Hello there!
I have some progress after three weeks of frantically packing - doing nothing - trying to return to reality.
Crochet & Knitting
Yep, knitting is back in business.
Traveling Afghan
Progressssss! I started this little s… square at the beginning of February, and now it’s almost finished. Well, I made the same number of rows on the other ones. But this one is still too short, so I will add one or two repeats.
Is it weird that I like the wrong side more?
The right side is okay:
I did not give up on knitting, and it was nice after I got into a rhythm.
Vanilla socks
Let’s stay within the knitting domain. One of my NYRs is “make a wearable pair of socks”, and as I was watching The Crazy Sock Lady, I noticed she has a tutorial for vanilla socks on 9” circulars. Welp. I ran upstairs, found a cake of sock yarn, took my baby chiaogoos, twist shorties and started working on the cuff.
The yarn I am using is Alize Angora Gold, and the colour is 2970. I took out the shortest cable from the set, which should be 13 cm (5”) and 8 cm (3”) needles of size 2.25 mm (US 1).
I learned the long-tail cast-on and was on my merry way to do something I don’t like. RIBBING. LOOK:
The ribbing looks horrible. But do I care? Well, I did for a while. But then I got into reasoning: it took me hours to make this, so I decided to keep it and get better at it later. I will make another sock, right? … I will, right?
Side note: I love how the stockinette is so tiny and neat while the cuff is a raging chaos :D Don’t mind the stitch markers; those are also part of the tutorial, they are supposed to help me count.
Anyway. I did 20 rows of stockinette, and according to the tutorial, I should be doing 59 total, so that’s gonna be a bit. But stockinette is fast. It will be over very soon.
Ugh, I need to get some tips for the ribbing. My current plan for the other sock is to tug after each stitch.
I look forward to the heel; I already looked at a tutorial for an afterthought heel and contemplated doing it because it does NOT look difficult. But hey, let’s stay in the line and follow at least ONE tutorial, shall we?
Cable hat
No progress. I am not giving up (just yet!).
Hexie Cardie
I was looking for a project to work on during the flight. And all my projects are either too big, require too much stuff (like amis), or are knitted (I am not having my precious needles tossed by airport security).
So I dug through my stash and found two cakes of Papatya Angora (colour 60) from ancient times. I bought them as a crochet newbie because they were so pretty. And the lady at the counter asked me what I would make - I told her the honest truth: no idea, the yarn is just too pretty. She suggested a sweater, and I told her, “Haha, that’s WAY out of my skillset”. She brushed me off, saying, “Just make two rectangles. It’s really not difficult”. Sure. Haha. Until recently.
I don’t know why I was scared of making wearables before; she was right. It’s not that difficult.
The plane project was set - I took a 3.25 mm hook with me after I made an unfrogable swatch - this yarn is not forgiving, so be cautious. But crocheting on board was not fun. My eyes got tired quickly, and the dry air made me want to nap instead of crochet. So I did.
For the vacation, I rented a suite that had a terrace with an ocean view, and I worked on my cardie there. I didn’t follow a tutorial or a pattern. But it was slow because you go places when you are on vacation. So during the daylight, we were chilling on the beach, and during the evenings, we were lounging in the bars by the pools (we had just one alcoholic drink for the whole vacay, just saying, we are not drinkers).
So I did not get a whole lot done. But I worked on it when I came home, so this is the current progress:
Gamer Bunny
I finished and stuffed Bunny’s body and started his hoodie. That’s all the progress there is.
Acquisitions
Well, just to get it out: I bought hooks. A set of hooks. And my reasoning is simple: I needed shorter-shaft hooks for amis. My current ones are great, and the ergonomy is excellent, but the shaft is a bit longer than I would like for short and tight ami stitches. So I bought a set of Addi Swing.
No regrets whatsoever. I did not need to do research or read reviews or anything; I’d had a few Addi hooks before.
Sewing
Oh hello! A new category. A few years ago, my grandmother gave me a sewing machine she didn’t know how to use. Aaand it’s older than me. That part on its own is scary.
So at that time, “a few years ago”, I tried to use it, and the pedal caught fire. Totally encouraging to continue. </sarcasm>
I bought a new pedal and set it aside. And a few days back, I just took all afternoon trying to set that up (because there is no guide for this particular model anywhere). The whole machine is made from heavy metal, and the outside is sturdy plastic, so I don’t plan to get rid of it; it’s a machine that will last another fifty years (if I won’t set it on fire again).
All that to say, it was a pain to set it up because it’s fiddly and heavy as heck. And I had very little idea of what I was doing.
But when I managed to set the tension from both threads and sewed up the first hole in some of my clothing pieces, that felt like an achievement should’ve popped up somewhere.
I bought some fabric many moons ago, but I am not ready to start making. For now, I will repair stuff and then maybe build up the courage to cut. Because once you cut, there is no frogging.
And a little spoiler alert for the next time: there is another craft coming my way. I don’t know if the kit will be here in two weeks or if I will have the time and willpower to start it, but it’s coming nonetheless.
Postcards
As I was on vacation, it’s given that I sent cards.
Warning: I did not take the time to take nice pictures of the cards because that would be awkward. I was already getting odd looks from people: having 13 postcards on my table when we have internet = weird. I ignored that part happily. But walking around the table, trying to take the best shot. Yeah, this behaviour is not my cuppa; I don’t do it even at home when I am alone.
There are only 11 cards; the other two were for relatives, so I did not want to snap pictures of them.
The following cards went to these countries: Germany, Ukraine (yep, their post works), Sweden, Netherlands, India, Taiwan, Hong Kong, USA, and Uruguay (I so wanna visit this one).
In case you are into stamps, here is the only available stamp they had:
See you in the next post ~ which should be a regular one this time.