I can't express how much I appreciate all the comments you all left last week about the Ravelry ad! The response was above and beyond what I ever would have expected. You never cease to amaze me! There were some really great, thoughtful comments in there. Although I did not post all the results from the experiments, I did attempt each suggestion that was made, and I've come to a decision…
drum roll please…
Ad #6 will be the ad you'll see in the featured pattern section of Ravelry's pattern page on April 16th!
Kate, who commented "#6 is the best" was chosen as the winner! Kate, I've e-mailed you the pattern, if you read this and have not yet received the pattern, please let me know!
It's quite the coincidence that I agree with Kate's simple and direct response.
I love #6 because it's a tease, and leaves us wanting to see more. It gives enough information to get us interested—the name of the design, my name, part of the sweater—but to learn more, we'll need to click on the image and go to the Ravelry page where there is lots more info, and a way to purchase the pattern. The ad doesn't give it all away. Think about a movie trailer—if the trailer gives it all away, then what's the point in seeing the movie? ::shrug:: I've been watching lots of movies lately, maybe that wasn't the best comparison, but it's all I've got.
Thank you all SO MUCH for helping me to decide which ad to use. If you are interested in the Gardening Tee pattern, it is currently available for sale both on my website and on Ravelry.
Throughout the end of March 2010, use the code 6L73GLNF during checkout to receive 20% off your total purchase from my website! Happy stitching everyone!
The Ravelry Featured Pattern ads are difficult to obtain. The window of time which it's available is very limited, and we have to be there at just the right time to be one of the 20-or-so people who can reserve the prime-time ad space. Fortunately, last week I noticed something at the top of the advertisers page stating the date and time that the next round of featured ad listings would be open. I scheduled my computer calendar to alert me, telling me to go get the ad—and it did! So, on April 16th I'll be advertising the Gardening Tee on Ravely through the second half of April.
I've used the featured pattern ads before. More often than not it's worth the $40 for half the month fee. The ad is in a great location, right on the front page of the pattern section.
I have a little bit of time before I need to get the ad to them, but I want to do it soon, because it's fresh in my mind. I spent a little time last night coming up with a few different variations. I'm not sure which I want to use—so I figured I'd ask you all what you think.
Please answer the 2 questions below, as well as add anything else you might think about the 6 possible ads. Your comment will enter you to win a copy of the Gardening Tee pattern! I'll be doing a drawing tomorrow (March 19, 2010) at 5PM EST to decide the winner.
Q1: Which one draws your attention the most?
Q2: Is there anything I could change about that one to make it better?
The Flame Scallop Cardi is being offered by Interweave Crochet for FREE! Yes, that's right, you don't actually have to buy the magazine to get the pattern. The pattern was too long to fit into the space allowed in the magazine, so they had to leave it out, and they're instead offering it to you for FREE!
I have to admit, I like when my patterns are given away for free. I love seeing people make the designs that have come through me, and people are often more likely to make something if it's offered to them freely. So, please crochet away—it's a fun pattern :)
This is such a fun stitch pattern—There are four rows, which become pretty easy to memorize after a few repeats. It's basically only a two row repeat, which shifts for the following 2 rows. The ribbing on the sweater is also a lot of fun. It is worked by crocheting half-double crochet stitches through the back loop. The picot on the lower edge of the body, cuff and on the neck trim is a great, elegant addition—it's done simply by skipping the last st and then chaining 1 extra st. Work the first hdc of the next row into the extra chain, then continue across the row.
I designed this sweater around the same time as the Violet Hat and the Lacy Kerchief. They all use the same stitch pattern and rib. These head accessories, if made in the same yarn might make a great addition to your new Flame Scallop Cardi.
I'd suggest, if making the Violet Hat, to hold a few strands of the Fresco together to get the right gauge. I'd LOVE to see one of these made with multi-stranded Fresco—what a soft and beautifully slouchy hat that would be!
The Lacy Kerchief pattern is another free pattern, and it is written to be used with any yarn. Crocheting it with Fresco should not be a challenge. The ribbing along the band and outer edge mimics the Flame Scallop Cardi beautifully too!
Friday was my birthday, so I decided that this weekend, I'd do what I wanted—i.e: no work. Instead of sitting at my computer all weekend, which seems to be a trend… I decided to knit!
Sunday was an absolutely beautiful day here in Austin—80ºF and bright and sunny. I woke, did a little yoga in the bright, hot sun, showered then sat in the sun to get a little knitting done… little did I know it would turn into an all-day thing. Yes, I sat outside and knit ALL DAY. It was great.
