a good idea

Every Christmas I'm surprised at how much I spend not on gifts, but gift bags. Christmas Eve I dropped $25 on wrapping alone, and that was only for one side of the family. Not to mention finding the right size bag for the gift is impossible. I inevitably have several gifts that are too big for medium size bags but too small for the large. And with the whole "go green" movement, I cringe at thinking of spending so much on paper bags that are going to be thrown away and fill up a landfill somewhere.

So, my husband came up with a clever idea. Well, he might not have intentionally come up with the idea; I think he was teasing me about my yarn-addiction. However, he suggested that I knit/crochet bags - they would be reusable and could count as part of the gift.

I'm going to take some of my stash yarn and try to think out some easy bag-like patterns. Even a year away, I'm not sure if I have the discipline to make all of my gift bags for next year. Still, I might make a gift bag or two for a birthday and see how it goes.

attack of the stash

I'm getting desperate to cull down my stash. I'm working on a granny square blanket, trying to use up all the extra yarn I have. So far I've done five complete squares, each 8 rounds, each round a different color, with a size K crochet hook.

And I've only used up one leftover skein.

I haven't made a dent on my stash. And considering I was only going to make a lapghan for church, it looks like this little endeavor is developing into a full-blown project.

Now, in addition to figuring out what I'm going to do with all the excess yarn, I need to figure out what I'm going to do with all the granny squares. Bah!

WIP it good

I am now officially doing too many projects at once. Seriously, my WIP list is a little out of control. It runs as follows:

* fingerless, gauntlet-style gloves for my sis-in-law

* knit shawl for my mother

* crochet shawl for my sis

* cap/beanie for my husband (for our trip to the UK in December)

* knit scarf for myself

* a mini-blanket made from all my scrap yarn (because it was freezing at morning service on Sunday)

That's not adding in the sweater pattern I've been eyeing over at Lion Brand's website. Plus I'm feeling the urge to purge my stash. It's overflowing the sides of the bin I keep it all in. I was able to use up some of my baby yarn stash yesterday making cute little beanies for an expectant co-worker.

I just can't help starting new projects.

abort mission...

Okay, I'm putting my knit baby blanket aside for two reasons:

1) Because I couldn't get the gauge right. I have only been knitting for four months, so I'm still not the best at it. I tried doing separate squares but it was hard to sew them together. I'm also not good at sewing knit/crocheted fabric together, so it looked rather hideous. I then got the bright idea of knitting in strips: sort of like knitting a scarf, changing the colors as needed to form a row of blocks. For some reason the green section was shorter than the white section. Ugh.

2) I found out that the baby shower for the girl I'm making the blanket for is in two weeks. The group is throwing an early shower for her and I want to have the blanket done in time to present it to her. I can crochet faster, so I've change my plan over to a crocheted baby blanket. Which is something I've done a dozen times. Pretty fool-proof. Of course, I'm itching to try a new pattern, but I just don't have the time to experiment or to hunt down the right yarn. The local craft shops only have the bare basics type of yarn (it took them six months to start carrying Debbie Stoller's Stitch Nation brand). I'm kind of quirky about wanting the yarn that the pattern recommends. Plus I'm just not good at substituting yarn.

So I'm back to the tried and true method. I have to say, it's getting dull, but on a strict time line, it's do-able. I'm still going to be pushed, but I can crochet up a baby blanket by Oct. 14.

I think....

knitting a baby blanket

I'm getting ready to embark on my first large-scale knitting project. I've knit a little pouch and a scarf, both fairly basic, easy-to-do sort of things. Now I'm going to try a baby blanket. I'm modifying the pattern from one I found at Lion Brand's website. I'll keep the basic blocks (about 3 x 3 in squares), but I'm changing the color scheme. The girl that I'm making the blanket for doesn't know if it's going to be a boy or a girl yet, so I'm doing the typical white/green/yellow color scheme. Ideally, it will end up like this:

G Y W G Y W G Y W

W G Y W G Y W G Y

Y W G Y W G Y W G

G Y W G Y W G Y W

W G Y W G Y W G Y

Y W G Y W G Y W G

G Y W G Y W G Y W

W G Y W G Y W G Y

Y W G Y W G Y W G

The real kicker will be the fact that I'm going to have sew all the little blocks together. I hate having to sew pieces together. Almost as much as I hate weaving in the ends. Those two steps seem to give me the most trouble.

But there's nothing like facing your fears and challenging yourself. And sewing all these little squares are going to be a challenge.

too busy to blog

Okay, maybe I haven't been too busy to blog. More like just too plain lazy. Even though I have been doing some serious yarn-crafting in the mean time. I managed to crochet a shawl in under two weeks (given as a gift to a grieving friend who just lost her mother). I was my first sort of "over-drive" crochet project, where I had an extremely tight time line to follow. It helped that I mentioned to another friend I was thinking about crocheting up a prayer shawl...I had the added sense of responsibility knowing I couldn't just put down the hook and say "Well, no one knew I was doing this...so I can't disappoint anyone if I don't" - which by the way is one of my favorite excuses for putting down a project and never picking it up again.

Also, Christmas is approaching, and I still have a few projects I want to whip up before the holidays. The beret for my mum-in-law is complete, and I just finished knitting up a scarf for my sis-in-law (which by the way is my second completed knitting projecting since I started to teach myself a few months ago). I'm now working on my other sis-in-laws gauntlet style gloves...which are going surprisingly well. If I could just commit myself to crocheting 30 minutes a day, I would probably have them finished. But I keep get caught up in some of the novels I've been reading.

