Make do or go without -- or give into the sun

When it comes to home decor, I am cheap and picky. (Well, to be completely honest, when it comes to every purchase, I'm cheap and picky.) I have the attitude that if I can't find what I like for the right price point, I simply won't buy it.

Which explains why I've lived in this apartment for close to five years and until early this morning, had no living room curtains.

But it's getting scorchingly hot in Pittsburgh. We're hitting record temps most days of the week, and the sun beating down on my living room has simply been intolerable. So I decided that I needed curtains. And I needed curtains that AbbyCat wouldn't destroy.

The criteria:

1. Be adjustable, so that I could raise and lower them based on the amount of sun, and the tenacity of AbbyCat. 
2. Be able to be placed on a tension rod; I'm not installing a curtain rod just to take it down in a year. 
3. Coordinate not only with this apartment, but with the living room in whatever house I buy next year; I don't want to set my decorating standards next year based on a cheap curtain today. 
4. Cost less than $25 a panel. 

It's amazing how you can't find curtains that fit these criteria. I don't want flat panels because they can't be adjusted, and it's basically an open invitation to AbbyCat to come play and destroy. Likewise, traditional blinds can't go on a tension rod.

Which brought me to Pinterest, and the idea of Roman shades. While I didn't like the ones in this tutorial because they couldn't be adjusted, it gave me a jumping off point and led me toward Butterick 5159.

This would give me the best of both worlds -- I could hopefully control fabric costs, and get nice adjustable curtains with minimal opportunity for AbbyCat destruction.

 I initially hoped to lower the cost of fabric by buying a tablecloth and deconstructing it. No luck: I simply couldn't find tablecloths that were below my price point ($25 was what I had determined I would need for the main part of the curtain) and were attractive. I wanted something in a light color with a print, and it had to be 60x84 so that I could get two panels out of it.

When that didn't work, I went back to the quilting section at Joann. I had seen some fabrics there that I liked, but they were a little pricey. I did some more digging, though, and found two other prints that were just as nice, but half the cost. They'll still meet the requirement to fit in a house next year, but weren't spendy enough that I'd feel guilty about making new ones.

A couple of modifications to the pattern:

• I made 30-inch curtains instead of the minimal 36. My windows weren't big enough to make the 36, and I didn't want to go full-width, since I wanted to adjust individually. 
• They're on tension rods instead of the outside bracket that the pattern required. This didn't take any effort to change. 
• Instead of putting the ribbons eight inches from the fabric edge, they're six inches from the edge. 

I would definitely make this pattern again, and am keeping it in my stash so that when I move next year, I can make more using the same valance and panel structures. The dowel at the base keeps the middle from sagging, and overall makes it look nice and polished. Plus, I got to buy a hacksaw to trim the dowels to the right length!

From start to finish, it probably took me about three hours -- and the most complicated part was adjusting the tension rod so it fit without sagging. I don't like how the fabric seems to wrinkle so easily, but I'm hoping that time and hanging will get rid of that. If AbbyCat ends up pulling the rod down, I'll spray starch them before putting them back up, but ironing alone is not worth the energy to mess with that rod again.

They're definitely doing their job. Because the fabric is light colored, they let in light without blocking it -- but also without allowing the sun to beat in at full force.

Ideas for when I make them again:

• I want to possibly do a different color for the lining on the back, just so it doesn't look like (from the street) I just stuck a bedsheet up. 
• I'd also want to stick with a similar color theme between the valance and the main panel, just to give it more continuity.

One way to keep AbbyCat cool in the summer.

And the interesting side effect: AbbyCat won't go near them. She's been glaring at me all morning, and I suspect she's actually afraid of them. She'll figure it out at some point, but maybe in the meantime it'll cut down on the cat hair on the couch.

Role reversal?

So am I being the opposite of Scarlett O'Hara if I take fabric originally bought for a dress, and turn it into a lining for curtains?

Summer lovin' ... what'll I craft?

Summer is a difficult time of year for me to do crafts. Or, rather, it's difficult when I am trying to stash bust. Lots of stuff I could do, but nothing that I *want* to do. Yes, I have air conditioning in my apartment, but I'm frugal in some arenas (mostly with utilities) to a fault, and refuse to have it kick on until the indoor temperature hits 80.

