Interesting blog post

An interesting blog post about a knitter who's made a great discovery about crochet. Note: it's something that we crocheters have long known, but sometimes takes knitters a while to understand. I love the aran cardigan in the photo, as well as the potted catcus at the bottom.

Museum of Unnatural History

Here's another just for fun article about an artist who uses crochet in her large scale projects. One of the animals in her "unnatural history" exhibit is "...horned sheep called the pushmi-pullyu, have two heads, enabling them to consume twice as much food during limited grazing hours." These two-headed, horned sheep are wearing a large striped sweater!
It would be a lot of fun to see more of this exhibit, unfortunately it's in Houston, Texas.

pretties

Isn't this a pretty little sweater? (oh wait, could it be a sweater vest? LOL)
"crochet sweater"

There's potential here:
"another crocheted sweater"

The addition of government legalese to crochet projects!

Would you like to spend a little time trying to interpret government legalese? The above link is to a long-winded determination of whether this crocheted garment is a sweater or a sweater vest! It's a ruling of "United States International Trade Commision Rulings And Harmonized Tariff Schedule".

I'm having fun trying to envision the project just from the technical descriptions. But, does anyone remember having seen these actual garments in the stores?

This is just a little fling, because a lot of what I'm working on lately just can't be discussed in public yet.

Back to the paperwork, and occasional swatching.

Special Olympics scarves update

Here's "an article" from a Boise, Idaho newsletter about getting ready for the Special Olympics Winter Games. In the right hand column is information giving numbers about different aspects of the game. This should just blow your mind - "35,000: The latest count of handmade, donated scarves (the goal was 5,000)."
Be sure to click on the pictures and zoom in to see stacks and boxes of scarves. Hey, the girl in the front of photo 1, with a scarf that's blue on one side and white on the other,...I think she's wearing my scarf. I made one just like that!
Now to get those little hats packed up and shipped out to Save the Children/Warm Up America!

Here's a little peek at what I'm swatching right now.



Sorry that the pictures are so small. Need to mess around with the scanner and see if I can get better pictures. You can always click on the individual picture, it will give you a big picture.

These are swatches for the Tunisian Winter Crochet-A-Long. These two swatches were made in the left-over mill ends from the round ripple in Christmas colors. More swatching is going on, between periods of paperwork.

The Cutest crochet I've seen today

Here's a really cute pattern for baby booties, they're made into sock monkeys, frogs and ducks. I think that a set of these would be a big hit at a baby shower. Check out the cuteness at Maggie Weldon's store:
"BootieBuddies"

Checking In, weather & paperwork

Hey,
I'm alive and well, and not snowed in, yet! Everytime they predict snow we tend to get a wintery mix, or freezing rain; and in a day or so we're back to cold but clear. This a.m. we're supposed to get snow, possibly some accumulation. Then snow again Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. I'm not at all surprised, the Farm Show starts at 8 a.m. today. This happens so frequently in the Harrisburg area that it's actually known as "Farm Show Weather". It doesn't matter what the weather is like days before the Farm Show, or what happens the days after the Farm Show, the week of the show is typically cold, wet, snowy, blustery,...
Crochet-wise I'm not getting much accomplished with the hook and thread or yarn. My crochet related activities all involve paperwork. I'm putting together a flyer about our local CGOA Chapter, which will be handed out at the Farm Show. If you're going to be there, look for the Keystone Lace Guild booth where we'll be promoting crochet, our Guild chapter, and the upcoming Gathering of the Guilds. I'm also filling out papers for an ad in the program of the Gathering, registration for the Gathering, and posting notices to our Chapter on our Yahoo Group: "Those Yarn Crocheters"

I'm also filling out forms to reserve the library meeting room for Chapter meetings, and trying to find a few alternate locations for when the meeting room is not available. I recently finished writing a press release about the Guild Chapter and our recent charity crocheting for the Special Olympics Winter Games and Knit One/Save One caps for Save the Children/Warm Up America. I hope to get it out to local papers this week (reminder, it seems to be stuck at the proof readers).

I'm also working on some other CGOA related paperwork. I'm also a moderator on the Ravelry group Learn Crochet. If you're a member of Ravelry, check out the group. It's very informative. I belong to about 40 other groups on Ravelry, right now I'm not very active on many, but hope to get back to them soon. I've also joined Crochetville, mainly because I wanted to take an online class that they were offering called Designing for Print Publication. Part of the class will actually be writing and preparing a pattern for publication, and submitting it to a publication. This starts on Jan. 23rd. I think it's going to be a fabulous class.

When I'm not working on paperwork, I tend to think a lot about the next garment I want to make. I've now bought sportweight yarn to royal blue, fingering weight yarn in white, some light worsted in pale blue soy blend, some worsted in blue cotton blend; all with general ideas of a vest, top, tunic,...I really need to start swatching, checking gauge, laundering swatches, assessing drape, etc. then get busy designing or crocheting. I have several patterns in Everyday Crochet that I'd like to tackle, but I've also been thinking of creating a "sampler" cardigan involving a band of motifs around the bottom, then some basic stitches, some textured stitches, probably some Tunisian, maybe some hairpin lace,...so many possibilities.

Must shut down the computer and get some sleep. Fiber filled dreams!

Special Olympics scarves update

I made one last quick scarf on Tuesday evening, picked up another on Wednesday and packed up 15 scarves from the group.

Our next project is finishing up little hats for the Knit One/Save One campaign of Save the Children and Warm Up America. I made 4 hats tonight while watching tv. I used the Tulip hat pattern from Dee's blog. It's a beautiful little hat and works up fast. These 4 hats are made in Bernat Satin Sport and Caron Simply Soft, I used a G hook, eliminated one round of increases, and then adjusted the edging just a little bit. The 2 Tulip hats I made earlier are in a cotton and soy blend, so I can't send these to the Knit One/Save One, they will be going to a local charity.



The colors aren't exactly accurate, the green is actually a light sage/seafoam shade, and the red is a pure, primary red.
I'm really excited about how cute and soft these hats are, keep this pattern handy for future charity projects!