ambitious quilt start

I did this color chart of fabric a while ago. Sunday night I finally started the quilt! It feels a little bit like a great journey has started. There were a few activation barriers I had to get over to get going. First, was wrapping my head around all the fabrics and how they mapped onto what was in the pattern. That I accomplished in February by making myself a little chart using snips of each fabric and some glue. 

Second was the fact that I am kind of intimidated by the very large cut of background fabric I have. The thought of cutting it into tiny pieces is not the best because that seems like an awful lot of work! Thankfully the instructions pretty clearly help you stage this process by the type of block and corresponding size of quilt you are making. When I realized I could do that by block design and not have to do it all at once, that was a much smaller problem. So I went ahead and got started on one of the simpler blocks. There are two stages of cuts - one for larger pieces and the second to subcut the individual pieces for each block. These are my piles of first stage cuts for the nine aloe blocks.  

I chose the aloe first because it seems like the simplest. It also has just two colors in it, so I felt like I could keep track without needing to label anything. The cutting is indeed detailed - some of the strips were different by just a quarter of an inch! And this will take precise piecing. This first aloe turned out a little bit less wide than it was supposed to even though I thought I was using a scant seam. Thankfully the width was easily remedied with some elbow grease and the iron. Still, go scanter. 

It will be interesting to see how this goes. I'm certain it will be slow. I'm also certain to learn a lot in the process about myself, my sewing tendencies, and my preferences. Avanti!
 

project planning

I cleaned up my craft space today.  It felt like an appropriate activity to refresh my headspace and take stock of what I was up to since I just got a big project off of my needles. I can tell I have the itch to start something new! I still have a couple of things going that I'd like done, though, so I am making the choice to wait until at least one of those (the blanket or the summer tank) is done before casting on a new project. I think I have been watching too many YouTube influencers start all. the. things. 

I had a couple items of yarn that entered the chat from LYS day yesterday so that got me playing with my stash and considering what I wanted to cast on next. Since I was planning and have been having an excellent time making project bags, I decided to tuck the yarn (and in one case, wind it) into bags so they are ready to go when I am. 

There is of course the yellow for my Agave sweater that I have been thinking about forever - a yarn crawl purchase and my next garment start. The other yarn crawl item is the dark blue cake which will become a textured scarf. I think that should be a fun project that's easy but interesting. The bright poppy red skein in the appropriately neon bag is going to be a micro scarf. I have been loving the little crocheted Sophie scarf my mom made me, and I've been thinking about a knitted one. I actually went to the LYS with the intention of getting JUST yarn for that little scarf and for checking out the DK stock for potential materials for a crochet row blanket project. There wasn't much I liked for the row blanket, but I did look at patterns and find one for a cute shrug. And lo, she also had the right type of yarn. That will be a fun no thinking project, so probably great for when I finish my blanket up and is hanging out in my big Firefly tote until I'm ready to start. 

It felt good to line up the next projects. Of course, I still have a few other long-term projects that will remain on the go (Clint shawl and tiny succulents, I'm looking at you) but I like the idea of waiting until at least one of the blanket or tank top is done before picking up a new shiny object. This process was fun and I kind of feel like I've already started ;) 

a good soak

I finished knitting my Geddy Tee last night! I had put it down for a few days this week (after finishing the body last Friday) because I had the impression that picking up stitches for the arms and neck was going to be annoying. It absolutely was not. The arms were super fast, and even the neck was a breeze. I picked up the neck in the morning yesterday and was binding off at the end of the day with a short amount of knitting time. I was feeling kind of like a knitting super hero. 

My next hurdle was weaving in ends! I sent a photo the knit night ladies after binding off and then intended on putting it aside to work on my throw blanket. Better sense prevailed and I got a needle to take care of the ends right away. If I had not, I'm sure it would have been another couple of weeks before that was done. There were a lot from the granny squares, though they were mostly woven in as I crocheted so I just snipped those off, and the rest in the body and ribbing weren't actually that difficult to do, I just don't love it. I chatted on the phone while doing them, so it went by fast. 

This morning I felt motivated to get it blocked right away; I'm hoping to wear it to work one day this coming week! Given how vibrant this yarn is I was not altogether surprised to see some dye coming out in the water, but it did mean I soaked this for very little time and mostly with the granny squares parked up on the side out of the water. I did not want the green to catch onto those bright pinks and muddy them up. 

I haven't pinned anything except the bottom ribbing, which I want to tame to be as wide as the body, or at least as close as possible. It is currently puckering the bottom in way more than I really want (and more than the pattern photos suggest is correct).  When I first laid it out it was 26" across, so nearly 52". This is supposed to be a 48", so I slid the fabric around a little bit vertically to make it longer. It is now measuring closer to 24.5", so 49" which is close enough. I tried it on before blocking and mostly liked how it fit so I'm a bit nervous about how it will be after blocking. Way too big? Way too long? I knit it longer than recommended by 2" to avoid it being too short so this would be ironic. It feels like some of the "spring" has come out of the fabric but that could come back as it dries. This is always the price I pay for not doing a gauge swatch - suspense while blocking! 

nesting baskets

This set of very satisfying baskets was what occupied me in the evenings most of this past weekend. I have been doing so much knitting lately, I wanted to play with some crochet for a change. The yarn for this project has been hanging around in plain sight in my craft closet for a very long time. I purposely put them where I'd see them, and kind of in the way of getting my ball winder out, because when I bought them I intended to start these right away. Ha! Best laid plans... 

