Catching Up: The Second Half of 2022

Knitting

Pyramis

I stitched this out of a merino/bamboo blend from Knit Picks because I wanted something with lots of drape — and I love the way it turned out.

Celestarium

I’ve had the Celestarium shawl on my list for at least ten years, recently stumbled across this delightful gradient from Knit Circus, and knew I’d found my yarn for this project.

Tweedy Kia Socks

I haven’t knit socks in a while! I needed something portable for a crafternoon, so I started another pair of Kia socks in some leftover navy tweed.

Garter Snake Mitts & Losing-At-Yarn-Chicken Hat

I waited a while to make something with these two yarns because I wanted to use up every yard of it — and turns out I sure did. These are the Garter Snake Mitts from Lavanya Patricella, and I attempted twice to make the matching hat but lost at yarn chicken twice! So I switched to a smaller hat pattern and finally succeeded.

Llawenydd

No pictures of this one (yet) because it was another spectacular loss at yarn chicken and I haven’t decided quite how to finish it. I cast on two extra repeats to make it a bigger shawl and then absolutely, very clearly ran out of yarn before all the decreases were done and had to cast off early. I think I’ll sew it together into a permanent-cowl after I block it.

Hats for Everyone!

Halfway through November, I remembered that I told my niblings and my father that I would make them hats, so I made three in a row. Lucky for me, they were all a hit.

Fingerless Mittens for Everyone!

I knit a coworker a pair of fingerless mittens out of my own handspun as a prize for a work contest I held, and I also knit my mom a pair of these Belyse fingerless mittens. It’s been a very Ysolda-pattern last few months of the year!

Spinning

Red-Brown Rambouillet

I got this fiber on a trip to the Artful Ewe in Port Gamble with a friend and her parents, and am really happy with the yarn I made. I used this to make my dad’s hat (see above).

Red and Grey Rambouillet

This is fiber from Koomasee and another attempt at a 3-ply — I’ll say successful, because I wanted it to be a little moodier than a 2-ply and I feel like that’s exactly what I got.

Chain-Plied Dirt and Sky

My first chain ply! This is Polwarth/Silk from Three Waters Farm and it spun up so beautifully — and now I’m a little obsessed with chain plying.

Green-Blue Rambouillet

Another braid from Koomasee, I spun this one on my EEW Nano while on a family vacation and they had a ton of fun watching me each morning.

Colorful Koomasee

Hmm, do you think I like fiber from Koomasee? This was a lovely spin.

Goth Rainbow

For this one, I used some mixed BFL from Alexandra the Art of Yarn that I got at Fiber Fusion. I did a fractal spin and my little goth heart is so happy.

Hot Pink Gradient

Another chain ply — when I saw this BFL from Caroline Dick Designs, I knew I wanted to keep the colors close together. I think this one will turn into a cowl.

Good Vibes

I got this when I backed Fully Spun’s kickstarter, and while I’m not typically a yellow person, I really like the way the colors spun up here.

Combo BFL

My first 4-ply!! This was a combo spin from Caroline Dick Designs, and I wanted to keep the colors distinct but also together, the same way the braid was. I really love the way it came out, but might not do too many 4-plies in the future.

Rocks and Sand

More fiber from Three Waters Farm, this time Rambouillet — also chain plied.

Golden Wensleydale

This was one of the first braids I got from Koomasee, and I finally decided I wanted to chain-ply it too.

Stitching

Benevolent Gay Goddess

This was a kit I picked up from Junebug and Darlin, and I stitched it when I felt like a quicker project than my Eternal Cryptid Stitchalong!

The Eternal Cryptid Stitchalong

I didn’t make much progress on this, but I’ll get there eventually!

Catching Up: The First Half of 2022

Knitting

All of the Lights

I LOVE this cardigan. It was fairly complex knit and had a lot of pieces I hadn’t done before (mostly pockets!), but I wore this very often after I finished it and now that it’s getting colder, I’m excited to start wearing it again.

Epernay

Another “I LOVE THIS” make — I snagged some Corrie Confetti from La Bien Aimée (grey + rainbow = everything I ever wanted), saw this sweater when it launched, and immediately knew that the two needed to go together. I didn’t get to wear this one as often before it got too warm, but again, I’m glad we’re getting closer to sweater weather.

The Pandemic Shawl

Back in March 2020, I started this shawl using lace weight yarn on teeny tiny needles because I tried tons of variations and this was my favorite. Well, two years later, I finally finished it! It came out exactly the way I wanted it to, and is absolutely worth the time spent — but boy am I never going to knit something this big on needles this small ever again.

Yet Another Musselburgh…

…this time in Valkyrie Fibers’ self-striping in Imladris, which is just the best combination of colors.

Larinda

This yarn+project combo had been on my mind for a while, and I finally got around to making it. I loved the original color of Larinda when Jen at Webster Street Knittery launched the pattern, and I may have one or two two-skein sets of toffee-colored yarn, so the hardest decision was choosing which toffee-colored yarn I should use. This perfect gingerbread color from Little Skein won, and like I already said, it’s perfect.

Brioche Tiles

Continuing my “Let’s knit with Little Skein yarn that I already have a project in mind for”, I pulled out another yarn combo I’d been saving and knit this brioche beauty. It’s exactly the low-contrast that I wanted.

My Brother’s Forth

Ysolda’s swatchless hats are pretty much my go-to when I need a hat, and I finally branched out with a not-Musselburgh for my brother, out of handspun from fiber he bought me with a note that said “make me something out of this”.

Spinning

I spun a LOT the first six months of the year, folks, so these will probably be a bit brief.

Iris

As discussed above, this was a request from my brother — some Polwarth from Created by Elsie B.

Koomasee OOAK Falkland

Every time I start a spin with fiber from Koomasee, I think “I will like this an ordinary amount” and every single time, I am enamored with it the entire time.

Koomasee Dusty Rose

Another Koomasee, also Falkland, also a joy to spin.

Moody Three-Ply

Something different! This is fiber from Caroline Dick Designs, and it was my first attempt at a three-ply, which I think succeeded admirably. The third ply makes it even moodier than I think a two-ply would have, which I really like.

A Frabjous Spin

This is an older braid I had, some BFL from Frabjous Fibers.

Lavanda

Merino from Malabrigo, that I spun up to eventually pair with the leftover Iris to make a shawl…someday.

Green-Grey Masham

Another braid from Caroline Dick, although I’m not sure I like spinning with Masham that much.

Blue Polwarth/Silk

This was a braid I got about a year ago when a friend and I took a trip to Port Gamble and I stopped by the Artful Ewe. As always, Polwarth is one of my favorite fibers to spin.

Alpaca/Silk

The first of a batch I got from Fiber Fusion NW - this is from Alexandra the Art of Yarn and turned out soooo soft. Definitely making something that sits close to the skin with this.

Mixed BFL

Another from Fiber Fusion NW, but this time from Island Fibers. I love the way the singles spun up marled and the extra-marled they got when plying.

Stitching

Summer Birb

I’ve got all four of these kits from Junebug and Darlin and stitched up this Summer Birb at the beginning of summer (which reminds me I should stitch up the fall version now that it’s officially Fall!)

Rainbow Linen Outfit

I haven’t sewn in a while, but I did make this matching outfit out of rainbow linen that I bought at JoAnn two years ago. The top is a Wiksten Shift Top, and the skirt is the Gypsum skirt, both patterns I’ve made before. I love how this turned out and I love wearing them both together and separately.

Catching Up: The Rest of 2021

Oh, hey there. It’s only been a month or so, right? Definitely still 2021. September…2021. That’s definitely right. Right? Anyway. Here are some things I’ve been working on for the last few months.

Knitting

‘Onipa’a by Leila Raven

I made this using yarn from Ocean By the Sea and it’s so soft and glowing and feels like I’m wrapped in a cocoon.

Truly Textural by Lesley Anne Robinson

Another project with my own handspun! This is handspun from Hipstrings via my brother, and I paired it with this great toffee color from La Bien Aimée x Mondim.

Hats for Friends

I have knit many Musselburghs, and two of them are for friends of mine who moved to Vermont. The first (left) uses self-striping from Valkyrie Fibers in Appa, and the second (right) is Mongolian Cashmere from ULA + LIA.

