Fiber arts: 11 months

[cahn]

It has been about 11 months since I learned how to crochet!

The number of meetings I have to go to has gone way down (mostly because the projects that had All The Meetings and which led to my learning crocheting in the first place came to an end or are on hiatus) so I have been churning out things at a much lower rate, but in fact I have been crocheting and, um, also doing more and more knitting.


Knitting: Knitting is becoming more and more fun for me, due to now having done enough knitting (mittens and a shawl) that everything isn't just slog, and the motions are kind of hypnotic, and also I've gotten faster. It's still a lot slower than crochet, but it's sort of the difference between not being able to see past the endless miles of knitting to the end of a project, and knowing that it's miles but it will end someday. Also I really like the way knitted fabric feels and drapes, more than crochet. *ducks* I stiiiiiill hate fixing knitting mistakes (THE WORST), although the kids have gotten used to knitting needles scattered about the house and know to leave them alone. I am at the stage where I really enjoy just doing knit stitch over and over so I feel like I should embrace that before my short-attention-span self decides I need to learn lace or something.



Here, have a pic of some mittens! You can see one of them is noticeably larger than the other, that was the one I did second and had more thoughts on how to make it fit properly (and it does for the most part, except for the top where I got impatient and should have knit a couple more rows, and didn't -- doesn't show in the picture, but I added them on at the end and it looks a little funny).

I have a problem, though:

Things I need and should knit, and would go well with my short attention span, and which I could use to learn more techniques: Dishcloths. (Several of our dishtowels have recently self-destructed -- a once-in-ten-years opportunity!) Fingerless gloves in wool. (I adore the acrylic crocheted fingerless gloves I made last year, but why have one when one could have two, of different materials :D ) More Socks!

Things I actually want to knit: Shawls. (I don't even wear shawls! But... so many pretty patterns... and many of them easy enough that I could actually do them... I guess I'll have to start wearing them. :P ) Sweaters. Well, okay, I do actually need sweaters... but they take forever, self, and you have to swatch and stuff, what are you thinking?!

Crochet: Since I last posted on this subject, I have finished Baby Blanket #2 (and don't want to make another one anytime soon -- baby blankets take foreeeeever, even crocheted, and tbh this one was kind of monotonous after a while -- but which I think came out pretty nice, and the recip really liked, so yay!);

and most of a cardigan which I am in the process of dismantling and erm, knitting into a shawl; and I finished all the tiles for the hexagon blanket which has been just sitting there for a couple of months now, waiting for me to put it together; and I just started square 37 of A.'s crochet Hue Shift blanket. Out of 100 squares. and not counting the border. I started it about a year ago. And yes, I took a lot of breaks, and yes, it's going faster than before, and I seem finally to have figured out how not to make mistakes, but right now it's at about 1 square/week, so at this rate I'll be done, uh, sometime next year.

...To be fair, at this precise moment I'm rewinding a lot of yarn (turns out that some yarns SAY they're center pull but in practice they collapse into hideous tangles if you actually DO center pull them, ahem) so I think I can go faster than 1 square/week after that, especially if this next work project starts up and I have more meetings again. And if no one else I really like has a baby! :)

Yarn: For mildred_of_midgard's wife: I have bought some Malabrigo (I used Mecha to make the mittens, and I've got some Rios now too) and it is so squishy and soft, I love it, thank you both for the rec and for the advice to treat it as one weight down, which has saved me a lot of grief :D

Comments

[philomytha]

Nice! Your mittens look great! I haven't done any knitting for ages, but some years ago I made a huge throw for my sister's wedding present, log cabin style in rainbow colours, and Cub liked it so much he said I should make one for him too. So I have that sitting staring at me from a corner of the living room, and at current rate of progress it should be done, um, round about the time he goes to university /o\

[cahn]

Thank you! :D Oh, that sounds like a beautiful blanket and I can see why Cub wants one too :) Fistbump of solidarity for blankets that might be done around the time our kids go to university :) (A. is becoming insistent enough and repetitive enough that it's just possible he might nag me into getting his blanket before that...)

