#also speaking of crochet i love the pattern i'm doing but for some reason i keep accidentally adding stitches ???? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

journeyman-tier-fibercraft · 4 months

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WIP Wednesday day. Lots of fucking around and also black/grey this week.

I didn't knit the border repeat of my evenstar (Shawl 14) for a couple days there due to family gatherings so I just banged through a couple repeats last night and called it good enough. Which puts me at 12 repeats out of 56. I was right that it's already a little boring but each repeat takes me less than an hour so it's pretty easy to just. Knit one and move on.

I also finally got through the first half? of shawl 15's repeat. I'm entirely off pattern so I'm just kinda fucking around until I get low on yarn but I'm not entirely sure where the paper is I wrote down all my yarn weights on before so I can't really continue until I track that down. When I was actively working on it all the time I wasn't super happy with it but picking it up again, I really like it. I'm sure I'll hate it again within the hour but that's what happens every time I do any sort of colourwork.

Speaking of hating my colourwork, the weird super bulky knit skirt is. I can't tell still if I love it or hate it. I've had fun making it either way but man does it confuse my brain. I'm almost done with the actual knitting portion, I decided to add a lace edging around the bottom which was a mistaakeeee. I still think it looks ok? so i'm not going to remove it but every row takes Forever to knit. The edging pattern I started with is beautiful but 18 rows and I literally will never finish this if I do all of them (also I managed to totally fuck up the row i'm currently knitting and have no idea how or why but it's black yarn on super big needles I'm not gonna be able to fix it).

This skirt still absolutely 100% needs steam blocked tho and I don't have a place for that set up right now. Also other finishing work (sewing in the waist elastic that was thankfully on sale, I kinda wanna add some of my patches to it, I wanna embroider some on it). I think? I don't like it right now not because it's ugly. But because it takes up so much space on my desk. So the minor hatred will not go away for as long as I work on it.

Lastly is a different fuck around project. Knitting a large gauge sweater out of the world's stinkiest crochet cotton with intentionally distressed lace work. I finished the sleeve I was knitting and now started with the front body, which I've strangely had a lot more issues with (dropping stitches, tension issues, the crochet cotton hurting my hands when purling). I don't have much to say about this one tbh, I'm not looking forward to the short rows to shape the front neckline (the pattern I'm working off of has zero neckline shaping so I'm going to make it up) but it's mostly purling that has me down. I'm almost tempted to do part of the body in garter stitch or switch to norwegian purling but neither of those are attractive options for different reasons so I'll just suffer (and wait for my hands to heal all the way before picking it up again).

#knitting #knitblr #lace rot #wip #wip wednesday #project: shawl 14 #project: shawl 15

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thegirlwiththelilactattoo · 1 year

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No. 5, or "Spell Pharaoh. Tell me what the FTC does."

"Name a single hobby of your's outside of media consumption."

That satiric and honestly iconic TikTok by Glamdemon2004 (a head's up that there are no captions on this video) has lived in my head rent free since the I saw it on Twitter.

The fatal read hit me on two levels.

I have very few hobbies. I used to have some amount of hobbies when I was younger. I wrote when I was a teenager and was a voracious reader. College slowly stripped me of any love of reading. It wasn't until I entered grad school that I realized the anguish I felt picking up a book. Writing, too, has lost its luster (although this blog is an attempt for me to reclaim that).

All of my hobbies are media consumption. I hate to call the mindless and mind-numbing scrolling I do on Twitter, Reddit, or Youtube a hobby, but it's how I spend all of my not school time. There are reasons of course. For me, media consumption fills time and it provides much needed audiovisual stimuli for my melancholic neurodivergent brain. Of course, there's also nothing wrong with consuming media. Humans have been creating and enjoying the creations of others forever, but idk...the Frankfurt School and the critiques of popular/mass media also haunt me when I sit for hours just doing nothing but staring at a screen.

It's also something that has bothered me for years. I've often wondered how other people pass the time. How do people find things that bring them joy? That fill the day with someone other than doing the things they must to survive capitalism. (a lot of this is the melancholia speaking, i know.)

And on a less depressing note, how do people find things that they like to do? I wasn't a child who played the piano or did a sport, so there's no like childhood thing for me to return to. I quit almost everything I was in as a child the moment things got challenging and no longer enjoyable. I've left a wreckage of potential hobbies in my wake, so my goal this year has been to find the joie de vivre in something and a smaller side goal of that to quit less things.

Enter Crochet

I've learned/re-learned how to knit off and on for the last 15 years probably. My last return to knitting was in 2018. I was desperate for literally a n y t h i n g to break the monotony of gym, class, spend hours online, homework, sleep (but probs not even bc of insomnia). I started knitting for something to do with my hands while I was watching Youtube. Like all my times knitting, I quit (I plan to return to knitting at some point because I think knitted socks look nicer than crocheted socks). When I quit knitting, I thought that maybe at some point I'd take up crochet since it seemed easier thank knitting.

Towards the end of 2022 I was gonna start knitting again, but a barrage of posts on Twitter showing beautiful crocheted items convinced me to give that a go.

And, I like crochet! I find it easier to get in a rhythm working the stitches, working up a project is fun, and even the moments of frustration feel encouraging, rather than a reason to put down the hook. It's also an activity I can do in silence without feeling like I need to have something else to do to occupy my mind. Hopefully glamdemon2004 is proud of me because I finally have it, a hobby outside media consumption.

I am a wee beginner crocheter and I love to start new projects all the time, which is something I love about crafting! I can work on different projects depending on how I'm feeling. Currently, I'm working on:

Yearlong mood tracker blanket (using this pattern from TLYarn Crafts).

Face scrubbies made out of a cotton/bamboo blend to replace the disposable cotton rounds I use (linked here)

Granny square beret (linked here)

Oh and a sweater I'm gonna frog because the ribbing in the pattern is Not Fun to Work! If you have any beginner friendly patterns using a category 3 yarn, I am all ears.

Crochet has not cured me of my media consumption woes or tendency to sadness, but idk Marx was on to something. Having the fruit of my labor in my own hands does give a burst of serotonin like no other.

P.S. Also, I made another account to reply from (theblogwiththelilactattoo) because I refuse to have this account linked to the primary blog I haven't used since 2010!

#gradblr #phdblr #grad school #crocheting #crochetblr #crochet #hobbies maybe aren't overrated idk they do add spice to life

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k00297635 · 6 months

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Soft Sculpture Workshop

Today I did the soft sculpture workshop. I started off with some sketches of things I found in my fridge that I thought would be represented well through this medium. I am making different things from my fridge because I am looking to make a small installation of my fridge with three different shelves for three different people. I've been looking at how objects can speak to the disruptions that happen in the lives of three very different 23 year olds. I picked my favourite comforting foods that also had a form that would work with will the materials. I started off with a tub of soup. Its my favourite thing to eat, I buy 5 tubs every week and getting through the mornings are so much easier knowing that there is a warm tub of soup waiting for me.

My first attempt of making a pattern for the object did not go well. I redid it and used a measuring tape to get the dimensions right and it turned out much better.

After making the pattern I cut out the shapes and started sewing them together.

Im still not finished this piece and if I'm honest I'm struggling to get through it. the tutors were so lovely and friendly and I do enjoy knitting and sewing but for some reason I just hated doing this. I will finish if because I think it will look goo but I just don't want to. I plan to use the sewing machine to write the text on some white silky material I found and crochet a white trim around the lid. Will update further during the week.

#disrupt

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