3KCBWDAY1: Color Lovers

Welcome to the third annual Knitting & Crochet Blog Week! This is the first of the daily posts for this week - focused on color.

Colour is one of our greatest expressions of ourselves when we choose to knit or crochet, so how do you choose what colours you buy and crochet or knit with. Have a look through your stash and see if there is a predominance of one colour. Do the same with your finished projects - do they match? Do you love a rainbow of bright hues, or more subdued tones. How much attention do you pay to the original colour that a garment is knit in when you see a pattern? Tell readers about your love or confusion over colour.

Though I've always had a favorite color - purple - my "color of the moment" changes often with the seasons and my mood.

This spring, I'm latching on to all things green and alive with brightness - including the neons that are popping up everywhere.

Zuzu's Petals in The Wool Dispensary, Lizard Boy colorway

I'm also currently obsessed with Noro's undulating and gradual color changes.

Striper Cowl, featuring MTL and Noro Taiyo SockThey are inspiring a whole new set of designs that I'll be releasing later this year. The cowl pictured above (Striper Cowl) is knit up using MadelineTosh Tosh Merino Light and Noro's Taiyo Sock.

A simple stripe pattern combined with the vareigated yarn creates a fascinating finished piece.

tidy mind, tidy stitches...2KCBWDAY3

How do you keep your yarn wrangling organised? Well, that's a really good question.

I'm one of those people that tends to find harmony and order in a mess. There's a fine line between having "neatly organized" piles and having total chaos. While I like to think that my piles are organized, lately they seem to tilt towards chaos.

The photo above is one of the ways I store my yarn. I have 3 large storage containers from The Container Store that I keep most of my yarn in. The overflow lives in a plastic drawer unit inside my closet. My books, patterns and magazines all live on various book shelves, but there is no rhyme or reason to their arrangement. This method is a little hairbrained and annoying, but it's the best I can do with the small space I have in my city apartment.

One of my stash problems is that I am a collector of beautiful single skeins of yarn. This makes for many headaches - the need to constantly make one skein projects, and the inability to effectively organize my stash in a decent manner!

But I just can't help myself...look at this beautiful skein I recently purchased from Windy Knitty - Madelinetosh Tosh Merino Light in Duchess.

The only thing I am vigilant in keeping organized is my design notebook, which has sections for pattern notes, sketches and inspirations.

my knitting evolution

It's day 2 of Knitting & Crochet Blog Week - it's so fun to see everyone's posts! Today's post is about my knitting skills evolution, or revolution perhaps.

Knitting & Crochet Blog Week - Day 2. Look back over your last year of projects and compare where you are in terms of skill and knowledge of your craft to this time last year. Have you learned any new skills or forms of knitting/crochet (can you crochet cable stitches now where you didn’t even know such things existed last year? Have you recently put a foot in the tiled world of entrelac? Had you even picked up a pair of needles or crochet hook this time last year?

2010 was an interesting year for my knitting. I can't say that I've learned any groundbreaking new skills, but I have discovered what types of projects I find most enjoyable to knit. I'm finding it easier to subsitute yarns, modify existing patterns, and my designing is becoming more thoughtful.

I was one of the lucky designers published in Malabrigo Book Three. For this project, I worked with cables and simple textures, and experimented with colorful stripes and shawl construction.

Twisted Cowl, Malabrigo Book ThreeMy cabling speed has definitely increased, allowing me to complete projects like this Snapdragon Tam quite quickly.

Snapdragon Tam by Ysolda Teague

Knitting for gifts became easier too...

What knitting skills did you learn in 2010?



I'm Participating - Knitting & Crochet Blog Week

It's almost time for the 2nd annual Knitting & Crochet Blog Week - March 28th - April 3rd, 2011. This will be my first time participating and I'm very excited to be a part of this event!

Are you joining in on the fun?