[zdenka]

Pretty! I love the mittens.

[cahn]

:D Thank you! I'm really pleased with them, although we need to get into colder weather more often :)

[hamsterwoman]

Love the mittens! Such a pretty color! and the blanket, too.

I finished all the tiles for the hexagon blanket which has been just sitting there for a couple of months now, waiting for me to put it together;

L's granny square blanket has been sitting with all the squares finished but still not fully pieced together for a full year now XD I know because she took the half-finished blanket and all the squares with her to uni on Jan 19, 2021 XD So you're well ahead of her, at least, on that front.

[cahn]

I really like the color too :D

omg, I feel L's pain XD I mean, I'm ahead of her now, but we'll see next year if I've managed to put mine together yet either :P Honestly, the real reason I'm undoing the crochet cardigan and making it into a shawl is that I picked a seamed pattern (not knowing what I was doing at the time), and I now realize that if finishing it depends on my seaming it, it's just... a tossup as to whether it ever gets done.

[thistleingrey]

36 completed hexies is really great! And the baby blanket looks lovely. I definitely do not have patience for a blanket done in that way, whether knit or crochet, and salute everyone who makes them. (Your Jan meme topic suggestion pertains re: what I've done instead--one moment.)

Yes, center pull tends to mess me up unless it's something very ... stable. Lately I wind balls instead of tidy little "cakes" because if I'm going along the outside anyway, it doesn't matter which shape, I think. There are a few fussy things that do poorly with being drawn from the outer end, but ... I haven't made anything thus lately....

[cahn]

(heh, it's only 19 hexies! But 36 squares, yay :) The squares are definitely less work than the hexies -- I have gotten to the point where they take me probably about 1 1/2 hours each, if I don't mess anything up. I just have to overcome a lot of inertia to do it! I think it'll be less inertia once I get all this yarn wound.)

Oh interesting, is it the repetitiveness of it that would be a dealbreaker for you? It was the big problem I had with it -- I don't think I would do this pattern again for an entire blanket (as opposed to a square, which sounds rather more reasonable) because it got really boring. The other blanket I made, with clusters, at least had two different types of rows and so wasn't quite as monotonous (and iirc had more open space so was less yarn anyway).

Curious also as to what needs to be center pulled? I know it matters for gradient yarn, especially if the gradient's made so the colors vary in length (e.g. if it's supposed to translate into same-size regions in a triangular shawl) but I don't think I'm aware of anything else.

[thistleingrey]

Ah, oops--I was going too fast, sorry! Still cool to have a significant percentage completed of a potentially intimidating total.

The weight. :) Mostly I make things at my desk (and I vacuum the external keyboard periodically *whistles innocently*), which means it helps for things to fit on the little strip of desk between keyboard and me or fully on my lap. An adult-sized sweater is slightly too big already and tends to slide off. But I might try making a blanket in strips--tried once, decided I didn't like pattern-plus-yarn well enough, but I'd like to try again at some point as a stashbusting endeavor.

Some people have commented that some fine, fuzzy wools and some part-silk skeins benefit from it, but I agree with you that color shifts are really the only factor. The abrasion/friction thing can be counterbalanced by how one handles the working skein (not letting it bang around a large project bag, etc.--at home I use a small cardboard box).

[cahn]

Realized i didn't reply to this -- That is super fair! How heavy it would be was one of the things I didn't really realize, having not done one of these before, and it was in worsted, so... yeah. It was really heavy. Fortunately it was for a January baby! (The other blanket I made, not even realizing it would be a lot lighter because fingering yarn and open space, was for a summer/fall baby, so that worked out well.) Though I also apparently really dislike seaming more than I dislike weight, so I might be doomed :)

[thistleingrey]

*nods* Warmth for one's lap while making it can be pleasant, at least.

Yes, I'm probably being too optimistic about my own prospect of seaming, but I don't mind it if my fingers cooperate. Adding stitch markers (the little pins) at intervals usually helps me avoid redoing half the seam several times.

