I realized today that I think about Black Flag Knitting all the time, but have been horrible at keeping up with the posting of images and journaling. These lapses aren’t quite what I dreamed about when I started this back during the winter holidays. I think about my site almost daily and have deep sense of guilt about the neglect of my site. Why, I’m not sure other than I’m guilt prone. I meant, the site’s inatimate and a handful of people know I’m out there, most have stopped checking because I’m not posting.
But today, I got a comment. I don’t think it’s spam this time. It’s prompted me to at least list my progress because I have been knitting, just not writing. Pictures will come. I need a better gallery plugin though, not thrilled with this one.
Completed Projects (or so close it’s good enough to post.)
1. My big success is that a sweater that I’ve been working on for about a year finally got sewn up the seams last month. The sweater is for my mother and the pattern is from Rebecca’s issue # 31. After some fittings with her which lead to the tearing out and reknitting of every piece, I am pleased to say it fits me great! I’ll find out if it fits her in about a week. I didn’t weave in any of the ends just in case I need to make more adjustments. Crossing my fingers. I’ll post an image after I know it fits her.
2. Also out of the Rebecca #31 I knit myself a sleaveless lacey crop top sweater. Good for layering.
3. Felted my very first project! The Celtic bag out of Interweave knits Fall 2007 issue. It’s so cool, even my partner likes it. The success I had with felting has prompted me to knit a whole series of bags in an attempt to seriously reduce our use of plastic and paper grocery sacks. My break through idea is to knit them all on the knitting machine.
*note: I was making absolutely zero progress knitting the fishnet nightgown out of Sexy Little Knits on the knitting machine. So I’ve taken it off the machine and am back to the idea of knitting it by hand. It’s monotonous enough that I can watch a movie: K2tog, yo, K2tog, yo, K2tog yo . . . . to infinity, well actually 37 inches. I did get the bright idea of knitting this in the round up until the arm holes. Seemed ridiculous to knit a front adn back seperately when I can just keep going in circles and no turning my work! Whheeeee, that’s knitting excitement
4. Well, this isn’t knitting per se, but I did write my first chart this weekend. My dear friend Audrey was working on a sweet purse which a 10st repeat and decreased each row on each side. However, the pattern failed since it didn’t specify how to adjust the 10st repeat for the major decreasing on each side. So when Audrey brought me her work nothing was lining up as it should! Long story short, I created a chart in Adobe Illustrator that showed how the pattern should work on each side since she would be working only partials of the 10 stitches. It was a bit more complicated than I anticipated, but loved working through the challenge. Hopefully, next time I see Audrey she will have a cute purse with a pattern that lines up correctly!
5. And this isn’t knitting either, but I did organize my yarn stash. Maybe that’s an oxymoron, but I bought a bunch of shoe bins and ordered my yarn by color. It’s so easy to see what I have it’s sick. Just seems to go against all rules of a “stash”, but I couldn’t help myself. As soon as I was done, I thought, “ohhh, I could have done it by color and yarn weight for even higher level of organization”. Anyone else engaging in oxymoron activities like this with their yarn stash?
And In-Progress:
1. Sexy Little Knits fishnet night gown. *see note above.
2. Felted grocery sacks on the knitting machine.
3. Learning to knit socks 2 at at a time. So efficient!
4. Sweater vest. Never ending sweater vest.
5. Swashbuckler leg warmers!!! and Pattern. Trust me, the next gen looks so much better.
6. Writing a pattern for the blue hat that’s on the site.
7. I know there’s something else if I just delve into my knitting bins and notebooks.
Plus, I may be a test knitter for a friend’s entrelac book she’s writing! More on that as it comes. I love entrelac as it give me the ridiculous excuse of indulging in knitting backwards. I taught myself on a whim a number of years ago, but it wasn’t until this past winter that I realized there was practical reason for what I thought was just kind of me going, “hmmm, I wonder if…?” when I attempted my first entrelac project: a Nori and cashmere scarf for my father.
Next time i’ll have to include a picture of my knitting mascot and dear friend, Skye. Instead of a parrot (pirates, black flag, get it?) I have a large long haired mottled grey feline. She’s lolled on her back at the moment, entreating me to rub her tummy as I write. However, when I’m knitting she likes to crawl into my lap, and lay on the yarn strand, either biting it or my needles as they tickle her ear or nose. I can cope since she keeps my lap warm in the winter is intolerably good natured and well, damn cute.
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