Falling off the crafting wagon

With more than a week left to go on my ArtSoMoPo month-long creativity binge, things have come a bit unhinged. But I'm back up on the bandwagon now, so I think I can finish out the month.

I left off on Day 12 (10/12/06)

That evening I made some brownies for tailgating on Saturday. That wasn't an especially creative endeavor though since they were from a mix. For what it's worth, Betty Crocker Original Fudge Brownie Mix makes the best brownies. Skip the chocolate chunks and peanut butter and stuff - the plain jane ones are tough to beat. Sure, I could sift cocoa and flour and make these from scratch, but I actually prefer the short cut ones.

To round out the day, I also learned to knit i-cord. Okay I get that it is called idiot cord for a reason and this is actually easier than making brownies from a mix, but I hadn't done it before. New skills are always a good thing - even mortifyingly simple new skills.


Day 13 (10/13/06)

Rather than waste a perfectly good Friday the 13th (in October, no less!) I had some friends over for dinner and scary movies. This ate up a bunch of my evening, but I did make a bit more i-cord and sketched out a template for some felt Christmas ornaments.


Day 14 (10/14/06)

Okay, are you sensing that my creative endeavors are getting a bit paltry? Things hit a new low on Saturday when all I managed to make was a batch of break-and-bake cookies to go with the brownies for tailgating. I was feeling a bit Martha, so all of the brownies and cookies were individually wrapped in plastic for extra tailgating convenience and portability. It also made it easier to pawn leftovers off on my friends - a safer option than being left to my own devices with half a pan of leftover brownies. Alas, Saran Wrap doesn't really make the creative output for the day any more impressive.


Day 15 (10/15/06)

I made some Christmas ornaments using Friday's template and played with my cashmere felt a bit more. Can't show you the results yet, but I swear - there was actual crafting.

This is also when I made the Halloween candle wraps I posted about last week. Here they are again:

Day 16 (10/16/06)

I am really taken with the knitty pattern for Fetching fingerless gloves. I just really like the little cables and the 4x1 ribbing. I've decided I want to make a hat to match Fetching, so I spent the evening swatching possible decreases for the hat.

I've only made stockinette hats before, so I needed to figure out how to make the ribs merge into one another so that it actually looked nice. Someone else may have a better plan for this, but for my part, I thought

K4 P1 K4 P1
K2 SSK K2TOG K3 P1
K7 P1
K2 SL1 K2TOG PSSO K2 P1
K4 P1
worked well for merging 2 ribs into 1 rib.

I also worked out a pattern for decreasing the ribbing as above based on 100 stitches - which according to my gauge swatch and a couple of average hat patterns seemed like the right amount. (Did you catch that mistake? I planned to copy the measurements of another pattern rather than measure my actual head)

I also played around a bit with my camera's macro function (Thanks to Turtlegirl's helpful suggestion for improved yarn pictures on the knittyboard). I need a lot more practice, but I think my candle wrap pics were a bit of an improvement.

This is the pretty pink yarn from my CASP3 secret pal without the benefit of direct sunlight. Not too bad, if I do say so myself. It helps that I could rest the camera on the table when I took the picture. If you want knitting glamour shots, you're still better off going here, but at least now you'll be able to see what the heck I'm talking about.


Day 17 (10/17/06)

I cast on my 100 stitches and made it through the first cable row for my Fetching hat. Twenty itty-bitty cables takes a while. When I was done, I couldn't help but think it looked a little small, so I transferred the stitches to waste yarn and tried on my hat-to-be.

Sigh. Apparently, I have a ginormous head. What would be a normal sized women's hat looked ridiculous. The sad little cables were terrified that I was going to ask them to stretch further. So, frogging.

I did make another ornament, so the day wasn't a total loss.


Day 18 (10/18/06)

I made more of the mini-button idea books. This is what they look like (in case you forgot or have noticed the relative absence of pictures in this post):

Day 19 (10/19/06)

A little light on the crafting - I re-planned my Fetching hat decreases, this time for 120 stitches and enough ribbing for my giant melon. Most of the evening was spent cleaning my house for out-of-town guests.


Day 20 and Day 21

I got nothing. I didn't even make coffee. My parents were in town for the weekend, so there was much visiting, but no crafting. We went to some galleries and looked at art on Saturday - does that count? Yeah, I didn't think so. Totally fell off the ArtSoMoFo Poseur wagon - which is worrisome when you figure that I was the only one on the ArtSoMoPo wagon to begin with. Who was left to steer?


Day 22 (10/22/06)

Here we go, back on track. I finished the remainder of the button books and I started knitting my giant size Fetching hat.

I think I should be able to be crafty for the rest of the month. More updates and pictures soon.