Classic Cozy Raglan (Light) by Jessie Maed Designs

This was a knitalong that a friend hosted while very kindly discussing fit adjustments and math with a bunch of us, and I’m so happy with how it turned out. This is the most delightful mermaid colorway from Serendipitous Wool.

Baby Cardigans

A childhood friend of mine had twins, and you know I love (almost) any excuse to knit small things, so of course I had to find some scraps and knit her two baby cardigans.

Left: Petit Peridot by Tricot Design MCL, right: Pinson by Nadia Crétin-Léchenne

Nourish

This is another from Little Skein Anne’s Beatrix Box (pattern by Dawn Landix), and I fell in love with this colorway and this pattern.

Spinning

Woodland Owls Like Toffee

This was a “Giant Spin” (aka 200g) using one braid of Woodland Owls by Elsie B and one braid of Toffee, both Rambouillet. I still haven’t decided what to make with it, but I really love the way the colors came together.

Blue Raspberry

Another Elsie B braid, this time Falkland Merino & Rose, and it was super soft and dreamy to spin up.

Color Wheel

It’s an Elsie B bonanza for 2021, I suppose, since this is another one of hers! (or: I ordered them all at the same time and then just pulled from the top of the pile, which happens a lot). I didn’t have a color-plan for this one — I just split it into halves and halves again and halves again, so I’m curious to see how it knits up vs. how it looks in the skein.

Stitching

Wildflower Bouquet

This was a Crafter’s Box collaboration with Junebug and Darlin and I, as usual, love all of Zoe’s patterns so of course I had to get this one too. Before this, I was a little intimidated by backstitching and considered it a necessary evil (like weaving in ends), but this backstitching was really enjoyable.

Read Romance

A smaller project (also Junebug and Darlin, obviously) that I will definitely need to make multiples of in different colors.

Stockings

I moved into a bigger place and decided to make myself a stocking to hang by the fireplace I now have. While I was at it, I made a couple of stockings for my friend and her cat, and even tried my hand at quilting names! They turned out legible, which was pretty much my only goal.

Aaaand that’s it for 2021, folks! I’ll be back, later, with some projects from 2022.

March & April Roundup

Yes, I realize we’re halfway through May, but it’s a good thing I do what I want!

March

I finally finished my Frog & Toad (presents for a friend’s little one!) and am just so enamored with how they turned out. I had to slow this one down a lot because it turns out knitting DK weight yarn on sock needles is super hard on the wrists! But maybe someday I’ll make a pair for myself. I think my favorite part of this combo is Frog’s sweater, and I will probably (definitely) make more.

I started playing with different colors in my spinning — I bought a few different colors of Malabrigo Nube on sale, and had fun thinking about what to do with them. I ended up doing four combinations, two each with matching bases, and maybe someday I’ll take a picture of all four, but here’s the first two, which I call “pink ‘n’ purple” (left) and “Razzleberry Pie” (right).

I knit a Sizzle Pop with two skeins of me-dyed indigo yarn, something that’s been in my queue for a while. This pattern was super easy to follow and was almost memorizable once I got into the swing of it. I’m already planning one or two more in different color combinations!

I cross-stitched this Spring Bird from Junebug and Darlin, and I can’t wait for the others to complete my set.

I also started my long-awaited project using the Avatar mini-skeins from Valkyrie Fibers, using a Mongolian yarn as the contrast, and settled on the Painting Honeycombs shawl. Not only does the color contrast, but the texture does too, and this is definitely one of my favorite makes in a while — I’m very happy with the combination of everything.

April

I knit up the most recent Beatrix Box from Little Skein in the Big Wool, the Agaric Shawl by knitboop. This was a totally addicting knit for me and I love love the color combination I picked. It hasn’t been blocked yet because, well, life happens, but I’ll get it done eventually.

I tried my hand at one million French knots in this stitch up of Junebug and Darlin’s Amethyst Floral kit (will I ever cross stitch something that Zoe didn’t design? Maybe, but not anytime soon). Very enjoyable, excellent colors, and now I just have to find a place in my shrinking wall space to hang it.

This one also isn’t going to have many pictures, but I knit a Plover cardigan by Jacqueline Cieslak using (what else?!) more yarn from Little Skein — this time, her Sugar Maple colorway from last year’s Rhinebeck. Folks, it is perfect and I should definitely block it soon, but it’s also not going to be super useful until fall, so I suppose I have some time.

January & February Roundup

It’s hard to believe we’re already at the end of February!

January

One of my first projects was knitting my first handspun-by-me project, a pair of convertible mittens. I tried to do these two-at-a-time at first, but I ended up ripping one out and just knitting one after the other — and I think the colors turned out better this way. I love the way they match but also don’t match, and the way this yarn plied up into that slow color change that I love so much.

I also spun my first project on my new Kromski Minstrel, using some Malabrigo Nube. I have many more colors of Nube in my growing fiber stash, so you’ll see lots more coming up, too.

I finally finished (1.5 years later) my tweedy, cabley, wonderful sweater out of the most perfect pumpkin orange from the Farmer’s Daughter Fibers. Do I have pictures of this one yet? Nope, in fact I haven’t even blocked it yet, because no one can tell on Zoom that the bottom edge of this sweater is kind of squirrely. For those of you keeping track, this was the sweater I had to put on hold when my wrist started acting up, and I finally decided that I could handle picking it back up, slowly — and I could. I probably won’t ever knit another seed stitch sweater, though!

And I also made a Bubble Cowl out of a combination of Canon Hand Dyes (peacock gradient minis), Local Color Farm and Fiber Finnsheep, and Magpie Fibers. I love the way the texture of the yarn combines with the texture of the stitches, and this cowl is sooo warm and cozy.

February

One of my February spins used some Hipstrings that my brother bought me for Christmas, and I’m really pleased with the way it turned out. I’m not sure what I’m going to make out of it yet or whether I’ll combine it with something else, but this was a really fun spin and I find that I really enjoy spinning on a treadle machine, because it uses both my hands AND my feet.

A friend of mine posted a Musselburgh hat she had made, and I immediately knew I needed to make one, so I pulled out a skein of La Bien Aimée (that some friends brought back for me from France!) and knit this very strange-looking tube that morphed into a very nice-looking and comfortable hat.

I also spun up some more Malabrigo, this time combining two different colorways into what I’m calling Razzleberry Pie (thanks to a name from a friend who talked me through color choices). I’m currently spinning the rest of the purple to ply with a much brighter pink, and then I’ll experiment with my remainders to see what I can turn those into.

And lastly, I’m almost done knitting a Sizzle Pop out of yarn I indigo-dyed myself. This pattern is really intuitive and is definitely not as intimidating as it looked to start with, and I already know I’m going to make more of these. I love the subtle difference between the two blue shades.

I haven’t really sewn anything since I forced myself to make masks in March or April of last year, but I have been thinking (just thinking!) about pulling out some of my quilt pieces, or finally getting back to some garment sewing. We’ll see.

Time Doesn't Matter, Knitting Does

Well, it has been an amount of time (is this what I write every time I get around to writing a new blog post? Probably). I was thinking this morning about how, once I’ve missed a month of blogging, it’s so much easier to miss the next month, and then the next, and so on. In my defense, we had an election, some extra weird holidays, an insurrection, and a new president between now and the last time I posted. Also, I don’t write blog posts for you! (no offense. I write them for me.) I do enjoy a vaguely time-bound summary of activities that’s worded in ways other people might understand, though, and this helps me do that, so I’m going to catch up — probably in stages.

October

I enjoyed knitting the Sharon Show so much that I went straight into knitting the Secret Handshake. Have I blocked it since finishing it, now four months later? No. Did I still enjoy knitting this one? Absolutely.

October’s socks were the Asali Socks, by Dawn Landix, a pattern I knew I would love. I missed up one (1) row, but no one will notice but me so it doesn’t matter, and they’re so waffly and comfortable.

I also cross-stitched a mini Vintage Cabin by Junebug and Darlin. Did it take me another 4-6 weeks to do the backstitching? You bet it did. Did I put it in a frame and hang it on my wall immediately after finishing the backstitching? Yes I did.

