thursday, I received some costumey stuff in the mail, knit 15 rows of the hooded shrug pattern I'm testing, and drafted a corset pattern, cut out the pattern pieces, and pinned them to the mock-up fabric. Friday, I oiled and tested my sewing machine; cut out, sewed, and tried on the corset mock-up; and knit 35 rows of the hooded shrug, which got me to the END of the sleeves! Now I just need to do the edging and the hood. Saturday, I went thrift-store shopping for costume pieces and got a fairly good haul of those and some sewing supplies, including some supposedly antique buttons.

So what about you? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here, and don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Costume accessories and another Princess Peach sketch

2010-08-27T18:02:00.000-04:00

Anticipate a corset-drafting update later — either today or tomorrow. For now, a quick peek into a few accessories I've collected for my Robot, Monster and Ghost Co. collaboration costume. (The RM&G costume, in contrast to the steampunk Peach costume, is mostly collection — meaning that documenting the costuming process would look suspiciously like shopping and showing it off. Here goes! ;))

Handmade bobby pins from Peasant and Raven on Etsy. Arrived today and I'm wearing them as we type! (I have to test them, you know.)

A weird glass bottle I picked up in New York, which might get used as an accessory. Funky, huh?

Another New York flea market find: Some keys for my character. And why deos she need these, you might ask? Stay tuned and find out! ;)
It also came to my attention yesterday that I neglected to post the second steampunk Princess Peach concept sketch — now with more Cute/Quirky and rather less Historical Flavor — so here's that:

Not as fancy and ruffly as the first concept, but I promise I will do a fancy Victorian dress someday.
Now I will bravely go and see if my sewing machine wants to work with me. I basted together my bodice sloper mock-up by hand, but I'm probably going to have to use a sewing machine at some point, so I need to find out if it's feeling well-behaved.

You remember the sewing machine cleaning/fixing extravaganza, right? It was reasonably successful — after that, my sewing machine worked. Mostly. But sometimes still not so much.

Let's try an experiment: Everyone clap your hands like you're reviving a fairy, and maybe it will bring back my Sewing-Machine Sixth Sense, which allows me to tame any rebellious sewing machine on the planet. Ready? Clap! Clap! Clap!

...Now imagine me running off to find a piece of scrap fabric to sew with...

Why things don't always happen on time (or, the tale of the wonky sloper)

2010-08-26T16:01:00.001-04:00

On Tuesday, I took my measurements for the Princess Peach bodice sloper, drafted the front and back pieces, cut them out, made a muslin to check the fit, drafted a corset pattern based on the sloper, and with the help of my trusty leftover plastic boning and some hemp cord, I sewed my first corset!

Not.

That was what I was kind of hoping would magically happen, but this is what happened instead:

On Tuesday, I took my measurements for making a front bodice sloper. In case you don't know, a "sloper" is a super-basic pattern fitted to your exact measurements; you can use it for all kinds of stuff, including for making other patterns that you know will fit you, which is what I intend(ed?) on doing. In this case, I was measuring myself for the front half of a sloper for my upper body.

Anyway, when I got to the measurements for the back bodice sloper, I realized I would have to be a contortionist with bug eyes to take some of them myself.

My Special Tape Measure does let me, say, measure my own bicep with one hand, but alas, it does not come with sticky bits that would allow me to measure from the back of my neck to the center of the back part of my waist.
So I had to wait until the first mate got home (and he works the late shift, of course! ;)) to take the missing measurements. If I could have double-checked the measurements personally, I would have, but I couldn't even watch him in the mirror as he measured — if I could do that, I would have the "bug-eyed contortionist" thing down and wouldn't have needed his help.

So I had to trust his measurements, and went forward with the drafting of the sloper pattern. (Again, in case you don't know, that just means I was following the directions to draw the sloper pattern.) While doing this, I realized that the theoretical girl in the pattern-drafting example diagrams was definitely not the same shape as I am, and I started to doubt myself: Would my sloper even come out correctly if I couldn't follow the directions properly? Alarmingly, my across-shoulder and across-chest measurements don't work out so that there's a pointy bit where it should be. Here, let me show you.