In other words, I'm not going to do anything with warm fabrics until it gets cooler again. AKA: Why I'm sitting in my living room with a tankini on and a girly fruit/gin/tonic spritzer on the coffee table.

I have lots of lovely patterns to sew and make summer projects, but my stash fabric is mostly winter weights -- wools, tweeds, and heavy fabrics. Um. No. I'm not going to put myself through that, especially when I know I won't get to wear any of them until the fall, and with some luck, I'll have trimmed an inch or two from my waist by then. What's the point of sewing something, and then having it not fit?

And then let's talk the knitting. Wool, cashmere, silk, and more wool. A sweater on the needles, and a shawl on the needles that's rapidly getting big and heavy.

Would you want to knit any of those in a humid Pittsburgh summer? I certainly don't.

So I'm thinking socks to tide me over for the rest of the month. I found some Ultra Alpaca when I was cleaning out the craft room, and those should be small enough to keep me going through June. They're also small enough that I can tuck in my bag when I go to my night class, and I won't need to worry about having this massive thing taking up so much space. (Seriously. The shawl is huge right now.) This pattern seems reasonable enough -- there's lace involved, but the chart looks easy enough.

I feel guilty, though. I told myself I wasn't going to start new projects until the old ones were done. And here I am doing it, just to alleviate my crafting angst and heat-related misery (see above about the AC -- I'm not stranger to heat- or cold-related misery). I'm not buying new materials, which I guess is the point of the overall thing, but now I'm not getting anything *old* done.

*le sigh*

But what the heck. It's hot, and I'll make socks. My impossibly high standards can wait for another day.

iPad cases are SO overrated...

Having now made two iPad cases, this is my sage advice: Spend the $30 and buy one. Don't waste time trying to sew it and figuring out why the heck the laws of physics don't apply to fabric in your home. Just buy a case made by someone who knows what they're doing.

This is my second attempt at the process. "But it looks pretty," you might say.

So. Not. Worth. It.

I had great plans initially. I was going to use this cute quilting fabric, put a layer of solid foam between two fabric bags, and put a zipper in. I was going to write up a tutorial about how to do it.

And then the cursing started.

I failed to realize in the initial plans that to fit the foam and make the whole thing snug enough to actually protect the iPad (silly me for wanting it to be more than just cute!), the two bags would have to be different sizes. And they wouldn't line up. And thus a zipper could not be added.

Lots of swearing involved by the time I figured all of that out.

So this is how we have it now: no zipper, and the inner core is merely tacked to the foam and the outer core. There is a band and Velcro to keep it shut, and overall, it's still fairly well padded. I feel like a Bad Person for using fabric glue to attach the band to the case, but by that point, the idea of trying to sew Velcro through quilting fabric and one layer of foam by hand was something I just didn't want to do.

But it still serves its purpose.

And eventually, when I get the spare cash, I'm so buying a "real" case from Vera Bradley.

Early? Inconceivable.

The May Sewn thing is... done? On May 6, even.

Oh, this dress. Simplicity 2886, and Simplicity is the last thing this project needs to be called. Although it turned out nicely in the end, the beginning was pure misery, and resulted in one of many modifications.

Simply put, the bands that were supposed to be at the top were not working at all. They worked until I tried to flip them to the correct side. All I read online in reviews for this dress were that the seams "didn't line up".

That's one phrase for it. Another phrase to describe it would be "human boobs don't point in that direction" -- which is exactly what I said a week ago after spending close to two hours trying to make it work. The more I tried to fix it, though, the more frustrated I got, and finally decided to just tape the two pieces together, and cut it out as one whole piece. (Pro Tip: If you do this, make sure to delete the seam allowance from the bottom of the piece, before the midriff is attached, or else the front and back won't line up. I neglected to do that at first, and couldn't figure out what went wrong.)

Aside from that major issue -- which had me muttering about this expletive expletive dress for a while -- I quite like this dress. After last week's mishap, it was easy to finish in a weekend, and the only hemming involved was hemming the lining. All told, I'd say it probably took me five hours this weekend? Not too bad for stash fabric that's been sitting around since 2009,  and for a cute sundress that will serve me well.

The style was precisely what I wanted -- something that would use up the denim stash fabric I had, while making a sundress that was work-appropriate for casual Fridays. If I throw a white cardigan or bolero over it, it's nice for work, and then the cardigan can come off if I want to go out after work and have something a little more casual.

