okay, i know i'm more than a little behind. since i didn't actually finish anything in march (i know, i'm terrible), i decided to wait until after round three was over. had trouble getting my act together in the last two months.
anyway, here's what i've gotten done in the last two months.
for round two's technical challenge: the scrap heap, we were challenged to make something from the scraps we had left over from previous projects. i started with a third of a skein of Caron Simply Soft Brites Blue Mint. i feel the need to tell you exactly what it was solely because i have now used the same skein of yarn on four different projects. that and i still haven't used it up. who knew one skein could go that far!? anyway, i decided to make a hat that looks like dr. manhattan's head. you know, from the
watchmen. it is really good. if you haven't read it, you should. go ahead. i'll be here when you get back.
for round three's geek pride challenge: follow the leader, we were meant to go back and gain inspiration from a project submitted to previous rounds by someone on a different team. i was inspired by a project from team PI, an open lace crocheted scarf. i have always been jealous of the ease of open lace done in crochet (it is so pretty!), so that project gave me the kick in the pants i needed to go searching for a good open lace knit pattern. and i found one! in a book i already had, no less. so i set about the task of making the Salmon Scarf from
One-Skein Wonders: 101 Yarn-Shop Favorites by Judith Durant. it turned out beautifully. when i started it, i had just finished reading
Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett, and had chain mail on the brain. i swear, especially when i held it up and it caught the light just right, it looked like spun silver. i'm very pleased with it. i was also pleased with myself for my team tie-ins for the challenge (mostly because our team unity project was to have two different tie-ins and i ended up with something like five!). for the main tie-in, there's a webcomic i once a devoted follower of called
Real Life. it was really good. pretty sure the reason i stopped reading was finals one semester. anyway, at one point Greg decides that his Renaissance costume should be more in depth (translating to “lots of armor”). he finds instructions and materials online to make his own chainmail. a few months later he has
finally completed a chainmail mantle.
something i had been meaning to make for a while was a towel. more specifically, a towel in honor of towel day. "what the heck is towel day?" you may ask. well,
towel day occurs every year on May 25 to celebrate the life of Douglas Addams, the author of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy of five. there's even an official
website if you want to learn more information about it. anyway, in high school i had a dish towel that i clipped onto my school bag and carried around. actually managed to convert a few of my friends to seeing the infinite usefulness of knowing where your towel is. when i started knitting, one thing i knew needed to be made was a new towel for towel day. so here it is, made from deep purple cotton. love it. i used
this pattern from
Kaitie's Knits blog. i may rework the letters to be bigger when i make one for my dad (i get my awesome nerdiness from him after all), just so they'll be a little easier to read. if nothing else, i will rework the N. it came out kinda wonky. i am now prepared for this year's towel day.
so yeah, that's everything i've made in the last two months. still working on that baby blanket. it was honestly the only think i worked on for about two and a half weeks. we needed some time apart in order to save our relationship. i know that seems silly, but we've all had friends like that. i believe it also applies to projects and even appliances (hopefully the oven will be healed for good tomorrow). anyway, the snail-ish pace of the blanket put a definite crimp in my inspiration/motivation gland. thus, the low number of projects.
summer seems to have settled upon west texas with the usual speed and disregard for what anyone may say. it is significantly more difficult to motivate myself to knit in the heat (piling fiber on your lap does nothing to help combat said heat). i apologize for my whining on the subject.
still working at the whole trust thing. it is one thing to know everything will turn out alright. it is another thing entirely to believe it with every fiber of one's being. dealing with my own dislike of change is rough. keep me in your thoughts on that one. it will be a seriously long road.
may we stay the course, despite the pot holes, and trust with every fiber.
