Guess what I’ll be doing this weekend…
Finishing up this cutie. more »
A new take on the old
Way back in April, I was skimming threads in the Ravelry group, Sock Knitters Anonymous, when I saw a post announcing a sock design contest by Lorna’s Laces.
After reading the rules, I remembered I had some leftover Shepherd Sock from the Slytherin socks. It seemed like a perfect project to work on during the forthcoming weekend’s trip up north. So I packed myself a “design kit” plus one extra project (you never know, right?).
You see, ever since I knit the English Crystal Design from Kinzel’s First Book of Modern Lace Knitting, I’ve thought it would be interesting to rework this motif for socks. So I decided I’d try and give form to my visualization during the long weekend.
It took a while; two challenges I struggled with were 1) not second-guessing myself (should I let the stitch pattern spiral, or not?), and 2) figuring out a nice transition between the large and small motifs. Much tinkering, knitting, tinking, re-knitting, and frogging ensued until I achieved the result and look I wanted.
This. more »
Pithy
(Quick update re: the Rory pattern; it’s now available for downloading or saving to your library at Ravelry. If you’re not a Raveler, a public download link is available here.)
No knitting report today, but look! Pretty yarn! more »
Mini-Surprise
I’m still behind with posts, so many pictures to sort through and and posts to proofread.
Meanwhile, I was finally able to merge my old Wordpress feed with FeedBurner. I had signed up for FB ages ago, but couldn’t find an easy solution at the time. ESCknits at Ravelry clued me in to FeedSmith. This plugin made the transition so much easier. Now that my feeds are going through FB, the formatting should look much nicer now.
Since I was so happy with the feed improvements, I decided to change my blog template. It has a bit more white than I’d like, but is very clean and readable. I’m kind of picky about my templates… too many files or too many graphics can require more work to customize than I’m willing or have time to apply. This one is well designed and was easy to tweak here and there. The green color in the header navigation bar and the comment background is still a bit off. I always have trouble viewing light green colors on a LED monitor. I’m satisfied with it for now but don’t be surprised if it changes. Do let me know if anything looks wonky, thanks!
Spiralling Surprise
I haven’t been a good blogger/commentator lately; I really appreciate all your comments on my recent posts. I haven’t had time to write up any posts for a while because Grandma was here visiting. Less computer time also means more knitting!
Quick Ravelry aside: Casey has just added an “image slurper” which is being tested now by some users. It takes the URL of a picture and resizes/crops it for use on Ravelry; the pictures show up with a ©[User] caption. I’m so excited for this option because I generally host my pictures here instead of Flickr or Picasa. Ravelry is also getting new servers this week; after the switch (and related testing), they plan to speed up the invites. Good news for those still on the waiting list!
I didn’t even blog about these socks when they were wee socks in progress because they went so quickly!
Boring Post Today
I’ve been so busy lately that I barely had a few minutes to spend on the computer. My blog-reading and emails were completely neglected last week because said moments went to Ravelry. But I’m off work this week so I have lots of time to catch up on things.
Yesterday I scrolled through a gazillion blog posts. Almost all emails have been answered. What’s next? This blog! I have new pictures to share: a FO, and new SIPs. I’ve also got a Questionnaire I need to post later today. So look for knitterly content tomorrow! : )
