Check-In Post September 22nd 2021

[badly_knitted]

I'm late! Apologies, I got distracted and forgot. Having a frustrating evening.


Hello to all members, 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.


Today's Question: No question today.


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]

I've had a quiet day, out in the garden clearing away some of the ivy that's been chopped down. Still got a massive pile of it on the lawn.

I did get another pattern repeat done on my sweater sleeve though.

[peaceful_sands]

Well done on ivy clearing and pattern repeats.

[badly_knitted]

Thanks! I'm being kept very busy indeed.

[wiseheart]

Sounds like a lengthy project. You are a hero for getting another pattern repeat done as well!

[badly_knitted]

Is is. Getting rid of ivy is never-ending.

[medievalrosalie]

Gardening just keeps on giving!

[badly_knitted]

Especially right now. The ivy had to be cut down to remove the collapsing shed from underneath it. Some of it is as thick as my wrist, it had to be sawn down!

[peaceful_sands]

I worked on the tapestry for a while tonight.

[wiseheart]

I imagine that making a tapestry must be complicated. Is it woven? I have no experience with the technique.

[peaceful_sands]

The type of tapestry I’m working on is simple sewing - the picture is built from diagonal stitches (like half of the cross-stitch) but the whole canvas is covered with no gaps and it’s done with wool rather than sewing thread. Probably the most difficult part is deciding where to change colour as the picture is printed on the canvas but sometimes two colours meet where there’s only one stitch. I’ll try and post a picture of a section on the next check in post.

[badly_knitted]

Woohoo! You only just found it again and you're already making great progress!

[medievalrosalie]

I admire anyone who works on tapestry. It seems such a mammoth task to me!

[wiseheart]

I was waiting for the Vodafone techie today - not my idea, they were doing some general quality control in the area - so I took out my mini-mittens and made considerable progress. I've finished the fourth batch - the ones with the star applications - and started the last one.

For this batch, I chose little Christmas trees; which, fortunately I found in my stash in the form of a ribbon that was made up of interconnected little pine trees. Since I only have red and green mittens left (save for one that's white), and the trees are naturally all green, I cut out small white circles with the help of an old coin and a pair of zigzag scissors and sewed the little trees on them. With red yarn. They look very nice that way. The white circles then will be sewn onto the mittens: with red yarn onto the green ones and with green yarn onto the red ones.

Since the mittens themselves have been cut out from felt rests of various sizes, I was left with half a red and half a white one. The first plan was to make a mitten that's red on one side and white on the other one. But then I chose to be cunning: I cobbled together the missing halves from smaller felt rests, with the help of double-sided tape. No, really, it doesn't look as bad as one will think; and besides, they'll be sewn together in the end anyway, so I can hide the glued parts behind the blanket stitch.

Current mitten count: 20 finished, 2 half-done, 4 more to go.

[badly_knitted]

That's really excellent progress, and some very clever ideas to get around the mismatched ones. I'm looking forward to seeing pictures of the finished mittens.

[peaceful_sands]

Good use of the waiting time

[medievalrosalie]

The mittens sound really cute, and a good use of time too!

[annofowlshire]

Yesterday I was sorting out the craft room and noticed the wool blending board my husband got my last Christmas that I hadn’t so much had even gotten out of the box for various reasons (mostly of the busy variety, but also because the wool I had for blending had not yet been located in the post-move chaos and wouldn’t be for some months following).

I decided to pull it out of the box and look it over. One thing let to another, and I took the aforementioned wool and began blending rolags. And then I started spinning them.

But that wasn’t all. Husband and I both have colds, so he wanted to veg in front of the TV in the evening, and me, a bit bored of washcloths decided to pull out a cross stitch kit and worked on that for an episode or two.

That was probably more crafty goodness than I’ve done all month!

[badly_knitted]

Wooo! You're crafting dry spell is coming to an end. I'm curious about the blending and what it involves, although I'm assuming you use wool that hasn't been spun since you mentioned spinning it.

What's the cross stitch design? Enquiring minds want to know ;)

[annofowlshire]

I hope so! I feel like crafting is feast or famine with me!

Here’s a thing about using a blending board: https://www.motherofpurl.net/blog/2020/10/19/rolags

Here’s a link to the cross stitch kit I’m doing (although not where I bought it): https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32820738280.html

The version I’m doing is on stamped fabric, rather than counted cross stitch.

[badly_knitted]

Fascinating! And then you spin it into plys, combine the plys, and have blended yarn for knitting or whatever!

Wow, that's a great kit!

[peaceful_sands]

Sorry you’re not feeling great but sounds like you were very productive with your crafting

[medievalrosalie]

Sorry to hear you've been under the weather. Nice that you got some wool things done!