The Big Lit Knit Thread (and crochet too)

[Etoile]

Knitting is SO popular these days, I know I can't be the only fiber artist on Lit! I'm actually a crocheter, can barely knit worth a darn, but I have many knitting friends, so I've come to accept that some people feel the need to use TWO sticks instead of one.

I just stuffed the body of the Fuzzy Lamb amigurumi I'm making, yay! Stuffing is my favorite part of making ami. Meanwhile my poor big fuzzy winter sweater is languishing without sleeves or seams; maybe I should put it into hibernation until August or so, then finish it up in time for cooler weather. I'm meredithp on Ravelry if you want to check out my stuff!

So what other projects are being done out there in Lit-land? Come on, I know we've got some HOOKERS out there, and knitters too!

 

[CutieMouse]

I pretend to knit and crochet... in reality I fondle yarn and drool over color.

On hearing I had a thing for old books, old clothes, and pretending to knit, someone once told me I'm a texturaholic.

 

[Lady_Fiona]

I'll admit, I'm a knitter, mostly baby stuff as it can be picked up and put down easily on my night shifts, gotta fill the time with something as I am no longer allowed to write

 

[PurpleTiara]

I am a fairly new knitter, but am getting pretty good at it. Are any of you on Ravelry? There are a few Lit people over there, too. I do not want to name names, (including my own!) but will share via PM.

As soon as I get some measurements from Shankara, I will be starting one of these for him: Weenie Warmer. Lately I have made lots of booties for my best friends twins, and now I am working on some long, fingerless armwarmers. I am chronically underweight and almost always cold, so I wear them at work a lot so that I can be warm and still type. The thing is, I have only been knitting since last July ish, so I am still sort of slow.

 

[Netzach]

I was doing both for a while, and really enjoy making felted purses and wet felting.

But I don't have time lately. *sigh*

I've never made ami - it sounds kind of fun, actually.

 

[ShyVixen]

I knit and cross stitch.

Right now I'm making a purple woollen waist coat/tank top for the winter. I found this wonderful coloured wool - when it's made it appears as if numerous different wools have been used, in fact it's just one. It's amazing but then I'm a geek when it comes to wool.

I have two cross stitch projects - a Nefertiti bust on a piece of navy blue canvas. It's hard going mainly because the thread is not cotton in some parts, it's floss so it's awkward. The second is a Christmas card decoration - always pays to start early!

 

[eastern sun]

I'm a knitter and a novice quilter. I like to knit multi-colored pieces (i.e. celtic knots) in simple stitches and intricate patterns. I also like to knit lace. And am in the middle of a lace shawl that keeps getting bigger and bigger but never seems to be finished.

I also have a subscription to Quilting Arts, (the most beautiful magazine in the world ), and I dream of having the time to explore the ideas I see in there. I have a great desire to create story quilts and Native American story shirts, stitched documents of people's lives. But sewing machines have changed so much since I was young, I'm a little intimidated.

I'm setting up a corner in my studio devoted solely to fabric in the hopes that I'll use it.

 

[rinka]

I think I'm a texturaholic too... Mostly with fabrics and yarn.
I start a lot of projects, rarely finish any. But I'm still relatively young.... (In a knitting persective)

Projects I have going at the moment are:
Two knitted purses in wool that I will wash hot so they felt and then do some needle-felting on.

A big triangular crochet shawl in different shades of yellow wool. (that I'm gonna wash hot so it felts... yeah that's so fun )

Wristwarmers knitted with small glass beads.

 

[Harmony_1985]

I knit and cross stitch.

Cross stitch is where it's at.

 

[the captians wench]

I do a lot of texture art. So many different ones that it's hard for me to stay focased on one project.

I knit and crochet, but usually only things that I can finish in one sitting because I won't pick it up again. And I tend to use really big hooks and needles.

I also machine knit, I really like that cause it's fast. And those little knifty knitters, that's something I will start on but eventually pick back up.

Crochet on the double is another interesting twist that I really enjoy. It combines knitting and crochet. I can make lots of fansy stichest with that, where as I haven't learned any with the other techniques.

And I can't follow a patern to save my life.

I also quilt, tho only for special occations. I'm thinking about doing another Irish Double Chain for Jounar's mom. I did a wall hanging size for her birthday, but I'm thinking about doing a queen sized one.

I love embroidery, but I tend to do it by machine these days.

I cross stich if you really make me. (again, I get distracted if I have a long project and it never gets finished)

But my real passion is costumes and corsets. I just finished a size 12 Elizabethian style wedding dress in gold and white that I had started and put away 3 years ago. I'm not completely happy with it because my talents are so much futher along than they were then, but to make up for it, I'm making a child's size 8 verstion.