Many modifications to this, mostly because I liked the style, but hate how Simplicity does things:

1. Got rid of the bands at the top. See above paragraph about human boobs and gravity. After I finished the dress, I also realized that the white bands in contrast would have looked too cutesy, and not what I wanted for this dress. 
2. No pintucks in the midriff. This started out as "I DON'T WANNA AND IT'S NOT GOING TO WORK" and then shifted to "Wait. Why are there pintucks in a summer sundress?" With the way the ties are, I like having it smooth all the way across. 
3. Gathers instead of pleats. Pleats don't look good on me, and with the lightweight denim, I was worried that pleats would just look weird. 
4. Wider elastic in the back. I felt it needed a little more support than the narrow elastic would provide, so I went to 1/2 an inch over 1/4 inch. It fits nicely, and gives the girls a little more support in the back. See previous references about gravity. 
5. Fully lined. I prefer lined dresses, and even though the bodice was lined, I didn't think it was enough. I went with my standard Posh Lining from Joann Fabric. The price is reasonable, and it gives dresses and skirts a little more body. .

Probably the only time it's going to have a perfect bow. 

This dress sort of sums up my problems with Simplicity. I end up not liking how they've drafted the patterns -- or they just plain don't make sense -- and I end up modifying it to the point where the only thing I get from the pattern is the actual pieces. I don't know that I'm going to completely give up on Simplicity, but I'm pretty close. They have really cute patterns, but I do hate how nonintuitive the patterns are, and how some things take a lot of shortcuts. Like, why only line the bodice? Why not attach the straps through the back, instead of afterward? 

I'll probably continue to stick mostly with Vogue. Even though they don't always have nice trendy things (they do, but not always in the sundress assortment), the patterns make more sense and they're usually lined -- or at least easy enough to add a lining.

Facing startitis head on -- and getting stuff done in the process

April has been a very good month for knitted things.

I finished Beyond The Sea early in the month, and just wove in the ends this morning. The pink lacework shawl I made for a friend saw its knitting completed last weekend, and currently is hanging out on my bed getting blocked.

I never thought I'd see a month where I made not only a sewn thing, but also two knitted things. And, I'll probably hem the skirt from March today, so that'll be *two* sewn things.

I'm quite pleased with this, and I have one reason I can think of to explain how it's getting done: I've gone cold turkey on startitis.

Yep. You read that right. I'm refusing to start new projects (the iPad case was an exception, because that was a desperate need) until old ones are finished.

My mother is probably shaking her  at this, but I can see now why I was only allowed to have one coloring book at a time as a child, and why I couldn't get a new one until I'd colored all the pages. Frankly put, I'm finding as a grown up that if I start a project while in the middle of another craft or sewing project, project A is simply less likely to get done.

So I'm going cold turkey. No new projects until WIPs are finished. Period.

After I finished the pink shawl, the next up was Life Changing Shawl. I've called this shawl many things since it was started. I first cast on for it after Ex and I started talking about futures, and he asked for my ring size. So I figured I'd want something blue, and pretty, to wear on a certain day. As you can tell by his pseudonym here, that didn't quite pan out.

I put it away for a while, and dug it out of hibernation the first time when I started thinking of buying a house. I could wear it to a closing, I thought. But now I know that this thing is going to be huge, and will block out big, and that might not be all that practical for a closing.

But this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to knit it. I'm going to block it, and I'm going to wrap it in tissue paper, box it, and put it in my cedar chest. When that moment comes that is truly magnificent, whether it be a new house, another cat, Mr. Right, or something like that, I'm going to have it ready.

Whoot! I made stuff.

And not just a blog post. :)

I may have been slacking in posting, but for once, I have not been slacking in crafting. I, like, actually finished projects. And now am actually writing a post.

This latest project is an awesome example of stash busting. Yesterday, for my birthday, I received an iPad. There aren't many words to show my pleasure about that.

But with an iPad, and my need to carry it in a purse most days, comes the bed for a sleeve. So off I went to Joann to buy quilted fabric.

I can see you shaking your heads now. "That's not stash busting, you say."

And no, that step wasn't. But three hours into the project, when it wouldn't work, and then the iPad didn't FIT, I turned to the stash. I had the idea that if I could wrap stash fabric around the quilting, that it might actually work.

Yeah. This was one of those projects that was so crazy it actually worked.

