Saturday, October 27, 2012

State of the Crafting (part 1)

Goodness, it's been a while since I've been around these parts!  Since I've made some new friends who found this blog and declared an interest, I thought it was time I got around to posting.  I've finished a few things and started a few things since the last time I posted, so I thought it would simply be easiest to do an overview of the general state of my crafting.  Part 1, which you're reading right now, will cover all the things I've finished since the last time I posted.  So, without further ado, lets get started!
So, around the time I last posted I got involved in a community on Ravelry called Nerd Wars.  The concept is somewhat similar to the House Cup, which I explained in a previous post.  Each month, a number of challenges are posted and we knit or crochet items to fit into the challenge.  There's some 20 or 30 teams, each based around a specific fandom.  For each challenge you complete, you earn points for your team, and if you manage to tie your project into your team's fandom in some way, you get bonus points.  I'm a member of Team Shady Cels, which is for the animation and comics fandom.  Most of the smaller projects I do are turned in to Nerd Wars, so you'll be seeing a lot of things inspired by various animated things.  (Coincidentally, I've mostly stopped doing the House Cup, as people started taking it far too seriously for the game it is).

Anyway, first up we've got Dullahan.

  


This is quite possibly the most unexpectedly quick project I've ever done.  It being an entirely lace scarf, I was expecting it to take most of the month to finish, but in fact it ended up taking only four days.  As those who are up on their anime may have guessed, the name of the project is a reference to Celty Sturlson, the resident headless rider of DRRR!!  It was meant to be a part of a series of challenge turn-ins featuring some cooperative storytelling between a friend and myself set in the DRRR universe.  Sadly, due to real life obligations and our mutual inability to come up with an actual plot, it fell through.  Still got a nice scarf out of it, though.

Yarn and pattern details can be found on my ravelry project page here


Next we've got another anime-inspired project.



Around the same time as the previous project, there was a challenge to create something inspired by the works of Gustav Klimt.  I don't know if any of you have seen the anime Mononoke (no, not the Ghibli film, the series), but if you're not familiar with it, the art style is basically what happens when you mix the styles of Klimt, Mucha, and anime, and add a sizable dose of acid.  I had planned to make something to tie in to this anime from the moment I saw the challenge, but when I saw this yarn colorway in the store I knew it was meant to be-the colors in the yarn are very similar to the colors of the main character's clothing.  Given the Edo period setting of the series, this wide obi-like belt was a perfect fit.

Yarn and pattern details can be found on my ravelry project page here

This next project is a completed WIP from last year when I was still more active in the House Cup. 



Just a simple pair of socks with a nice lace panel down the sides, in my house colors of blue and bronze.  These are one of those projects that would have been a pretty quick knit if they hadn't languished in the WIP box for ages.

Yarn and pattern details can be found on my ravelry project page here

Next in the lineup, we have what is probably my favorite FO from the last year.



This one wasn't connected to either the House Cup or Nerd Wars, but rather something I simply started for the fun of it. Like the socks above, it languished in the WIP bin for many months, but this was a victim of subtitles rather than neglect.  Most of my crafting I do while watching tv shows or movies.  I don't own a television, so most of the stuff I watch is streamed on my computer and in either Japanese or Korean.  While I have over the past year started to study both languages, I'm nowhere near the point where I can understand without subtitles so I've developed the skill of reading subtitles and knitting at the same time.  Unfortunately, at the time I started this particular project I needed to level up that skill, as it were.  The middle chart, where the color changes start, is highly asymmetrical and patterned on both the knit side and the purl side.  Until about May or so I simply didn't have enough skill with knitting that I could knit that complicated a pattern and read subtitles at the same time, so this one gathered dust until I could.  I finally finished it, though, and I couldn't be more pleased with the results.

Yarn and pattern details can be found on my ravelry project page here

My last major FO is actually a pair of FOs


Back in July, my aunt gave birth to twins.   They were earlier than expected, so I hadn't actually started yet.  Luckily this was another lightning quick pattern and so I was able to get them sent off without too much delay.  They zip up the back for easy dressing of the babies.

Yarn and pattern details can be found on my ravelry project page here

Aside from those, I also made a few small household items




Nothing special here, just a few things to keep this place from getting too messy.

I do actually have one more thing I've finished just in the last couple of weeks but as it's a gift that hasn't been shipped yet, it'll get it's own post sometime later on.

That's it for my FO's, but there's still lots more I've been working on.  Part 2, coming hopefully tomorrow, will cover everything that's still on the needles.

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