Welcome back to Firstie Friday! Today we get to meet two more of our fabulous First Years!
LadyJhia (Candy)
How did you find the Cup and what motivated
you to give the Cup a try? I found the cup through
friends in Heidi Nick’s group. Gardenmama, eternalknitter, kneedleart, and
Heidi, of course. They were talking about their cup projects and after a while I got curious about what all the cup was. I went and looked around for a while
and found I like it. I liked that it was not more work, but a motivation to
help keep me a bit more on track. I also found that I had a lot of Rav friends
who were already part of the cup… and I soon made more, too.
What, in your own estimation, is your wackiest/most awesome
project and why? Wacky I
don’t know. I tend to do much more practical things, really. The most awesome
to date is still my Linear Progression and Linear Celebration socks. They are
color work that are inspired by my study/curiosity about lines and how they
work in knitting…. and also for the Celebrations, my love of beads. That pair
has a LOT of beads, but they are places in such a way not to make any part of
the sock heavy or saggy.
What characteristics do you love most about the Tower so far? How do these things impact and
change or encourage you? The people and the interactive…
constantly interactive structure of things. There is never really a long wait to
get help if you need it, encouragement when that is needed, or a kind word.
Everyone wants to be there and is there for the fun or it, not the competition
so much, and it shows. Having
support for things I would like the ‘attempt’ is always a good thing.
Understanding there are different ways to look at things too. For instance, I was
totally brainlocked when the prompts for this month came out. Folks offered
ideas and support until I.. and others… were able to take a less literal look
at the words and see the concepts. I think that kind of thinking, once
developed a bit, lets me as a designer stretch to new things.
What is on your crafting bucket list? Tambour beading or a close cousin called
Kantan. It’s beautiful and detailed, which suits my nature.
What is currently on your needles? Socks, lots of socks. I always have socks
on the needles. I also have a scarf that needs to be finished. I sometimes do
minis (yes, elf and/or ornament sized), mittens and sweaters, but for the most
part I do socks. I do want to open things up a bit, but there are just so many
amazing socks in my head that I am not sure that will happen all that soon.
Skittle02 (Liz)
How did you find the Cup and what motivated you to give the Cup a
try? I found
the Cup when I first joined Ravelry, right after I began knitting. I saw a
beautiful arm-knit blanket on a Facebook post & wanted to give it a try.
After I made my first arm-knit blanket, I decided I wanted to try regular
knitting with needles. I had crocheted a bit as a child & I also saw a post
for these gorgeous Dragonscale Fingerless Gloves that I wanted to make, so I
re-taught myself to crochet at the same time as I began teaching myself to
knit. My Gramma is an avid sewist who also crochets and has great love of
crafting, which is where I believe I get my love and ambition for crafting as
well, although I don’t sew. So after I learned to cast on, knit, purl, and bind
off, I started with YouTube videos of different stitch patterns, made my boyfriend
& I each a pair of slippers than decided I wanted to learn more!!
So I joined Ravelry & started looking up different patterns and groups and
what not. The first thing I knit (other than the slippers, which were really
mostly a square sewn up) was a knit hat from a pattern I found on YouTube for
Hermione’s hat in the Godric’s Hollow scene in the Deathly Hallows movie. I have loved Harry Potter since I was about 12
years old (again, my love for reading is something I get from my Gramma as
well, for she bought me the first 3 HP books). I feel like I grew up with
Harry, Ron & Hermione. The books used to come out in July & I would
always have them preordered for my birthday & my best friend & I used
to stay up until midnight then walk to the local bookstore to get our books as
SOON as they came out! I still read the books fairly often, I read the whole
series over again just last fall. So….. when I started looking for patterns
& for groups on Rav, I wanted to find more HP inspired patterns & when I
found the Cup, I was really amazed at how intricate and complex the group
seemed to be. It seemed like it would be a great community for me to join, as it
combines two of the things I have come to love the most, HP & crafting.
What, in your own estimation, is your wackiest/most awesome
project and why? My
Gramma is also very involved in all sorts of various activities, groups and
committees in the community and her and my late Grandfather helped build their
local senior center. So with that, she organizes lots of events and what not
there; they often receive donations of yarn of all sorts. She sorts them out,
sells the full skeins and needles and she donates the rest of the yarn (often
times full garbage bags full). So she started giving me these yarn scraps to
practice with. She then asked me to learn how to knit hats for 18” dolls for a
charity she organized a few years ago where her and 15-20 of her friends buy
18” dolls similar to American Girl Dolls (she absolutely loves American Girl Dolls) then sew together
a tote bag & 9 different outfits for 100 dolls every year to be donated to
little girls (typically those in foster care or in situation where they don’t
have steady homes and often may be forced to move at a moment’s notice, hence
the need for the totes & the ability to keep the dolls & their outfits
in a ready-to-go-at-a-moments-notice for these young kids sometimes end up losing
everything, especially toys). These hats need to be finished by November &
so far I have made roughly 35… leaving me about 65 to go. I switch between
knitting and crochet, as I tend to be quicker at crochet but I really prefer
knitting. After much practice though, I have taught myself to “flick” instead
of “throw” which has made me a lot quicker at knitting than I was when I began
(and even when I was throwing, for I never really had a good “set-up” to throw
so I always had to take my hand off the needle, grab the yarn, wrap the needle
& pull through & repeat. With flicking, I wrap the yarn just right
around my wrist & am able to feed the yarn around the needle without ever
letting go which saves more time than I would have thought possible).
What characteristics do you love most about the Tower so far? How
do these things impact and change or encourage you? As I am still fairly new to knitting (I
began teaching myself back in December) I figured the community would be a
great way for me to learn (I don’t know any RL knitters) & to help motivate
me to learn more & continue on my journey as a knitter (and with crochet as
well). I spent last term as an NQFY & was amazed at how helpful everyone was. I knit my
first sweater (top-down seamless) & would often turn to the different
Houses as well as the NQFY thread to ask questions & people were so
friendly and so helpful. I honestly think there are a
few different projects I would have given up on in frustration if it wasn’t for
some of the amazing people in this group & I am beyond thankful to have found
this group. I also tend to get a bit “click-happy” and I joined a bunch of
groups that seemed fun/interesting/helpful as well as another HP group but
honestly. Haven’t spent much time in any other group as everything I need is
all right here. I was actually sorted in Ravenclaw in this other HP group but I
am a little ashamed to admit, their group didn’t hold my interest nearly as
well & I actually feel bad I don’t think I’ve been back since I was sorted…
which makes me feel a bit guilty, but I admit this to you for I feel it speaks
volumes about the greatness of the group we have here. :)
What is on your crafting bucket list? Oh my Goodness, what a loaded question!
There is just so much! My boyfriend’s mom has a blanket her Grandmother knit
her & it is just so beautiful! I have never yet found anything like it, it
is made out of 4-5 consecutive different stitch patterns running up the blanket
in columns, a center stitch pattern & then the same 4-5 patterns again (its
symmetrical). There are cables & brioche stitches among several other knit
stitch patterns but it is all knit in 1 piece. I think that is the ultimate
knit blanket. I’d also like to knit a big comfy sweater out of bulky yarn using
a “template” rather than a pattern. My most current bucket list challenge is to
knit a shawl using beads, which I plan to submit for a Mission this term.
What is currently on your needles? As of right now, I have a Frilly Skirt for
my friends daughter, a Sun Kissed Neckwarmer, a Love the Winter Hat, a Two by Two, and an 18” doll hat on my needles
& an 18” hat on a hook. Plus a few other various projects that have been
tossed aside for the time being as I just keep starting more….. lol