On my version of this pattern piece, the Line of Wonk does not do what it does on the above example (image ganked for illustrative purposes from Andy Nguyen's pages on tailoring — meaning I do not claim to have created nor do I own this image).
See that line between points 6 and 9? See how it sticks out past the line coming down from point 7 and forms a little point? That little point is the top of the arm-hole (a.k.a. the armscye), which, in a lot of patterns, curves like that because people have cylindrical arms. And the space between points 4 and 7 is determined by measuring across my shoulders, meaning that that line needs to be a certain length in order for the bodice to actually make it across the front of my body.

But using my measurements, point 9 ends up to the left of the line coming down from point 7. That's right — using the appropriate measurements, my armhole wants to start on the inside of my chest width. Which seemed a little wrong (I swear I don't have arms on the front of my body) so I re-checked my body measurements, and had the first mate check, too. And yes, it's true: If I measure a little differently, I can get a different result. I can make the measurement even smaller. Perfect! You know, if by "perfect" I mean not. ;)

Oh, and just to confuse me a little more, the Line of Wonk, in my version of the pattern, angles UP, not down. After an emergency consultation with my costume buddy of Olde Times, I decided to just draw the dang line longer than it should have been and make adjustments in the muslin (meaning the mocked-up test bodice that gets sewn using the sloper as a pattern).

It's pretty faint in this photo (my pencil lines aren't that dark, since pencil point + too much pressure + newsprint = hole), but if you follow the photo link to Flickr, I've added a note pointing out the Line of Wonk in my sloper.
Tuesday ended with me feeling rather like some kind of genetic mutant, but at least I had a finished front bodice sloper to play with.

On Wednesday, I drafted the back bodice sloper without trouble. Which should really be taken as a sign of trouble in itself. ;) I even found some fabric that would work to make the muslin (that is, a mock-up sewn garment of inexpensive fabric, used to test the fit of the pattern in question), and applied pattern, pins, scissors, more pins, needle and thread to said fabric (in that order), indeed to produce a muslin.

Which fits perfectly from the bust point down, but horrendously from the bust point up. Ha, ha. So the part of the bodice containing the Line of Wonk is, indeed, wonky. I probably should have expected that, considering I knew I was doing something wrong in that part of the pattern. (But part of creating is hope...)

However, I realized late, late Wednesday night (so late you might *cough* even call it Thursday morning) that I don't need properly-fitted shoulders to make a corset, because none of the corset styles I was considering has shouldery bits. WHEW.

So my quest today is browsing my period clothing books and mooshing together what I find there with the information from various online corsetmaking pages.

Then maybe I'll play with other online sloper drafting instructions (like the even more complex sloper instructions at Leena's or the ones on Seamlyne.com), or maybe I'll raid my own closet for items of clothing with shoulders that DO fit, so I can trace them and magically meld the result with the bottom half of my current sloper pattern, a.k.a. the bit that fits.

Or maybe I'll do BOTH. Dangit. Yeah. So there.

If I do all these things, I will have momentarily channeled the spirit that made me name my blog "Quicksilver Crafter" a few years ago. That would be a miracle, so don't expect it ... but do feel free to send good wishes. ;)

Craft or Bust Week 33 Check-In and Roundup (August 15-21)

2010-08-22T18:21:00.000-04:00

Tip of the hat to my staunch friend Jessica as we march forward in our weekly crafting together! ;)

Roundup of Week 32: What We Crafted From August 8-14

Last week...

Jessica made True Blood team t-shirts with her friends, reached the end of the gusset decreases in her socks, cast on a Fair Isle mitten and made it about a third of the way through it, made a pair of baby booties for her former nanny's god-child, went to an interview, and posted photos and a narrative of her latest adventures on her blog — squirrels, climbing, covered bridges! Check it out!

