My newest addition April 8, 2008

So last week I promised I would soon post my newest item.  As I am mainly a knitter I have been spending the last few weeks thinking about how I can take a traditionally cold weather craft into the warmer months.  During the early spring fingerless gloves seemed to be a popular item.  That gave me the idea of toeless socks!  Now it sounds funny but how many of us love to wear our sandels but feel silly wearing them with socks in the cooler months?  Toeless socks would be the perfect solution.  You can wear your socks and keep your feet warm while your toes are free to cradle flip flop thongs or what have you.

So now you are all very excited to see the toeless socks, I’m sure.  Don’t get too excited.  I decided to do some internet research to learn about the prevalence of toeless socks.  I learned they aren’t super prevalent, but I did come across an equally fun and exciting project, yoga socks.  Essentially they are toeless AND heelless socks that allow the feet to stay warm while still gripping the mat. So now I present you with my version of the yoga sock.

The yarn maybe familiar as the same yarn used to knit the multicolor scarflette from a previous post.  It originally was knitted into a gently worn sweater that I purchased from my local thrift store.  I then unraveled the yarn, washed it, hand dyed it and re-knit it into these.  For those of you who loved the idea of toeless socks, do not despair.  You don’t HAVE to be doing yoga to wear yoga socks and the toeless socks may still make an appearance yet.

New items! April 2, 2008

So I have totally been neglecting my Etsy shop. Truth is I work full-time and often don’t really feel like messing with the computer after hours, but this week I have finally been reinspired and productive!  All of these items will be listed in my Etsy shop this week.For starters I FINALLY finished the lace knit beanie that I started AGES ago.  This hat almost killed me.  It was my first lace project and I learned that you (or I in any case) cannot possibly knit lace while doing other things.  The yarn is purchased from a fellow Etisan.  She unraveled a silk/angora sweater and hand-dyed it in greans, yellows, oranges and browns.  The colors were very earthy so I decided to knit a leaf pattern into the hat.  It was very trying but I am happy with the end result: a perfect spring hat!

 I also finished two coffee cup cozies made out of a Gap sweater I unraveled.  The sweater was a gap turtleneck, aqua on the bottom, mint on the top. The first one is all aqua with a diagonal rib pattern.

 The second was also a diagonal pattern but this one used both the aqua and the mint.  It is knit in a fair isle diagonal stripe.

 On top of all of that I am about half way done with a new project I am working on.  More to come about that one later!

Alchemy March 13, 2008

 So Etsy, the site where I sell (or try to sell) my hand made goods has just come out with a forum where people can request custom orders. It is called alchemy and it allows potential buyers to name their price and describe the item they want created for them. The sellers then make bids stating how much their item will be and how exactly they plan to make it. The seller then gets to choose from several bids. Apparently this was a feature on Etsy before but it went away so they could fix some bugs and now it is back.

I am excited about this feature but also a little nervous. When a buyer is saying exactly what they want and has an idea of what they want in their head I think it is harder to satisfy them. So far I have only made one bid for a cable knit hat mittens and scarf set that I feel pretty confident about. Other requests I have almost bid on but then I second guess myself. The other thing is that for knit goods so many people make bids compared to other requests so competition is definitely fierce.

Pointless Nostalgic March 10, 2008

 

Today I would like to feature my friend and fellow Etisan emmylouhelmuth at Pointless Nostalgic. Emmy and I are volunteers together and pass much of our free time doing creative things. Emmy is the one who reintroduced me to knitting and got me into selling my goods on Etsy. She has been doing so since October and has had much luck at her shop.

She has a wide range of items available from bookmarks made from a vintage quilt to fingerless gloves and hats from recycled silk spun from the ends of saris.

Her newest addition to her shop is a To-Go Cup Sleeve made from wool she dyed, spun, and knitted all by hand. How amazing is she?! Anyway, be sure to check out her shop and blog.

