hallelujah...

praise jeebus, i'm finally done. if you've been reading this blog for a while, or if you've read back through my archives (or if you're my family who's heard me bitching "what was i thinking") you may know that last october i got the brilliant idea to knit a wrap for each of my bridesmaids.

i found a lovely fallish orange lace weight yarn (read: very fine yarn that requires billions of stitches to attain a size of any value) and picked out a pattern. roughly two months later, the first wrap was done. then i decided it would probably be a good idea to knit each wrap as a different pattern or i'd want to kill myself before i finished four identical knitted objects so wrap 2 and wrap 3 slowly but steadily came into existence.

wrap 4 was hard on me. i found a pattern i liked and i started it, no fewer than 6 times. it wasn't difficult really, i just made dumb mistakes, and it draaaaaagged on. i never even made it past the fifteenth row, i just couldn't do it and finally i gave up. (though i held on to the pattern,in the hopes that it would work better another time. it was pretty, after all.) while perusing a yarn shop in Asheville in June, i came across a gorgeous lace baby blanket pattern.

Eureka!! tweak the stitch count a bit, make it longer and it would be perfect for a wrap, i thought. i cast on that weekend and never looked back.

i have to be honest, i love the way this picture turned out.

I finished knitting it last night and was almost late for work this morning because i was blocking it. The pattern has points on the end, but i didn't pin them out so instead of points, i have sort of a wavy edge. The more pointed edges are pretty, but i thought something more subtle would blend better with the other wraps.

why hasn't anyone told me that when i tuck my hair behind my ears i look like an elf?? and not in the good "orlando bloom smokin' hot elf" kinda way.

its very difficult to take a picture of yourself, even with a tripod. especially if the battery in your remote shutter button is dead. and while the natural light in the bedroom was lovely, it wasn't very bright so the pictures turned out quite grainy. (have i mentioned that i heart my fisheye?? i want to marry it.)


this is just a closeup of the edge. the provisional cast on worked out nicely and i am quite pleased with the edging in the pattern. in spite of all my grumbling about being tired of knitting miles of orange lace, the results really are pretty. and i overestimated how much yarn i would need so i have plenty left. i may even make myself one in the future as they make lovely, soft scarves.

so many crafts, so little time

for once i actually had a hard time deciding what to blog about. true it helps that its been a few days since my last post. knitting, sewing, craft shopping, wedding... about the only thing that wasn't a possibility was the next photography installment, primarily because i haven't done any sample shots for the next topic.

but while we're on the subject, i've only really gotten feedback from one person. if there is anyone that's come here for the photography explanations, i'd love to hear what you think. i'm trying to keep them from getting too bogged down in technical details while still actually explaining how it works. is it too confusing? would you rather have less detail and more tips? more camera specific stuff? i'm open to talking about whatever, really. i do actually plan to talk a little about lighting and composition once i finish with all the exposure stuff, so if that's what you're after, stick around. its coming, i swear.

but anyway, i decided to go with knitting today, both wedding related and not.



This is Soft Wave, a 100% cotton 1-ply from Queensland Collection. It has sort of a nubbly texture that knits up quite nicely. We shall see how it is to work with. I bought it from Purl's, a really nice little yarn shop in Asheville, NC.

see what i mean by "nubbly?"

We were in town for an evening wedding so we had all morning to kill. My mom and I left Mr. Z and my dad on a bench in the sunshine while we wandered around petting the yarns and chatting with the woman who ran the store. There really is something magical about sticking your hands into giant piles of soft fluffy yarns in all the colors of the rainbow. i have a special thing for teals and greens. but this time i refrained, and in the end only bought this (albeit 10 skeins of it) for a very special project.

and this, of course, is the fourth and final wrap... just in case the orange didn't give it away.