Check-in for Week 33: What Have You Done Lately? (August 15-21)

Still haven't re-taken-up my writing brain, but it will come back soon. It will. Really. Other than that ... Last Sunday I tweaked some packaging labels in Illustrator, put crafty thingies in packaging, made a shawl pin, and knit 10 rows in the continuing saga of the hooded shrug. Monday, I brainstormed & consulted with my friends over at Robot, Monster & Ghost Co. about our costume collaboration for Dragon*Con and ordered some glass jars for the costume. (Can you guess what they'll be used for? ;)) Tuesday, I researched historical costumes for my Steampunk Princess Peach costume, did a preliminary costume sketch, ordered some costume books, made scones, looked at costume patterns, and created a Food set on my Flickr account. Wednesday, I ordered some new business cards (and crossed my fingers they'd get here before Dragon*Con), added a kind of wonky bottom graphic to the blog, and knit 40 rows on the hooded shrug and thus reached the beginning of the second sleeve, of which I knitted 15 rounds. Thursday, I started writing a character sheet to help me with my RM&G costume-building. Friday, I finished said character sheet, bought a set of hair pins for the costume, and read/looked through about half of one of the Victorian costume books that arrived this week. Saturday, despite all good intentions to get an Obscene Amount of Costume Stuff done, I only knitted two rows of the hooded shrug, and made chocolate non-mud cupcakes. (I thus commit myself to getting an Obscene Amount done tomorrow.)

So what about you? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here, and don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

In which costume hell week (or fortnight) 2010 begins

2010-08-19T19:06:00.000-04:00

After ten years' worth of doing it, you might think I'd know better than to start a costume at the last possible moment. Of course, you might also think the Loch Ness Monster exists. I'm not saying it doesn't, but I am saying that there's not a whole lot of hard evidence for it. The same goes for the evidence that I will ever start sewing a costume before the last possible second.

This tendency, of course, is really a subset of "If I'm making it for me, I can put it off a little longer; oh crap, I don't have any longer." So if I were to sew you a costume, I would be fully capable of starting it in a timely fashion.

Since this costume is for me, however, I was required by the laws of my own reality to wait until I only have two weeks to finish.

What costume, you ask? Oh, it's an answer to my personal steampunk dilemma — to the love/hate relationship I have with this neo-Victorian costume and aesthetic trend that combines two things I love dearly (technology and Victorian-era style) but which somehow manages to offend me the way many people do it.

I know. I'm a terrible person for thinking some people's "steampunk" costuming is a horrible, mutant, self-indulgent, Mary-Sue-ish interpretation of techno-Victorian style. It's terrible of me because there's an attitude, in steampunk culture, that steampunk is a bit about uniqueness, and expressing yourself, and defying convention. I approve of and support all of these things — and yet I still think some people's steampunk costuming is more like visually screaming "LOOK HOW F***ING BADASS I AM!" than it is respectful of the Victorian/technological aesthetic and ideals. And that offends me because I love Victoriana and technology more than I like watching people preen and show off.

Hate me for it if you like. ;)

Anyway, if you do, you may be pleased to know my attitude has presented me with an inescapable conflict: Since the rise of steampunk costuming, I've felt driven to make a steampunk costume that I DO like — nay, that I love! And that requires me to research and confront what I dislike, so that I can fail to do those things.

Aside from starting a frickin' costume on time for once, this is probably the hardest costume-related thing I've ever done. It's taken me a couple of years to get to the point where I can even envision a steampunk costume I can bear to wear.

And so, the costume

One of the Things I Dislike is when a costume or character takes steampunkiness Far Too Damn Seriously. (Note that I am not accusing the people in the costumes of taking steampunk too seriously. I am, however, saying that if they don't, their costumes and characterization utterly fail to show it. ;)) At the steampunk fashion show at Dragon*Con last year, the models I loved best were the ones with a sense of humor.

Thus, I was inspired: Why not do a steampunk costume that inherently has a sense of humor? I could even pack a ton of over-seriousness into it and potentially be a walking piece of satire. A self-contained in-joke. But I don't want to be a standoffish in-joke. I want to be an in-joke that everyone can share. Something so ridiculous that people can glance at me in costume and go "OMG is that what I think it is? That is Hilarious! Take a picture!"

