Follow Friday: Drawn From My Father's Adventures

From Drawn From My Father's Adventures

From About This Blog:
I have always loved my father's stories, the grim ones from boarding school during the war, the exciting ones from being the son of a spy, the exotic and bizarre and beautiful ones from traveling to unpronounceable places long before there were guide books. I have always seen these stories as pictures and I thought it was high time I coaxed them in writing from the source and drew them.

While I was going to college in Arkansas, I co-taught an ethnography course with a very good friend. I don't quite remember how I initially got involved with it, but I know that it gave me a new appreciation for listening to and making note of the stories that our loved ones have to share. Drawn From My Father's Adventures has Simon Blackall's fantastic stories and his daughter Sophie adds her art to take them a step further. I always enjoy what I find here.

Surge in Activity

Those of you following along have probably noticed the dramatic increase in activity and posting here. the very observant of you, will have noticed that it began on January 1st. You will just have to believe me when I say, this wasn't an intentional New Year's resolution. The truth is, I was inspired by my uncle while we were visiting over Christmas.

He's writing a book. Reading his chapters and listening to him talk about page counts made me think about how little writing I've done over the past few years. I had a writing intensive undergraduate program and during my graduate program I kept a blog to work out my ideas. My current job has a lot of writing involved but most of what I do is editing and working with other people's ideas. For the past couple years, I have toyed with the idea of taking an open source course to start writing again, but I have also been enjoying not be a student for a little bit. It wasn't until this Christmas that I started to remember how fun writing can be. I also realized that value writing and my post-college adult life was missing it.

I've decided to start in again by blogging. I don't expect this blog to full of lofty or remarkable ideas. I just want to get use to expressing myself again. Daily posts are a goal, but not a promise. I cannot think of a good knitting picture to complement this post, so I'll share one of my amazing uncle instead.

He is the best at making me laugh.

Playing With Colors

So I've already broken the rule. While working on my secret project, I shouldn't be working on anything else that isn't for me. Last night I brought my brother's blanket to a new knitting group. It was just the perfect project for the occasion. My secret project is a little fiddly, and my Viper Pilots require a little extra attention. My brother's blanket on the other hand is simple and it fosters chatting and never suffers from distractions.

Instead of pretending that this never happened, I'm confessing and embracing (just for a moment) this fantastic project. The pattern from Woolly Thoughts comes with a line drawing of what the finished object will look like. I was able play with it in paint and work out a bunch of fun different color options. Here is some of combinations I came up with.

The Bro Blanket

I have gotten my very first knitting request! My awesome little bro (who is quite a bit taller than me, but little none the less) asked me to knit him a blanket. I love him, and I couldn't tell him no, but since it is such a big endeavor, I told him that he had to get involved in the planning. I sent him a bunch of links to patterns and made him help me pick out the yarn. I had sent him a link to a Woolly Thoughts pattern and while he was on their site, he settled on the Curve of Pursuit. Hubby is jealous because he asked for one of these back in 2008 when I was considering it for a girlfriend. My bro gets his because it turns out I can be bought (for a blanket's worth of yarn.)

When I did the practice piece for this blanket, I was worried that it would be miserable because of all the ends since the yarn is broken after each triangle is knit. Fortunately, Owen's blanket taught me to sew in my ends along the way. This was my vacation project over Christmas, and I'm happy to say this was the perfect knit for the holidays. It is all knit stitches, but you have to pay just a little of attention. It is easy to work on while watching football or chatting with the family. It also carries enough impressiveness to wow the people who only see my knitting once a year. The best part though is the geeky little tidbits that I got to share when people asked me about it. It turns out this blanket (like a lot of the Woolly Thoughts patterns) is mathematically fantastic! Here is one of the cool little quirks about this pattern: When you finish any square (four of the triangles) you can weigh the blanket and you will need half that weight in yarn to complete the next square. (How cool is that!?!)