I'm pretty sure it was cruising around Pinterest that led me to this lined basket. I was intrigued both by the nesting habit and the two color design. Curious, I went and found the pattern (free on Ravelry) and now here we are many moons later. I have a well behaved lineup of colorful cylinders. I played around with the middle size to see what swapping the variegated and solid would look like. I like it both ways, but the solid ball of yarn has more yardage than the variegated ball does, so I wouldn't have wanted to do all of them solid on the outside. This way I used up every last bit of yarn. (Disclaimer: I did make the second one last and ended up making it one row shorter than the others to do so.)

I love how the variegation behaves differently depending on the circumference of the basket. I especially like the pooling of the largest one. These are nested up and settled in with the other things I'll be sending to my mom at some point soon for an extremely handmade Mother's Day. I have another set of solid/variegated yarn to make another set for myself, but my RSI says I should take a break from crochet and go back to knitting for a bit! 

 

a quick mushroomy bag

I have been watching a lot of knitting YouTube lately which means I have been seeing a lot of lovely project bags. I've enjoyed my Firefly Totes very much (both big and small), and I've made small drawstring bags too. What I've seen that I haven't tried yet has been kind of angular, boxy bottom, zippered top project bags that look like they're kind of a standard type. I don't have a pattern for it myself so I went looking. I ended up using a YouTube tutorial from Voolenvine that was very clear to follow and looked like it was about the type I was seeing. 

I ended up not using the measurements given in the tutorial just because the scrap of this awesome mushroom fabric was a bit bigger. I kind of wish I had cut it down because the depth of the bag would be better suited to something wider, but I learned. No squares! Use rectangles :) Instead of fusible fleece, I used scrap batting I had on hand and just quilted the outer panels with straight lines spaced maybe 3/4" apart (followed an easy to see line on my sewing machine, no other reason for the spacing other than it seemed about right). No regrets there. It is sturdy and I think the vertical quilting helps it stand up as well. A fusible fleece may have been more robust, but I'm using what I've got and I've got a LOT of batting scraps.

I made the tab out of scraps of a cute snail print, a bit wider than called for - I cut a 4x3 piece (instead of 3x3) and made it 1" wide since my D ring was bigger. I ended up skipping the handle mostly because I didn't have a lobster claw finding to hand. I think I can hook a carabiner or something similar to the ring should I want something longer. Maybe a tassel! The inside is a heavy toile that is also in the canvas family. I've had it forever and it's nice to have another place to peek at it. It pairs quite well, if quirkily, with the mushrooms. 

I enjoyed making this, and it's going to be nice to use for something, whether travel or craft projects. If I make it again I'll fix the ratios. In the end, it's pretty darn close to the ones I have been seeing so that's awesome to know. I've seen a few other zipper installation configurations and it will be fun to understand those, too, if I can find a tutorial. I've been having a good time coming up with prints and zipper color combinations, so let the adventures continue.

big day for my geddy tee!

It's not done, but a milestone has been reached - the body and bottom ribbing are complete. I made it 1" longer in the body than recommended as well as 1" longer in the ribbing. I'm not sure if I'm going to end up regretting that in the final fit, but I am not exactly a cropped tee kind of shape. We shall see. I am going to decide now that I'll be brave and rip back and fix it if I don't love it after blocking. 

I'm a bit bummed about that one splash of pooling across the chest from the second skein, but that's what I get for not alternating skeins with a hand dyed, though tonal, yarn. I'm going to live with it and call it a feature. I have loved working with this yarn, and a woman at knit night this week put her finger on it when she said "Hella stitch definition!" I think that's what I love the most about how it looks. How it feels is pretty much the #1 feature - the silk in the blend is very apparent. It's also kind of hefty, so it will be interesting to see how this blocks out and drapes on me once everything is all done. I think it's going to be great. 

I just have to do ribbing around the armholes and the neckline now. "Just" may be understating how annoying it is likely to be, but it still feels like I'm in the home stretch. 

ring blanket progress

I have been making steady progress on my blanket project. This is about a month's worth of progress, and I have just two more stripes left! It has been great knitting for staff meetings and breaks at work when I don't have much brain power to devote to something but I still want to knit. This is where I am after this evening's knit night at the LYS. 

The yarn has been really nice to work with. It's just cotton, but it seems a bit softer and more slippy on the needles than other cottons which makes the knitting really easy on my hands. I'm still not a fan of ribbing, and this is a LOT of ribbing in the bigger rings, but I'm finding it a good opportunity to try out some different ways to knit rather than the lever style I usually use. I'm not a great continental knitter because I feel my tension is way looser and it's all messy but it is ok to do for a bit. I have actually have more luck with Norwegian purling than I do continental purling, so I've been playing with that, too. I don't think I will ever be an ambi-knitter, but it's fun to try.