[thistleingrey]

Ooh actually, perhaps I could crochet a slip stitch to "seam" blanket strips. hmmm.

[cahn]

I know it is a thing people do! And single-stitch crochet seaming and "join-as-you-go" crochet seaming (maybe those are the same? I haven't looked into them closely) but I think those may be more for all-crochet blankets. I'm doing the "join-as-you-go" (even though I've already made them all) crochet seaming for the hexagons, because I know there's no way I'm ever going to get around to that much seaming with a needle. To be fair I also haven't gotten around to it with a crochet hook, but at least there's a chance it may happen someday :)

[thistleingrey]

Join as you go is for all-crochet or all-knit projects, I think, yes.

Mattress stitch, slip-stitch seaming, knitted three-needle bindoff, single-stitch crochet seaming are in one bucket in my head. :) That's in order from least to most visible, since the knitted bindoff is usually done wrong side and I've seen sg-st crochet done right side decoratively.

Hm, if you've made the hexagons already, then I think it may not be join-as-you go. Usually the latter means building the next stitch onto an existing one without adding a buffer zone--next hexagon uses the edge of a prior hexagon. Doesn't matter how you do it, as long as it looks the way you'd like it to and is tolerable to implement!

[cahn]

I did do a little mattress stitch a couple of days ago (ironically, for something which I now think I'm going to frog) and it's not so bad :P :) Still pretty sure I would not be willing to do an entire blanket that way :) Knitted three-needle bindoff sounds very intimidating (just the name sounds intimidating!) but I suppose I'll have to learn it one of these days. But I might be able to do a slip-stitch crochet seam without complaining too much :) (I think part of it is that crochet hooks are just a lot more manageable in the hand than yarn/sewing needles, to me!)

[morbane]

The baby blanket looks lovely and those are very neat and effective-looking mittens!

[cahn]

Thank you! We were in cold weather for a few days but lately it's actually been quite warm -- I should go visit my family who lives in a much colder climate so I can use the mittens :)

[regshoe]

Hooray for progress on the knitting! I agree about the repetitive motions and doing knit stitch over and over again—I've discovered I like knitting in the round because it means you don't have to keep switching stitch types for stocking stitch, you can just do knit stitch all the time and I enjoy that more. Heh, I also know what you mean about all those attractive shawl patterns despite not wearing or needing shawls... And those mittens look lovely!

[cahn]

Yesss! This is why I'm eyeing maybe trying to make a sweater/pullover, it would be lots of knitting in the round :D Hee, I'm glad i'm not the only one who is tempted by all those shawl patterns... Thank you!

[sophia_sol]

Your blanket and mittens look great! I'm glad you're enjoying knitting -- even if the things you're moved to knit are not the things it would be most helpful to knit :P I'm familiar with that problem

[cahn]

Thank you!! Haha, I was excited to get a hobby that could be useful, but it is only sporadically useful :P

[mildred_of_midgard]

I have been busy and my wife and I have been on opposite sleep schedules, so this is late, but: Yay! Go you! I have conveyed your last paragraph to her and she is happy to have helped!

turns out that some yarns SAY they're center pull but in practice they collapse into hideous tangles if you actually DO center pull them, ahem

She also nodded vigorously at this bit, so you're not alone.

She says you should make shawls and sweaters. She makes lots of them!

Oh, and she also doesn't believe in gauge, which she says helps with her willingness to do something like a sweater. :P There's somebody on YouTube who does tutorials and who also doesn't believe in gauge, an Italian woman I think? She said she would try to dig up the link for you.

But we also have mice and I'm working weekends, so ask again if you want the link and you don't hear from us. ;)

[cahn]

I feel like I can get away in crochet with not making a gauge swatch. I think I must crochet in a pretty middle-of-the-road way, because the times when I've tried it seemed to work pretty well. For shawls it doesn't matter, of course!

I just started knitting a sweater (I did do a sort of half-hearted gauge swatch and gave up when it looked reasonably gauge-like) so I guess we'll see! In... some number of months, omg knitting is so slow.

Oh no, sorry about the mice!