Socks on the beach & crochet of various frilliness

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. ;)

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

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! ;)

The Brian Christmas socks

As promised, for once, the photo!



Yay, I say, again. ;D

Merry Christmas to Brian ... three months late. ;D

I finally finished Brian's cabled socks, from Handknit Holidays. ::beams:: Pictures tomorrow, when there's better light.

Yayyyy for Brian's socks! They look sterling on him. I need to knit more socks. ;D