You SPOONIE!!!

(You know, like “Goonies?” Maybe I’ve just got Goonies on the brain because Martha Plimpton was on the Tonies the other day. Martha freakin’ Plimpton!)

Anyway, got my Spoonflower invite! WHEEE!!! I’ve got derby practice tonight, and then I’ve got a few errands to run tomorrow night, so I don’t know if I’ll get to upload my designs for a few days yet. BOO! FROWN! I’ve got some super cute things in my sketch book right now, and I’ll scan them in and see what I can make them do in a fabric pattern. I’m so unbelievably excited about this, it’s getting a bit silly.

FABRIC! WOOO!!!

(Prepare yourselves for the awesomeness that will be roller derby fabric. Oh, yes! Skates! Stars! It’s going to be so RAD!)

OMG! Not a derby post!

Finally! My brain’s been able to shift away from derby for a bit. I haven’t been to practice in two weeks. (I’ve still been going to the meetings and to events, so I’m not away from it completely.) I wasn’t able to walk properly after aggravating my injury during the bout, so I thought a wee bit of time off would be great for healing. I was right. I’ll be back on skates Tuesday.

But this post isn’t about derby! It’s about crafting! Yay!

The lovely Emily over at Inside a Black Apple posted about this really neat new tool for printing one’s own designs on fabric. I love going to the fabric store, but I almost always leave unsatisfied. I find that I settle for something that’s close to what I want, but never quite right. The fabrics I do end up buying are still really cute, but not what I went in for. (I have this same problem with yarn, so I haven’t bought much yarn in the past several months either.) If I want stripes, they’re not the right colors or widths; if I want flowers they’re some wonky size or color or shape or whatever. Never exactly what’s in my imagination. And what’s in fashion, is almost never what I’m looking for. Sometimes the two synch up, but not very often.

Well, the folks responsible for Spoonflower thought the same thing. I love making my own clothes. There’s something really wonderful about wearing something interesting and people asking you where you got it, and being able to reply that you made it yourself. I almost never use patterns (for anything- including knitting to cooking) so what I end up with is unique. I’m not always successful in my clothing endeavors, but I learn with each attempt, and what I end up with is the expression of my own style and sense of color and design.

Imagine what I could do with my own fabric designs! My brain nearly explodes with the possibilities!!! I want gnomes! GNOMES!!! I want the right kind of flowers! I want wee little people dancing on wee little vines! Imagine the skirts and aprons and summer tops and wraps and EVERYTHING made from fabric straight out of my imagination. I’m positively giddy with the prospect of it all!

It’s of course in beta testing right now, and so I’ve added my name to the waiting list, and must therefore wait patiently like everyone else. I miss my crafty time. Derby leaves me pretty spent, so on my “off” days, I usually just park it in front of the TV and zone out until it’s time for bed. This is not an energizing activity. But I know that taking that time to be crafty would be so rejuvenating and wonderful. Whether that’s by knitting or sewing or whatever. I need to get that time back.

Neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed to.

Organization nation…

I’m trying to get my brain in gear for school, which starts next week. Yikes.

Last semester I discovered that I don’t depend as much on my hand-written to-do lists and calendars as I had in years past. I had a tried and true system that evolved during my undergrad years, and that I adapted for grad school. Somehow, this past semester, I rarely used it. I still enjoy my little note pad, which comes in handy whenever I have an idea that needs jotting down. But the system as a whole just doesn’t fit me anymore.

Hence, a new tool: Netvibes!

I was made aware of this tool by the Spinstah ages ago, and never really got around to figuring out if it’ll be useful for me. Well, today I spent some way too much time playing with all the widgets, creating tabs, etc. It’s quite fun, if you like organizational tools. I can have access to it pretty much wherever I go, without carrying around my large notebook. I have a lot of things to keep track of, and each area of my life has its own tab and sets of to do lists.

It rules.

“You can’t knit for crack hos!”

The quote of the evening, indeed.

Thursday I went to see the Yarn Harlot speak at the Burlington, MA Borders. It was a fun evening: I met up with The Spinstah and Andrea in Somerville, and Andrea drove us in her delightfully air conditioned vehicle to Borders (eventually, but we got there in plenty of time). There was a great turnout. Underpants were thrown. (Seriously.) I started another ball band dishcloth for Missy. Good times. Stephanie gave pretty much the same talk as at Webs in May, but with some fun additions. We learned all about Kinnearing, for example. There were many young knitters in attendance, as well as many more male knitters than I had seen at previous knitting events, which was super awesome. I saw Jess and Casey of Ravelry, but they were surrounded by their own group of fans, and I was too shy to go say hi. I do covet a “Where my stitches at?” button, though. After the talk, we (eventually) made it back to Davis Square and had a nice meal at a diner. A lovely evening with friends.

I’ve been having so much fun on Ravelry looking at patterns, checking out the groups, reading about people’s projects, all sorts of stuff. It’s such a great site, and I haven’t even explored it fully yet. I’ve got a few things in my queue to look forward to, and several hibernating projects to deal with. My goal for the rest of the summer is to deal with the hibernators and then pick out one project from the queue to work on next and start planning for that. I’m a one project at a time kind of knitter, who just happens to have several on the needles at once. I can’t work on several things all at once. If I don’t focus, nothing gets done. I’m a pretty fast knitter/crocheter so there’s really no reason to have stalled on so many projects.

I hate August, but I do love that feeling of organization that comes before the start of term. (My last semester! Yeah! Woo!)

hibernation documentation

Sweater Sampler

I’m going through my hibernation basket (where knitting WIPs go to sleep for a very, very long time) and logging them in Ravelry. It’s pretty fun, in a scary sort of way. I have way too many things on needles or being held on scrap yarn. I need to finish them, for my own sanity, as well as to free up needles and storage space.

The project shown here is the Sweater Sampler from Jacqueline Fee’s The Sweater Workshop. Great book. I’ve just taken forever to make this damn sampler. Click through for a better description of the project.

I plan on using Ravelry to document my “stash” as well. I use the little quotey things because it’s not a stash in the more commonly accepted use. My stash does not contain much yarn that I picked out myself and then stashed away for later use. Rather, it is comprised of many, many, little balls of miscellaneous yarn that no one else knew what to do with. It was given to me by various acquaintances (and some family) because I am a knitter and general crafter, so of course I’d know exactly what to do with it.

Hence all of the miscellaneous stripey hats that have developed. And gnomes. All of that stuff has been made with these remnants, which is cool, but doesn’t make for a very nice stash. I dream of a stash full of luxurious things, or at least recognizably useful things. I’ll settle for my hodge-podge, though. It does look kind of fun: I have the yarn divided into plastic baggies according to general color, and the bags are arranged in a rainbow like way. It’s a nice effect, really.

The good quality stuff (or at least better quality) is in baggies, which are kept in a hat box. That’s where all the natural fiber stuff is, and even a couple of hand spun items. So, ok, I do have some nice stuff. Just not a whole lot. Perhaps you could say I have an unostentatious stash? Yes, let’s say that.

I think I’ll record my rainbow scrap stash as well as the other stuff, because it will be fun anyway. (Visit me at Ravelry!)