In less than two hours, I sewed it together, and tried it out. I'm actually happier with this one than I am with the Plan A version. It looks somewhat sophisticated, and only cost about $9 to make!

Stash busting and frustration for the win!

YAY! I made stuff!

WHOOT! I actually sewed stuff! Like, actual stash stuff.

I was good this weekend. I finished the Atom Red Dress on Saturday, right down to the hemming and trimming of threads. And then Saturday evening, I cut out this skirt.

And discovered that winging it with the lining may not have been the greatest idea, because it meant that I was short approximately 3/4 of a yard of lining material.

Oops.

So I did what I could Saturday night, until it was time to sleep. And then got up Sunday, did as much as I could without the lining. And then bought more lining material.

And got to mostly finish the skirt. Except for the hemming. In my defense, I want it to hang out for 24 hours before it gets hemmed. :)

I can sum up this skirt in one word: Adorable. It's more retro than I was envisioning, thanks to the combination of the print and the fact that the skirt is almost a full circle skirt. And I love it for that.

This Very Easy Vogue pattern (Vogue 8749) was true to its description. It took less than a weekend to sew, and basically involved putting a zipper in. I added the lining and bias tape, so I can't take that time factor into consideration when deciding if it was easy or not. If I had left it unlined and just did a facing, like the pattern called for, it would have taken far less time.

But it was important for me to line it for two reasons:

1. I like lined clothes because it means I don't have to wear a slip or worry about light going through and giving strangers on the street more than they bargained for in a Pittsburgh afternoon or morning.
2. This fabric is very lightweight. If it weren't lined, you could totally see through it. As it is, the lining really helps the colors pop more because it enhances the background.

All in all, I'm thrilled. I love the way it looks, and it hangs, and yes, I've already done the 5-year-old child thing where you spin round and round in circles.

Looking forward.

March.

I had really high hopes for March. They haven't entirely been dashed, although the lack of a blog post since the first weekend of March may speak to the contrary.

You know how life sometimes just gets in the way? Yeah. That's been March so far. There was traveling stuff, and work stuff, and the evil thing that is Daylight Saving Time.

But I am optimistic. I have hemmed the Atom Red Dress, and now all I need to do is hem the sleeves and trim threads. And I will be continuing to work on the new shawl that I bought Malabrigo for the first week of March, and I might even finish the stash-busting sweater or maybe the shawl for Nikki. I might not finish a knitted Thing, but I will be working on multiple knitted Things. Some of which will someday get finished.

A girl can dream.

On the other hand... Does it count in my favor if I make two sewn Things in March? I know I can finish the Atom Red Dress this week (maybe even tonight, if I had the motivation to get off the couch and sew). I also am going to make Vogue 8749 this month, with the fabric I bought in January. So that sort of counts as stash, since I bought it more than a month ago, and it's been sitting in the stash pile.

I goofed.

So here we are. March 3.

Know how I said I didn't want the sock to be the knitted Thing for February? Well, it was.

I made progress on the stash-busting sweater, but it didn't get done. I meant to finish it during Craft Weekend in New York, but then I didn't bring enough yarn, so I stopped, and I just didn't pick it up again.

I also didn't finish the dress. It's still at the point where it was -- zipper pinned in, and needing to be finished and hemmed -- but life got in the way. I got stressed, and frustrated, and just kept knitting and knitting -- and not on the sweater.

Case in point: I bought four hanks of Malabrigo Silky Merino on Thursday for a shawl. Which, thanks to some traveling this weekend, is seeing some pretty decent progress.

So there we have it. It's the first weekend in March, and although I finished the sock, I didn't meet my other crafting February goals. And now, instead of knitting on this lovely train ride through Pennsylvania, I'm tapping out a blog post on an iPhone.

But I've come clean. And March will hopefully be better, and more calming, and won't thwart my plans to Craft All the Things.

What do you want to do better this month?

The view from the train. Somewhere near Lancaster where there was 3G.

Knitting Lace to Unlock the Brain

Sometimes I think I'm weird.

When I'm stressed, and hurting, and cranky as all get out, I knit lace. Yes, doing a garter stitch scarf would be easier, and doing rows and rows of stockinette would leave less room for error, but lace is what it takes to put me back at piece with the world.