So, you know. I could do something like a steampunk version of the video game character Princess Peach. And what's a Princess Peach costume without a Mario to match it?

Yesssss. This is the light at the end of the brass-goggled tunnel. This I can do. This I will do.

...in the next two weeks.

Yes. Laugh at me. Laugh! Your laughter will fuel my own hysteria, and thus give me energy!

And even though I am doing a tongue-in-cheek, video game steampunk costume, my sense of steampunk (which pretty much matches that described in this blog post on the Steampunk Fashion LJ community) demands that I design using real research into real Victorian clothing.

So! Using the evil power of Amazon Prime, I magically made this book appear on my doorstep today! And there are two more that should show up tomorrow.

And after doing copious Internet research, I came up with this not-entirely-satisfactory preliminary sketch:

Steampunk Princess Peach dress idea. Obviously I still need to figure out the hair. Also: Pardon the fact that this is a photo and not a scan. My scanner is currently indisposed. ;)
It needs more insanity. More Peach. More steampunk. More everything! It needs to be more over-the-top in all ways! And really, this is just a structural idea sketch, not a complete costume sketch; this is basically just an idea for the bits that I would need to literally SEW. Accessories and colors will help transform it. A parasol will help. The Princess Peach crown, and the earrings, and the fabric choices will help.

More money would help, too. Turning the crazy ideas in my head into reality seems even more insane on this month's sadly credit-card-dependent budget. (On the off chance that you have an overabundance of charitable feeling toward me and my geeky costuming, and a bit of money you'd like to donate, feel free to drop me a line. Even a small donation would help, and I'd be happy to give you a big fat "This costume sponsored by" shout-out and a link on the official costume info/documentation page — when one exists, on my Web site and/or here on the blog.)

And because my life is meant to be overly complicated — the Quicksilver Crafter reality is driven by stuffing too much productivity into short spans of time — this is not the only costume I'm working on. A collaboration with the lovely Robot, Monster & Ghost Co. will be unveiled at Dragon*Con this year, too.

Imagine me surrounded by sketches, coffee cups, fabric, newsprint-turned-pattern-pieces, and vintage accessories, wherein two fluffy cats and a long-haired boyfriend are trapped, and you have a decent estimation of what my next two weeks will be like.

Piratical homebodying: of purple knitting and revisiting scones

2010-08-18T16:21:00.000-04:00

So although I was a slacker and didn't blog almost at all while I was in New York, I did capture photographic evidence of my craftiness. See? Look!

That's the sleeve of a hooded shrug I'm test-knitting. (Right now I'm stuck in the sea of stockinette stitch that is the back of the shrug, but I only have a few inches left. I'll make it out soon!)

And last night I was finally driven to action by the endless march of food shows that the first mate and I tend to watch. I wanted cupcakes, but I made scones:

Date and raisin scones, to be precise. The cupcake avoidance was partly due to lack of ingredients, and partly due to having No Clue about how to make the kind of cupcakes that I really want to make. I crave the irrationally gourmet kind of cupcake — the kind I'd be happy to pay $2.50 for two bites of. I was never a cupcake fan, by the way, before I worked at an office job where someone with good taste, a lot of money, and a kindly heart got me addicted to the uber-awesome variety. But now? Now I NEED to figure out how to make my own. Any book or blog recommendations, me hearties? ;)

Anyway, the scones turned out pretty well, considering I've taken a five- or six-year hiatus between batches. We didn't have any baking soda, so I had to limit myself to baking powder, and dates and raisins were all we had enough of, so in they went. But all in all, they still kick the butt of all the scones I've ever bought from anyone else. And that's a win. :D

Life = Energy: a semi-epiphany about energy and motivation

2010-08-17T17:14:00.000-04:00

Remember that "safe space and creativity" theme I came up with a few months ago, that I kept promising to come back to? Yeah, it's perverse how not having safe space often means I don't have the creative energy even to write about it. I'm sure you can hear me laughing about how friggin' funny that is. ;P

Anyway, yesterday I was ranting about a specific type of non-motivation — the kind that comes from spending all your energy on one huge problem, so that you don't have any left to solve the everyday problems that come up. You know, like when you spend all your time trying to wrangle personal drama even though you know you should be thinking about how to fix the leaky washing machine and how to pay the bills this month, or deciding whether to use up the next two weeks of your life on a single project (not that I'm avoiding thinking about that right now, or anything...).