Only a completely non-yarn related note, I've gone to the dark side. That is, I've started reading Austen fiction - novels written based on Jane Austen's works. I know this makes me a traitor to my two best friends (we're all Jane Austen nerds), and I know I've spent the past year turning up my nose at these novels, crying out "Geez, make your own characters, idiots" - ironic since I used to write fan fiction. But the lure of the novels proved too great, and I've fallen. I just finished Me and Mr. Darcy last week and I have to admit, I liked it.

So that brings me up to date on not one, but two, of my major hobbies. Yep. That's it.

further adventures in bootie making

Okay, so maybe booties aren't my worst enemy after all. Last Saturday I grabbed a skein and hunkered down for an afternoon of bootie making. I even went so far as making a gauge swatch before trying the real deal. And behold! I produced something that was definitely bootie-shaped and looked like it might actually fit on a baby's foot without having to be tied on.

But even after one successful pair, I'm sort of nervous about attempting a second pair. I've also realized that it only takes one skein to make a pair of booties with matching newborn cap. In an overzealous fit of wanting to have enough yarn, I had bought two skeins of each color. So now I have extra skeins that I really have no idea what I'm going to do with (especially since each skein is drastically different colors; I can't combine them to make one piece).

Still, even with my glowing first success, I'm still procrastinating from trying to finish two more sets. I've been avoiding the project by catching up with some reading this week. But now that I'm finished with the book club's selection for the month (Sex with the Queen by Eleanor Herman), I have no other excuses to shy away from hook and yarn.

adventures in bootie making

Baby booties are the bane of my existence. Okay, maybe that's an over-statement. But still, something that should be so simple, so easy to whip up consistently stumps me. The first bootie I ever tried to crochet came out looking fine. It was the shape of a foot. But every other attempt from that first bootie on has ended in disaster. They end up looking more like little brightly-colored cotton baggies than something cute and "awww"-worthy. I've tried different patterns, different yarns, but each time I get the baggy-effect.

So I said I wasn't going to try to do booties again. Ever. But now one of my dearest friends is expecting her first and the itch to take needle and yarn to hand is overwhelming. I could do a blankie. But to be honest, I'm sick of them. Most of my projects have been baby blankies and I want to do something different. Not to mention, my friend attends a church with a very active crochet ministry - I know she's going to get tons of blankies, booties, caps, etc.

And that leaves me in a bit of a conundrum. It's one thing when you're the only knitter/crocheter in a group. Your gift sort of sticks out with all it's handmade-with-love yarny-ness. But when your one of over a dozen crocheters, it kind of feels like "oh, another blankie/cap/bootie/etc."

And my husband is no help. As I whined in the yarn aisles at Michaels about not knowing what to make, he uttered the dread words: "Why don't you make some booties?" This is the man who thought my baggy-booties were "kinda cute."

I pretended to ignore his suggestion and bought six skeins of bright-colored variegated yarn with the purpose of crocheting caps/hats. Lots of them. (A complete aside here, but another aspect of crocheting baby stuff that I've come to dread is the limited color palette. After three years, it's getting old using the same shades of pastel blue, pink, yellow and green.)

But now that I have the yarn at home and I've been mulling all week over getting started on the little hats, I find myself being drawn to the idea of making little matching booties. Three little caps, three little sets of booties. So I think I'm going to suck it up and try again. Maybe use a different size hook (have I mentioned that I loathe gauge swatches and try to pretend they don't exist?) I'm feeling determined to make it work.

That is once I can get up the nerve and/or energy to start.

rinse and repeat

Today I hunkered down with my crochet supplies, determined to get to work on the many projects I have planned for Christmas. I was able to crank out a beret for my mother-in-law. The pattern came from the September/October 2009 issue of Crochet Today!. I had made one for myself last year and loved the pattern. It's amazing how much a years difference and experience can make.



Last year, it took me two days to complete the beret. This year, it took me under six hours (including a lunch and dinner break). The first time I made it, I had never worked in rounds. Instead of using stitch markers, I tried to count correctly. Needless to say, it was a nightmare and I ended up improvising several times to make the count come out correctly. This time I used the markers and the stitches came out nice and even. Which probably explains why this beret fit much better than the one I made for myself.


***the red beret to the left is the one stitched last year; the green to the right is from this year

a quick intro

So I finally gave in and started my own "yarny" blog. I've been crocheting for three years and I've just bought the supplies to start to knit. I'm not very sure what the format of this blog will be like. Probably lots of links to free patterns, gripes about creations going awry, maybe some book reviews (both fiction and non-fiction - I've lately found myself addicted to fiction revolving around knit clubs), and photos of projects.

As for the title of this blog - The Yarn Artificer - it's a bit of an inside joke between me and my husband. The hubby is a big fan of Magic: the Gathering (a fantasy-based card game). There is a class known as artificers, people who specialize in making artifacts. I teased him the other day that if there was a Magic card based on me, I would be a yarn artificer since I'm thoroughly obsessed with my crocheting and knitting. It struck me that it would make a fairly cute (if not overly geeky) name for a blog.

That's a pretty concise summary of this new blog. Thanks for stopping by!