November

I knit a Bandit sweater by Jacqueline Cieslak! I blocked it pretty much immediately, and then it waited for buttons for three months. Of course I still wore it — no one on Zoom knows that I didn’t trim my ends and that those things that might have been buttons were actually stitch markers — but I haven’t officially taken official photos for the official Instagram yet. I used some stash Madelinetosh that I already had but I also still preordered some of that Sugar Maple colorway from Little Skein in the Big Wool, because I have capital-P Plans to make a Plover Cardigan, so it’ll still be a Little Skein / Jacqueline Cieslak collab, just a little different.

My November socks were these excellent slippers, which I have probably worn the most out of all the socks I made this year — mostly because it’s still winter and my toes get cold.

I also spun yarn! I couldn’t resist getting this Extremely Fall Braid from Knitcraft & Knittery, and I spun it up pretty immediately. I also (spoiler alert) knit my very first project from my handspun out of this, and I love it.

December

I finished my twelfth pair of socks, one per month, for the entire year. This month I made up my own pattern again, and I’m pretty happy with the result. I am not holding myself to one-pair-of-socks-a-month in 2021 because I don’t feel like it, but I’ll probably knit a few pairs here and there.

I knit my brother a hat, once I remembered to ask him if he wanted one! I used a pattern I’ve knit before — Andrea Mowry’s Harlow Hat — and also managed to use leftover yarn, which means I can reward myself with buying more yarn, right? …right?

And I picked back up where I left on my Seven Wonders pullover, which I finished in January. I stopped knitting it near the end of 2019 because my wrist started bothering me (seed stitch is not my friend), and I very carefully decided it was time to keep going on this one. Sleeve Island with seed stitch and wonky wrists is rough, y’all.

The other thing I did in December was beat my all-time-high books-read-in-a-year-since-I-started-keeping-track record, which had been set at 104 in the year 2010. 2020’s count came in just over the top at 105, and I focused a little more on reading once I figured out I could actually beat that record. Do I remember everything I read? Absolutely not, my brain is too busy just trying to survive a global pandemic. But did I enjoy reading that many books, most of them lighthearted and relatively conflict-free, usually in bed? Yes I absolutely did. I haven’t set a specific goal for 2021 yet, but I’m not planning on beating that record anytime soon. 2021 is (maybe) for digging in to much meatier books, that take me weeks instead of days to finish.

I have more updates, especially spinning updates, but I’ll write about those later. Thanks for sticking around, friends.

September Roundup

Well, time continues to be a strange beast, but I’m somewhat reassured by having written a blog for August already, so I suppose it hasn’t been as long (and somehow still short) as I thought.

I spent most of the month finishing up my Sharon Show shawl, which I’m really pleased with and which was a really consistent bright point in my knitting. It was my first mystery knitalong, and while I usually opt out of MKALs because what if I don’t like how it turns out?, I’m super happy I made this one. It felt like I could just knit forever, and it was the perfect combination of mindless-yet-interesting-enough knitting.

I also knit my September Sock Squad socks, which I made up as I went along, and which I am very pleased with.

And at the beginning of the month, I also knit a Wave of Change Jacket by Denise Bayron using Earl Grey Fiber Co. As usual, I have not even blocked it yet, but someday I’ll get around to it and when that happens I will definitely post pictures.

I also spun up more Neighborhood Fiber Co and am absolutely, totally smitten with it. Still learning how to spin consistently, but this is so soft and the colors are so good, and I can’t wait to figure out what I’m going to make with it.

And…that’s all, folks. It’s been a weird month. It’s probably going to get weirder.

July & August Roundups (Rounds up?)

I realized I never posted about my July projects because I got distracted by Ravelry’s shenanigans and time continues to be a black hole with no end, so here’s my summary of my last couple months of crafting.

July

I cross-stitched this Books Sweet Books from Junebug and Darlin for a friend’s birthday. It was really fun, and I love taking pictures of the backs of my cross-stitch too. I recently bought her Maker kit but am very intimidated by it, so I haven’t started any cross-stitch projects since I finished this one, although I finally soaked and framed my Be Bold project.

For July’s socks, I made the Red Robin Socks by Helen Stewart/Curious Handmade.

I also test-knit the delightful Audacity Shawl from Transmutation Knits out of this silk-linen-alpaca blend that is just dreamy. Liam’s patterns are always really satisfying to make and have such great stories behind them, and this one was no exception.

August

I started my first mystery knit-a-long, The Sharon Show by Casapinka (er, I mean, by Sharon, of course). I’m trying to knit more from my stash, so for this one I went stash diving and came up with a pretty good combo. For a first-time MKAL, it’s been very enjoyable, even though I haven’t been participating online and am just knitting along quietly by myself.

For August’s socks, I didn’t use my FDF yarn (yet!), because I really wanted to knit up this self-striping rainbow yarn from Valkyrie Fibers. Like I said on Instagram, I’m not always a self-striping person but I might just be a convert for Lauren’s colors. I made this one up myself by cobbling together a bunch of different patterns that I liked.

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I also spun up this Wensleydale/Lincoln blend and plied it together. I had some left over after plying, so I used up the remainder of a previous spin for a little contrast skein. I think I can squeeze a pair of socks out of these, so it’s going into my eternal knitting queue.

Other than that, the world is still very weird and mostly terrible. I’m still trying to find joy in smaller things and not let myself get overwhelmed. I’m still trying to make a difference, one day at a time.

How I'm Using Airtable to Track My Knitting and Sewing Projects

Like I said in my last post: if you know me, you probably know that I love Airtable. Since a lot of people aren’t familiar with it, I thought I would write up some details about how I made my Making Database Template (which you can copy for free!), which I’m using as a replacement for Ravelry as well as a new place to combine information about my different crafting projects into one location.

I’m going to use some Airtable lingo in this post, so I’ll also link you to Airtable’s Guide to the Basic Field Types for explanation in their own words. Airtable has pretty robust documentation, and I’ve found that once you get the hang of linking records to each other across tabs, it’s pretty easy to get the hang of.

One of my favorite things about Airtable is the ability to link records together across tabs. When I do that, tt creates a two-way link between the records and the tabs. For example, when I link my Knitting Make to a particular Knitting Pattern from the Makes tab, it also creates a corresponding link from the Patterns tab back to the Make as well, and both of those links and associated lookups and formulas are updated when a record changes.

My second favorite thing about Airtable is the lookup function: once I’ve linked one record to another, I can pull in information from that other record into the tab I’m looking at (or, I can lookup that information). For example, when I’ve linked my Knitting Make to a Knitting Pattern, if I want to display the designer of the pattern on my project record, I can just add a lookup field that pulls the designer’s name in from the Knitting Pattern record, and doesn’t force me to duplicate that information.

How To Use This Blog Post

This post turned out super long, so please feel free to jump around, use control+F, or just look at the pretty pictures. For each section, I pulled out the fields that I did the most with, or which require some explanation — the ones that link to other records, the formulas, the lookups, the complicated stuff — and am assuming that you’re all familiar with the concept of text fields, date fields, and drop-down lists. And just to reiterate, I customized this for me and the types of projects I do — this is by no means a full template or an exact set of rules! Take what is useful out of this for your own Airtable, change whatever you want about it, and feel free to delete what you don’t want. For example, I don’t mention crochet that much in this post because I don’t crochet, but I included crochet as an project type option in my Knitting tabs and you can use it the same way you would for a knitting project. Similarly, if you’re not a spinner or sewist, you can just delete those tabs.

Sewing

There are three tabs in the Sewing section — Sewing Makes, Sewing Patterns, and Fabric. Sewing Makes is where I keep track of my projects, Patterns where I track the patterns I use or want to use, and then Fabric to store all the info about the fabric I have. In Sewing Makes, I link to both the project and fabric I used.

Sewing Makes

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• Status (single select)
  I use the following: Planning, Queued, In Progress, and Completed. I switch a project from Planning to Queued when I have the materials and pattern picked out and am ready to start it, but you may have a different way you think about that separation.

• Fabric (links to Fabric Stash tab)
  This pulls in the fabric name (and associated information) from the Fabric Stash tab, and can link to multiple records if I used different fabrics in this project.

