synestheticknits

transitions are hard. i'm still around, just not doing as much fun stuff (because work, school, etc). things are just moving more slowly than i'd like. sloooow. i did go and freshen things up a little bit around here, fix a few broken things, and whatnot. and i was reminded of the long-running afghan project in my last post... since then, it has been put away again and then taken back out AGAIN. sometime last summer i started working away at it while listening to podcasts (mostly unexplained and binge-catching-up on you must remember this ). i can say that all squares are now done and blocked! now the edging. this may take another ten years. sigh. so, there is still work to be done around here. in the meantime, some old favorite posts: a look through some vintage crafting magazines. early-90s vogue knitting (every hipster in my city looks straight out of 1992 lately anyway, so...?) and granny squares of the 70s ! i definitely have more of these magazines around...

hi people. it's been a while. life is weird. just here trying to fix things up since photobucket decided to suddenly kill off its image hosting. if you see anything around here that looks like it should be a photo but is instead a grey box asking you to pay $$$, that's why. i'm on it. recently i dragged out a super old and decrepit knitting project, for some reason, and have been slowly working at it. (way too many project bags just hanging out.) it's an afghan made up of intarsia panels, picturing knit-related items. knit in whatever assortment of semi-color-coordinated crappy acrylic yarn i had available at the time. which was, incidentally, 2004. because sometimes, i knit like frozen molasses. also, i remembered i kind of don't like knitting from charts. aaaand, i went back to school. so there's that. it's a little crazy. just a little, though. i hang out on twitter, even though i don't talk much. forever a lurker. say hi, though.

so.. i don't really watch much tv. (no superiority here - oh, you'll see) we don't have cable, though we do have netflix and a stack of series on dvd and recommendations from friends, etc. i just really have trouble sitting down and just watching something without thinking "oh god i should be washing the dishes or finishing this or that project". but this winter, i did get into... celebrity big brother. look. if you're going to get into reality tv, there's no point unless it's trashy and over-the-top. no pretense of a higher purpose here. yes, vh1 celebreality was my shit at the time. i have been lamenting new york's absence from the airwaves for some time now. so when i found out she would be on this season... #hbic i'll refrain from discussion of the show for the disinterested (but if you want to chat...!) and i was actually glad when it was done.. damn, this thing's on every day? with after-shows? but i realized that th...

so i realized i have never photographed one of my favorite FOs, my neon lace socks . these started out a thrifted white merino and cashmere sweater. i unraveled the body, and was left with the sleeves. i'd heard of using sweater sleeves as sock blanks before, so i figured i'd give that a try. it turned out pretty awesome, i think. i used some of my hoard of easter egg dyes to make a super neon rainbow. one sleeve turned out to be enough for both socks. the dye didn't penetrate the knit fabric fully, which actually gave the yarn a cool sort of mottled look. so, something to be aware of if that's not what you're going for. i knit the socks pretty much directly from the sleeve, without winding it into a ball first.. seemed unnecessary. okay, fine, i guess i could have, but who needs an extra step between them and knitting? i did discover that the yarn is a bit delicate for socks. like a lot of store-bought sweaters, this one was made from multip...

so this past year i met my friend's new baby, got engaged, worked with some awesome people, met my sister's new baby, spent time with some cats, saw some friends get married, ate some good food, saw some great concerts. etc. there has been altogether not enough knitting, amongst other things. have been slowly adding some of this year's photos to my flickr stream. working on some changes in 2015. (:

so it looks like i need to admit that it's going to be fall pretty damn soon. (i don't have to like it..) i am need of a cozy sweater. not a pullover, but something with buttons. maybe i can start doing that knitting thing again, remember that? i do have a ravelry queue a mile and a half long, after all... i do like the levenwick (and have been wanting to make something with shelter for ages!), but it's not quite the warm & cozy thing i'm looking for.. especially with the three-quarter sleeves. a funky grandpa cardigan is definitely something i need in my life. not so sure about the big open v-neck at this point though. a coordinating scarf would be in order... but a simultane ! would have to lengthen the sleeves, probably the body too, for my purposes. getting warmer though (har). i think the one i have finally decided on is sesame , which has been in my queue since it was published in magknits in 2005. yay for stripes! now the real ...

hey peeps. sorry for the radio silence. it's been a rough couple of months, shall we say? moving on. i've started knitting again. i had some purple 2-ply handspun waiting to be a sweater for some time, so i got started on a little something inspired by the lovely owls pullover. my yarn was of a thinner gauge, so much math has been going on (ugh). the body went as planned, but after finishing the first sleeve discovered that the fit was just.. off. slightly too-fitted cuff, slightly too-loose upper arm. frogging and math (more math!) are not amongst my favorite parts of knitting, but here we are. it'll be a while yet before this thing is done. it's okay, seems like it's going to be winter forever in new england.

i'm starting to think i'm the only knitter out there in internet-land who doesn't love knitting socks. i mean, i like sock-knitting.. but it's not a love. but i keep wanting more, somehow, like i just want to have knit them and be done. i think it may be partly (or mostly) to do with the fact that i don't really like doing the same thing twice. recipes, paintings, day jobs apparently... so i do tend to prefer fraternal socks. and yet, here i am with twenty-two sock patterns on my ravelry queue. some, since 2007. i need to get a grip on reality. why must the call of self-striping sock yarns be so strong? i've been thinking of this lately because of these . i found some lovely coffee-colored yarn on etsy to make a little something for my lovely coffee-fiend boyfriend. i had intended to start & finish them in a couple weeks before his birthday this spring. that didn't happen. fine, i thought. plenty of time for a christmas gift. ri...

