CrafTBQ

Current projects are doing more work on the scarf and getting ready to swatch something for a friend (*waves hi to my best enabler*). In the meanwhile I post links of note, interest, and general funitude. I figure this works better than posting the boring links that even I don’t care about.

First up, I point towards the Village Knittiot again as she posts links to different ways of looking at our consumption as part of her Summer of Knitting Naturally. I’m particularly interested in The Omnivore’s Dilemna as I find food culture to be utterly fascinating and the idea of tracking four different meals is a creative way to approach our current eating system. I mention it here both to remind myself to read it, and to point it out to friends who might share similar interests.

Next up, and along the lines of a completely different for your now for something needs, CrazyAuntPurl posts a review, with pictures, of Sexy Little Knits which has a title that’s fairly self-explanatory. (She also talks about loving to look at patterns even if she doesn’t make them, which goes far to comfort my guilt issues about doing the same.)

SLK reminds me of SKC which is the Sexy Knitters Club which I may try to join at some point. Possibly in the near future if they pick a project that I’ve been hoping to do already. I notice a few of their nominated patterns are ones I’ve had my eye on, so I’ll have to keep watching.

I’d post a link to my LYS but in spite of them swearing that they’ll do so, they have not yet updated their website since the Carter administration. Which is amazing when you consider that the store itself only opened a few years ago. The good news is that they’ve got new classes, and I’m sorely tempted to take some if they fit into my schedule. The bad news is that they’re moving to summer hours, which cuts down on my ability to scoot over there after work on Wednesdays. (Granted this might be good news for my wallet, but still.)

In case you missed the updates on my LJ, BGAL now has its own blog. My perfectionist nature is still twitchy about some aspects of it, but I’ve decided to throw people at it and see if it breaks. Right now we’re still doing sign-ups. Sometime soon I’ll update with a start date and what have you. (Down, perfectionist nature, DOWN!)

Speaking of alongs, I thought some of y’all might be interested in The Summer of Knitting Naturally (more info to be found here). I’d probably join in myself but with enough knitting and crochet projects on my plate one of the ways I can reduce my impact is by not buying more than I need to. I am fascinated by those links, though. I may chat more about them when I get through Knitting in America which references one of the yarn sources she talks about.

Finally, lest you think this too texty for words (…is that a pun?) I give onto you pictures of the infamous zill holder:

This was a project done by me to basically give myself practice working with size 3 dpns. I modified the pattern based on the bag you can see on the cover of Last Minute Knitted Gifts. The modification was very easy once I guesstinated my gauge. At which point I have promptly forgotten just WTF I did. This is where my knitting journal would’ve come in handy. Whoops.

The yarn was sock yarn that was given to me by Zortified (I miss that LJ code whem I’m blogging). I assume it’s wool. I used it since I liked the colors. On the whole it was a quick and easy project once I got past the point of ZOMG this size 3 wooden octopus is going to stab me in the EYE!!

At some point I’ll make another one so I can recreate the pattern. I’m also contemplating doing further modifications like adding in cables. I suppose one modification could be to use larger yarn and needles, but at that point I think it’d miss out on a lot. Plus the holes might be too big to make it useful. I use this for zills but nothing’s saying you couldn’t throw other weetiny things in there.

As for the question of “WTF are zills?” here ya go:

Which is admittedly a better picture of the holder to begin with, IMO. Anyway, hence my desire to make more. Not only do I stubbornly wish to recreate the pattern just because it’s driving me nuts that I forgot it, but this could make for a very easy but still nice gift for my belly dance instructor. Hence why I ponder ideas like fancying it up more with cables or even beads.

Looks like enough of us are into the idea of a blue and gold along (herein after referred to as BGAL, because I’m just. that. cool.) that it’s a go! When I have a little brainpower I’ll look into setting up a blog for it.

In the meanwhile what do we think about rules? I’d like something very laid back, so bare minimum I’d say no time limits. I was also thinking that it’d be useful to give everyone lead time. So even if I get the blog set up this weekend we may still want to wait a few weeks before it officially begins so that way people can find patterns, get supplies, etc.

Is there anything else we should think of? Age limits? Craft limits? So far people have suggested knitting, crochet, sewing, and cross stitch. Do we want to limit it to needle arts or is anything okay as long as it’s got the colors?

I’ll probably start throwing together a rough draft FAQ too to help us all get on the same page in these early planning stages.

A few of you nibbled on the knitalong idea, so I did some research to see what our options are.

Option 1: We join an already existing knitalong. Advantages of this include not having to start it ourselves, meeting new people, and not having to start it ourselves. Ahem.

Option 2: Start one ourselves. Disadvantage of this is that, AFAIK, none of us have even joined a knitalong before, let alone started one.

OTOH doing it ourselves means we can make it be whatever we want.

Havocthecat has generously offered to help with the organizing if we started one. If we do I’m gonna say we make it a blue and gold knitalong and, for that matter, not be so hard and fast about the “knit” part. People could crochet, cross stitch, sew - if some form of thread, needles, yarn is involved, it’s all good.

I’d also like to make it open to anybody to join. We could set up a free blog with Word Press so they can worry about the security issues and bandwith. I imagine we’d have to set some ground rules about appropriate posts, projects, and behavior, but otherwise I don’t see why it couldn’t be open to anyone like all the other KALs.

So, uh - how nuts am I? Anyone interested?

ETA for those who don’t know: A knitalong is basically a group of online folks who are all working on the same type of project at the same time, and posting about their progress to a blog. So it’s sort of like an online stitch n bitch, only with a theme. Very often it’s people all working on a single pattern (so they can answer each other’s questions and offer moral support) othertimes it’s folks using the KAL for inspiration on what to make.

So a blue and gold KAL would be one where people could knit (or crochet or whatever) projects that involve the colors blue and gold in some way.