not my most artistic photo,
but in progress shots are hard to make pretty

the Cheshire Stole, while pretty, just didn't keep me interested. So, while at Purl's I also found a pattern for Fiber Trend's Estonian Lullaby Blanket. I modified the stitch count to make it into a wrap, which consists of making it narrower and longer, and so far its worked out nicely. I think the stitch pattern fits better with previous wraps as well. It does have a knitted border on both ends though, which meant that I had to learn a new trick and do a provisional cast on. hopefully that doesn't bite me in the ass when i try to take it out later.

i will say i am surprised that i don't hate this yarn, or lace knitting, yet. i'll be glad when i'm done, but i really enjoy the lace. and luckily this one is knitting up really quickly. that may have something to do with the fact that i have watched the entire first season of Lost over a matter of days. you can get a lot of knitting done watching 17 episodes of anything. i have to admit though, i'm a little bit in love with Charlie... in spite of the heroin addiction. oh wait, what?? he's not real? damn.

its a(nother) wrap

That's right, I have finished the third bridesmaid wrap. This one was done in record time, at least compared to the last one. Only a few more hundred yards of orange lace weight and I'll be done! In fact, I've already cast on for the fourth and final wrap. It will be the Cheshire Cat Stole from Purlesence. I'm pretty sure I can have it done in five months, with time to spare even.

Pattern: Michaela by Berroco
Yarn: Knit Picks Shadow in Campfire Heather
Mods: knit on size 3 needles w/ lace weight yarn
10 repeats across, knit until 60" long

Pattern detail

This one I almost want to keep for myself its so pretty. But I guess there will be plenty of yarn leftover... I could always knit another.

The top photo is a result of some photoshop experimentation with actions. The actual color is pretty accurately represented in the detail pictures.

All in the family

It has recently been brought to my attention that my mom actually reads my blog. Apparently my sister taught her about the "Older Posts" link at the bottom of my page, and she spent an afternoon catching up on previous posts. Its a good thing I haven't been writing in this blog for very long... She also said she's going to share it with one of my aunts. I know they are family but I'm flattered that they're interested in my ramblings nonetheless.

Not a lot to update on. Still chugging away on the current bridesmaid wrap. Its actually moving along more quickly than the last one, but its still rather monotonous work. I would say I'm probably about halfway done.

Pattern: Michaela (free pattern from berroco.com)
Yarn: Knitpicks Shadow in Campfire Heather

So far I am really happy with the pattern, and I can't wait to see how it looks when blocked. Its pretty easy, but since its a 16-row repeat, I still haven't got it memorized. However, there are something like 17 pattern repeats across, so I generally just have to look at the pattern once at the start of each row and I'm good for the rest of the way across.

I also have a new little friend. His name is Huey.


Huey has color calibrated my monitor and now he sits by my laptop and monitors the ambient lighting and apparently adjusts my monitor as needed. I got Huey because I would like to start making some prints from my photography again. And as I once learned back in the days when I was dating "he who must not be mentioned for fear of my head exploding" there is nothing so disappointing as sending what you think is a beautiful picture to the printer only to have something very different come back because what you see on your monitor is not actually what Photoshop thinks its showing you.

Huey was a surprisingly cheap option that got decent reviews. I think I may be a victim of the slight reddish cast people mentioned (i.e. my pictures still look slightly more red on my monitor than they do when they print out) but over all its pretty close. And I'm happy with it. Especially for the price.

One of the main reasons I wanted to make sure I could get reliable prints is because I have started an etsy shop. You can see it here. For those of you not familiar with etsy, its sort of a storefront for people who want to sell their crafts and artwork and whatnot. You can list an item for 20 cents and etsy only charges you a small percentage of what you sell each item for. So if you don't sell anything, you are only out the 20 cents.

I haven't sold anything yet, and I'm not holding out high hopes really... especially when you see all the gorgeous photography that others have done. But I figured it wouldn't hurt to post a few. The print company I just signed up with sent me my free test prints and they look pretty good. They also have an option to print blank greeting cards using whatever photos you want, so I was thinking those might have a better chance of selling. And even if they didn't, I could always use them myself. Worth thinking about.