• Pattern (links to Sewing Patterns tab)
  This pulls in the pattern name (and associated information) and usually links to only one sewing pattern, unless I’ve decided to combine 2+ patterns into the project I’m making.

• Combined (links to the Combined view)
  I’ll explain about the Combined view below.

Sewing Patterns

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• Company (link to Pattern Makers tab)
  This pulls in the maker’s name and associated information. There’s more information on how I set up the Pattern Makers tab below.

• Sewing Makes (links to the Sewing Makes tab)
  If I’ve already linked my sewing project to a specific pattern, it’ll show up here automatically.

• Size Range: (multi-select)
  I added this as a multi-select because I wanted to be able to filter more easily on patterns that have an inclusive size range. I think someday I’ll color-code these options so they’re easier to scan, but I haven’t done that yet.

Fabric

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• Yardage (text field)
  While I can’t do math this way, I can identify yardage, fat quarters, scrap bundles, and other “amounts” of fabric, which for me is more useful.

• Brand (single select)
  You’ll notice in this example I have a lot of blanks and a lot of “unknown”s. Most of this is because I haven’t made the time to go through and figure out the brands for my fabric stash, and others are because I got fabric as a gift or from a thrift store.

• Store (links to Yarn and Fabric Stores tab)
  This links to the store name, which I explain a bit more about below.

• Content (multi-select)
  This is a multi-select so that I can choose several options for a wool/silk blend, for instance, or so I can clarify when something has a different material in it. This is similar to the setup for yarn, but as you’ll see below I added percentages to my yarn stash, where I haven’t done that here.

• Sewing Makes (links to the Sewing Makes tab)

  If I’ve already linked my sewing project to a specific piece of fabric, it’ll show up here automatically.

Knitting

This is the most fleshed out section, because I imported a lot of stuff from Ravelry and because I want to keep better track of how much yarn I’ve used in a project so that I can see what I have left over. Unlike the Sewing section, I actually have four tabs here — Knitting Makes, Yarn Per Project, Yarn Stash, and Knitting Patterns. The important step for being able to calculate yardage used in a project and remaining yardage in my stash is the middle-step of the Yarn Per Project tab between the knitting project and the full skeins in my stash: this makes a record for the yarn (amount) that I’ve specifically used for this project, and then does calculations based on the yardage I used to tell me how much I have left in my stash. So here, I link to Knitting Patterns and Yarn Per Project in the Knitting Makes tab, and then link to my Yarn Stash through the Yarn Per Project tab. What’s awesome about Airtable is that once you’ve linked one record (tab) to another, you can also pull in information automatically, which means you don’t have to repeat the information you’ve already collected in the other tabs. So if I wanted, I could pull information about the yarn in my stash into either the Yarn Per Project or the Knitting Makes tab, but would only need to update that information in one place.

Knitting Makes

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• Pattern Used (links to Knitting Patterns tab)

• Yarn Used (links to Yarn Per Project tab)

• Status (single select)
  I use the same options as I do in the Sewing Makes tab: Planning, Queued, In Progress, and Completed.

• Needles Used (multi-select)
  I considered linking this to my Needles Inventory, but decided against it because what I wanted to keep track of here was just the size used, not necessarily the specific needles I used. I might change my mind later.

• Tags (multi-select)
  This is a holdover from Ravelry, and while I used it occasionally there, I feel like I might use it more often here.

• Total Yards (calculation from Yarn Per Project tab)
  This is one of the things I spent a lot of time figuring, because I really appreciate this about Ravelry, and wanted to be able to do something similar in whatever I came up with. This takes the sum of the yardage from all the yarn records I’m using in a project and adds them up, so I can see my total yardage per project.

• Combined (links to the Combined view)
  I’ll explain this more below.

Yarn Per Project

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• Name (formula combining Stashed Yarn Name + Knitting Make)
  I made this a formula because since it’s really a middle-step between the knitting project and the yarn, I don’t necessarily need to make up anything fancy for the name. So the most important pieces of information — what I’m making and what I’m using — are in there for me to search for easily.

• Yarn Stashed (links to Yarn Stash)
  This links to the record for the full skein of yarn I’m using. If I only use part of it, I’ll keep track of how much I did use for this project on this tab, which I can then use in calculations later.

• Knitting Makes (links to Knitting Makes)
  This links to my knitting project, and while on this end there should only be one record for each yarn type/colorway, on the Knitting Makes side I can link to multiple records (if I’m using multiple yarns or colors).

• Grams Used (number)
  This field is very important because it’s what all of the yarn used calculations are based on.

• Yards Used (formula based on total yardage & grams used)

• Lookup Fields:

  • Yards Per Skein (lookup from Yarn Stash)

  • Total Yards (lookup from Yarn Stash)

  • Total Grams (lookup from Yarn Stash)

  • Project Finish (lookup from Knitting Makes)

  • Project Start (lookup from Knitting Makes)

  These lookup fields are important because they make the math work. Luckily, since I already set this up, you can pretty much ignore these fields, unless you want to change the formula.

Yarn Stash

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• Name (formula combining Brand, Yarn Name, and Colorway)
  Again, this is a formula because I’m already keeping track of all the pieces I would use to identify the particular yarn I want to use — namely the brand and yarn name, but I added colorway in because I have a lot of yarn that’s the same brand/yarn type and is only differentiated by color, and I wanted to be able to see that in the record name.

• Knitting Makes (lookup to Knitting Makes via Yarn Per Project)
  This is a lookup field: because my yarn stash isn’t directly linked to my project, when I want to see what projects I used a certain yarn for, I can do that because they’re both linked to the Yarn Per Project tab, and I can pull information in either direction from that tab.

• Yarn per Project (links to Yarn Per Project tab)
  This is the active link to the record for yarn used in a particular knitting project.

• Yarn Amount:

  • Grams Per Skein (number)

  • Yards Per Skein (number)

  • Total Skeins (number)

  These are important because a) of course you want to know how much yarn you have, and b) they’re used to calculate how much yarn is used per project and, later, how much yarn is remaining in the skein(s).

• Formulas:

  • Total Yards (formula multiplying yards x skeins)

  • Total Grams (formula multiplying grams x skeins)

  • Yards Per Gram (formula calculating yards per gram)

  • Grams Used (sum/rollup of how much of this yarn has been used via Yarn Per Project tab)

  • Remaining Yards (formula calculating remaining yardage based on Yarn Per Project tab and yards per gram)

  • Remaining Grams (formula calculating remaining grams based on grams used in Yarn Per Project)

• Spinning Makes (links to Spinning Makes tab)
  This one is only just beginning to be used, and isn’t used all the time — it’s to link my spinning projects to their finished yarn records, so I can then link those yarn records to projects (when I eventually start knitting my handspun).
  

Knitting Patterns

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This one is pretty straightforward, if you’ve been reading through — we have two linked columns: one to the designer and one to the knitting projects — and the rest of the fields are single or multi-select, URLs, and notes fields.

Spinning

This has a lot less in it because I have only just started spinning, but I put in fields for information that I want to keep track of. As I keep learning and spinning more I may add more features, but I might also find that this does the job perfectly well.

Spinning Makes

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• Twist Direction (multi-select)
  I put four options in here — two for singles (S or Z) and two for plied (also S or Z). This may be something I’ll change as I keep learning to spin and using this to keep track of it.

• Finished Yarn (links to Yarn Stash tab)
  This is the rarely-used Spinning Makes field that links the fiber I spun to the yarn that I could actually use for the project.

Fiber

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• Name (formula combining Brand + Fiber Name)
  As with my Yarn tab, I made this a formula that combined the most common things I would search for. If my fiber stash gets too out of hand, I’ll probably add in the option for colorway as well, to help me differentiate between all the Neighborhood Fiber Co. I will continue to buy.

• Used Up? (checkbox)
  I opted to add this checkbox because so far, I’ve been spinning the entire amount of my fiber into one final yarn product. If that changes, I might update this to function more like the yarn stash with weights/amounts rather than an all-or-nothing field.

• Spinning Makes (links to Spinning makes tab)

The Combined View

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This is where it all comes together: all of my projects, in one place, with start/finish dates and pictures. There’s probably some more work I’ll do here — I haven’t decided exactly how much else I want to pull in, but I’ve started with project type, date started, date finished, and photos. This has almost no original data — the Cover Photo is the only field, and that’s only because photos don’t have the same rollup/formula capability that text and date fields have, so I created an original photo field and just copy-paste over from the lookups. My favorite view on this one is the Gallery view (above), where I can see pictures of everything and a couple details.

