Sunday, July 13, 2008
Fountain Pens
Dear Red Platinum Preppy,
If you wanted to be an eyedropper filler, you could have just asked. You did not have to spontaneously split your cartridge and send hot pink ink sloshing all over the inside of the barrel. Nice seal on those threads even without silicone, though.
New rule: Noodler's Bulletproof inks only go in cheap, easily replaceable pens. There was so much stuff in my poor pink Cavalier, I think I'm going to run a load of J. Herbin through it to try to redissolve/suspend some of it. Just rinsing wouldn't do it.
Sadly, most of my Esterbrooks meet the criteria of of cheap and easily replaceable. Not the Icicle (no way in hell), but right now I've got a plain black SJ with strange shrinkage issues filled with Zhivago (which is actually near bulletproof). Once that's empty, well, I've got a Platinum Preppy that wants to be an eyedropper filler. ;)
Sunday, July 6, 2008
Some foot fetishist is going to love me.
I don't usually keep a design notebook, so you all will have to put up with my ramblings instead. (Well, not really, you can always scroll right by me.) Anyway, the socks in progress:
Learning process. First, learned that I really am pale enough to glow in the dark. Lookit my ankle blow the top right off the photo histogram there.
Ahem, anyway. I did an afterthought heel, but next time I think I might use Charlene Schurch's "forethought heel" method instead to avoid ungodly fighting with getting stitches picked up without getting needles tangle while having two balls of yarn hanging off the project. OK, the two balls of yarn part would have been inevitable, but I think the picking up stitches bit would have been easier still. I probably did not start the heel in the right place; next time I'll do the math with the row gauge, conveniently available there on the sole of the sock. Still less frustrating than a short row heel is for me, though. I might also work the heel over closer to 2/3 of the sock stitches instead of 1/2, but that needs some playing around with.
Ignore the gaping hole of death right at the ankle. I know that happened because I didn't pick up a stitch across the end. At that point, I'd literally been fighting with needles for 45 minutes, I couldn't figure out how to nab that stitch in the two-at-a-time method, and I didn't bloody well care anymore anyway. I'll duplicate-stitch that closed later.
I also learned that my ankle is about an inch larger around than the ball of my foot. This is not what designers usually assume; socks are basically designed as a tube with a heel stuck somewhere in the middle. In the future, I'll try to sneak in a few increases between the toe and the heel to compensate for this. It kind of pisses me off on these particular socks, because I thought about doing a chevron pattern on the cuff, but it has an 8-stitch repeat and I was at 60 -- about half an inch off of either interval that would work. Didn't realize I could use those extra four stitches anyway, and now I don't want to rip back. Although there or a little higher up might not be a bad place to switch to the chevron. What do you guys think?
I may have spoiled myself doing my first real pair of socks two-at-a-time, because I don't think I'll ever want to do them one-by-one after this. I think the magic loop method is growing on me, too, which is good. I discovered by accident that two-at-a-time two-circular method won't work with one of the circulars being a 16", so I'd have to buy extra needles for that method that I wouldn't normally otherwise. Ultimately, I am a cheapskate, and magic loop has the advantage that one long circular needle is usually cheaper than two shorter circulars or two sets of DPNs.
Unfortunately, I realized that I may not have needles for the next project I want to do. When I finish these, I'd like to start either another pair of socks, or a pair of mittens, and I don't have a lot of bunch of needles in smaller sizes -- and none other than the one I'm using long and flexible enough for two-at-a-time. If I get lucky I might hit gauge for something on the current needle, but I've got nothing else in the house to try if I don't. So now I'm trying to get up the guts to push the "order" button on a fairly large Knitpicks order to fix that needle deficiency. :P
Learning process. First, learned that I really am pale enough to glow in the dark. Lookit my ankle blow the top right off the photo histogram there.
Ahem, anyway. I did an afterthought heel, but next time I think I might use Charlene Schurch's "forethought heel" method instead to avoid ungodly fighting with getting stitches picked up without getting needles tangle while having two balls of yarn hanging off the project. OK, the two balls of yarn part would have been inevitable, but I think the picking up stitches bit would have been easier still. I probably did not start the heel in the right place; next time I'll do the math with the row gauge, conveniently available there on the sole of the sock. Still less frustrating than a short row heel is for me, though. I might also work the heel over closer to 2/3 of the sock stitches instead of 1/2, but that needs some playing around with.
Ignore the gaping hole of death right at the ankle. I know that happened because I didn't pick up a stitch across the end. At that point, I'd literally been fighting with needles for 45 minutes, I couldn't figure out how to nab that stitch in the two-at-a-time method, and I didn't bloody well care anymore anyway. I'll duplicate-stitch that closed later.
I also learned that my ankle is about an inch larger around than the ball of my foot. This is not what designers usually assume; socks are basically designed as a tube with a heel stuck somewhere in the middle. In the future, I'll try to sneak in a few increases between the toe and the heel to compensate for this. It kind of pisses me off on these particular socks, because I thought about doing a chevron pattern on the cuff, but it has an 8-stitch repeat and I was at 60 -- about half an inch off of either interval that would work. Didn't realize I could use those extra four stitches anyway, and now I don't want to rip back. Although there or a little higher up might not be a bad place to switch to the chevron. What do you guys think?
I may have spoiled myself doing my first real pair of socks two-at-a-time, because I don't think I'll ever want to do them one-by-one after this. I think the magic loop method is growing on me, too, which is good. I discovered by accident that two-at-a-time two-circular method won't work with one of the circulars being a 16", so I'd have to buy extra needles for that method that I wouldn't normally otherwise. Ultimately, I am a cheapskate, and magic loop has the advantage that one long circular needle is usually cheaper than two shorter circulars or two sets of DPNs.
Unfortunately, I realized that I may not have needles for the next project I want to do. When I finish these, I'd like to start either another pair of socks, or a pair of mittens, and I don't have a lot of bunch of needles in smaller sizes -- and none other than the one I'm using long and flexible enough for two-at-a-time. If I get lucky I might hit gauge for something on the current needle, but I've got nothing else in the house to try if I don't. So now I'm trying to get up the guts to push the "order" button on a fairly large Knitpicks order to fix that needle deficiency. :P
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