Crochet Liberation Front First Ever Book... And I'm in It!

It is finally here: The Crochet Liberation Front First Ever Book. It will be available at some Local Yarn Stores, at Create Space and on Amazon.

What's the Crochet Liberation Front? It's a Ravelry group dedicated to championing the cause of crochet. As of now there are over 2,200 members.

The first ever book has been organized and edited by the "Fearless Leader", Laurie, with contributions from the "minions" of the CLF. It is not a "Learn to Crochet" book, but rather a reference book with a wide range of patterns and articles.

Articles like the one I wrote. It is about using math and other technical tools, such as spreadsheet software, to write and adjust crochet patterns, and to just have a better understanding of crochet construction.

One of the main focuses of the article is to show you how to write a pattern that looks like this:



The numbers here are all automatically calculated and easily adjustable. It would be very simple to write a pattern in multiple sizes, or to make changes to a pattern as you go.

My main goal with the pattern was to make the math and "technical stuff" behind crochet more accessible to everyone.

I will probably be giving away at least one copy of the book, more updates on that later.

Two Tropical Storms and Ravelympics Wrap Up

I've been a bit busy the past two weeks. After the last post, one might think that I've been off creating. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Life has gotten in the way.

I've weathered a tropical storm and bits of a hurricane. First, Tropical Storm Fay slammed our fair city with buckets of rain and plenty of wind. Two days off of work were spent in my pajamas, mostly sleeping and reading.

Last weekend my family and I headed to the Keys for some snorkeling. Unfortunately, Gustave brushed close enough that the waters weren't clear. Even more unfortunately, we didn't find out how murky the water was till we had taken a boat tour into the ocean, through a squall. It was a rough ride, and a few times out there we caught enough air to scare even the seasoned sea-goers. I am not a big fan of being on the ocean, and I'm still not sure how my family managed to get me to go out on a boat during a hurricane.

Other than that, the trip was a lot of fun. There was a little rain, we've all lived in Florida long enough to not let that bother us. We got to feed the Tarpon at Robbie's, which is great fun even if you're not a fish fan. Beware of the pelicans though, because they're even more aggressive than the ducks in my neighborhood. They will try to take the fish right out of your hand.

In other news, Ravlympics is over. I made a pretty good start on the Curve of Pursuit.



It's probably about 25% done or so, which is how much I could realistically hope to get done. We'll call that a success!

Cat Bordhi + Cast On Podcast + Caffeine = Inspiration

It's been an interesting day.

When I went to work this morning, I had a killer headache, so I took some medicine. Medicine with about as much caffeine as a cup of coffee.

This was a risk, as I am very sensitive to caffeine. If I eat too many m&m's, I will get a caffeine buzz for a little while, then get tired, restless and be unable to relax.

To help me feel better, and since I'm lucky enough to be able to listen to music at work, I turned on the new episode of Cast On. And Cat Bordhi was the guest. If Cat Bordhi is the mad scientist of knitting design, then Brenda Dayne is the Kung Fu master of podcasting.

With this perfect storm of energizing forces and creative genius, I had quite the rush of designing inspiration at work. A few new design ideas came to me, and I had a couple of break throughs in some of the older ideas I've had bouncing in my head.

I couldn't justify sketching at the office, let alone play with yarn. Believe it or not, I was actively working. Frustrating!

And even if I could have sketched, I don't have an organized way to keep track of these ideas. Even more frustrating!

So I'm starting a design journal.

And yes, I'm talking about designing, which isn't something I've ever really talked about here. Recently I've been almost exclusively using other people's patterns, perhaps playing with yarn choices. But I would like to start designing more of my own projects. They may not necessarily be published, but if they are, I have some ideas, especially for online publishing. Think of a sweater pattern in a worksheet, where you input your gauge and desired dimensions, and customized instructions are automatically calculated. No math or spreadsheet prowess necessary. If you can type in a few numbers, and hit print, you have your very own custom pattern.

Also, I've been making progress on the Ravelympics project.



This is how it looks right now. I'm not going to post every day's progress picture, because they all look pretty similar. They can be seen at my Flickr page

This energy has made me overly optimistic about what I can accomplish this evening. My to do list is ridiculous! I just hope I don't crash.

More Ravelypic Progress

It's not yet afghan sized, but it's getting there.

Day 2



Day 3



As you can see, Indy clearly approves.

Starting the Ravlympics

Here are the results of day one of my Ravelympics project.



I didn't take a picture on 8/8/08 because I didn't get home till midnight that night, and I was dead tired. We knitters know how to party.

I've found that, for now, this project is relatively portable. I'm sure once it gets bigger that will change.

Getting Ready for Knitting Olympics

This year for our anniversary, Nerdy Husband and I decided to get ourselves presents. He got a Playstation 3. I got these



I ordered the swift and ball winder online from Hank's in Gainesville, and on the day it arrived, I walked in to find this.



It was wrapped in Christmas-y gift wrap and came with a very funny card. It just got better. When I unwrapped it, I found a note written on the side from the awesome ladies at the yarn store.



A ball winder and swift. Good thing too, because I had to wind all this.



into this




That's 24 different shades of Cascade 220. What am I going to do with it? I'm basically copying Brouhaha's Curve of Pursuit. It's gorgeous, and my afghan is as much inspired by her work as it from the pattern from Wooly Thoughts.

That being said, no, I'm not going to knit an entire afghan in 17 days. My goals are to knit every day (which I normally don't do) and make an average of 1 square a day, or 17 squares total over the course of the games. I also want to take a picture of my progress every day.

Although I think I may be crazy to knit a worsted weight 100% wool afghan in August in Florida.

Spinning Class

So, I was lucky enough to get a spot in a spinning class at Hank's Yarn. The shop is great, the ladies that own it are great, and Ginger's a great teacher. It's so much fun.

There's this



The Golding Spindle that Ginger was nice enough to let me use. It's amazing, and if I wasn't getting a wheel soon, I'd be investing in one.

It allowed me to make this.



Then, there's the wheel.



This week I'm using the Ashford Traditional. I picked it out because I love the look of the Saxony wheel.

Wheel spinning is easier to do than I expected. I've gotten started with this (the same roving as the spindle).



Which has become this



I also made a few purchases. Going into a yarn store on pay day can be dangerous. But fiber is a lot less expensive than yarn. I seem to have bought them in pairs.