A few weeks ago I had a lovely chat with TBD’s Arts and Entertainment editor, Andrew Beaujon. He interviewed me about art,fiber,Walmart,and the punkrock nature of crafting communities. He talked to a bunch of other cool people and then he posted a short piece based on those interviews last week, so here’s a link to “the year in yarn.”
Thanks, Andrew!
The hyperbolic crochet coral reef project is extremely cool.
The Smithsonian will be participating by installing a reef in October 2010 and you can participate. There’s a workshop and lecture this Sunday at the Natural History Museum from noon – 4. (rsvp: sicommunityreef@yahoo.com)
You can still participate even if you can’t attend that workshop.
You can contact the local organizers at sicommunityreef@yahoo.com to arrange a local community workshop or you can attend one at Fibre Space on June 24th, from 5-9 pm:
Join our Thursday night “Stitch in Space” every week, starting June 24th to make your own piece to the crochet coral reef. Jennifer Lindsay from the Smithsonian Community Reef will join us on the 24th to help everyone get started. Or you can find your own inspiration at the Institute For Figuring’s Gallery of Crocheted Models. Our reef will be on display in our front window before heading off to the Smithsonian in August to become part of the larger reef project.
Here’s video of a recent TED talk by Margaret Wertheim, co-founder of the The Institute For Figuring, in case you want to learn more (or you just can’t figure out what the hell I’m talking about and why it’s cool).
Dr. Birdcage made me a case for my knitting needles. It’s perfect (and adorable).
I had to take a little vacation from knitting. Consequently, I have an abnormally large number of unfinished objects (UFOs) hanging around. Now that I’m off my feet with an injured foot maybe I’ll get caught up. The painkillers make knitting a little more, um, freeform, than some of the patterns require, so the lace project and the cabled sweaters may have to wait a little longer. I don’t usually have this many WIPs (more knitting-nerd speak. translation: works in progress) at a time – you know unfinished projects drive me almost as crazy as clutter.
There’s a GreenGable Hoodie from the Fall 2008 Vogue that I’m making with the gold Debbie Bliss Donegal Chunky Tweed I scooped up at a Knit Happens. 
I don’t much like working with tweed, but it’s a really pretty color and the fiber lets the cables really pop.
Last time I was at Fibre Space I impulse-bought 5 skeins of Crystal Palace Mochi Plus (colorway: feldspar). The color is very similar to the Noro Silk Garden Clapotis I made last year, but I’ve altered the pattern and am using very large needles so it’s completely different. Sort of.
Plus, the Mochi is a more polished looking yarn than the more elegantly rustic looking Noro. Elegantly rustic? That seems like a ridiculous description, but maybe Noro knitters know what I mean. That’s my rationalization for making another clapotis, anyway. I’ve also been working on a delicate and slinky looking one in pure silk, but that one keeps running into trouble, so let’s not discuss it now. Let me also say for the record that I think most Noro, and most Mochi for that matter, looks like the aftermath of a clown explosion. There are a couple of colorways I like, but not that many.
There are always a couple of unfinished socks hanging around in little project bags. Those don’t count, I always have a simple stockinette sock or two around for traveling or conferences or other down time where I want something to do but don’t want to have to pay attention to it very closely.
I’m also still finishing the Marilyn (Miss Babs Yowza), a top-down raglan for Husband (Paton’s Classic Wool), and the 2nd sock for a pair of lace socks (Spud and Chloe).
Speaking of Miss Babs – she’ll be at Fibre Space Saturday for a trunk show. I may coax Husband into taking me over there for a bit. Maybe I should finish his sweater first so as to bribe him…
This post serves no real purpose other than to give you, my loyal readers, a chance to snicker at the fact that I have these projects all over the house, taunting me with their unfinishedness. I know you like to believe that I’m a vision of earthly perfection and would never have such untidyness in my life and all, but your worship of my fabulousness really isn’t healthy. Your complete and utter devotion, on the other hand, is perfectly acceptable.
I can’t even mention the gift projects I have planned or started for a couple of friends who won’t be surprised if I spill the beans here. The fact that I keep stealing their clothes to measure them so I know what size to make might also be tipping them off. They may also think I’m just making some sort of nest, which may also be true. I’ll never tell.
Recently, I acquired an object. An almighty and all-powerful object.
I didn’t set out to acquire an object of such importance, I just wanted a swift to hold my yarn while I wind it up into a ball so I can knit it into cozy things. Although there are many models, this was the model that was available at Fibre Space, my excellent local yarn store, on the day I decided it was time to get a swift.
A swift expands and collapses like an umbrella (hence the term “umbrella swift”). This makes it adjustable because hanks/skeins/clumps/blobs of yarn come in all different sizes, and you can only ask Husband to sit around holding out his arms while you wind yarn up so many times before things start to get a little tense. Or so I’m told.
You clamp the swift to the side of the table to hold it in place. Then you can take yarn and transform it from something like this:
to something like this:
That was obviously not a before and after of the same yarn. That really would be a magical machine.
This is what it looks like when in use (the swift is on the left in the image, the winder is on the right):
Husband and I find never-ending humor in the almighty and all-powerful reeling machine and mention it in conversation whenever we can.