Knitting lace gives me time to think, and time to not think. There's something about reading a chart, and looking at the controlled chaos that makes me think, "OK. I can do this. You knit, and yarnover, and knit-two-together, and slip slip knit, and it all works out right in the end." And then the next row, there's nothing but purling (save for the three knit stitches to make the border on each edge).

It's soothing. It makes sense. And it gives me control when it feels like the world is taking all control away from me. If I can knit lace, I can survive. 

This is what I made the last time I was hurting, and needed lace to rebuild. I had started it before the very painful end of a relationship, and used it to help me through those next few weeks. Doing lace helped me think about what I was losing, what had happened to that relationship, and how pain could create such a beautiful, beautiful work of art.  

When I started using this shawl to work through Life, this is what I posted on Facebook:

Lace is a funny thing. It's hard sometimes, and sometimes it takes some work. And sometimes you want to rip it out, throw it on the ground and stomp on it. But when you're done, it's really quite beautiful.

What I am working on now will not be the Thing for February. Instead, I'm knitting it as a gift for a friend who is getting married soon. When I finished the Healing Shawl, she liked it, but wanted a bigger one. So she bought the pink yarn, and I'm knitting it.

Unlike the last lace shawl, this one is not being knit to help me heal through a time of grief. Instead, it's going to help me realize that although life can be hard, and it may be hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel, that the light is there. if faith is believing in things when common sense tells you not to, and hope is the bit of common sense that helps you see your faith through... then lace is the conduit to help you make that journey to feeling whole again.

And life, like knitting lace, is just a series of knots and smooth passages, and a pattern that in the end leads to one beautiful work of art.

Lady in... atom red?

The zipper color calls it "atom red", and I'm not necessarily inclined to disagree.

I knew the fabric was red, obviously, when I bought it. What I didn't remember, however, was it being quite that shade of red. Or being that shiny.

So there we have it. February's sewing Thing. The OMG Atom Red thing. Which I guess is appropriate for a girl who is fascinated/obsessed with Cold War propaganda, and sort of thinks that nuclear war and epidemics would be cool on a bizarre crisis communications level.

February's Thing is Simplicity 2550. Not only is it sewing from stash materials for the fabric, but the pattern has also been in the stash for a while.

I bought it on a craft weekend two years ago, and to be honest, now I'm not sure what I was thinking at the time. I don't even particularly like Simplicity patterns anymore, mostly because the patterns aren't easy to follow, the layout for fabric isn't the greatest, and because it isn't lined. And on this one in particular, I'm not quite pleased that it didn't say on the outside of the envelope that Bodice B was cut on the bias. I wouldn't have picked this fabric to go with the pattern if I had known that, although I'm fortunate that it still works with the fabric.

It's an easy enough project to sew. I was able to cut it out and sew most of it within an evening/night, and it seems to fit well. I've got the zipper pinned in, so now just need to baste and sew that, and then hem the dress and the sleeves. I don't know that I'll get it done tonight, or this upcoming weekend, but next weekend for sure. (This upcoming weekend is craft weekend, but I'd rather take knitting and cross stitching as projects!)

But it's just so... well, atom red. It sort of reminds me of a show choir dress, and that's not quite what I was thinking of when I started sewing it. I know I liked the fabric when I bought it, or else I wouldn't have bought it, but it's so bright.

Which brings us to the problem here. I had bought the dress pattern and the fabric to wear for a work dress. But now, because it's so RED and it's so shiny, I'm just not sure. And I don't quite work in an environment where we do bright colors. Most of my wardrobe is black, grey, blue, and deeper colors -- and the brighter colors in pinks and purples only come out during the summer. Wearing a bright red dress for everyday wear just strikes me as bizarre.

Can I still get away with wearing it in a corporate environment? What accessories could be paired with it to tone it down a bit?

No, I never talk about knitting.

Someone on Ravelry linked to this, and um, well. Yeah. Totally impossible to relate to. Really.

I'd never talk about knitting. Or say any of these things. Ever. Really.

What's up with socks?

I'm not quite sure what it is about socks that makes them seem magical to the uninitiated. Or, rather, what makes the knitter of socks seems magical and talented to those who don't knit socks.

Over the past weekend, when I was in Washington, I worked fairly diligently on a sock. I cast on on the bus on the way to DC, and by the time I got to Frederick, Maryland, had half of a cuff done. By the time I'd gotten to DC, I had enough of a tube done that while it could be mistaken for many things, it wasn't unthinkable for it to be considered a sock.

