A year of projects - 2012 in a Nutshell

So, 2012 its over,  and taking into account that I haven't posted as much as I'd like to, I thought It would be nice to make a post summing up everything I did during 2012... that way I can stop feeling guilty over the bunch of crap I haven't blogged about, and start fresh (blogwise) this new year...

During 2012 I...

-Joined the Nerd Wars game, and met a bunch of cool and loving people. I'm a proud member of team Shady Cels, dedicated to everything animated (comics, cartoons, anime, manga, claymation etc).

-Crafted a bunch of toys, a few of them (like beekat) weird as fuck

that little lion was also my first time using fun  fur... 

- I did my first try on pinneaple crochet... Its pretty cool, but the pattern I chose had an increasing number of picots every round, it wasn't pleasant...

-I had de chance to work with self striping yarn, and I loved it (also, the fucking socks match!!!), sadly the yarn was discontinued...

- I knitted my first dishcloth, that soon was followed by a bunch more...

- HATS!! I made a bunch of them...

these are just a few, I couldn't find more pics... Also, the red hat in the middle is evil, I almost died while working on it

-I frogged one of my biggest projects, in wich I had been working since  2011, because I realised I wasn't doing the YO's properly... Someday I'm gonna start it again, at leat thats what I tell myself...

- Continuing with the frogging, I knitted a pair of socks, said socks were assaulted by what I believe were goblins rapists, and I frogged and reused the yarn... I made a Clapoktus 

- I had the opportunity to test knit one of Denise's (from Voie de Vie) accesories collection patterns, the Piaf Scarf... 

-Also, I gave up to peer pressure and crafted baby clothes for the first time... I might  do it again :p

-Around  November (or something like that), Blogger pulled a total dick move and put  a 1GB limit to their picassa photo storage, read here.... Also, read here for a few options to get around the blogger photo limit

-The mayans were bluffing, the world didn't explode... 

   note: this is a joke, the mayans never predicted the end of the world, just the end of an era

- And finally, I end the year with MOAR WIPS that when it started... A problem that I hope to fix during this first month...

two bags, a sock, and two scarves (well, technically a scarf and a stole)

Next time (which could be tomorrow or next october, who knows), New year knitting resolutions!

This is probably what Hell looks like a.k.a The story of a sock

This was supossed to be a post about love, a post about the kind nature of knitters around the world, it was supossed to be a story about socks, and about everything a sock could stand for... But not anymore, or at least not the way I had it pictured, now, it'll be a story about one of the most horrible things that can happen to a knitter, about angst and despair, about redemption and new beginings, this will be a story about frogging...


Many, many months ago, I took part in a mistery sock KAL hosted by the lovely Jen  a.k.a Knitting Like Crazy, in order to participate for really pretty prices (a skein of sock yarn) you had to finish at least one sock and show a pic, 

then names would be selected by a random thingy generator... The Fates saw fit that mine was one of the names randomly selected, I couldn't believe my luck, addresses were sent, and so a pretty skein of sock yarn took a plane to my country and to my hands... However, not everything was beautiful and perfect, the Fates proved to be a bunch of sadistics sociopaths that enjoyed making me suffer. The package took its time while coming to me, aparently because the postman designated to my area was sick and it was OH SO DIFICULT to find someone else to do the job ¬¬, but when it did, a gray and rainy november day, it was like a christmas eve, that was also your birthday, and you where eating bacon and cake, AND then you had an orgasm, yeah, it was THAT good...

This was the yarn I got

STR light weight (I think) in a colorway called "Knitters without Borders", in honor to Mrs. Harlot's organization. 
I was ecstatic, skeins were hugged and sniffed, swatches were knitted

 and patterns downloaded... At the end I decided to do a plain vanilla sock with How to Knit Socks: A FREE pattern and eBook - By Heather Ordover , because I didn't wanted nothing that messed with the colors... The yarn flew through my needles,

 and the socks were done in what felt like an instant -although, Ravelry says that it took me almost a month-...
Once the socks were done, I wore them around three of four times, 

always handwashing them... Until that time, when I forgot to, and my dad put them in the washing machine.This is were the horror -oh the horror- begins...


STR is a superwash merino yarn, so its technically washing machine friendly, even though that its recomended to handwash it... But taking into account what happened leads me to formulate the following hypotheses:

•  There is a goblin living in my washing machine
•  There is a goblin living in my laundry basquet
•  A pervert sneaked into my house and did horrible, horrible things to my socks
•  All of the above, plus a black hole of doom, an old lady with saggy boobs, and molested goblins...

Because what I found when the socks came out the the washer wasn't normal, wasn't natural, it went against every possible natural law, it spat into mother nature's face... This is what I found

Yes dear readers, a hole, an awfull, duckfucking hole in my heel flap... It was like if the yarn had just melted away.Tears were shed, angry fists were shaken into the sky, but the dreaded hole remained... After probably a week  of waiting that the socks fixed themselves,

Are they fixed??

 I decided to take actions, my first idea was to darn the hole, but a closer look at the hole showed that the damage was just too much for darning, I would have to darn the whole heel flap, my mom kept saying "throw them away, they already went past their useful lifetime". At the end I came to the conclusion that it'd be better to frog the whole thing and probably start over...

Thats a great idea!