so much to be done. every year (every. single. year.) i say that i will start gift knitting in july. this has never happened. this year, at least, i have about half a sock going for the boyfriend (but really this is only because i was trying for his birthday earlier in the year..). though now i am feeling drawn in to all these november knit-a-longs going on. could i do it all?? there's wovember of course, where you knit with nothing but 100% wool for the entire month. this sounds excellent, but i tend to use blends and machine-washable fibers when making stuff for other people. aww. and then there's naknitswemo , in which, much like nanowrimo, you must knit a 50,000 stitch sweater within the month of november. this i could do! i have some handspun intended for a sweater, and a pattern lined up for it. however... there's also the indie design gift-a-long , which would be great gift knitting encouragement. but can i do that and knit a sweater at the same time...

hello october! my favorite month. (: so at long last i have started the skoodlet . i'm a big fan of leethal 's stuff - fun thinky knitting! i've only had this yarn balled up and ready to go for skoodlet since the summer. erm, of 2011. anyway. after a few false starts, it zoomed along until i realized that, tragically, i had underestimated the amount of yarn i would need. daaaaamn. good thing i waited two years to cast on so there's no way i'll be able to find some from a matching dyelot, right?? sigh. i actually only have part of the scarf bit left to go, so a single skein should do it. i found someone destashing some on ravelry, so i sent out a message to her today.. fingers crossed!

so what i wanted was to knit with some handspun. i also wanted one of those scarf-type things that you wear around your neck like a cowl, and can pull up over your head like a hood. this did not end up to be one of those things. just means there's more knitting to do, is all. never a bad thing. but i got to knit some handspun, and really, this is something that one just needs to do that every so often. there's something that feels more real and dirty about it, you know? in the best possible way. lumps and fluffs and lanolin, a bit of hay every so often. real life, real yarn. i had a particular skein picked out. a big reason for it being that it has been in my stash for so so so long. embarrassingly long. years. i was never quite sure how to do it justice. now was the time. after much swatching, i found that the best stitch pattern for this would be.. garter. just garter stitch. on big needles, for some nice drape. but it wouldn't really look, or stret...

welcome back. it's been a busy weekend. ben folds - bizarre christmas incident. immature, i suppose. whatever. i like it. so, knitting? this has been a bad year for that. check out the progress on my new years socks . yes, cast on in january of this year. ugh. i don't know, it's like i lost my knit-mojo for the past year. working on that. been plugging away at some smaller projects (smaller than socks? sigh).

it has been found! from one of the bestest holiday albums ever (which you should definitely own... ): Get this Ringtone mp3 hawksley workman - learn how to knit. this is not even the best song on this album, but it does involve knitting so this has to be the one today. he has said these are sort of songs from a simpler time.. which is true, isn't it? i can't believe it's been over ten years.

so, we have moved. for reals this time(no roommates!). just me, the man, and the cats. so, that and a bunch of other crappy business that happened kind of set things into a tailspin for a while. tmi, etc. and really, i don't deal with stress as well as i probably should. also making very slow progress on the knitting. these are my new years socks, as in january 2012. i've just gotten past the cuff on sock #2. sigh. so, pity party over. now back to real life. (:

i am working on stuff, i promise...

i have a thing for vintage knitting magazines and booklets. ones from the 70s tend to be my favorites, but if i see one anything more than a few years old at savers, i'm always tempted to scoop it up. it just seems that at some point thirty or so years ago, peoples' knitwear tastes went a little haywire. anyway. i offer, from the synesthetick vintage knit mag collection: vogue knitting, spring/summer 1992. i do enjoy the sassy magazine-esque styling. there was a kind of 60s throwback thing going on for a while, with some jewel tones and hair gel mixed in. i can appreciate that. HOWEVER. no. really? because no. and speaking of novelty yarns... apparently the unfortunate muppet pelt phenomenon went back farther than i had realized. i also don't get why people felt the need to make sweaters as huge as possible. can you imagine how many skeins of rowan cotton that must have required?? there are some useful articles that still hold up, like how to choose patterns that ...

getting back into the swing of things. started some socks from my ravelry queue (added in 2009!).. my new years socks of kindness . using my hand-dyed, done in august of 2008 per my ravelry records. does everyone let their stash marinate for 3 1/2 years before using or is this only me? also: i just made these chocolate stout cupcakes and they are as amazing as they sound.

so i bought yarn. it's been a while, okay? ahem. so the main impetus was to finish this mitten project that has been hanging around for six years or so, waiting for me to find another skein of kureyon in 92. finally i discovered the problem: it has been discontinued. gah! on to plan b: buy a totally different color and stripe it. first mitten down! i wasn't so sure i liked the way the red and green fell together, but okay. mitten number 2: ugggghh. mud. now on third attempt. let's think of happier things, hm? like more noro: two skeins of silk garden for a special project to be named later.. and one more skein of kureyon for, well.. i don't know, i was distracted by the pretty colors. colorrrrs... but, pattern suggestions? i like the top of this hat , but i'm open to other ideas.