I just finished my little sewing nook while I was on vacation last week. I'll post some pictures. It came about after that flooding accedent I had.

Oh, I also have picked up chainmale. I LOVE that too, but coiling the wire to make rings really hurts my fingers.

 

[eastern sun]

other projects and dreams -

I inherited my grandmother's hooking needles, and have hooked rugs for my children's bedrooms. And I love to bead and embroider. If I could personalize every piece of clothing me and my children wore, I would.

This morning too I realized how much I'd like to weave. I'm particularly interested in woven hangings with "non-traditional"/"non-fabric" elements woven in.

I also got interested at one point in making a quilt or woven piece out of panties I'd purchased to please different lovers. Like the erotic fabric equivalent to my scrapbooks.

 

[eastern sun]

Oh, I also have picked up chainmale. I LOVE that too, but coiling the wire to make rings really hurts my fingers.

Chainmail! Wonderful! Tell me, tell me! Do you make each link individually? Do you have pictures? Oh My. I think I might swoon.

(I work with wire a lot, but only as armatures for puppets. I love the idea of making chainmail! And so would my son. . . )

 

[Harmony_1985]

I knitted when I was younger, but I gave up after I'd start with 10 stitches and end up with 35 =/

Cross stitch is easier for me and I love the end result. I've done stitching projects that are now hanging in my house and I've made samplers as presents for people. I'm in the process of making an alphabet sampler for a friend who is pregnant.

 

[Etoile]

As for Ravelry, I already mentioned I'm meredithp so feel free to look me up!

I've done cross stitch in the past, it's very rewarding!

I am trying to figure out what project to bring on the trip to Hawaii in a few weeks, I haven't figures anything out yet!

Wenchie, I have heard of Crochet on the Double but I haven't tried it. It's similar to Tunisian crochet, right? Pick up stitches on a forward pass, then finish on a return pass?

 

[rinka]

I quilt a bit too. And there I really revel in the textures. I've mostly made really crazy quilts with lots of color and patches in all different sizes. I love the feeling of a velvet patch next to rougher linen, a few flanel and soft corderoy mixed in with more regular cotton.

I go to fleemarkets and secondhand stores and buy things I can cut up. I also use old curtains and clothes so there are memories and history in the quilting. It's so restful and therapeutic.

 

[the captians wench]

Chainmail! Wonderful! Tell me, tell me! Do you make each link individually? Do you have pictures? Oh My. I think I might swoon.

(I work with wire a lot, but only as armatures for puppets. I love the idea of making chainmail! And so would my son. . . )

Google is your friend. *giggles*

I used to sit and watch they guys at the shop chainmale for hours and hours. They had a little contraption where a bent bar went thru this wooden piece, so they could turn the handle and wrap the wire around the open space of bar between the two wooden pieces forming a long coil. This is what I do, only on a smaller scale as I don't have one of those nifty contraptions, tho I may get a friend of mine to make me one soon!

From there you cut each link off of the coil.

Using google I find a lot of paterns to try. There are a lot of people out there who are willing to share the craft.

I don't have any pictures of chainmale right now. I've given all the pieces I've made away as gifts.

Wenchie, I have heard of Crochet on the Double but I haven't tried it. It's similar to Tunisian crochet, right? Pick up stitches on a forward pass, then finish on a return pass?

Yes, very simular.

I quilt a bit too. And there I really revel in the textures. I've mostly made really crazy quilts with lots of color and patches in all different sizes. I love the feeling of a velvet patch next to rougher linen, a few flanel and soft corderoy mixed in with more regular cotton.

I go to fleemarkets and secondhand stores and buy things I can cut up. I also use old curtains and clothes so there are memories and history in the quilting. It's so restful and therapeutic.

I have a costume I have set aside to work on that will be made from things I collected from my great aunt's collection. A table cloth, a bed spred, and a huge lump of fabric. Once it's finished it'll be like her hugging me every time I wear it.

 

[Etoile]

Just finished a potholder for a friend who has none. Starting work on one of my silly scarves, just for fun - it's about a 3-hour project. I use two colors of Lion Brand Fun Fur with a carry-along of Lion Brand Homespun. They turn into fluffy nothings, I have them up on my Etsy (also "meredithp"), nobody buys them but I think they're fun to make and definitely fun to fondle! LOL.