A Spring Scarflette February 22, 2008

A scarflette from recycled materials

As I have mentioned previously I am very in environmental issues. I pay close attention to the resources I consume including food, natural resources, etc. I try to buy second hand items over new ones. This interest is also reflected in my hobbies. It is hard for me to defend contributing to consumer culture by creating goods that use new materials that require a high degree of energy consumption in their production. My solution is to scour local thrifstores to find gently used items that can be repurposed into something different, useful, and beautiful.

One example is a scarflette I recently knitted. First, I found a gently used, high quality, 100% virgin wool sweater at a local thriftstore that contributes 100% of profits to our local homeless shelter, La Puente Home. I found the seam and began unraveling, and unraveling, and unraveling until the sweater was no more. It was now several balls of white wool. I then seperated the yarn into three grouped hanks and dyed each one a different color, blue, green, and purple.

Finally, I reknit the yarn, combining the three strands in a diaganol rib pattern to form the above scarflette. At the end I knit in a button hole and stitched on a large white button. Now this is a creation that I can feel good about and the person who ends up with it can feel good about it too.

Of course an entire sweater did not go into the creation of just one small scarflette. I have a ton of yarn left over and will be using it in several projects to come.

The Birth of Hilo Verde February 20, 2008

So as I said earlier I have been knitting regularly for about four months. Originally I took up knitting to be able to provide a inexpensive, personal, and high quality gifts for friends and family members. I knit up several hats for friends and family. Additionally I knitted socks for my boyfriend, embroidered a set of kitchen towels for my best friend, and a table topper for my mother. All of these gifts were well received and I have to say I was pretty proud of my work.

Christmas came and went and I was still knitting with the same fervor as before but this time I didn’t know what to do with my products. I had more scarves and hats than I could use myself. A friend of mine and fellow volunteer has an Etsy shop where she sold her handmade items and she encouraged me to try it. Thus Hilo Verde was born. My friend and I spent awhile brainstorming names and I have to admit that I was pretty picky. Finally we settled on HiloVerde which means Green Yarn in Spanish. I chose this name for several reasons. First, I lived in Spain for 9 months while I was in college and came away with a great appreciation of the culture and language spoken there. Also I am currently volunteering in the San Luis Valley of Colorado where there exists is an amazing mix of Hispanic, indigenous, and American culture. I wanted to honor these two locals with my shop name. I also wanted to allude to the fact that I would be selling items that were produced in a way that was environmentally sustainable and thus “green”. Almost all of the knitted items in my shop are made from recycled or natural fibers. Additionally I strive to support local businesses whenever possible.

Knitting Roadblock February 19, 2008

The famed original headaband – check back
for the new and improved (maybe) version.

Well I have been knitting regularly for about four months now and unfortunately I have come to an the knitters’ equivalent of writer’s block. I have been working on a couple of projects lately and cannot seem to move forward with them.

First, back in November I bought a great hand dyed silk/angora blend that I was using to make a hat. This was back before I knew really anything about fiber types. The yarn lacks any give and so the hat was just blah. I ended up taking it out and redoing it about 4 times before I decided to set it aside. Four months later I was feeling industrious and picked up the discarded skein. This time I planned to make a lace leaf pattern on a hat. I though surely after four months of knitting under my belt I would be able to produce a beautifully laced hat in no time. Think again. I have probably taken out and restarted this version of the hat another four times! The problem with lace is that once you make a mistake it is much more difficult to go back and rectify it than other patterns. This hat is still in progress so check back for updates.

The second never ending project is a headband from super soft hand spun, hand dyed yarn. I had just a little yarn left over from a couple of fingerless gloves I knit and I thought a headband would be perfect for this ultra soft wool. My first attempt I finished in one night despite repeated unraveling and reknitting. I posted this on Etsy but found that I had a hard time promoting the item as I wasn’t wild about it myself. This led me to once again unraveling it and starting anew. It is currently sitting on my kitchen table and I have yet to do the finishing touches such as buttons and appliqué flowers that I have crocheted.

So all in all it has been pretty frustrating couple of weeks as far as knitting goes. It seems I just can’t finish a project! I should probably set both aside and just start an easy no brain project for the time being. Check back for pictures of the finished projects.