Finding Colors that Sing
Finding colors that sing.
Many color combinations work well together.
They’re beautiful, and full, and play off of each other.
Coexisting to make the world a more beautiful place.
Some color combinations sing.
They hum, and vibrate, and resonate.
They wibble, and warble, and trill.
They make your eyes light up and dance.
These are the combinations that are kinda-weird, but totally amazing.
Unexpected.
In the best possible way.
The combinations that transcend “that works.”
The combinations that wander into “that’s amazing” territory.
And set up camp.
What if, we take two steps past “it works?”
Two steps towards finding colors that sing.
it’s been a week of crafting mishaps
Each Wednesday, I post little snippets about what’s happening, and what I’m working on.
My crazy colorful sweater is coming along. It’s pretty slow going, and there was a bit of a hiccup when I realized I had vastly underestimated the yardage I needed (by about half) because I miscounted the number of rows I had to the inch. Luckily, I found more yarn, and I’m transitioning my colors now, so all should be ok. Fingers crossed.
And then I tried on my purple sweater and decided I hated how the neckline was sitting, so I cut it off, wound the yarn back up, and am going to re-knit it.
But at least I’m working off of the correct row count for this sweater.
So as sort of a consolation prize for the sweater mishaps, I cut the fabric for my first Archer button up shirt, and started sewing it together.
Unfortunately the fabric slipped, or wudged, or something while I was cutting (I mean, it’s not like I was being super careful) and the stripes don’t quite match at center front. But I’m making it anyway, because a) I want the shirt, and b) I’m planning for it to be an over-shirt anyway, so it’s not like I was going to wear it closed very often.
Once the shirt is all sewn together we’ll see how “off” the stripes actually are, and we’ll also see if I still don’t care.
At least there was a consolation prize for the consolation prize.
Two skeins of absolutely lovely yarn arrived from Toil & Trouble! I’m working up a new design in it, and I can’t wait to start knitting with it! Yay!
(But I’ve held off winding the second skein until my week of crafting mishaps comes to an end – just in case.)
PS. If you’re in the US have a fabulously wonderful Thanksgiving. And if you’re not in the US, have some pie anyway.
Knitting my “Boring Black Sweater”
I have a love-hate relationship with basics.
I love wearing them.
I hate making them.
This creates a little bit of tension in my self-made wardrobe.
I’ve talked a little bit before about the disconnect between what I love wearing, and what I love making. I love making really complicated & technically challenging, colorful & intricate & interesting things, while I love wearing basics – tank tops, jeans (they’re coming! – eventually…) and straight forward stockinette sweaters.
Sewing basics is pretty boring.
Knitting basics is a nightmare of boredom.
But a nightmare that’s kind of worth it.
I’ve dubbed this sweater the “Boring Black Sweater.”
It’s a solid black, basic pullover, knit in stockinette stitch, in lace weight yarn on a US size 4 (3.5mm) needle. Which, if you don’t knit, is tiny yarn on a not-so-tiny-but-certainly-not-large needles, in a very basic knitting stitch.
The yarn is “Forest Hills” from Cascade in color #3 “Anthracite” (black). I love this yarn for shawls. But I wouldn’t really recommend it for garments because of how much this sweater is pilling.
The pattern is a basic, yoked pullover, worked from the top-down, with a wide neckline, and turned hems on the sleeves and body.
Knitting it was really boring.
It was so boring, in fact, that I knit the sleeves too way short. And once the sweater was all done I cut off the cuff, picked up the stitches on the sleeve, knit a couple more inches, and graphed the cuff back on.
Even so the sleeves ended up being bracelet length, which isn’t what I had in mind, but works fine.
Even though it was kind of a nightmare to knit, I love this sweater. It works with just about everything in my wardrobe, and is the perfect thin layer to wear under or over something.
From now on though, I think I’ll stick to sewing, instead of knitting, my basics.