Now, let me tell you, frogging something that has been knitted for at least 4 months, and washed a few times its NOT an easy task, the yarn was slightly felted in some points, but I kept at it... While I pulled the yarn away, and the stitches unraveled, strange thought flew through my head, in no particular order:

• This is taking forever, I need to pee
• I spent probably two weeks working on this... what a pity...
• I feel so sad
• I really need to pee

• I hate you washer goblins
• I need to un-kink this thing
• Will it bleed when I wash it?
• Will I have the courage to reknit this?
• Maybe the yarn didn't wanted to be socks? 
• This reminds me of those monks that spent months doing paintings with colored sand, and the sweep it all away..I feel so zen...
• So, what now? a shawlette?
• It'll probably look cool as a citron
• Or maybe some monkeys?
• Fuck it, I'm gonna pee

Even though it pained me to no end to frog the socks, I felt strangely free, lighter, better, once I was done... After all, life goes on, its just yarn, you love it, knit it, frog it and knit it again...
Its just yarn...

 and the possibilities are endless right?

Breaking out a.k.a Fuck you Jiminy Cricket!

So... Its been a while huh? I don't really have much of an explanation for my absence in the blogosphere... Except that the fucking brain-melting parasite is back... No, I haven't lost my mind (I think), but everytime I'm meaning to do anything, from saying hello to someone on Facebook, to replying to an email or even getting up from bed, I get this awful and nasty voice in my head, saying awful stuff like "whats the point?", "who cares about what you have to say? you're not gonna make any difference", "you're stupid, go die plzkthnks"... 

And so far the fucking brain melting parasite has been succesfull... I've stopped talking to people to the point we're my poor social skills, have become even more awkard, if thats even posible... I wouldn't say I'm depressed, depression is a fucking serious  thing, but I haven't felt "good" in a while... And I've had enough of it... I don't like feeling out of place everywhere and everytime, and I've had enough of that little voice telling me off each time I feel like doing anything...
I'm gonna put my shit in order, and I swear on my Madeline Tosh Sock skein that I'm gonna be a productive human being again, no more lurking on the net, no more ignoring my friends, and no more postponing stuff...

I have a few things planned for this blog (which by the way, its gonna be a year old in a few weeks), including (possibly) a pattern... 

Knitting and Crochet Blog Week - Day 7 3KCBWDAY7 "Balanced Crafting?"

Hullo! I'm back... Shit rained on me (not litterally, thank god) during this week, its a shame I couldn't participate in all the days :/
But fuck it, lets not focus on the negative and lets talk about this day's topic: 

Crafting Balance Are you a knitter or a crocheter, or are you a bit of both? If you are monogamous in your yarn-based crafting, is it because you do not enjoy the other craft or have you simply never given yourself the push to learn it? Is it because the items that you best enjoy crafting are more suited to the needles or the hook? Do you plan on ever trying to take up and fully learn the other craft? If you are equally comfortable knitting as you are crocheting, how do you balance both crafts? Do you always have projects of each on the go, or do you go through periods of favouring one over the other? How did you come to learn and love your craft(s)?

I can both knit and crochet, and I tend to have at least one project of each going on. However I find really hard to "read" my crochet or, the yarn gods help me, follow a crochet pattern. A peek at my projects will probably tell you that I seem to have a little problem when it comes to using equally both crafts...

For me crochet its only for doing toys and for doing small lace pieces, like doilies, even though I've seen all those beautiful crocheted garments, I can't seem to wrap my head in the idea that you can actually make clothes with a hook. In the other hand I tend to use knitting for making all the other stuff that aren't toys or  doilies...

Want Evidence?

Exhibit A- Crocheted doilies

Exhibit B - Amigurumi = crocheted  toys

Ignore his lack of eyes, I'm a very lazy person...

I should rename him to Pascal xD

Crocheted clothes/gloves/hats/dead raccoons:

Now, what If we look into my knitted projects?

Hats

a cardi

A few pairs of socks

shitloads of scarves

With a cameo apeareance of Momo the cat...

See???

Well dear readers ( you guys exist right?) This marks the end of my first KniCroBlo, it was fun,and I would've liked to participate more, next year I'll try not to be a slacker and get things done before hand... Now I need to start catching up with all the blogs that participated....

If you want to read more posts about balanced crafting (or the lack of it) click the first pic  of the post...

Knitting and Crochet Blog Week 2012 - 3KCBWDAY2 "Photography Challenge"

Today's topic was actually a sort of challenge, we're suppossed to take creative and inspirational pics, related to our crafts... Technique wasn't important here, creativity and imagination where supossed to guide our mighty camera lens into epicness...

Now, yours trully, even thought likes to boast about having a great creativity, was baffled by this challenge (I'm gonna stop talking in 3rd person now, I'm already doing my best writing in crappy english). In had absolutely now fucking idea of what to do... Maybe something related to the evil and scratchy scarf of doom? or maybe something involving my cats? What, in the name of everything wooly, could I do for todays challenge???

The Inspiration came, once again from the water... Specifically from this cute yarn...

I had this awesome visions about water lilies and ponds made of yarn... I was a genius! This would work perfectly!!

Sadly, my mind is able to create really intricated things... Things that my clumsy hands not always can mimic... Before showing the pics, I'll say that in their original form, they are really crappy... After almost an hour of sheer frustration, because I couldn't put together what I had in mind, I decided that Photoshop would make up for my clumsyness... After all, everything looks better woth photoshop right?

The waterlilly, came up looking like this

And after playing with it in photoshop, it came looking like this:

It still looks like crap...

After the waterlilly fiasco, I tried again... The original pics are still crappy, but the photoshoped version, don't look THAT bad... 

From, this

To this:

And from this

To this:

They kinda look like children's drawings... And I kinda love/hate them...

Wanna see more blogposts with awesome and kickass pictures that put mine on shame? click the first image of the post :D