Weekend Wonder #19 - WIP Slinky Gray Sweater

Hello again! This Weekend Wonder is a sweater that's been on-again-off-again in my life and is now in its third iteration. Originally, I bought the yarn - a soy blend - on clearance to use to make the Five O'Clock Tank from Crochet Me. Alas, I have neither the right hooks nor the patience for that particular pattern right now, and after my problems with the Strapless Corset from Sensual Crochet (three completed tops, three of which didn't fit) I decided to free form the tops with stitches I knew I could do with my current hooks.

After I started it, though, I lost interest, but an idea for a different type of sleeveless sweater, a drapy thing, kept dancing through my brain, so I began this:


Okay, I know it doesn't look like much yet, but it's only the neckline and a few inches of the front and back! It's getting there. The idea is a balletneck yoke in half-double crochet with the body made of alternating double crochets and double crochet clusters. It's more complex than that - the front involves a mitering effect - but it's also free form, meaning I'm still making it up as I go, trying it on every couple rows and doing a two-steps-forward-one-step-back dance of experimentation. But I'm enjoying it, and it's making a fun fabric, I've got to say.


If it turns out really well, I'll have an excuse to go buy more similar yarn - I'm enjoying the feel of it! - and I'll write out and test a pattern, but that's still a long way off.

Before I go, one more little present. My favorite distraction, chomping away on his Kong. This is Luke. Luke, Blog. Blog, Luke.

D-O-N-E and WIP

Well, I'm writing this post in advance, but by the time you read it, I will be done with my first semester of my MFA. I imagine that it'll feel both like a big load off my mind and also a bit daunting. I have a lot I want to get done over break - a new writing project to start, books to read, family to see - but it'll still be nice to have a change of pace. And school doesn't resume until the week of January 12th(!). Still, that won't be enough time to read the 25+ books I just added to my goodreads wishlist. Yikes!

The WIP I want to share today is my circle rug, which is currently about 20% done (as of Saturday). The great thing about a project like this is you can take it anywhere - you just need a skein, a pair of crochet hooks, and a pair of scissors (unless you're better than me and can tear yarn). I'm making it out of a softer thinner yarn than called for, so I modified the circle pattern (added a repeat I think) and changed hook sizes. My goal is to finish this and make it a holiday present to myself and my roommate. It's going to be our bathroom rug.

Next time - the sweater!

Weekend Wonder #18 - WIPs

This Weekend Wonder is that I have, yes, actually been crafting. I've got a potluck to get ready for and a couple days of work on a take home exam ahead, but I wanted to take a quick break to share some of my current projects, even though these are all just WIP photos - progress, but not pretty.


First up, today, are two smaller projects I've been working on at bed time and will, with any luck, wrap up this week. One is a small bag based on the Tube Bag pattern from Uncommon Crochet, a book I really like and am going to take the time to finish reading, cover-to-cover, this holiday break, because it is that kind of book. Neat patterns, yes, very(!), but it also deserves attention to the design principles and ideas the author is putting forward.


Any blog followers may recognize this yarn as the lovely stuff I used to make the Boy Chicago Scarf earlier this year. I had a smaller-than-my-fist amount left over when I finished, so I decided to use it for this little experiment. As much as I love the stitch definition, I am planning to felt it and then play with strap or flap design from there.

The second is an even simpler project - a too-be-felted rectangle that will become a hook book, a la Lion Brand Yarn's pattern. I took a photo, but to be honest it didn't really say much. Look at me - I'm a variegated rectangle! I'll take a better shot before felting and share it with the FO.

Next update, my WIP Circle Rug, which you can see a preview of in the corner of a photo above, and after that, my sweater prototype.

If you win the lottery, sponsor an MFA student!

Sorry for the recent radio silence. It's been a busy-busy week for me. My workshop class had an extra meeting this week to make up for a previously canceled class, so I had double reading. I also had an essay due - one I really struggled with. This is the first day I've just been able to relax.

Add to all that a couple major financial snafus and you have my current state of mind. I knew - certainly - that going back to grad school would not be cheap, especially since we are operating two separate households. But when we made this decision in the spring, we expected the house to sell within six months. We didn't expect the collapse of the market, etc. It's been more than six months and we haven't even had someone come look in almost three months, despite dropping the price. Setting aside all of the other lovely costs of living, my husband and I are paying about $4000 a month for housing, which, as you can imagine, causes savings and loan moneys to evaporate. My mother said something encouraging to me, which is that things will hopefully turn around after the election, so we're thinking we'll give it another month and then drop the house price again.

So, what time I might spend composing blog posts, even just mentally, has been diverted to drafting essays and query letters to agents, editors, publishers - anyone who pays for words. I'm sending out two commercial pieces as well as a contest entry and half a dozen query letters about my novel in the next couple days. Think positive thoughts.

I'm crafting in the spare moments as I wait for the bus or for class to start. I'm about 65-70% done with the shawl, and I hope to finish it up in time to wear it to a friend's gig Sunday night. I just recently finished (for reals) the Retro Femme - post scheduled for Saturday! - and I'll try to take better pictures of the Retro Femme and the shawl when it's done. And then, I'll be picking up the Inspired-by-the-Five-O'clock-Tank-Dress-Tank again! I'm also hoping to get the supplies I need next week to crochet a bathroom rug for our house. It's getting to be that time of year.

Happy Crafting!

