I made a hat! (and other things I with which I pass my time.)

Among the things I have done over this period of (f)unemployment, I have started and finished (!) a few knitting projects. Although, this might just be a record for me--I have started and finished knitting a hat in under a month. And with plenty of winter weather left to spare. It seems like winter will never end, despite the daffodils blooming in our yard.

True story: I actually got dressed in "real" clothes for this picture.

I got the pattern through Ravelry, which is the most awesome website ever if you are looking for patterns or inspiration for your next knitting/crochet project. Starting the hat was a bit tricky because I had never done an Italian Tubular cast-on, so I had to look up instructions and sort through all the different YouTube videos out there. But once I got started, I only made like 5 mistakes, which seems really low considering that most of the time I was knitting while watching Gilmore Girls.

A few months ago, I also finished a cowl scarf. I had bought the yarn on clearance not really thinking about the color only that I liked the yarn. So once I finished, much to my chagrin, I realized that with the color and the way it's striped, it kind of looks like a bacon scarf.

Bright side: My bacon-looking scarf is ridiculously warm.

Lest you think that all this time spent not working have been toward productively knitting cold weather accessories for myself, I have also wasted countless hours on Interwebs watching cute animal videos. True story: One night I stayed up way too late, just watching a dog named, Murkin, and his cute little kittens. You are just going to AWWWW all over the place. Behold:

EXTRA BONUS CONTENT!
So, here's an outtake of me trying to figure out my PhotoBooth program on my computer. It had been a while since I last used it, and my laptop is getting into its twilight years, so I kept on hitting the button to set off the camera, but when it took it's sweet time to load, I got up to open the door for some fresh air. And that's when the little punk decided to start working.

I can't wait to have a job again.

Glutton for punishment (Part 1)

I was moving at the time, so my apartment was messy. I don't normally live in squalor or with bad lighting.

The other day I was reading Apartment Therapy and they had a post on crocheted granny squares. Between the lure of another comfortable blanket for myself and a seemingly fun project to while away the cold days of February, I briefly toyed with the idea of making my own granny square blanket. Then I remembered that this same siren song of DIY occured to me about the same time last year too when I decided that I could and should make a quilt. This week, I am going to share a story about my adventures in sewing a quilt. It's quite exciting for you, I'm sure--so exciting that I am splitting this story in two, the first part today (with a cliffhanger!) and finishing next week. Onto my personal quilting hell!

I have a tendency to fall in love with things very quickly and very often--puppies, pretty flower arrangements, and DIY projects--and once it clicks in my mind that I love it, I absolutely must have it/get it/do it. Well, sometime in January last year, I got the brilliant (BRILLIANT) idea to make a quilt after reading a post on Boing Boing about Boo Davis' quilting book (I think). I figured my sewing skills were decent enough that if I found a simple pattern, executing and putting together the quilt would be a fairly painless process. I was wrong. (SO WRONG)

I checked out Boo Davis' Dare to be Square quilting book from the library and looked for interesting patterns. I eventually settled on her Chatterbox pattern, which was an easy four block pattern that was just pieced together until it was big enough for a blanket. One interesting thing in her book was that she said making quilts were not for weekend warriors; quilts take time and you should take your time piecing it together. At the time, I was like: Okay, whatever.

Gathering the fabric took a while, but my spirits were high. Then came the cutting of all the squares. Holy crap. This was when the resentment began to set in--the whole patterned called for over 100 pieces of various fabric sizes for just the "face" of the quilt (not counting many pieces I cut out incorrectly), more smaller rectangles to make the border, and cutting three large unwieldy pieces to make the back of the quilt.

The general pattern in the book was to start with two pieces, block them together, do the same with another two pieces, and then sew the two blocks together to make a four square. Continue doing that until you have all the four squares in that row blocked together, then you sew the four blocks together until you have a complete row. Repeat. Once all the rows have been completed, sew all the rows together until the whole thing is pieced together. Sewing the fabric together initially wasn't so bad until I started blocking off the larger pieces. Things started to get real hairy because it just got kind of heavy, I didn't know quite where to drape the fabric to line it up for the machine, and all the pins. Oh god, the pins. I was stabbed so many times handling the fabric.

At this point it was...March, I think? I was pretty miserable because I had spent quite a bit of my free time (when not on the couch surfing the interwebs or eating or working or going to Kate's) on the quilt and all I had to show for it, a month plus into the project, were just blocked off rows. Plus, the damn quilt started to take over the living room; it was a project just setting up to begin to sew the blocks and then cleaning up.There was the sewing machine, the ironing board, getting the iron, laying out all the pieces in the order I wanted them. Then to pin them together, sew, press open, sew some more and repeat.

I was not even close to being able to put the layers together to baste the blanket because I hadn't cut the large unwieldy pieces for the back. The reason was that my little cutting board was only 18x24 inches and so cutting fabric pieces larger than that required some fabric wrangling which usually resulted crooked lines and shaving off tiny pieces of our area rug.

So, once I finished sewing together the face of the quilt, I folded it up and put it away. I patted myself on the back for a job well done and rewarded myself with a small quilt vacation thinking that I'd work on the piece for the back next week. Then, work got a bit stressful and more than a few weeks went by without working on the quilt. Suddenly it was April and the weather got nicer and I wasn't nearly so inclined to stay at home. So the quilt stayed folded up and neglected while I caroused around Seattle greeting the spring.

By now, you are probably on the edge of your seat wondering what happens to my project. Will it get finished? Does it rot away in quilt purgatory forever? Partially finished but never quilted together? Find out next week! Unless you've visited me in the last half of 2011, then you already know the answers.