The main picture for this post (above) is of the one design I managed to complete in 2012…that I haven’t mentioned yet! It’s in Brett Bara’s new book, Clever Crocheted Accessories. Patterns and samples have to be made up so far in advance for books, it’s kind of hard to keep track. When this sample came back to me in the mail it felt like about a million years had gone by. At any rate, it’s called Silky Soft Scarf and it’s a simple crocheted shell pattern worked lengthwise in Fibre Company Acadia, so it’s got great texture and drape. The book as a whole has a ton of quick little crochet projects in it–super fun!

Now to the main point of my post: 2012 FOs. All 38 of them.

This mosaic pretty much has them all, minus a crocheted baby hat (turban) and two pairs of Tingvoll slippers:

This picture was taken by my brother in law, after him and his wife unwrapped their Christmas slippers. Success!

Of my 38 FOs:

22 were gifts
9 were class samples
6 were for babies
2 were sweaters
2 were socks
2 were mittens
4 were blankets (that number is kind of shocking to me)

So what’s up next? I’m currently working on my second Chevron Love Mitten; hopefully this will be my first FO of 2013. I also started a scrappy Granny Square Sampler afghan before the Christmas gift insanity began. That’s temporarily on hold but will probably be resurrected any day now. Argo sat around for too long and had to be re-started, then I wasn’t paying attention and screwed up the increases, so… this will be restarted again. Finally, I’m sadly stalled out on my Luna sweater. I think at some point I realized I was a bit off in my numbers, put it down, and ever since then it’s been the thing that requires too much thought. One big goal for 2013: either figure out what on earth is going on with this and get started again, or rip it. (sigh)

Wow, I think 2012 might be my worst year yet for keeping up with FO/WIP photographing and posting on any site whatsoever. Most things made it here, but my 2012 crafts photoset on flickr was pretty piss poor, and let’s not even talk about my rav posting. Nevertheless, I have a few projects to post about, which I’m going to do quickie-style in this post here, and then there will be a quick retrospective post–something I also love doing, and reading from others.

First up, I am so completely embarrassed to admit that I finished these two items about a YEAR ago. They were my first FOs of 2012. I sent them off to family in Norway (no I’m not Norwegian) and I think I wasn’t totally happy with the pictures, and bla bla bla. Next thing you know a year had gone by. These are both designs by the fabulous Mandy Powers, whose work I absolutely love. Both of these are from her Red Collection. I’ve tons of designs from that book in my queue–all so cute!

Ziggity:

knit in assorted alpacas, these were super fast and super fun. The picot row is a nice touch, but could easily be left out if you’re not a picot person.

and Holly Jean:

knit in assorted colors of cascade 220. Holly Jean is a reversible hat–totally clever and super warm. As I recall from, uh, a year ago, I wasn’t able to match both stitch and row gauge for this one. No big deal, I think I ended up adjusting by eliminating one of the chart repeats, stitch-wise/horizontally.

For Allison, a birthday present and a Christmas present (although I can’t recall which thing was for which holiday!):

This is the cable-braided necklace by Olga Buraya-Kefelian. It totally blew my mind when I looked at the pattern and realized that there was no actual cabling involved here. You make two strips with holes in the middle and weave them through one another, basically. I went with a nice luxurious laceweight yarn so the necklace would have a delicate profile.

And this is the Saturday Beret from the new book, Clever Crocheted Accessories. This hat pattern is super fun, and adorable! So much so, I made another one for my mom for Christmas:

Allison’s version I made exactly as written (except for changing colors, obvs). My mom’s has an extra ribbon “round” to add a bit more depth for her curly hair. About this pattern–super cute, really satisfying, worked in a really interesting way. Watch out that you don’t miss the note before the actual pattern starts that states that every stitch is worked through the back loop only!! This note is placed in a way that makes it incredibly easy to miss. Also, I wish the pattern specified more clearly how to join and direct new rounds so you could get all your ridges facing the same way. This was a bit of a mind-bender.

