Poke

There should be a poke gadget on blogger, a la Facebook, where you can "poke" someone to remind them to post something.

Poke.

Slowly, we have been settling into our new home, fixing and arranging things as we like. I managed to unpack most, but not all, of my crafty stuff. An intricate plan is in the works as to how to organize the yarn and fabric. I feel so lucky to have a room dedicated to my passion.

Since moving in, I have been working reducing my stash, and I hope that reorganizing my stuff will further that goal. Like many others, I'm sure, I have tons of fabric and yarn. Its really time to either do something with it or get rid of it. So. . .

My first goal: makes clothes
I wear black. Or I should say that I use to wear a lot of black. No, I'm not part of some cult or goth or whatever. Over the years, I guess I just stopped making an effort about my appearance, and black seemed the simplest thing to grab.

Based upon reviews and other blogs, I decided to get this OOP pattern: Simplicity 3803.

It's apparently somewhat difficult to get. I scoured the internet for months. A few months ago, I just went ahead and bought it in the size 4-12 range, hoping that I could somehow fix it so it would work for me. Mind you, I'm not in this range. Fortunately, I snagged one in the higher size range for a few dollars on Ebay. What luck! I plan to use some stashed fabric to make my first dress for summer 2011. Whoohoo!

My second goal is to resurrect old quilt tops and blocks that I put away for whatever reason. Here, I had made pinwheels at least four or five years ago. The original idea was to make a ton of pinwheel blocks and put them together for a scrap quilt. But, to be honest, I'm not all that jazzed about the idea now, and my quilting abilities and desire have simply advanced beyond making pinwheels. For now. Don't get me wrong. Simple blocks are great. In particular, I like pinwheels. Nine patches are good, too. But, man, lately, I have been into curved patterns, like the Double Wedding Ring, New York Beauty, and other circular patterns.

This will be Em's first baby quilt. I'm using a motif for the blocks, and I am thinking about using the bubbles stencil for the border. I finished quilting the blocks already, and I just did swirls in the lattices. One of my sewing machines is on the blitz now, so its on hold until I get it fixed.

Poke.

In fiber news, I finally visited Grandma's Spinning Wheel last week, and I took some lessons on how to do intrelac. I had tried it on my own once, but I lost interest in keeping up with it. I like the pattern though, and I've since learned that taking a class or instructions is generally helpful.

The good part? I made this:

The yarn is Crystal Palace Taos. The needles are really beautiful. I bought those at the Spinning Wheel even though I already have size 8s. With help, I rolled right along with it and worked a lot of rows in a short time.

The bad part? Yesterday, I was about to knit during my daughter's tae kwon do practice, and I noticed this, wayyyyyyyyy at the bottom: a drop stitch!

I was so crushed. It looked so nice, and I was planning on making a bag to hold my makeup. And, well, I couldn't work any more rows. I tried frogging it back down to where I made the mistake, but the yarn is so unforgiving. After a few rows, I ended up with pieces. Sniff.

The project is scrapped. I have a little bit of yarn left, probably enough to make a smaller pouch. Its disappointing, but a lesson learned well on my first attempt. :)

By the way, if you're juiced into Ravelry, I have many other projects there as well under craftyotter.

Back to the otterpond.