The sweater I spoke to you about the other day, which I'm currently calling Wooly Ribs for lack of a better name, is almost finished. Here are some progress pics:
Above is where the sweater was at on Friday afternoon. The yoke was finished, and the body ribs were in their infant stages. If you follow me on Facebook, you may have already seen these updates—as I update on Facebook more frequently than I do here in Mr. Blog.
This is where it was on Sunday afternoon. I have since finished knitting that sleeve, and the other one is almost done—about 50 more rounds to go! Then comes the question of the button band… I originally intended on putting buttons—many of them, close together—all the way down the front. However, when I've been photographing it I seem to only be putting 3 in the yoke section. I'm not entirely sure which I prefer. I think I'll wet block the sweater when I'm finished knitting to see what happens with the ribs before deciding which I'll do.
In somewhat other news… the yarn for the cotton version has arrived, and that yoke is in progress! Yay!
About a year ago, my step-mom bought me some Plymouth Homestead yarn that I had asked for. I had planned to knit myself another Beatrice Coat with it, but I decided that I don't need two of the same sweater, and the yarn could go to better use in a new design. I've been wracking my brain trying to figure out what to do with it.
Fortunately, after the Gardening Tee was published something easily just came to me. It's really funny how that works—when I'm trying, nothing comes, but when I'm just calm and open, design ideas flood in. I've begun a regular 3 times a week yoga practice again, and this time I'm continuing to keep knitting involved in my life as well. The results seem to be pretty positive so far. The day this new design came, many other things came to me that I've been *trying* to figure out for some time now. I'm sure the yoga is helping to keep me calm and centered, and therefore I'm not trying too hard to get anything done, things are just happening.
One of the things I seem to have figured out recently is a *style*. I had worked with Interweave a little while back, and one thing they asked me to do, was figure out what style I wanted to express… That stumped me, and left me pondering for months… (years?) about what a style is, and how I could figure out what my style is. I haven't yet put it into words, but I finally have something visual that I can use to help me understand. I've assembled a collage of some of my favorite designs—published, unpublished and yet to be created—that seems to be my style.
It's about really being honest with myself about what I like. I *can* design any shape, size, texture, and that seems to be what I've been doing. I have been using design as a way of challenging myself—a way of pushing my boundries to see what I can do. But what is it that I like? Shouldn't I design things I would like to wear and knit? Why bother designing something challenging if I wouldn't enjoy knitting it?
So, this new design is something I've been enjoying knitting. The pattern is not challenging, but rather designed to be something that can be easily understood and knit relatively mindlessly.
It's knit from the top down with raglan increases and a garter ridge texture, then divided and knit with ribs. It's coming along really quickly. I've only worked on it for 2 evenings, and the yoke and body are well on their way.
I'm planning on knitting two of these. This first one is a wool winter cardigan in Plymouth Homestead, and the second will be a cotton summer top knitted in Pakucho Organic Color Worsted. I'm using these yarns because of their eco-friendly properties. I want to encourage the use and production of earth friendly yarns, so as part of my *style*, I'm choosing to design with yarns that help the world become a better place.
Classic Elite has some great earth friendly yarns in their Verde collection, and I'll usually use CE yarns before anything else. But this time, I choose the Pakucho yarn because I need a vegan, cotton yarn that is smooth and knits up to 4 sts to the inch. It wasn't easy to find, and there are very limited options available for such a yarn. I encourage more yarn companies to create a smooth organic cotton yarn that knits to this gauge… I really was amazed at the rarity of this kind of yarn…
As you may remember from a few posts ago, I spoke of publishing a pattern for the Ravelympics—one that I knit about 2 years ago. I didn't meet the finish line before the closing ceremonies of the Olympics, but I felt motivated yesterday to get the thing finished, and published—just in time for the spring!
I knit this sweater in July of 2008, and you can read a lot about the process in my July 2008 blog. However, I want to share a few of the highlights of this design with you here, and some of my favorite in-progress photos too.
I love when a sweater design comes out looking just like, or better than imagined. Thankfully, this Gardening Tee is one of those times. This is one of my all-time favorite designs. I love wearing it—it feels and looks great. The swatch above was what I first imagined it to look like. You don't really need to see a drawing to get the idea, since the swatch is a miniature version of the sweater.