A sock is really great for this kind of trip, especially when one is single and is spending time in restaurants and places where you need to do something while waiting for food or other people, but you don't want to read.

What surprised me about the sock this time, though, is the amount of attention it attracted from other people. A hostess at the restaurant where I had brunch Sunday morning looked over as I was knitting, and asked if I was knitting or crocheting. Her mother crocheted, she said, and she'd wanted to learn how to knit, and wondered if I could show her. I happily obliged, and she commented that I must be really good at it "since you're doing fancy stuff like socks."

I was awfully pleased with myself after getting that compliment, but shrugged it off mostly, figuring that the young woman didn't knit, and thus thought that anything beyond a simple garter stitch scarf would be fancy.

What intrigued me more was the bus trip back to Pittsburgh. Unlike the trip to DC, this bus was packed, and I had to share a seat the entire time. The young woman next to me was likewise interested in the sock; she was a knitter, and had gotten stuck on her first sweater and hadn't done anything in a while because she got frustrated that it took so long.

The woman also was intrigued because she had heard of people doing Magic Loop, but had never tried it or seen it done. Soon enough, though, she went back to studying, and I went back to the sock.

When we got to Pittsburgh, she very innocently asked if I had finished the sock. I laughed, and explained that no, I hadn't, but I was at the point of working on the heel flap, and hoped to turn the heel soon. She shook her head, and said that they took so much work, and after all of that, she couldn't imagine actually wearing a handknit sock because of all the time that went into them.

True to my word, though, I did finish the heel flap, and turned the heel Tuesday night.

Now it's actually resembling a sock:



It looks like a sock! Really!


So what is it about socks? Aside from picking up the stitches on the heel and gusset, I find it easier than most projects because there's relatively little shaping, and it's predominantly knit stitch the whole time. Not all that much different from a garter stitch scarf, except for that whole circular knitting thing.

Why do nonknitters find them so magical?

Pro Tip: Don't Knit Angry

You would have thought I'd learned my lesson by now.

When in doubt, and I'm angry about something, I should put down the knitting needles and walk away. Or sit and play Bejeweled. Or sit and do something that doesn't require attention and precision, and all of the other things that tend to fly out the window when you're ticked off.

Friday afternoon, I was angry. I was irked. I was irritated. And I wanted to knit a sock. I really should have stopped myself there.

I'd started said sock Thursday night, in preparation for my trip to DC on Saturday and Sunday. I'd make some decent progress. Only four rows, but enough that I could see there was progress being made, and, most importantly, the round was not twisted.

Note the use of the word "was".

Somehow, within five minutes of picking up the sock to knit on Friday during my lunch break, I'd managed to twist it. I still don't quite know how it happened. I noticed that the cables were knotted when I picked up the sock, and I decided that to unknot them, I needed to flip them. I think that's when I somehow turned it, and knit into the finished side instead.

Go ahead. Laugh. I'd be laughing if it hadn't happened to me.

The only solution was to rip it out. I guess I could have tinked back, and undone what I'd done, but honestly, I wasn't sure how, and I thought it would be more frustrating to do that.

I guess this was better than what I'd done the last time I'd knit angry.

After a "discussion" with my ex-boyfriend (still the boyfriend, at the time), he went out for a run and I picked up my knitting -- a baby blanket. I was so flustered and frustrated over the discussion and not knowing what to think or feel besides HURT, that I just picked it up and started knitting.

I didn't stop to think about what I was doing, or that maybe knitting a detailed pattern wasn't the greatest idea at the time. So instead, I picked it up, started at the row I thought I had left off on, and started knitting. Turned out I was two rows off. And didn't realize it until I had knit for five rows. On a fairly large baby blanket.

30 minutes of angry knitting led to three hours of slowily unknitting.

Someday I will learn.

Finally Finishing the Blueberry Pie Socks. Maybe.

My goal for this weekend is to turn this

Into this

I have suffered from a bad case of Second Sock Syndrome on this project. I started these socks Sept. 17, according to my Ravelry project page. I think – although I can’t recall clearly – that I finished the first sock within one or two weeks.

And then it proceeded to sit in my car. And sit. And sit some more.

I don’t have a good explanation for why these have not gotten finished, and why I haven’t started the second one.