Today it clicked that my rant also applies to creativity. Actually, in my head, when I say "motivation," that includes creativity; I do sometimes think of life as one long series of creative problem-solving sessions. Today's now-elusive moment of clarity left me with an idea that goes something like this:

Problem-solving = energy. Creativity (and its requisite safe space) = energy. You only have so much energy to go around.

So when you use up a huge amount of energy on trying to solve a big, important problem, it naturally drains your "reserves" — the energy that you would use on "luxury" stuff that doesn't immediately contribute to your survival, like painting or sewing or writing or even cleaning the kitchen. If you solve the problem, that drain on your energy goes away. As you generate more energy to live, you slowly "fill up" again, and are ready to do more stuff, whether it's tackling big problems or spending time on luxuries, or both.

But when a big problem doesn't actually get solved, you have to keep putting energy into it, so your reserves stay depleted. Then, you stay unmotivated, in proportion to the amount of effort you spend dealing with the problem. Sometimes that means you neglect luxuries but keep chugging along on the necessities ... and sometimes that means you neglect both luxuries AND essentials. (If the latter happens long enough, the structure of your life starts to devolve into a problem of its own, and that, of course, becomes its own drain on your energy...)

Of course, everyone deals with this big-problem energy drain differently: It depends on how much energy they have, how fast their energy returns (which is related not just to personal resilience and emotional metabolism, but also to the efficiency of the support network(s)), and how their priorities are structured.

As far as priorities, what your brain designates as essential might be something my brain designates a luxury. (Heck, an individual person's priorities change over time, too!) Maybe when you're dealing with a gigantic problem, you stop cooking and start ordering take-out for every meal and you completely stop working on renovating the bathroom, but you keep on driving your kids to school and taking the dog for walks and going to knit night.

And me? Right now when I'm dealing with a problem of epic proportions, I stop answering e-mail and working on anything I'm doing for myself, but I keep on working on anything I promised someone else I would do. (Sigh.) Have you seen the Hierarchy of Cleaning? Being creatively inspired is waaaaay up there in the tip of the "hierarchy of energy usage" pyramid, firmly in the "extras" section.

Sunset over Lake Tarpon, August 14, 2010. Going out and enjoying naturey goodness is one of the things that my brain marks as "luxury" ... but I should still do it more.

I've said for years that the only way to get me to stop being bothered by a problem is to solve the problem. Although I define "solve" relatively loosely, in a way that deals more with closure than with actually making a problem literally go away, that still means that if a problem isn't solved, doing "me stuff" can only sometimes put me back on track for inspiration and productivity. It depends on how big the unsolved problem is. I can only regain so much energy by reading, taking walks, eating noodles, and playing pointless video and computer games, and sometimes those things just aren't enough to bring me back to place where I feel inspired to do amazing, creative things.

And oh MAN does it put me behind when a massive problem rears its ugly, persistent head right when I need to be making crucial decisions, laying the foundations for important projects, and doing things that let me pay the bills. I know a priority adjustment would help remedy this by making sure I spend energy where I need to ... but there are some things I can't change without changing my personal ethics and values. I can't put cleaning the house before providing emotional support to loved ones in need, for instance. But I really, really need to clarify the parts of my hierarchy of energy usage that involve creating new products for the shop, promoting the business, and doing creative things just for myself. Really really. I can't keep shunting energy back and forth between dealing with Problems That Won't Go Away and Things I Need to Do To Pay Bills. They need to have equal treatment. And even if I have to go through Energy Boot Camp to expand my personal endurance to do that, well ... I have to do what I have to do.

I can't keep getting behind on life, no matter how demoralized or demotivated I am. I mean, sheesh. Why am I alive if I'm not going to really live?

