You know that thing? That thing where you learn about a new tool or contraption and then you have IDEAS! ALL THE IDEAS! Yeah...well here's a new thing you should know about.⁠ They're called chicago screws (they're also apparently sometimes called sex bolts, but I'd feel weird walking into the hardware store and asking for that, so chicago screw or barrel nut works better for me...but I bet you don't forget 'sex bolt' if you need to look this up again later). ⁠ They're a two part fastener where one part looks like a screw with a flat tip, and [...]

I tend to make tiny things with yarn from the scraps bin. One of these days I'm going to give myself permission to just go buy new yarn when I want to make new things (even if they're tiny things). I mean it is a legitimate business expense. But somehow I haven't yet quite managed to talk myself into it. ⁠ And using yarn out of the scraps bin means that mine are all out of different yarns (though I do at least make a token effort to make them out of yarns that look pretty together). But somewhere out [...]

See, I told you there was more than one way to put these together! There are, in fact lots of ways to fold these up. I'll have the four I've shown here (two in the previous post, two in this one) in the pattern, but I'm totally sure you clever folks will come up with bunches more I never thought of. ⁠ Everything is on track for the pattern to come out Tuesday (you know, standard 'as long as nothing truly dreadful happens to me or mine over the next few days). Do the mailing list thing if you want [...]

Ahem...see...I told you it would be cute when it was done. Mostly because little trays just ARE cute. ⁠ Same rule applies to little tins and tiny bottles actually. Basically, if it's small and you can put things in it to make yourself feel like you may someday be as organized as you think you should be, it's irresistible. At least to me.⁠ It's possible you are less easily amused than me and have higher standards.⁠ A couple of preemptive answers to questions I suspect might come up... Yes there will be a pattern (there's almost always a pattern...I can [...]

Insert your favorite lecture about blocking here. This is unblocked. This project, in its unblocked state, is a hot mess.⁠ But a bit of a soak, a bit of time laid out drying, and one quick pinch, and all will be revealed. ⁠ No really, I promise cuteness is coming. Just gimmie a minute to get it all spiffed up! Well...and to knit a few more. Because this is totally one of those 'let's knit a whole stack' plans!

This plan? The plan I absolutely and totally have? Well this plan spends a significant amount of time in the 'huh, odd' stage. Then, towards the end, you do the very tiniest bits of messing about and all of a sudden you get to the 'wow, that's remarkably cute' stage.⁠ Which is one of my favorite sorts of plans!⁠ But it does mean we're going to spend a bit of time looking at things that seem...odd.  But have a little faith, I promise the cute is coming!

Yarn and pattern matching, interlude. Ok, so here are the five swatches it took to figure out which yarn I wanted to use. There's still one more to come where I figure out sizing info, but these were what it took just to settle on a yarn. One of the most common questions I get is what I do with my swatches. Usually I just rip them out. But as always the real answer is a bit more nuanced. For swatches like these, where I am trying to match yarn and concept, but not yet trying to figure out gauge, [...]

Yarn and pattern matching, take five! I think we have our winner. This has the scale I want, it has the stitch definition I want. It has the color vibe I want. I think we're golden. Now, that doesn't mean I'm done swatching (there's at least one more to come where I work out some gauge questions and a few more last minute options). But it is the end of the 'which yarn do I like best' swatching. You can see I started to make some of the changes I talked about last time (fitting the ribbing to the faux [...]