Check-In Post - Sept 25th 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 (courtesy of ysabetwordsmith): For those of us who do yarn crafts, what kinds of yarn do you prefer working with and why?


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]

Argh! I just had to split one of my fanfic master lists on LJ because it exceeded LJ's measly character limit for a post. Had to edit the new post because I ended up with HTML coding for font style and size twice in every single entry on the list, and the font was HUGE! Taken about an hour and a half to get it all sorted, but it's done and checked, no major issues that I can see.


Anyway, I sewed up and stuffed the next 5 pumpkins, bringing the total to 90, finished knitting one I started yesterday, and started knitting another one. I'm slowly closing in on my goal of 100.

[sister_raphael]

At least the pumpkins are going well!

[badly_knitted]

Yes, at least that part of my day didn't cause any problems. It was just everything else. *sigh*

[althea_valara]

Oh, how frustrating! Glad you got it all sorted. And YAY PUMPKINS! I love all things pumpkin. Made Chipotle Pumpkin Pasta for dinner last night, in fact.

[badly_knitted]

That sounds good! I don't think my pumpkins would make a good dish though.

It was, especially because I'd cleaned up the coding on all my master lists and I had to do it AGAIN! I think I know how to avoid that happening in future though. If I put in my chosen font style and size coding first, then cut and paste the html coding for my entries instead of the rich text version, that should keep rich text from imposing its own idea of size and style... I'm far from being an expert, but I learned a lot from tidying my master lists the last time, so hopefully I won't have to deal with such a mess next time I have to split one of my lists.

[spiralicious]

That is very frustrating. At least it's sorted.

So many pumpkins! You can do it!

[badly_knitted]

Yeah, I just hope I don't have to split another of the lists too soon. Such a nuisance. On dreamwidth I have one list for that fandom. On LJ, I now have three... *headdesk*

Doing my best!

[spiralicious]

Oof. Yeah, that would be a pain.

:D

[nagi_schwarz]

Wow! 100 pumpkins! You've got this.

Also kudos to you for keeping a masterlist of your fics. I gave up years ago.../o\

[badly_knitted]

I have so many fics, I'm glad I started a Master List when I first started writing. Every time I post something (that is every day) I add it to the relevant Master List.

Where once was one, I now have lists for 4 different fandoms, separate lists for one-shots, drabbles, and chaptered fics, plus a miscellaneous fandoms list, and separate lists for three, no, four 'verses within one fandom... I think I have 27 lists linked on my sidebar, because some have had to be split into three or four sections... Eep!

I'm getting there with pumpkins. Numbers 91-95 are now knitted.

[sister_raphael]

I finished painting the little mirror and sealed it with Renaissance Wax for a bit of protection.

[badly_knitted]

Woohoo! Well done!

[spiralicious]

Very nice

[nagi_schwarz]

That sounds lovely! Way to go.

[althea_valara]

Thirty-three minutes on the cardi. I am at the point again where I feel like the sleeve must be done already. NOPE! At least four increases to go, might make it five so there's plenty of room in the sleeve to wear over other clothing. I'm taking a break right now, and then I will do something else creative, not sure what yet though. I kinda want to knit but that would mean getting up from my chair to retrieve that project, and I am lazy. So maybe I will code some more.

For those of us who do yarn crafts, what kinds of yarn do you prefer working with and why?

I loves me some real wool, but sadly I can't afford it often, so I mostly use acrylics and blends, with some crochet cotton when I'm in a doily mood. I suppose I can make "can afford yummy natural yarn" one of my motivators for finding full-time work and moving out, huh?

[badly_knitted]

Great progress on the cardi. Good idea to allow plenty of sleeve room.

There are a lot of yummy but pricy yarns out there. I tend to use mostly acrylics myself, not just because of price but for durability and ease of washing. Finding a detergent that doesn't shrink wool seems to be getting harder.

Good luck with your goals!

[spiralicious]

Well done and good luck!

[nagi_schwarz]

Way to go on the cardigan though, for reals!

And I feel you on real wool. I really need to wash the wool I have...and card it...and spin it...and maybe dye it. I get why real wool is as expensive as it is, but still...

[sister_raphael]

Go cardi!!!!!!

[spiralicious]

The last two days have been surprisingly busy.

Yesterday, I had the latest gel printing workshop. We learned to print impressions of leaves. I made a lot of nice prints for a change. Also, we were each given a framing mat to frame our favorite. It was a good time, but also a little overwhelming. That had more to do with some of the people though.

In more of the spirit of tidying, I also added as much of the things I had sitting around to put in my junk into my junk journal as I could. It was an odd assortment of things, but most of it was the 1 inch squares of scrap papers from all of the papers we've used to make cards with Lynne from Feb 2024 to July 2025. It took over 6 pages to get them in the journal, but I'm glad they're not sitting around in fragile little stacks anymore.

Today, I went back to detangling the yarn and I knit one full pattern repeat on the cable hat.

[badly_knitted]

Hope we get to see the gel print leaves at some point, that sounds like fun.

Well done with getting all those bits into your junk journal! And for progress on the hat.

Good luck with the detangling. I think you might need it...

[spiralicious]

I'm having trouble getting my new device set up, so it's definitely not going to be soon. T.T

Thanks!

I do. And now I have a Steve 2.0 T.T

[badly_knitted]

Ugh, getting tech set up... >.<

Oh dear! Steve is multiplying!

[spiralicious]

(>_<)

[nagi_schwarz]

Way to go on your junk journal! I am slowly working on a small one I made. I like the notion of using all the squares! That sounds fun. Also kudos to you for detangling yarn.

Gel printing sounds fascinating!

[spiralicious]

Thanks! Very nice. They can be so satisfying to make. I got the idea for using the squares from a scrapbooking embellishment technique called "inchies," which uses one inch squares to make page borders.

Thanks! Gel printing can be a bit fiddly, but when things work out, it's awesome.

[sister_raphael]

Gel print leaves sound pretty cool!

[spiralicious]

Thanks!

[nagi_schwarz]

Started watching a new anime with my husband, so I've been stitching up the blanket here and there. Wrist isn't so good, so I've slowed down a bit, but I think I can get it all sewn up in the next week, if not the all the ends sewn in.

[badly_knitted]

Good luck with completing the sewing up! Take care of your wrist!

[sister_raphael]

Sailor Moon fan here. What is the one you're watching?

[nagi_schwarz]

Solo Leveling (does it really count? It was originally a Korean webtoon but the production is Japanese). It's the first one I've watched in a while but I wanted to give it a try.