Weekend Wonder #4

Swatching: An Open Apology from a Recent Proselyte

This week's Weekend Wonder is about my new love/hate relationship with swatching. I've never really swatched before, though I've certainly started and frogged something when I didn't like the emerging result. I've read and read and read the advice of numerous knitbloggers who teach the holy way of swatching, and yet I never really felt it applied to me. (Not the least of which is the Yarn Harlot who teaches by example both the wonder of swatching and of not.) Part of my reasoning was that I had never made anything BIG until the shrug, which might (in retrospect, I say MIGHT) have benefited from swatching. It definitely would have benefited from a book on design. My most complicated project - the Calla Lily Bag translated to the loom - had a swatch only so I could test-felt the fabric, having never done that before.

Having decided to make my first crochet sweater (from Amy Swenson's Sensual Crochet - Ravelry) I initialy went with a yarn I already had in my meager stash - one of only two not committed to an already ongoing project. (Yes, I'm stashless. I know that's weird.) The two are Lion Brand Landscapes a super bulky acrylic that would never work for this sweater and organic cotton from Bernat in (ironically) Hemp and Oasis colorways. I was considering using the Hemp for the sweater - numerically, it matched the pattern suggestions perfectly.

(You'd think this lawyer would know the difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of it.)

Finally beginning to see the light, though not yet truly believing in it, I made a swatch per the pattern. A swatch that was supposed to be a 4" square. You can see it in the picture above - a lonely little number that was only 2-and-a-half inches on either side after vigorous wet blocking, even though I used an I hook instead of the smaller H called for. (I sensed the yarn wasn't fluffy enough, but wasn't really understanding what a difference it would make and that a hook size or two wouldn't be enough.)

Facing the obvious shortage of my stash, which I'm okay with, I headed to A.C. Moore and bought a few skeins (plenty) of this alpaca blend from Bernat in Peony. (The last photo below is the truest in terms of color). All swatches are shown above. The alpaca swatches were done with H, J, and finally a K hook (my largest) and all fall short at 3", 3.5" and about 3.75" on a side respectively. This is my third and most recent swatch - all wet blocked and hung to dry with weighted pulls.


I think the yarn is lovely, and it feels very nice to work with. But I'm having a damnable time getting a big enough swatch. This is more open than I expected the fabric to be, so I don't want to try to hunt down a larger crochet hook. K is my favorite anyway. I'm thinking, therefore, of proceeding with this even though I'm a little bit short on the swatch dimensions. (For those of you not into crochet, I can tell you that stitch gauge is much more important than row gauge (height). My swatch may actually be 4" wide if I didn't wet block it so hard to get row height, which is where I fall shortest.


I haven't decided what to do (and therefore am instead making notes on a new pattern idea and finishing up other little projects (more on that later this week)) but I think I'm going to spend a little more time with The Knitter's Book of Yarn by Clara Parkes before I actually begin this project. I love this book. :)

And I am now officially a believer in swatching. Imagine the blog posts you would have had to sit through had I (stupidly) gone ahead with that cotton yarn, or even with the new alpaca and the pattern-suggested hook? Now imagine how I would have felt writing those posts? Save yourselves while you can!

All that said, will I turn into the perfect swatcher? Am I going to swatch for the beanie I'm going to make soon? Heck no. What's the fun in that? My point is only that taking a little time to make something we love better, is definitely worth it, in this girl's book.

Advice done. I'll just add one more thing. I've got 9 thesis defenses to sit through this week and may be neglectful of the blog, against even my own wishes. :) Hopefully I'll be back soon, but if you're interested, my latest FOs are up on Ravelry.

My current WIPs and an almost FO

Wow! A crafting post! Imagine! This is what I've been working on recently, though not as much as I'd like.

1. An FO revisited - I ripped the ribbon lining of the Calla Lily strap out and re-felted the bag. A little denser and a little more pilled, I like it better and have been using it for about two weeks without the ribbon sewn back in. I like it and haven't noticed any stretching; so far, so good. I also haven't put my heaviest item - my journal - in it lately.

2. An almost FO - I improvised a camera bag out of some left over Landscapes yarn but I don't have the ribbon to thread through the top to cinch it, so the effect isn't quite complete. Plus, my husband had his camera, so I couldn't take a picture of it with a camera in it. I wrote my first crochet pattern and put all of this up on Ravelry if you want to take a look. (Please do!)

3. A WIP - The shrug I designed hit the 100 row mark tonight - and stopped on the 135 row mark at the end of tonight's faculty senate meeting. :) It's knit sideways on the yellow KK straight loom. The stitch pattern is described here informally for loom and needles. If anyone knows what the "proper" name for this stitch is, I'd love to know. (Sadly, I spotted my first screw up in this piece tonight, but since it's for me, I'm not going to tink it. It was just a purl where there should have been a knit.)

As Rachel said today, click to embiggen. You can see my crochet cast on in both pictures. I was trying a new technique.

For Loom: Cast on an odd number of stitches, R to L (CW). Row 1: Knit off all stitches. Row 2: K, P, to end of row. Repeat Rows 1-2.

For Needles: Cast on an odd number of stitches. Row 1: Knit all stitches. Row 2: P, K, to end of row. Repeat Rows 1-2.

(Note, I don't think that's actually quite right, because the way I loom knit, you only knit the end pegs once, but I'm too tired to translate it perfectly. This would get the body of the stitch right.) :)