NOTE: Because everything here is a formula, I usually create this record from the associated project page: in Knitting Makes, I click the plus icon to link to a record in Combined, and then just choose “create new record”. Based on the formulas, it automatically fills in everything else on this tab.

• Name (formula)
  This pulls in the project Name from the sewing, knitting, or spinning record. The way this formula (and most in this tab) works is: if there’s text in the Sewing Makes column, display that; otherwise, if there’s text in the Knitting Makes column, display that; otherwise, if there’s text in the Spinning Makes column, display that.

• Cover Photo (photo)
  Because it’s easier, I usually just copy the pictures from the lookup fields for each project type and paste them over into this one. And then, because this is my “finished projects” view, I usually delete my WIP pictures, but of course you can do whatever you want to with your pictures.

• Project Type (formula)
  This formula is similar to the Name formula above: if there’s text in the Sewing Type lookup column (which pulled in the sewing project type), display that; otherwise, if there’s text in the Knitting Type column (which pulled in the knitting project type), display that; otherwise, it’s a spinning project (assumed because the other two will always have an identified type).

• Sewing, Knitting, Spinning Photo fields (lookup)
  Again, I already did all the work here, so once you link a record it will fill in the appropriate fields automatically

• Date Started (formula)
  The formula pulls in the date from whichever lookup column is filled out (sewing, knitting, or spinning).

• Date Finished (formula)

  The formula pulls in the date from whichever lookup column is filled out (sewing, knitting, or spinning).

• Finished? (formula based on Date Finished)
  I made this primarily so I can create a filter on finished: yes or finished: no, rather than trying to mess with filtering on dates and empty fields.

• Links to Projects/Makes tabs:

  • Sewing Makes (link to Sewing Makes tab)

  • Knitting Makes (link to Knitting Makes tab)

  • Spinning Makes (link to Spinning Makes tab)

  These are also technically “original” records because you do have to add the data yourself, but if you’ve done it from your project record it’s already filled in on this end, so I consider them more automatic than not.

Other Tabs

Since this blog post is already a novel, I’m going to go less in-depth on these, but hopefully by now you’re familiar with the way Airtable works in general and the way I’ve set up this template.

Pattern Makers

I decided to use only one tab for pattern makers — both sewing and knitting — because the information collected about these individuals or companies is essentially the same: name, website, types of patterns made (this will also useful for knit+crochet designers), and links to the projects.

Yarn and Fabric Stores

Again, I decided to use one tab for all stores, because several stores I buy from stock fabric, yarn, and fiber, so it doesn’t make sense to separate these. I created a column for whether I’m buying from an individual vendor (usually indie dyer) or a store; whether they sell yarn, fabric, or both; where they’re located; and URLs to their online shops.

People & Measurements

These are two separate tabs, but I’ll talk about them at the same time. The People tab is fairly straightforward — who have I made things for? What’s nice about having these as linked records is that I can add a rollup (sum) of how many knitting or sewing projects I’ve made for a particular person (spoiler: not many). The Measurements tab will be useful for me to keep track of my own measurements but also to make sure that if/when I do make garments or sized things for my friends and family, that I have their measurements as well.

Needle Inventory

I’m going to be honest here: I never liked Ravelry’s needle inventory, because I always wanted to be able to do more with it. In typical Jane fashion, I might have made this more complicated than it needs to be, but it works for me and that’s really what counts here. I’m keeping track of my interchangeable needles (brand + length are key differentiators), but also how many interchangeable cords I have of which length and what needles they’ll fit. I’m hoping it saves me rooting around in eight different bags just to see if I have another 24” cord or not.

And there you have it!

Hopefully this was somewhat useful and helped explain a bit more about Airtable, the template I created, and how I’ve been using it. Again, the Airtable template can be found here, you can sign up for a free account forever, and if I missed anything or you’d like to know more, please let me know.

On Ravelry

It’s my birthday, and I’m celebrating by taking the day off, treating myself to some cake, and…writing about how terribly Ravelry has mishandled (and continues to mishandle) their new website interface.

This post has been a while coming, but now that I have some time to sit down and think (and, because Ravelry has continued to ignore the problem and have now escalated to gaslighting users and lying about people who have spoken up about this) I’m collecting my thoughts.

First: I know there’s a lot of other stuff going on. We’re still in a pandemic, we’re still fighting for Black lives, we’re still protesting injustice and trying to stop our country from becoming a fascist state. These have not gone away, and I have not forgotten about them.

I learned how to knit several times before it stuck. I learned in middle school, and was such a tight knitter my mom gave up because I couldn’t even get the stitches off the needle. I learned again in high school, knitting these absurd scarves out of one color yarn held with a different color of fun fur, and luckily since these were knit on size 17s or so I did a little better with the tension. I learned again after college, when a friend decided to knit a Ravenclaw scarf and I decided I wanted to knit one too.

And then, I had just moved to Boston and my mom and aunt came out to visit, and we drove down the cape to Provincetown and on the way back stopped at a yarn store on a whim. I found some yarn I liked (it had sparkles in it), and had many beginner-questions for the shopkeeper like “If I want to make it this wide how much yarn should I buy?” and “what needles should I use?”. She said “have you heard about Ravelry?” and wrote the website down for me on a piece of paper, and a couple days later I remembered that she’d mentioned this mystery website and signed up for an account.

And that was that. Since 2011, Ravelry has been one of the most regular sites I use. It’s got yarn, it’s got patterns, it’s got fancy math behind the scenes, it’s got one of my favorite faceted searches ever (yes I am a nerd), and it had people I could go to for help with anything knitting or yarn-related. I found new yarns on Ravelry. I found new designers on Ravelry. I participated in KALs on Ravelry. I got testers for my knitting designs on Ravelry. I bought almost every knitting pattern I’ve ever used on Ravelry. I told everyone I knew who crafted that Ravelry was the best thing out there for knitters and crocheters.

And now, I can’t use Ravelry (and I’m far from the only one), and Ravelry…doesn’t care. It’s been a month, and it’s becoming increasingly clear that Ravelry is not going to fix this problem, that Ravelry doesn’t believe its users when they say this new website is harming them, that Ravelry is going to deny that anything is happening at all. That instead of saying “we’re sorry, we’ll switch back to the old site so that we don’t give people seizures and headaches anymore, did we mention we’re sorry”, they’re buckling down, giving us all the middle finger, and cutting off any way to get in touch with them so that they don’t have to admit they made a mistake.

I think it’s accurate to say that I’m heartbroken about this. I thought Ravelry was here for us. I thought Ravelry was an inclusive website. I thought Ravelry cared about their users. Obviously I was wrong. So, I’m not using Ravelry anymore. I’m supporting projects like fiber.club, who will actually listen to what users need, and I’m moving my entire knitting project and yarn database to Airtable.

If you know me, it’s no secret that I love Airtable. I use it for everything I possibly can — tracking the books I read, keeping an eye on my expenses, storing info about my wardrobe and outfits — so it isn’t too surprising that I’ve moved all my crafting data there too. I’d been thinking for a while about learning how to API so that I could get my knitting projects from Ravelry and my sewing & quilting projects from Textillia (which I have absolutely not kept up with) all in the same place and have a more comprehensive view of what I make, how long it takes me, and what else I worked on at the same time. If I’m not using Ravelry anymore, I don’t really need to learn how to connect it to an API now, do I.

If you don’t know anything about Airtable, the easiest way I’ve found to describe it is either “it’s like Excel on steroids” or “it’s a baby relational database”, depending on how you like to think about things. I’ve set mine up with different sections for sewing/cross-stitching/quilting (“things I do with needles and fabric and thread”), knitting/crocheting (“things I do with yarn”), and spinning (which does turn in to yarn but is itself different from a knitting project). Then, I’ve pulled everything into one combined table so I can see that comprehensive overview while still being able to track different craft-specific information and materials used.