 

[Homburg]

viv is a fiber art junkie. She does all sorts of things, and I can never keep up with what is crochet, what is knit, etc. I'm clueless.

She also starts a dozen projects and never finishes them. I have announced a moratorium in yarn purchases until exist projects are completed, as I fear losing a child one day and finding a dessicated corpse under a carnivorous mound of yarn.

Oh, I also have picked up chainmale. I LOVE that too, but coiling the wire to make rings really hurts my fingers.

Get a piece of cold-rolled steel rod in slightly less than the internal diameter you want. Have a hole drilled slightly larger than your wire, and a few inches shy of one end. Make a crossbar out of wood with a hole depth half the thickness of the boards, and somewhat larger than the outside diameter of your rod. Oil said hole well. Insert rod into crossbar, insert wire into hole in crossbar, chuck drill onto opposite end of rod, stand on the board and hold the drill, use the drill to turn the rod at low speeds while someone else feeds the wire. You get a nice happy long coil of wire. Then just run a dremel with a cutting disc down one side it after you detension the wire.

This is how my friend in the SCA made his links. Not terribly period, but, hey, it beat the hell out of doing it with pliers.

 

[wicked woman]

I used to know how to crochet the granny square. Showed my ex-MIL how to crochet. I swear she tore out more than I ever did...she was always crocheting.

I've knit - mostly sweaters for kids and adults and tank tops out of cotton for adults. Mittens when the kids were little. oh! a very long scarf in school colours when I was in university.

I enjoy hand stitching. I find it relaxing. Mostly cross stitching, but when I took a quilting class, it was the hand stitching I liked more than machine stitching the pieces together. The cross stitching is neat because you can do full samplers, squares to make into a pillow, pictures to frame, Xmas stockings, even designs for hand towels or bibs. Where I worked on time, we all used to make a square for a quilt whenever someone had a first baby. My squares were always cross stitched.

Even took a weaving class. That was fun. Made a table runner, but even though I had a wonderful loom for a while, I never got around to using it.

I've sewn since I was a teenager. I started because it was cheaper than buying and I didn't like looking like everyone else so sewing my own clothes meant I could make sure I didn't see 'myself'. I go in spurts of sewing with long years in between. I think the last thing I made was a formal outfit for my son's wedding.

Like cutie mouse and her yarn, I'm like that with fabric. I've been known to spend hours taking a huge pile of my fabric and deciding which pattern I'd make in what fabric ...to end up making 1 dress.


When I recently moved, I gave away almost a big armoire full of fabric. Much as I hated parting with it, I knew I wouldn't use it, so better give it to people who would. I kept a large box of fabric - I couldn't quit cold turkey.

 

[CutieMouse]

viv is a fiber art junkie. She does all sorts of things, and I can never keep up with what is crochet, what is knit, etc. I'm clueless.

She also starts a dozen projects and never finishes them. I have announced a moratorium in yarn purchases until exist projects are completed, as I fear losing a child one day and finding a dessicated corpse under a carnivorous mound of yarn.

Sadistic bastard.

The cross stitch addiction was cured when my hands got too bad to work on 20/24 count linen.

I've managed to limit my yarn addiction by avoiding the local yarn shops.

I won't let myself buy fabric until my [very very expensive sewing machine that hasn't been tuned in... 8 years] machine gets a tune up.

I've taught myself to not pick up every injured baby bird (vintage slip/dress/chemise/nightgown/panty) on the planet - intending to up-cycle/repair it. Except when it's really really really freaking cool/uncommon.

I'm struggling with paper right now... okay I'm struggling with paper, various cardboards, art supplies to do yummy things with paper/cardboards, frustration over a lack of space to marble/paste paint/bind/build paper art...

I really do walk around fondling [inanimate] things way too much for my own good.

 

[Homburg]

Sadistic bastard.

Thank you for noticing. It is well and truly mean of me to regard the welfare of my children over her addiction to new yarn.

 

[CutieMouse]

Thank you for noticing. It is well and truly mean of me to regard the welfare of my children over her addiction to new yarn.

I'm just saying there's always another storage tub around the corner. That's all.

 

[Homburg]

I'm just saying there's always another storage tub around the corner. That's all.

Sure, because the tub would help to hide the smell.

 

[CutieMouse]

Sure, because the tub would help to hide the smell.

*apologizes for poking the sore spot*

 

[Homburg]

*apologizes for poking the sore spot*

So would it be better here to appear agitated, thus evoking more remorseful response? Or perhaps better to attempt to soothe and mollify, thus bringing about other reactions?

Choices, choices...



(It's not an actual sore spot, really. )