Yeah. Time to dig in my heels, grit my teeth, and find a way — a healthy way — to create more energy, or to pare down my energy usage.

That's just that.

Craft or Bust Week 32 Check-In and Roundup (August 8-14)

2010-08-15T23:07:00.003-04:00

Oooops! Look at my Shameful Absence of Post! I've had thoughts; they just haven't flowed out into blog posts. Bad me, bad! I will start posting again post-haste (ha ... ha...), I promise. ;) At least I remembered to do the CoB post, even if it's super-late in the day. My mind is just not all here right now.

Roundup of Week 31: What We Crafted From August 1-7

Last week...

Jessica cast on a new pair of socks, knit about 5 1/2 inches of the leg (by Saturday), baked a strawberry pie, went to a museum and took photos, and knit in public in Canada!
Susie finished her fish hat (it now has eyes! et voila! See the eyes and the rest of the hat on her blog), made some shopping bags and held her first giveaway (yayyy!), and worked on an underwear pattern (most cute!).

Check-in for Week 32: What Have You Done Lately? (August 8-14)

I've been a bad girl and haven't written for a while — but I'll start again ... I will! In the meantime, I've mostly been knitting. Sunday, I knit about 15 rows of the back of my hooded shrug, and shopped for costume accessories at the Hell's Kitchen Flea Market. Monday, I hailed my first New York cab! I know ... not really creative, but can we pretend it was because I really wanted to mention it? ;) I also knit 17 more rows of my hooded shrug and took some NYC photos. Tuesday, I came back to Florida, but before I did, I took notes for creating a new dress (for singing gigs!) and a new Web site for my New York friend Virginia Marcs. ;D Wednesday was pretty nondescript in terms of crafting. Thursday, I sold a Waves of Compassion shawl pin (yayyy!) and made it, and also made some charm pins for a custom order (yayyy again!). Friday was ... pretty much bust, in more ways than one. ;P And Saturday, I knit 18 more rows of the hooded shrug. See? Mostly knitting.

So what about you? Share your own crafty accomplishments from the past week in the comments here, and don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!

Craft or Bust Week 31 Check-In and Roundup (August 1-7)

2010-08-08T14:43:00.003-04:00

Holy crap, I haven't posted here at all in a week. Well, it's been a busy week, and now I'm in New York City for a little while, helping a friend get sane and running around feeding my creative muse with all NYC has to offer...

Roundup of Week 30: What We Crafted From July 25-31

Jessica knit another two inches of her dad's sweater back, finished her secret design project and typed up the pattern (COOL!), baked cookies, cast on and ripped out Karl's gloves the third time (alas ;)), and put in a job application. And yes, twelve hours of knitting is quite respectable. ;)

Check-in for Week 31: What Have You Done Lately? (August 1-7)

This has been a brain-altering week; on Sunday I bought a last-second ticket to New York City, and on Friday, I was here — and I still am! I did get a bit of crafting done, though: Monday I started working on a secret costume project. Tuesday, I cast on for a hooded shrug that I'm test-knitting and knit a bunch of one sleeve. Wednesday, I did a lot, but didn't actually make anything. Thursday, I knit some more of the hooded shrug in between preparations for the NYC trip, and packaged up the beaded Waves of Compassion shawl pin finally. Friday, I flew to New York ... and still managed to knit some of the hooded shrug. Saturday, I explored the city! But I admit I didn't actually make anything. I did watch a bunch of short plays and movies, and saw a scene from Wicked in the Gershwin Theater on Broadway, though ... so I watched creativity. Maybe that counts? ;)

My one FAIL has been that I actually missed a day of writing — yesterday. I don't feel horrible about it, since I knew I would probably do that at some point, and being in New York City for the first time in my adult life is a pretty good excuse. ;)

So what did you do this week? Share your own crafty accomplishments in the comments here, and don't forget to use the standard check-in format on the rules page!

And as always, if you're new to Craft or Bust, check out the CoB rules page and sign up if you like — it's easy!