I’m still working on putting all of the information I want into this Airtable (I’m adding needles and pattern information next), and I still haven’t decided how much of this I want to make public-public. I also think I’ll make another post that goes more in-depth on which pieces connect to each other, but if you’re interested in trying this out for yourself or poking around Airtable, I made a template and published it on Airtable Universe so that you can copy a shell of what I did and fill in your own information.

One thing I can’t re-create is the links to other projects, the extensive pattern search, the yarn database, and the community. That’ll have to wait for fiber.club.

April, May, June...

Time is no longer real, and now the year is half over and I haven’t kept track of anything here in three months!

I’ve been working from home since the end of February, and I’m extremely privileged to be able to do so. It’s been a quiet few months because I haven’t been going anywhere, but it’s also been an intense few months because of everything that’s been going on. I didn’t get that boost of productivity that some of the internet seemed to get at the beginning of the quarantine, but I have been plugging away at a few projects.

A caveat: I am still linking to Ravelry projects and users, though I’m aware of the accessibility issues with Ravelry’s new interface. If you have trouble with the new site, please be careful when clicking these links. Until a suitable replacement is made, I will still be using Ravelry for some things, though I’m transitioning other bits away. Stay turned for a deeper dive into what I’m working on for that.

April

I’ve kept up knitting one pair of socks per month from my Farmer’s Daughter Fibers Sock Squad yarn. April’s was a delightful bright yellow that I’ve been wearing when I need cheering up, or when the mornings are chilly.

I finished my Lizzie Shawl by Susanne Sommer and love, love, love the way the colors work together. I used a kit from TréLiz in colors Sealskin and Careless Whisper.

I started working on the teeniest tiniest project I have ever made (and probably will ever make): a shawl using laceweight yarn on size 00 (1.75 mm) needles. I swatched many different things before finally settling on a heavily modified Peach Tree Shawl by Sylvia McFadden — heavily modified because Sylvia’s pattern uses DK yarn! It may take me an entire year to finish, but in the end I think it’s going to work out really well.

I didn’t sew much in April — I made a couple of masks, but everything else felt like too much.

May

I got a little bit of my sewing mojo back in May — I pieced together some Ace & Jig scraps that I had lying around the house. I’d like to make a quilt and once I pieced together what I had, I did some quick math and figured out that I needed a few more scraps to make something lap-sized, so now I have a lot of half-square triangles waiting for more A&J scraps to turn into a larger quilt.

It was #MeMadeMay and I had a very low-key celebration of occasionally wearing clothes I made, and mostly continuing to wear comfortable lounge clothes.

I finished another Junebug and Darlin cross stitch, and despite my best intentions it’s still sitting on the TV table waiting for me to soak it and stretch it out.

My May Sock Squad socks were this lovely tweedy purple, and I picked this pattern (Astrantia by Helen Stewart) because it had enough interest at the beginning but then turned into plain vanilla once you got past the heel.

I kept working on my teeny tiny Peach Trees shawl — so much so that when I switched back to sock needles (a very small US 1.5 / 2.5 mm) I was shocked by how big they felt in my hands.

And I also bought an Electric Eel Wheel Nano, a small portable spinning wheel. I noticed a few people post about it on Instagram, and it was at a size- and price-point that I was comfortable with, and friends — I love it. I spun up the rest of my practice roving, immediately ordered more from a local farm, and then quickly ordered even more fiber, this time from Neighborhood Fiber Co. Now I just have to balance my spinning with my yarn stash, which keeps growing even though I tell myself I have enough yarn.

June

I spun up this braid of Polwarth from Neighborhood Fiber Co. and then plied it, and I am in love with the colors it made. The Nano wheel has small bobbins, so I wound up with several small skeins (40g or less), which is fine for a beginner (that’s me), but I can also see myself wanting to be able to spin more on a bigger bobbin. But the whole point of buying the Nano was to try a small electric spinning wheel, and by that criteria, I’ve been extremely successful.

June’s Sock Squad socks were the Lyne socks by Dawn Henderson, who writes such gorgeous patterns. I love these shortie socks and may just make lots of shortie socks for the rest of the year, but we’ll see where the wind takes me on that front.

I kept knitting my teeny tiny Peach Trees, and I also started a test knit for Transmutation Knits using this soft and shiny purple Linen-Alpaca blend.

Phew! Are you tired? Because I’m tired. And I haven’t even talked about the important stuff like the momentum in the Black Lives Matter movement and how the pandemic has laid bare the hideousness of capitalism and the way I see crafting as inextricably linked to our liberation. I’m not as good at writing about that stuff anymore, but I’m working on it.

March Roundup

Well, what a weird month March has been, huh? I have been working remotely the entire month — first because I caught a cold from my mom during my visit to Colorado, and then because the whole country has been slowly shutting down to contain COVID-19, starting with Seattle. Somehow the month has whizzed by as I’ve adjusted to sleeping in later (!), getting into a work-from-home groove, and trying to decide if upping my coffee intake has been a good idea or a great idea.

In terms of projects: I hemmed and put buttons on my black wool Estuary skirt and wore it exactly one time before social distancing kicked in. I finished my Brontë Sister Shawl, I knit my March Sock Squad Socks, and I (finally) started my Lizzie Shawl, which I may or may not finish later today.

I love the way my Brontë Sister Shawl by Lindsey Fowler turned out. I used three of Junkyarn’s Little Women colors: Marmee, Beth, and Louisa.

March Socks: Brioche Toe-Up Socks by Lavanya Patricella. As I said on Instagram, I’m really glad I didn’t have to knit these on the bus, because two-at-a-time two-color brioche socks are not for the faint of heart. Luckily I just knit these on my couch, where I could untangle the yarn after each row to my heart’s content.

I’m very close to being done with my Lizzie Shawl by Susanne Sommer, using a kit I preordered from TréLiz in October. I have one pattern repeat left and then the giant icord bind-off, so if I don’t finish it tonight I’m betting I’ll get to it tomorrow. I am so in love with the way these two colors knit up together, and this yarn is a dream.

I’ve also been learning how to spin! I bought a drop spindle and some roving and am slowly getting used to the way fiber feels and how it spins up. It’ll definitely take me a while to improve, but I have to keep reminding myself that this is how learning something new works.

Outfits: I’m going to be honest here, there were about three days this month where I put on “real” clothes, although one of them was the day I wore my new Estuary Skirt.

Up next: I need to pick a pattern for my April socks. I might start on my Indira using Ocean By The Sea’s yarn, I might (slowly) pick back up where I left off on my Seven Wonders sweater, or I might finally knit the Ursa Sweater I’ve been planning with a delightful colorway from Earl Grey Fiber Company.

February Roundup

February was a relatively unsurprising month, and went so much faster than January. I made great progress on my Brontë Sister Shawl, I almost finished knitting that bulky weight scarf for my coworker, and I knit my February Sock Squad socks. I also sewed most of my black wool Estuary Skirt (!) and just have the buttons and the bottom hem left.

February Socks: Winter Rose Socks by Helen Stewart. This month’s yarn was a merino/cashmere mix, and I wanted something delicate but cozy to go along with it. My new bar for sock knitting patterns is “can I memorize it fast enough to knit on the bus?” and the answer to this one was absolutely yes, I can.

Outfits, there were 14 days where I wore at least one thing I made. Most popular: my Dusk Light Shawl, my Trelawney Scarf, my Rose Cardigan, and my clay Estuary Skirt. I’ve also been wearing my knitted socks more, but I don’t keep track of those in the same way.

Up next: This morning I started on my March Sock Squad Socks — I’m making a three-color Brioche Toe-Up Socks by Lavanya Patricella. It’s possible that I’ll finish my Bronte Sisters Shawl this month, or I may start on something else on my list. It’s interesting how I used to be such a project monogamist but am really leaning in to having several projects on my needles to switch things up.

January Roundup

I don’t know about you, but January felt like an eternity, and I’m so glad it’s over. February isn’t much better weather-wise in Seattle, but at least it’s not January, and I get to visit my nephews at the end of the month. This month, I finally finished the top ribbing on a pair of socks that I’d started in October but had to pause for a month or so while waiting for my wrist to be less mad at me, I knit a pair of socks out of my Farmer’s Daughter Fibers January Sock Squad, and I finished my Dusk Light shawl by Sylvia McFadden. I didn’t sew anything, which feels appropriate for how January felt.