Christmas Socks

I have decided that I do not like Christmas knitting. There is too much stress and pressure, and I'm tempted to make gifts that I know I can complete on a deadline rather than gifts I think the recipients will like. This year though, I was stumped on what would be the perfect gift for my Grandpa. The more I thought about it, the more I thought that he would probably like some knit socks. In mid-November I accepted that the idea was stuck in my head and nothing else was going to seem like as good of a gift. I cast on some basic socks and spent every knitting moment I had working on them. These were my couch and subway projects. I even lost a DPN to the subway tracks in all of the frantic knitting. I knit through my lunch breaks at work. I wouldn't let myself sleep at all during our cross country trip to and from Thanksgiving with Hubby's family because it was prime knitting time. (Fortunately that meant I was awake for a delightful History Channel special on the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.)

I decided to knit these from the toe up. I knit the first leg as short as I thought I could get away with and left the stitches live on some scrap yarn. When I finished up the second one, I assessed my time and decided they both would get another inch and a half on the length of the legs. Hubby has never had a problem with the legs of his socks, but he must like them short. Both his dad and brother commented that theirs were too short. Despite Grandpa having smaller feet than Hubby, they still seemed to be some crazy long socks that went on forever. I did finish them on time though. Two hours into our train ride to Chicago all of the ends were woven in and everything was complete. I had hoped to block them, but I wasn't certain my family would be ok with the guest room smelling like wet wool. (They are not the converts that I am.) Grandpa seemed to like them, but Grammy was definitely giving them an envious look. Unfortunately, despite all of that buildup, I do not have a good FO picture to share, so instead I have this picture that Hubby took of the tree at Rockefeller Plaza. I hope your holidays were great. Happy New Year!

Tight Knit Family

I'm still around, I've just been spending time with family that is in town for the week. Spending time with family is great, especially when they pressure you to craft!

Rolling Along

We've been a little under the weather here. It has increased the sleeping quite a bit, and decreased the knitting a little. No worries though, the productivity has still been way up there. I finished the socks for my brother in-law and started a much deserved pair for myself. I also cast on a lace project and made myself a headband.

For tonight, I'll just share the finished socks with you. This isn't the best photo, but it will have to do. These are a tad too long for me so I don't make a very good model for them and they are no where near as long as hubby's feet, so he's not allowed to try them on. When I put them on, the pattern shows up better than they do on my sock blockers. In addition to the lack of foot models hanging around, we've also had rainy weather and a lack of sunshine for lighting. The pattern is Earl Grey, and I went all crazy with yarn colored Ash. The pattern was simple, and the color far from extravagant, but they are exactly what I wanted. I mentioned when I cast them on that I wasn't certain my BIL would want or appreciate hand knit socks. So my goal was tasteful, and what ever the male version of elegant is. I wanted them to be easy to like for the recipient, and I wanted them to be easy to make to ease my frustration in a worst case scenario. These socks were all of those things, and a real pleasure to make. It was close to mindless knitting (which is good for someone with a head full of cold) but there was still enough going on that the FO is something special that I am excited to gift. I've also been assured by my hubby that I'm allowed to beat his brother up if he doesn't like them. I doubt it will come to that though, since he's on the opposite side of the country. It does make me question whether or not I'd want hubby to be my big brother.

Brooklyn Tree Socks

I am working on some Christmas socks for my father in-law. The pattern is Francie, but I've renamed it Brooklyn Tree to make it sound a little more manly. I was originally drawn to these socks because they have a very unique construction, and my FIL is definitely one who would appreciate a unique construction. The inspiration for the pattern designer was the book A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I've never read the book, but I think these socks are going to inspire me to.

I was all excited about a new way of doing things, but now I can't get over the wonderful bark like texture that these have. I am thinking that I am going to need some brown/tan tweedy yarn for some incredible fingerless gloves. I don't know if my FIL will apprecaite the look as much as I do, but I 'm sure I'll be able to distract him with the very cool heel, toe, and arch shaping.