When's It Time to Start Over? A Question for the Crafter and for Life

Any crafter knows, sometimes that wonderful idea you had in your head doesn’t work out exactly the way you envisioned it.  You can tell early on, too – those first few stitches, cuts of fabric, swashes of paint.  But maybe if you tweak it, maybe if you carry on, it’ll magically become what you imagined.  Or maybe it won’t, and you’ll have a disappointing mess.

Thus, you are faced with the question of whether to keep on going, because you’ve started and invested your time, materials, energy, or do you start all over again and accept the lost investment, but hopeful for the thing you actually wanted.

This may seem a deep philosophical question for the events that come up in your life. That college choice, your job, a relationship.  There’s many choices we make in life that seemed like a great idea when we started, but somewhere along those first few steps, we get clear signals that we were not going to be happy with the end results.

For today, however, this is a pretty basic question. Should I keep on with this poncho/shawl plan I had for this orange yarn, because it’s not looking as cute as I had originally thought it would or do I unravel it and start all over again on a new design, one that I may like better and actually wear more? Do I continue with the one that may be easier, the poncho, because it's my own design so I can be creative and no one can tell me that it's wrong, or with the one that may be a little harder because it's from a pattern, which by the way is written in Russian with a basic pattern chart.  Such is the question of the crocheter.

Poncho in progress - my own design 

The other option - a summer shawl

Since I have two skeins, I’m gong to start option number two (the shawl) and see whether I like that any better than the poncho.

Life isn’t always like that, you can’t always follow two parallel paths until one is the obvious choice.  Sometimes you have to make a definite choice and be ready to start over if you have to.  Or stick with your choice and make the best of it.  But back to my yarn…

I’m carrying it around with me and will work on a few more rows, then decide. Either way, I guess I’m going to have to unravel one or the other.

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WIP On the Go

Meetings (at least 1 a week for something), doctors' & dentists' appointments (there's a lot when you have 4 kids), waiting on kids after practice of some sort, sports activities (games, meets, races, matches - whatever you want to call them). Like any busy mom, I'm always on the go. And so is my yarn. 90% of the time, I have a skein of yarn and hooks and needles in my bag. The other 10% of the time when I'm yarnless, it probably means I did not finish my coffee and did not fully think my day through and I'm probably sitting, twiddling my thumbs like someone going through withdrawal.

 

Along with my yarn, I also keep my supplies on hand - because what's a ball of alpaca without a hook or needle to stitch it?  Here's a peek at my supplies kit.

 

There are plenty of specialty knitting needle /crochet hook carrying cases on the market, at every price point. Mine is none of those. Instead, I have re-purposed a travel jewelry bag (which was a gift from a friend because it's pink.) It has zippered, clear plastic sections, folds up to the size of a large wallet, and fits easily in any of my bags.

     

What's in it? I don't / can't carry every hook and notion that I own. Here, I have just the basics for a project on the go.

 

Hooks & Needles - an assortment of the sizes I use the most and any others I anticipate needing

 

Notions

- small sewing scissors

- yarn needle

- teeny crochet hook 

- stitch markers 

 

Misc. Stuff  

- teeny Post-It notes - good for making notes on patterns or just when I need to write something down

- safety pins - they make good stitch markers and are useful for holding a stitch in case the hook falls out when I put the project away

- a pencil 

 

Do you carry a crochet/knitting kit? What's in it that I've forgotten? 

 

 

Evernote helps you remember everything and get organized effortlessly. Download Evernote.

#WIP - #DIY Decorated Clipboards

If you've read a little bit here, you may have picked up that in some ways, I'm still an old-school paper type of gal.  You know, with the paper planner and all.  So, I still find I need to write stuff down on real paper and I hold it all together on a  good old-fashioned clipboard.  In my organization meetings, for swim meets, counting Girl Scout cookies, kids doodling in the car - I still have a handful of clipboards scattered about the house.  But they're that dull, chipboard, industrial brown.  Boring.

But I've got a couple shelves full of scrapbooking and crafting supplies!  Modge podge, paper, doo-dads - meet plain brown clipboard.

• Any area that's not going to be covered in paper, paint with basic craft paint.
• Cover the rest of the clipboard with ModgePodge.  It's okay if it mixes in with the glue.  Lay the paper on top and smooth it out.  Rub out any bubbles and wrinkles.
• Add any other embellishments you have - flowers, buttons, stickers, letters, ribbons, pictures.
• If you want a little more shine, or if you might be using this poolside, you can go over the paper with a coat or 2 or 3 of ModgePodge.  (Don't ModgePodge the 3-D stuff, like my flowers.)

Ta-da!  It's such an easy project and you can't mess it up!  You can even do it with a margarita in hand - what else can you ask for?

You can be fancy and make our clipboard functional, too:

• Print kids' chores and to-do lists, affix the paper to the board
• Include pictures of your goals, encouraging words - it's a portable vision board!
• Use the clipboard for your daily to-do and grocery list

Enjoy!