Dusk Light: Used two skeins of Arby’s by Valkyrie Fibers in the most luminous, amazing purple. In the days since I blocked it, I’ve worn it about 90% of the time.

Kia Socks by Dawn Henderson: Used Grab the Bull By The Horns by the Farmer’s Daughter Fibers sock squad for January. 10/10 for both yarn and pattern.

For outfits, there were 13 days I wore at least one thing I made myself. I’m figuring out how I want to do this section, but I do want to keep better track of how and when I wear my me-mades, and in what types of outfits. For now, it may just be a monthly number.

As for new projects, I started a Brontë Sisters Shawl using three of Junkyarn’s Little Women colors, and I finally started a bulky cowl I promised my coworker I’d make her. Today I’ll probably cast on my February socks so that I can get started on them on the bus tomorrow.

2020 Plans

I know right now that I’m not going to get everything done in 2020 that I want to make, but I want to collect it all here so that I can keep track of it somewhere. In 2020, I want to sew/knit down my stash, because I acquired a lot of stuff in 2019. There are definitely things I’m going to buy — I want to make a Clare Coat and my parents bought me some lovely wool melton for Christmas, but I still need to buy the lining — but I want the majority of my projects to use materials I already have.

Sewing

• Clare Coat

  • Like I said, I have some wool melton from my parents (although they only had 2 yards in stock when they ordered), and I just need to pick a lining, order more wool (and cross my fingers), and get started.

• Wiksten Shift tops:

  • I have fabric that Arounna from Bookhou designed

  • My parents got me this lovely linen/wool doublegauze that I want to try piecing a top out of, to get the most of the double-sided-ness

  • I have some octopus print fabric that will likely turn into this top too

• Wiksten Shift Dress

  • I have fabric with metallic gold skulls on it that will, eventually, become a dress. I also have leftover mustard twill that may also turn into a Wiksten dress

• Kelly Anorak

  • Yes, this has been in my queue for at least a year, maybe two. I think I’ve finally decided that I want to line this, so I’m going to get the lining expansion and some lining, and then I’ll actually make it.

• Wool Estuary Skirt

  • I have some mystery wool from my grandmother that I think should be enough to make this. This should be higher on my list because I’d like to make it while I can still wear it this winter, so that means soon.

• Rainbow Estuary Skirt

  • I bought some delightful rainbow linen over the summer but haven’t made anything yet, and how fortuitous for me that I got distracted, because it will make the most amazing Estuary skirt.

• Several varieties of Sew Liberated’s new Lichen Duster

  • Obviously I need this in a super-luxurious silk or velvet to lounge around the house in, and I’d love to make this out of a twill or similar to wear out and about.

Knitting

• Dusk Light (in progress) using Valkyrie Fibers yarn in the most luminous purple

• I’d like to finish my Seven Wonders sweater

• Kia Socks using Farmer’s Daughter Fibers January Sock Squad yarn

  • On the socks note, I signed up for FDF’s Sock Squad, and I have a (very tentative) goal of making one pair of socks per month? On the one hand, it may be easy because I can knit on the bus. On the other hand, I may get nothing else made and might re-prioritize in a couple months.

• Ursa Sweater using Earl Grey Fiber Co’s English Breakfast Bulky in Moth Wings

• Sizzle Pop using two of my own indigo-dyed skeins of yarn

• Brontë Sister Shawl using three of Junkyarn’s Little Women colors

• Indira using (hopefully) some Ocean by the Sea yarn that I ordered

• A scarf I’m going to design that marls neon and greyscale speckled yarn from Black Cat Fibers

• Cozy Classic Raglan using yarn I haven’t decided on yet

• Lizzie or Brioche Tiles (I still can’t decide!) using a TréLiz kit that I couldn’t resist

• Shifty using House of A La Mode in neon colors

• Ember using a variety of yarn I keep changing my mind about

Weaving

Oh, I weave? Have I had the same project on my rigid heddle loom for approximately 1.5 years? Yes, and yes. I’d like to finish that project, because I have at least two plans for more woven scarves, perhaps even using something other than plain weave — but we’ll see about that part. I have two skeins of silk/merino from Sweet Georgia that I got at Knit City, and two skeins of yak/bamboo from Bijou Basin Ranch that I got at last year’s Taos Wool and Fiber Festival.

What Else Could I Possibly Have Ideas About?

I’m so glad you asked. I have a few damaged Ace & Jig pieces that I’d like to piece into a variety of things — pants into a top, a dress into a half-square-triangle block, lots of scraps that I can make scrappy things out of. I also have some indigo scraps that I’d like to piece together to make something. I still have my hand-dyed quilt top that I dyed a backing for but have not yet quilted together, because I want to hand quilt it and that still feels intimidating. I want to keep cross-stitching. I want to keep dyeing yarn and fabric. And we all know I’ll probably find another new hobby in 2020 that I won’t be able to resist.

2019: The Final Quarter

I’m in about the same #2019MakeNine place as I was when I last posted, except I finished my Courage Shawl. The Kelly Anorak is still waiting for me, I still haven’t brought myself to make an FBA for the Farrow Dress, I haven’t even thought about the Lou Box Dress, and I still have no further ideas for which blazer/jacket I want to make, although I have decided that I want it to be with two-sided fabric. But all that non-progress on my official Make Nine doesn’t mean I didn’t make anything in the last few months!

So, what else did I make from September — December?

• Piton Socks with yarn from Neighborhood Fiber Co

• Wiksten Haori #3 with Quilted Jacquard Cotton from Merchant & Mills

• Gypsum Skirt with spruce-colored silk noil

• Holiday Dress with deadstock art-deco style fabric from La Mercerie

• Poinsettia Cross Stitch kit from Junebug and Darlin

• A Scarf for my Father out of Poppy Yarn and Fibre that I picked up at Knit City

Other things that happened this quarter: I got a new job, I started teaching an online class, and I took my final online class for the post-Master’s Knowledge Management certificate I’ve been working on — so it’s safe to say this was a really busy semester for me, and my making-plans went a little sideways.

I also started having trouble with my wrist, so even though I started a Seven Wonders sweater in the most amazing Farmer’s Daughter Fibers tweed that I’m super pumped about, I had to put it aside for a while because it was too much stress on my wrist. I’m still not entirely sure I can pick it back up again regularly, but I think if I take it slow I’ll be okay. So, instead of knitting the last three or so months, I’ve been sewing more and starting another new hobby — cross stitch.

Junebug and Darlin makes amazing cross stitch kits, and I picked up three of them when she was up at Urban Craft Uprising in December. This poinsettia wreath was a perfect starter and an equally perfect gift for my mom, who loves poinsettias. I’m already working on my second — Be Bold.

This fabric is absolutely amazing, and even though it frayed like anything it was really fun to work with and I love how cozy my third Wiksten Haori is. This time I made the mid-length, and I lined it with a nice toffee colored tencel. I even have a bit left over that I think I can make a top out of!

This is the only picture of my Gypsum Skirt — I’ve been trying to find ‘good’ places to take outfit photos at work, and this spot usually has a reasonable amount of natural light, though you can see I still have some work to do on angles. I pushed this up my to-make list when I found this amazing spruce-colored silk noil. I’ve been layering it with leggings and sweaters (especially my hand-knit sweaters), and it’s been perfect for our Seattle winter so far. Plus, it has extra large pockets for yarn and snacks.

I’ve been thinking about my plans for 2020, and I’ll post about those soon.

My #2019MakeNine: Round 1

The List

It’s September, which means that the year is more than half over, and I’m almost (but not quite) halfway through this list. That doesn’t mean I haven’t been making things — I have 10 knitting projects finished so far out of my challenge of 15, I made another Dress #2 (always), I went through a tank-top-making phase in the early summer, and I made Sew Liberated’s newly released Estuary Skirt out of this amazing clay-colored linen. My main goal with this project (as with many new things lately) was to be more intentional about the things I’m making - am I contributing to a cohesive and multipurpose wardrobe, or am I continuing to add a mishmash of things to my closet? (I think the answer so far this year is both, really.) So, you’ll notice that I made some updates to the list, but I think I’ve held true to the underlying goal for each make.