Last gift, for my husband’s cousin’s girlfriend (easy to remember, right? ha), a Kabuto:

This actually has to go out in the mail ASAP… So here’s hoping she doesn’t read this. Ha. This pattern is AWESOME. It’s worked back and forth, and yet also kind of in the round, in order to get that little flap on one side. If you’re like me and you insist on knitting everything on super long circs, this will involve some periodic rearranging of your yarn and the circ cord, but it’s no big deal. The only modifications I made were to add a softer yarn in a contrast color for the inside of the hem (the gray yarn is wool of the andes-scratchy stuff for a hat) and to eliminate the last ridge section of the hat to make it a bit less slouchy.

And at long last, my last long-lost FOs (ha), both for me:

Manolos! I love love love this pattern. Long-time readers may recall that I have All the Opinions about gussets on mitten thumbs (i.e. they are completely necessary and I simply cannot abide a flap thumb); similarly, I have All the Opinions about gussets in socks. I realize short-row heels fit many people’s feet better (unlike flap thumbs, which simply do not fit a human hand that I have ever seen), but they do not fit MY feet better. I need a big huge gusset, which is why I love Yarnissima’s designs.

A howlcat. A what? It’s a cowl / it’s a hat / it’s a super clever design by Alex Tinsley. It’s a cute hat, but I think the cowl form might be one of my new go-to winter accessories. The ribbed part really hugs my neck, and with double-thick fabric it’s super warm.

…and I think that’s it! Or at least most of it. I’ll be back soon with a wrap-up post, and probably some thoughts about what I might want to make in 2013. Happy New Year to you, dear readers!

I almost titled this post “baby roundup” but I didn’t really like the idea of rounding up multiple babies… Although it still makes me giggle a little bit.

When Kat, one of my b bffs told me she was going to have a baby, I got to work on the crafting pretty much immediately. I was actually so excited, and so into this sweet little crocheted dress pattern that I started it right away, before Kat even knew the sex of her baby. I let out a huge sigh of relief when she said she was having a girl.

It’s pretty unmistakably feminine. The bow on the chest just kills me! This pattern is very straightforward, classic crochet – top-down raglan construction with double crochets on top, then a vintage-feeling shell pattern on the bottom. I used brown sheep cotton fleece for the first time on this project; I was surprised at how it really just felt like cotton. The wool content made it a bit more lightweight I think, but it worked up pretty much like cotton. The only modification I made to the pattern was to add a round of single crochet stitches on each edge (bottom of sleeves, bottom of skirt, and around the neck – although I think that last one is actually called for in the pattern) to neaten things up.

Secondly, I managed to whip up this pair of booties just a couple days before Kat’s shower, after I saw her post a similar-looking pair on pinterest.

I’ve gotta say, this pattern isn’t my favorite. The decreases on the top of the foot are a bit extreme and cause some holes in the fabric, and some strange bunching. The booties are also actually mostly worked in rounds that are turned, which seems unnecessary. They left me wondering: why use turned rounds in crochet? (i.e., join a round, then turn the fabric and work another round on the wrong side, etc.) I know practically that this means you’re looking at the backs of crochet stitches on every other row, and that the fabric then looks slightly different as a result … but why bother? I feel like I’m missing something here.

Lastly, I am so, so into this blanket I made.

I believe I originally saw this idea on pinterest as Casey’s version of this pattern (a free one from Caron yarns). It’s a simple idea: squares lines up corner the corner, with a ripple pattern coming off the ends. Kat has a ripple afghan in her apartment that her great grandmother made with a sort of ombre maroon thing going on, so I thought I’d make something to complement that. I chose four colors of Miss Babs Yowza; suffice it to say I have about a million yards of all these colors left over because these skeins are ginormous, but I’m not complaining because it is a BEAUTIFUL yarn.

There is my stoic husband, withstanding a blanket photoshoot in the park on what must have been one of the windiest days in Chicago history… I have a lot of pictures of crocheted FOs getting blown through the park.

I made one really obvious modification to the pattern, which was to only include one row of grannies on the end. The number of granny rows in the original pattern looks a bit schizophrenic.

I also whipped up a hat for this kid (she is never going to be cold, thanks to me and Allison) but failed to photograph it before the shower. I know; I don’t even know who I am, either. Hopefully once the baby arrives I can get some pictures of her wearing it!

