Check-In Post - February 5th 2025

[badly_knitted]

Hello to all members, passers-by, curious onlookers, and shy lurkers, and welcome to our regular daily check-in post. Just leave a comment below to let us know how your current projects are progressing, or even if they're not.

Checking in is NOT compulsory, check in as often or as seldom as you want, this community isn't about pressure it's about encouragement, motivation, and support. Crafting is meant to be fun, and what's more fun than sharing achievements and seeing the wonderful things everyone else is creating?

There may also occasionally be questions, but again you don't have to answer them, they're just a way of getting to know each other a bit better.


This Week's Question: Have you ever made a Valentine gift or card?


If anyone has any questions of their own about the community, or suggestions for tags, questions to be asked on the check-in posts, or if anyone is interested in playing check-in host for a week here on the community, which would entail putting up the daily check-in posts and responding to comments, go to the Questions & Suggestions post and leave a comment.

I now declare this Check-In OPEN!

Comments

[badly_knitted]

10 rows on the back of my Aran jacket! That puts me halfway through the second pattern repeat, and since the pattern is really simple, I don't need to look at it again until I get it to the right length for the raglan shaping. I did screw up on the second to last row I did today though, and had to undo part of that row, and what I'd done on the final row before I ran into my mistake. Still not sure how I managed it, but I knitted two stitches together on one of the cables so I only had 7 stitches instead of 8 =/

[wiseheart]

That's nothing! When I started practicing my (extremely primitive) knitting again with a 10 stitches wide doll scarf, I managed to produce 11 stitches in the third row already. *g*

Aside from the mistake (can you correct it or will you have to undo a big chunk?) you've made good progress, though.

[badly_knitted]

I undid it and re-did that part. Got to have the right number of stitches in the cables or they don't work.

When my sister used to try to knit, she never had the same number of stitches in two consecutive rows. Stitches appeared and disappeared at random, so you did better than my sister.

[darkcedars]

At least it was only part of a row!

[badly_knitted]

True, It I'd made the mistake at the start of the row, that would have been worse, unpicking cables is hard but I only had to deal with two out of six.

[nagi_schwarz]

At least you caught it before you got too far. You’re making excellent progress!

[badly_knitted]

Yes, it was impossible not to notice when I started the reverse row. Undoing cables ids NOT fun though, especially with the thick Aran yarn.

[spiralicious]

You are making great progress!

At least you only had to undo part of a row.

[badly_knitted]

Well, not sure about the 'great' part, but I'm making progress... *grins*

Yes, could have been worse.

[spiralicious]

:D

[wiseheart]

I've started working on the second very floral elephant; the one that will be called Lola, thanks to badly_knitted who came up with the name. I've cut out the parts, stitched together the body and made the ears - well, the second ear is only half-done, but there's always tomorrow.

[darkcedars]

Hooray for more elephants!

[wiseheart]

You can never have too many elephants! 💕💕💕

[badly_knitted]

Yay, Lola is taking shape! Ear today, other ear tomorrow ;)

[wiseheart]

Indeed. 😊

[nagi_schwarz]

Yay for another floral elephant! They’re so cute!

[spiralicious]

Wonderful!

[darkcedars]

I worked on a dishcloth a little today. Yesterday I cracked some more black walnuts. Here's the nutcracker from the family farm and a photo of a cracked nut with a ruler.

[badly_knitted]

The nutcracker looks pretty lethal! The walnuts look good though, and big!

[wiseheart]

I totally agree, on both points!

[nagi_schwarz]

That nutcracker looks so cool! And wow that’s one massive walnut.

[spiralicious]

The walnut is huge!

[mzwyndi]

Yes, I have made a ton of Valentine's day gifts over the years. My spouse is born on the day after, so I love to make knitted hearts and socks with lace interlocking hearts and so forth for the day itself.

I made paper valentine's day cards when I was younger, especially when I taught pre-school and elementary aged kids.

[darkcedars]

An excellent reason for heart socks.

[nagi_schwarz]

The interlocking hearts sound so sweet!

[mzwyndi]

And not very hard at all!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60_CPBFAwME

[spiralicious]

That is very sweet.

[badly_knitted]

What lovely gifts! I hope your spouse appreciates them =)

I think handmade Valentine cards are always that little bit extra special, more so when made by kids.

[tielan]

I cut and ironed some fabric for making quilt blocks.

[nagi_schwarz]

Way to go! Quilting looks so intimidating to me…

[spiralicious]

Well done!

[badly_knitted]

Excellent progress! What's the pattern for the next quilt?

[darkcedars]

My immediate reaction was "ugh ironing!" But you cannot skip that.

[nagi_schwarz]

Made lots of progress on the new bookmark but ran out of thread already and need to refill my bobbin. Joining new threads mid-project is always so tedious. Also working with crochet cotton instead of actual tatting cotton is always a bit iffy but here we are. Hoping I can finish in the next couple of days so I can start on a new project (as if I don’t have four other projects lingering in the background…not to mention several scrap yarn blankets gathering dust…)

[spiralicious]

Good luck!

[badly_knitted]

Joining new threads in pretty much any project is annoying. Good luck with that, and with finishing the bookmark!

Sounds like you have plenty of things to work on.

[darkcedars]

If you haven't looked at them in a while, you might review the scrap blankets. One time I had a couple stuffed in the closet for ages. When I finally looked at them they were (somehow) 90% done.

[nagi_schwarz]

Indeed, at least one of them does look close to being finished. Other projects have deadlines though...

[spiralicious]

I have a internet connection and a charged device at the same time!

I have many ongoing craft things, but I don't want this to be a book. The latest thing I worked on was project 8 for the sketchbook. It came out on YouTube yesterday and I managed it last night. It was supposed to be a wet on wet watercolor still life of an overflowing bowl of cherries. I chose instead to do wet on dry, because my paper tolerates it better and my cherries are getting poured out of the bowl. The bowl is a "3D"element. (You paint a messy dark area of a piece of computer paper and once it's dry, you cut out a bowl shape and glue it to the cherry painting at the very end). You also draw outlines and details on the cherries with a medium of your choice. I used colored pencils.

I'm housesitting again at the house with the spoiled dog and the chickens again. There are 9 now. I think there were only 8 last time? It's a bit of a shame. I'm spending 12 days (counting the 4 I've been here) in a place with 24/7 TV to knit by and I doubt I will be able to find any time to knit.

[badly_knitted]

Yay for internet access!

That sounds a fascinating project, if a bit messy, I hope it turns out well.

Have fun with the dog and chickens. Shame about not finding time to knit though. The dog and chickens must keep you busy.

[spiralicious]

:D

Thanks. I think my little red blobs turned out sufficiently cherry looking. :)

Thanks. It's a lot of little tasks all day long. The dog requires a lot of attention. The day starts early (when I am naturally a night owl). So there are weird pockets of downtime, I'm usually exhausted and they aren't really long enough for me to do much. (Despite my complaints here, it really is a decent housesitting gig.)

[badly_knitted]

The dog sounds like a lot of work.

Yay for cherry-like blobs!

[spiralicious]

She is, but she is also very sweet. But also so much work.

Thanks! (My mother keeps insisting they are fat hearts -_-)

[badly_knitted]

Maybe they're in disguise!

[spiralicious]

Perhaps, lol

[darkcedars]

Maybe the dog can be encouraged to knit. Good luck, I can usually get a dog to nap on the couch and let me read or crochet.

[spiralicious]

Thanks. Unfortunately, the dog, she has pretty much no chill and compulsively licks everything - me, the couch, the pillows, etc. I pretty much have to be cuddling her and not moving at all for her to take a nap.