✓ Rose Cardigan
☐ Farrow Dress
✓ Palisade Pants
☐ Kelly Anorak
✓ Wiksten Haori
✓ Some Other Pants Estuary Skirt
☐ Teroldego Shawl Courage Shawl
☐ Lou Box Dress
☐ Some Sort of Blazer/Jacket

The Makes

I’ve blogged about the Rose Cardigan and my second Wiksten Haori before, so I’m going to skip those. The maker of the Palisade Pants is unfortunately problematic, so this is probably the last time I’ll talk about this pattern by name.

My new Estuary Skirt, on the other hand, is one of my new favorite makes, and I already have a second and third planned. I still have plans to make more pants, but as my #memademay adventure showed, I don’t have a lot of bottoms, so I think swapping this out on my official list doesn’t change the intent that much.

I’ve been waiting for this pattern ever since I saw one of Meg’s Instagram posts with her wearing one — and I knew exactly what I was going to use to make it. I bought this linen with the original goal of making a tank top and shorts fake-jumpsuit combo, but that all changed as soon as this skirt came around. I sewed this while visiting a friend in Santa Fe (where I also helped her make some pants!), and the color-material-pattern combo was perfect for a late-July sewing project.

The Plans

My Courage Shawl is in progress, and I changed this one because the underlying goal here was to make something large that I could wrap around myself — which is definitely true of the Courage Shawl.

Farrow Dress: I’m still saving the perfect grey fabric for this, and during my insert-a-bust-dart adventure I figured out what was holding me back - it’s that this pattern doesn’t have bust darts, and in order for this to work as a sleeveless dress, I’d need to go an FBA. Now that I’m more comfortable with doing an FBA, I just have to actually alter the pattern to make this work.

Kelly Anorak: Still have the material, still don’t have the finishing kit, still planning on making it — eventually.

Lou Box Dress: This one has just been on the back burner for a while, but I know I’ll get around to it.

Blazer/Jacket: I think I’m leaning toward a Berlin Jacket with some as-yet-unpurchased boiled wool, but I’m also letting the hint of fall that I’m starting to feel lead me on this one.

#MeMadeMay 2019 Roundup

The Wears

I made some basic rules for myself — I didn’t want this to be stressful, so I gave myself weekends off to wear whatever caught my fancy. There were a couple times that I worked from home and didn’t get out of my PJs, so in those cases I usually made up for it on the weekends. I also challenged myself to wear something unique every day — I could repeat things, but only if I also wore something I hadn’t yet worn that month. That made it easier to think up outfits that complemented each other and combined pieces I like, and I didn’t have to worry so much about “repeating” myself.

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Overall impressions: I have a lot of me-mades! Also, May is a tricky month: as the weather warms up, I have fewer me-mades to wear since the majority of mine are sweaters and scarves. For instance, I didn’t get to wear my Dreyma cardigan because it never got cold enough, I didn’t really get to wear any of my sweaters (only one day was cold enough!), and I really only wore 5 different scarves (out of 17).

In general, Me-Made May made me think differently about how and when I wear my me-mades. I do usually try to wear something I’ve made every day, but I don’t often thinking about not repeating myself over the course of an entire month (as opposed to a week or two weeks). I also found myself wearing fewer RTW tops that I really like because I don’t have a whole lot of me-made bottoms to wear them with.

The Makes

I didn’t go in to May planning on making anything specific, but I did find myself inspired throughout the month. First, I finally found an amazing lining for my second Wiksten Haori jacket to go with the chambray I found in January, so I made that.

Second, one major thing I noticed about my wardrobe is that I don’t have a lot of warm weather clothes like t-shirts or tank tops. On a whim, I went to JoAnn and bought a tank top pattern from Butterick. Little did I know that Butterick patterns hail from the 1800s for their sizing, but luckily with a bit of fussing I made it work (including adding bust darts where there were none!). I’ve made a couple more adjustments in the ones I’ve made since, and I think I’ve finally found a winner. I may or may not be planning on making about 20 more…

Overall, I think my first #MeMadeMay was a success!

Sweaters for Days

I’ve made sweaters before, but since November I’ve been pretty consistently on a knit-all-the-sweaters kick, and I thought I’d collect them all here.

Zweig

This one started when I bought a skein of Farmers Daughters Fibers yarn to use as a contrast color and realized I had the perfect main color from Fidalgo Artisan Yarns already in my stash. I’ve written about this one many times before, so I’ll just let the picture speak for itself.

Weekender

This was my Christmas-vacation knit: I got the entire body done while visiting my parents, and finished up the sleeves when I got home. I love the exposed seam, the combination of reverse stockinette + regular stockinette, and the way the yarn colors knit up.

Dreyma

This has been in the works for a while — I love the pattern and bought the yarn for this in Iceland in September, but knew I couldn’t make a pullover out of Léttlopi and wear it comfortably in Seattle, so I decided to convert it to a cardigan. It is surprisingly satisfying to knit a whole thing in the round (take that, purling!) but still have it be a cardigan at the end of things. I can definitely say I’m hooked.

Rose

This is the most interestingly constructed sweater that I’ve ever made, and likely the most satisfying. I am in love with everything about it — the yarn, the pattern, the fade — and I’ve worn it almost every day since I finished it.

In the works

I started knitting a Caitlin over the weekend using some amazing colors from Valkyrie Fibers’ Stone Lore series. I also have plans for Nordiska using some amazing yarn from Ocean By The Sea as soon as I swatch up some contrast colors to make a final decision, and I bought some (more) House of A La Mode yarn to make a Shifty Sweater.

My #2019MakeNine

I’ve never participated in one of these before, though I’ve definitely made nine things in a year (last year I knit 15 projects, and that doesn’t count all the sewing!). But I like the idea of planning out a year and really considering what kinds of clothes and accessories I want to make. Turns out most of these have been on my list for a while anyway, and it feels nice to write down some actual plans, instead of playing by ear!

(If you’re not sure what the “Make Nine” challenge is you can check out the original post from a few years ago and the official instagram.)

Rose Cardigan

I’ve already made a start on this one — in a previous post I talked about being unable to resist a black heart fade kit from House of A La Mode. Not only am I in love with Heather’s colors and the way they fade together, the Rose Cardigan is also the most interestingly constructed garment I’ve ever knitted, so it’s been really fun to knit.

Farrow Dress

I’ve had this one in my plans for a while and still haven’t gotten around to making it, so I’m hoping that writing it on this list will actually get it done! I’ve already made one Farrow Dress and I love it. My plan for this one is to make a sleeveless version with this lovely grey wool-silk blend that I found in a bargain bin at the fabric store. It’s technically not wide enough for the pattern, so I’m hoping that I can play pattern-tetris successfully.

Palisade Pants

I bought some lovely yarn-dyed linen for this pattern, which is my baby-step in to sewing pants (gulp!)

Kelly Anorak

I’ve wanted to make one of these for a while, and bought some amazing twill from La Mercerie. My goal is actually to make two - this one is going to be charcoal and will have naturally dyed & pieced accent pockets, and the other will be something toffee colored with a lining. But before I tackle a lined coat, I’m going to make the unlined version out of the fabric I already have!

(Another) Wiksten Haori

The same day I bought that yarn-dyed linen, I also found a lovely chambray that I just couldn’t leave at the store. I don’t have the exact plans or a lining fabric yet, but I’m thinking a short version of the Wiksten Haori.

Some Other Pants

Assuming that my Palisade Pants are successful, I’d like to try and sew another pair of pants, as yet undetermined. Ginger Jeans? Not-yet-released Philippa Pants? Lander Pants? We’ll find out!

Teroldego Shawl

I actually started this shawl with some yarn that I dyed up, but stopped after a couple inches because I didn’t like the way the colors all went together. So, while this is still on my list it’s awaiting some more thought and color work before it turns into a real thing.

Lou Box Dress

I spied someone wearing this at my LYS and fell in love with it — I have no fabric ideas for it, but definitely want to make one.

Some Sort of Blazer/Jacket

There are so many good blazer/jacket ideas out there! I’m in love with the Berlin Jacket, the Sapporo Coat, the Tory Wrap Coat, and the Fulton Sweater Blazer. And I’m willing to bet that I find even more as the year goes on.