Dear readers, I have a ton of finished objects to share with you! This one though – this one needs its own post. A little while back Marie at the Underground Crafter wrote a series of posts in honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, wherein she featured different designers and crafters around the world, all sharing Hispanic roots. I added a ton of new blogs to my RSS reader from that series, and added quite a few new ravelry friends as well! I love seeing what crafters in all parts of the world are making. One of my favorites was this post on Sara Palacios, a designer and crocheter from Argentina. (Sara’s own site is here. I don’t know any Spanish, but it’s still fun to see what she’s making.) Her wonder blanket caught my eye, and I clicked through to ravelry to see that this gorgeous blanket is assembled all without cutting the yarn (i.e. you crochet the colored flowers all separately, then join them with the stars – the white parts in my version – CONTINUOUSLY). I’m always looking for crochet projects that are portable and easy enough to remember that I can make pieces while teaching, and those flowers fit the bill. I started making flowers with my many colored scraps of Knit Picks Swish (a washable wool worsted that I really enjoy working with, btw) and throwing them into a bowl on my coffee table. I got so obsessed with it that I had enough flowers for a whole blanket in just a couple days.

The next weekend we flew to California for the wedding of a couple friends, and those long flights between Chicago and San Fransisco gave me more than enough time to work the white stars joining all these flowers together. And as a side note, Sara does clearly state that this is a fairly advanced level crochet pattern, and after working those joining stars I can see why. The techniques include a few things I’d never seen before, and I definitely had to pay attention to where I was going, and ended up tearing back to fix mistakes on quite a few occasions. It wasn’t particularly frustrating since the pattern itself is so interesting.

In other news, going to the park to photograph finished blankets on a wind advisory day in Chicago may not have been my best idea. This is one of the few pictures I got of the blanket *not* being blown away. Sigh.

As for what I’m going to do with the blanket … no idea! It’s definitely a baby blanket and not an afghan (size and colors!) so I’ll probably hang on to it for the time being until the right recipient makes him/herself known!

I always cringe when I read those blog posts when people come back after long unexplained absences, all apologies and awkward empty promises. So I’m not going to do that. I will tell you that I have a super overwhelming new job (but no I’m not done with my degree yet! still working!), which is why I’ve been capable of little more than laying flat on my back on the couch. Fortunately, I am capable of knitting while in this position. So I have something to share with you today, and it is GOOD.

Knitters, meet my new brightly colored Hiro. The temperatures just dropped a bit in Chicago, this sucker is finally dry (after days and days of agonizing waiting), and I’m pretty much not removing this sweater until spring. It’s true love, me and this sweater. The pattern is by Julia Farwell-Clay, and I LOVE IT. Colorwork yoke sweaters are one of my most favorite things ever, and boy is this a great one. The pattern works great as-is, but it’s eminently customizable. (is that a word? you get what I mean.) I did things almost exactly as written, except that I wanted a more snug fit than the samples have on Julia – just personal preference – so I summoned my inner Amy Herzog and knit a sweater to fit my upper bust measurement-36″. The pattern shaping still suited my proportions around the waist and hips. Once I got above the bust though, I decreased to the smallest size for the yoke, because I apparently have the freak shoulders of a small child. The most thrilling part of the pattern for me is the generous quantity of short rows at the back of the neck above the yoke. I’ve learned from other sweaters I’ve made, especially yoked sweaters, that these short rows are a must on me. As much as I love my Orange Pop, it drives me NUTS that there aren’t short rows on the back of the neck. It really does make for a much better fit.

The only major-ish modification I made to the pattern (besides knitting something more close-fitting, if you can call that a mod) was to adjust the sleeve length. I love a super warm sweater with 3/4 length sleeves. Sometimes full sleeves make me feel constricted – insane, I know. So I cast on a few more sts for my sleeves – 48 sts instead of the 36 that are called for -, worked through the sleeve chart before I started increasing, and then increased at a slower rate, until I reached the total number of sleeve sts called for. Then I just worked straight, slipping the sleeve onto my arm as I went to judge approximate length.

As for yarn, I wanted to go kind of lopi-esque here and try working with a single ply – something I don’t normally do. This is good old Brown Sheep Lamb’s Pride, which I always love working with. That is a great, durable, salt of the earth yarn. They do have a few colors that have kind of a semi-solid look to them, like this red – something Carolyn pointed out to me years ago, for which I’ve always been grateful.