But I’ll have a lot of knitting time on my hands this weekend, and I need a project that’s small enough to stuff in a purse and take with me. I can’t guarantee that the socks will get done, but I’m hoping that I’ll be able to get enough done to have a burst of motivation to finally finish the pair. (The first one fits beautifully, for what it's worth.)

I don’t want this to be the knitted Thing for February, though. I also have a sweater that’s been sitting around in various states of completion since Nov. 8. I’ve got one sleeve done, one sleeve left to go, and then a collar to do. I’d really like the sweater to be the knitted Thing.

Accountability Time: January Stash Purchases

One of the goals in starting to craft down the stash was that I’d spend less money on fabric and yarn, and thus save money, and be able to buy a house in 18 months.

insert nervous laughter here

Even though you can tell the girl to not buy yarn or fabric, but that doesn’t always happen. There are sales, and there are OMG MUST HAVE buys, and there are pretties and shinies that one thinks might be a good treat at the yarn shop at the end of a long, long day.

But, not buying more fabric or yarn without using it is the goal for 2012, and thus I must at least attempt to be good. I figure if I put the cold hard truth up here, it’ll at least be staring me in the face.

January totals: $39

$8	Buttons at Joann
$31	Fabric, a pattern, a zipper, and lining fabric at Joann

 

All in all, I’m not sure how I feel about this. On one hand, I could have made do with the buttons that I’d initially bought for the dress. But I didn’t particularly like those buttons, and I wasn’t convinced that they really worked with the fabric I was using (I’d already attempted this dress once in a plain grey wool jersey, and it was a massive fail). But I could have been better about not going for the buttons that were $2 each.

Oops.

And then there was the fabric, pattern, zipper, and lining. I don’t quite call that an oops, because it was a good deal.

So I’ll start February fresh. Goal for this month: under $20. I know I’ll need a zipper for the dress I want to sew for this month, and I’m hoping to snag that Vogue pattern when it goes on sale on Friday, but I’m really hoping there’s nothing beyond this.

I know that’ll mean I can’t hit up my favorite bead shop in Dupont Circle this month, or go to a yarn shop when I head to New York later in the month, but it’ll be worth it. In 18 months, I’ll have a house with a real craft room, and hopefully less stash to move when I move.

I am going to knitting hell.

This is not a Thing that got finished in January. Well, sort of. Maybe. I actually finished knitting it last February, but it's been sitting, unseamed, in a box.

And unseaming, gentle readers, is why I am going to knitting hell.

It occurred to me last night, as I was putting aside the machine after sewing the lining hem on the dress, that I couldn't think of any good reason why I shouldn't seam the purse with the machine. Afterall, I had just made a knit dress, and it turned out nicely, and the only difference between that and a knit purse -- in my head -- was the gauge and weight of the fabric.

In other words, I decided to be lazy. I decided that handstitching the purse was overrated, and I'd see what my machine could do.

And you know what? Being lazy was awesome. It's the nicest seams that I've ever had on a knit project, and my machine could handle it like a pro. I was worried that it wouldn't feed the material (because really, that's all that knitting is -- making fabric to put together or wear), but it did.

It was fast, and the seams are even and straight, and the machine is good. I am probably going to knitting hell for taking a shortcut, but the final result is so worth it. If I can get away with it, I'm never seaming a knit fabric by hand again.

And really? If I seamed things by machine, they'd probably get done a lot sooner.

Big excitement on a Saturday night

I get to use my swift for the first time. 

 Yes, this is what passes for excitement around here.

You can tell to the girl to stash down... but then there's a sale.

When  I was in Joann Fabric a week ago to get a legitimate need for the dress, I saw some gorgeous linen-cotton fabric that I knew had to be a skirt for me.

Now, I know that buying more fabric was not crafting down the stash. And it wasn't being frugal -- although since it was 40 percent off, I could at least make the argument that I wasn't paying full price.

But I wanted it. And it was perfect for me. And, well, I really wanted it. Which, come to think of it, is mostly why I have a stash and a craft supply buying problem.

Anyway. Having found the fabric, I needed to find a pattern. I could have gone with something I had already -- Butterick 3134 -- but I wasn't super thrilled with all the panels, and I didn't really like how it had a thicker defined waistband. So I did what any girl would do who Really Wanted Something: I started looking at Vogue's website.

And there I found it: Vogue 8749. I liked how the waistband was nothing more than the facing (well, I'm lining it, so no facing) flipped over, and how it was flowy without being overwhelming.