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WIP: Cabled Tunisian Stitches

I started a nice cozy, squishy shawl/scarf/wrap for the winter, went with a Tunisian stitch to try to make it a little bit different. But by row 5 I was already thinking, "this is going to be a lot of the same rows," and wondered what else I could do to add a little something, some design, some stitch feature.  I've seen a few nice knitted wraps that have a lace design along one side and that's what I wanted.  I considered pulling it out and starting over again in regular stitches so I could get something fancy along the edge.

And then, the crochet fairies dropped the latest Interweave Crochet in my mailbox.  And ta-da there's a sweater with cabled Tunisian stitches.  Thus began my first experiment with this little twist on Tunisian crochet.

I've worked cables and twists before, so I understood the stitch construction; now, it was the "how" part, which, actually turned out to be pretty simple using the clear, step-by-step instructions from Kim Guzman.

Tunisian stitches for the forward pass

The return pass - move the stitches for the cable

On the return pass, you take (in this pattern) 6 stitches off the main hook, put the 3 closest to the hook on a second hook (or stitch holder), return the remaining 3 to the main hook, and then replace the other 3 from the second hook.  You'll do this twice, for each side of the cable.  Whether those stitches on the second hook are brought forwards or backwards determines the direction of the cable.  This is the part where you have to pay attention or your cables could end up turning the wrong way.

Return pass after moving the stitch loops

After you've moved the stitch loops, you're back to a regular return pass.  Kim Guzman in Interweave recommends stitching a single chain in the middle of the cabled stitches, i.e. after 3 stitches, to make it raise up more from the fabric.

This was a good find, I like it.  And it makes what would've been a hundred rows of the same ole' stitch a bit more interesting.

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My First Knit Hat!

I've moved another project from my WIP (Work in Progress) basket to my DONE! shelf.  I took up knitting last (?) year and have managed to finish a scarf, started another and then made the big leap to a hat. I love the slouchy hat look, I've made several crochet versions.  I tried this one because it was supposed to be really easy.  And actually, it was. Of course, by now, I have lost the pattern, but if/when I find it again, I will give proper credit to the designer.

 

New knitting skills on this project:

• Knitting in the round
• Increasing/decreasing
• Binding off a circle

For this hat, the stitches decreased at the top of the hat, ending up with a relatively small circle - then how are you supposed to maneuver the needles?  That was a bit of work, but I'm sure I didn't do it right.

I don't think I'm up to a sweater yet, still need to work on getting my stitches smooth. Actually, I should go ahead and make another hat because I'm sure this one is going to get grabbed up by someone in my house who thinks it matches her outfit.

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Yarn for a New Fall Scarf

A funny thing happened on the way to Costco. I passed the yarn store, so what could I do on a beautiful sunny afternoon but stop and look around?

I actually did have some intention - I need ("need"? let's just go with that for now) a cotton yarn to trim a baby blanket.  But there was some variegated yarn and it was on sale. And I got distracted.

My next WIP (maybe).  A scarf for the fall?

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Summer Stitched Shawls

I've been a little distracted today and have gotten nothing done that I was supposed to do. Why? Because the Summer issue of Interweave Crochet came and there's a beautiful green summer shawl on the front cover.  Did you see three of my favorite words right in a row: "green", "summer", "shawl." I spent my coffee sipping time to flip through the magazine and match them up with the yarn I had already considered from my stash when I stalked the online version of the magazine.

Love is a Rose Shawl by Kathryn White

The cover project is the "Love is a Rose Shawl" by Kathryn White.  She used 1 skein of a Lorna's Laces, silk/wool yarn.  The yarn I have picked out it is Scrumptous Lace by Fyberspates, a silk/mohair blend. The 1 skein is 1093 yards, the pattern calls for 1250 yrds; I think it'll be fine.

Solar Wrap by Daniela Nii

Now isn't this fancy?  Daniela Nii's pattern calls for approximately 900 yards of "100% Mako cotton mercerized and gassed."  What? I've got mercerized cotton (Paton's Grace is an easy to find option), but "gassed"?  Don't even know what that means.  The yarn I'm thinking is actually an acrylic (well, actually it says "acrilico"), but it has the same feel of mercerized cotton, so I think it will be cool for the summer. Either I picked this up on vacation or a friend gifted it to me, not sure.

Electra Wrap by Vashti Braha

I don't even really wear blue, but I really liked this yarn, although I didn't have a project in mind (this rarely stops me from purchasing).  And here's a lovely shawl, that happens to be in blue.  The pattern suggests about 450 yards.  The yarn I have is Precious, a 100% silk from the Natural Dye Studio; the price tag is in Pounds, so I guess it's souvenir yarn from vacation.

And as much as I like all of these, the one that I was all swooning over is the Ennis Shawl, also by Vashti Braha.  She used bamboo for the triangular shaped Tunisian stitch shawl. Love it.  I know I've got some bamboo around here somewhere.

I love shawls for the summer.  They make you want to have dinner and sip sangria outside on a patio and watch the twinkling fireflies. I'm thinking, if I make more shawls, my hubby will feel compelled to take me out for that pitcher of sangria. See, yarn can be used passively aggressively.

Are you on Ravelry?  Find me there - love2crochet.  Happy stitching!