This image reminds me of how much I love Classic Elite's Soft Linen yarn. It really is joyous to knit with. I can't say enough good things about this yarn. Clara Parkes once did a review of Soft Linen on her Knitters Review website—take a look at the review to get a great idea of why I love this yarn so much.
Here you can see the sleeve cap shaping. The body of the sweater is knit in the round to the underarms, then the piece is divided in half for the front and back. Stitches for the sleeves are cast on at each side of the back, then the back and back sleeves are worked up to the shoulders. At the same time however, there are markers placed to mark the shoulder location, then on the outsides of the markers stitches are increased to add more fabric around the shoulders, similar to sleeve caps in a typical knitted design. This is something I learned from Joëlle Meier Rioux. I think it's a really ingenious method for adding a little shaping.
And the finished photography—Carrie Bostick Hoge is the photographer of this garment, and I think she did a lovely job! There were many great photos for me to choose from, it was hard to pick just a few. The model she choose to work with is really beautiful, and models the sweater perfectly.
Overall, I'm really happy with how this design came out.
On the main Gardening Tee page, you can learn about the sizes, finished measurements, yarn requirements, etc… for the garment, and obtain the pattern if you'd like to experience the joy of making one for yourself. I'd also like to share that there is now a shopping cart available on my website, for anyone interested in more than one design.
Here are a few free patterns, that you can compare and contrast if you'd like. Click on the image to download the PDF version of the patterns so you can see more closely the types of changes that I'm making. They're all free, so enjoy!
I was recently looking through a knitting book, and the streamlined patterns, and elegant layout inspired me to take another look at my own self-published patterns.
The old versions of my patterns used an 8 point font size, a serif font, and occasionally a color other than black, which no doubt makes them difficult to read. Everything seems pretty boxy—lots of sharp corners. The typography was also pretty bland—basically just pasted in from a Word document, without much thought to variation in headlines vs body text.
I decided they needed a face lift, and in some cases a little more clarification for some parts of the pattern. I've taken a few of the best selling patterns to begin with, and I'm working on sowly upgrading the rest of them. Here's a peak at them. Please let me know what you think.
Easter is on its way… and March is Crochet Month, so I put the two together, and have been crocheting a little bunny in one of my current favorite yarns—Classic Elite's Fresco.
It's not finished yet, and I want to make another one before posting the pattern—for a few reasons. See that diagonal line across the bunny's belly… yeah—that shouldn't be there. Plus, I may as well take advantage of the opportunity to recheck the pattern.
My mom taught me the basics to crochet when I was pretty young. At that age, I could never exactly remember the details of what she taught me, but I understood the concept of the things she'd show me. For example: I knew that crochet could be worked in the round, and that there is a join at the end of each round, but I often struggled with where to begin and end the round, and how to join.
This is actually something I've continued to struggle with until now. I keep learning a new way of doing this, that seems better than the previous in some way or another. This little bunny taught me a lot. I began working the bunny using the method of joining that was currently the method I was using. However with each join, the stitches would shift one to the left.
Since this little bunny is so small, by the time I got to the head and shaped the ears, I noticed that this one stitch left shift had created a diagonal line running across either the belly or the head of the bunny. Either way it faced, there is a diagonal line.
It then dawned on me that that method of beginning, ending and joining was probably not ideal. So, I tried another one—one that I'd never tried before, but that makes lots of sense to me at the moment.
Below I've described the three different methods I've used throughout my life, and include photos of what they look like after being worked for many rounds. I can't say that any one of them is *better* than the other, or if there is a right way to do it. I think it may depend on the project that's being made at the time. As I said above, before now, I'd only used method's 1 and 2—method 3 is the one I just figured out.
Hopefully the info below will help you to understand better which method of joining will give you what result. Happy Crochet Month!
For a foundation for each of these methods, I've made a ring of 20 sc. Each round as described below will maintain 20 sc in each round.
Method 1: (shown above)
At the beginning of the round, loosely ch 1 (this counts as your first sc), sc 19, slip stitch into the ch-1 st to join. Repeat this round.
Method 2: (shown above)
At the beginning of the round, ch 1 (this does NOT count as a stitch), sc into the next empty sc, then sc into the following 19 sts, slip stitch into the first sc to join.
Repeat this round.
Method 3: (shown above)
At the beginning of the round, ch 1 (this does NOT count as a stitch), sc into the same sc that was used for the joining slip st of the previous round, sc into the following 19 sts, slip stitch into the first sc to join.
Repeat this round