I got lucky, and Vogue patterns were on sale at Joann for $3.99 through today. So I went back last night, bought the lining fabric, the zipper, the linen, and the pattern. And now I'm all ready to make it. At some point. Maybe in April or March.

I'm also stalking another Vogue pattern -- Vogue 8784. It's part of Vogue's spring collection, and was the only one that I saw there that I decided I Must Have. Sadly, even though the patterns were marked down to $3.99, my Joann didn't have the new Vogue ones in. But they're also on sale this coming weekend, so I'll make a stop back in on Friday before I go out of town.

Yeah, shush. They'll get made. Eventually.

Me, procrastinate? No. Never.

Um, this dress is cutting it a little close to my deadline. But... it's Jan. 28, and all I have to do is hem the lining and figure out what on EARTH happened with the zipper that's making it not zip all the way to the top.

This is what I learned along the way for this project, which I started... two weeks ago?

1. After sewing a velvet dress, doing knit fabric is easy peasy.
2. If I actually bother to cut out the dress, the rest of it goes quickly.
3. I hate buttonholes.

Honestly, if I'd actually kept doing the dress, and had done it consistently, I would have been finished ages ago. But I never bothered to cut it out until after Martin Luther King Day, and then I didn't do anything with the pieces for a while. And for some reason, that darn dress just wouldn't stitch itself. Clothes these days.

So this is Vogue 8442. I did it in a lightweight knit fabric, which feels like a brushed knit. So soft. So nice. Lined with a black lining.

On me, it doesn't look nearly as tentlike as it does on the dressform. I'm chalking this up to the fact that my arms and sleeves don't usually hang next to my boobs at all time, and thus you can actually see form definition when I wear it.

I can't remember how long I've had this pattern. But let's put it this way: When I bought it, it wasn't out of print. The fabric was part of the Joann Mixed Media collection... which I can also no longer find online. I think I bought that in 2010 or early 2011.

The accidental first project

Why can't a girl find a hat that won't smush her hair in the winter? That was the question I asked on Facebook.

I hate how when it's cold out, I have to wear a hat (because I'm neither stupid nor crazy, although I am picky) to keep my little ears from freezing off in Pittsburgh winters. But when I have to wear a hat, I also smush and scrunch my hair down. It's bad enough that it's fine and flat. I certainly don't need the weight and circumference of a hat contributing!

So when I was griping about small hats, it occurred to me that gasp! shock! amazement! I could actually just make my own hat. And thus began the January Knitting Project: Damnit, I'm Cold.

Damnit, I'm Cold helped me use up some yarn that's been sitting around since I learned how to knit, and I made my very first hat. That hat was incredibly warm -- and still is -- but was ugly as sin. I keep it in the car for hiking trips in the winter so it doesn't really see the light of day. It's your basic Paton's Classic Wool in Jade. Sadly, although I only came close to using half a skein, at least it's half a skein less than I had -- plus, I got a cute hat out of it!

Look, Ma -- I've got a craft blog!

One of my big goals/resolutions/whatsits to keep me accountable in 2012 was to actually craft down my stash. Three main reasons:

1. I have... an addiction. I love yarn and fabric, and can't seem to help myself from buying fabric and patterns and yarn when they go on sale -- and even when they don't. At last count, I think I've got more than a mile of yarn in my apartment, and while I don't have enough fabric to coat a football field, it's probably getting close. I have 39 patterns. This is... problematic.
2. I also like clothes. I really like clothes. I like buying them, but hate how in this day and age, even though a girl may have an hourglass figure, of sorts (40-36-42), if it's not a stick thin hourglass, you might be out of luck finding what you need and want. And damnit, I like cute clothes. I love vintage styles, and I hate how it's hard to find clothes that are made well, yet affordable, and don't require you to wear three layers of camis and shirts just to not reveal yourself to the world.
3. I also am cheap. I have fabric and yarn, damnit, and it's silly to keep paying perfectly good money for more fabric and yarn, and then go out and buy more clothes. So, I figure if I can use the fabric and yarn and the patterns to make clothes and accessories that I like, I can save money. And if I save money, I can buy a house.

So here we go (albeit a bit late, which is why this and the next few posts are backdated). One sewn item and one knitted item each month for 2012. 12 months, 24 projects. I think I can do it.