Hello everyone. From here on out I will be blogging over on my old blog Would You Like Yarn With That?
I
promise I'll be back with gobs of book-writing-specific posts in the
future. It's just that, for right now, I need to go out, make some
stuff, write the book, publish it, and then I'll return to teach you how
to do the same. I hope you understand!
Also, I made an Instagram! My username is: WouldYouLikeYarnWithThat
That's still in it's developing stages, but I'll be posting daily starting in the next few days.
So, in summary, I'm NOT done blogging or sharing content! I'm just moving.
I hope to see you all over there! Talk with you soon,
xoxo
Grace
6.11.15
27.10.15
Why I Shouldn't Be Blogging
Something hit me this past week.
I should not be doing this whole "blogging" thing. Why?
Well, it's simple. I haven't written a knitting book, so I can't teach you how to.
I can most certainly take you along on my journey, and I plan on doing so. Over the past month or so I've fallen into a rhythm of posting a "how to" on Tuesday and my weekly goal recaps on Friday. I'm going to mash those two together and post once every Friday with two things:
1) My week's progress & weekly goal
2) Anything major I learned throughout the week that I feel would be valuable to you guys.
I think this makes a bunch more sense and I can't wait to provide value to you all by simply teaching what I know. It will also give me more time to work on my youtube channel, write for the book I will eventually publish, and perhaps even start an Instagram!
Another major thing: I may be changing the title of my blog to reflect the new path I'm on. I've shifted from a focus on writing a book to simply building my knitting career (including a book, youtube, pattern designing, etc).
I hope you guys understand. And if you're no longer interested, no worries! I wish you all the best in your book writing endeavors.
See you all Friday,
Grace
I should not be doing this whole "blogging" thing. Why?
Well, it's simple. I haven't written a knitting book, so I can't teach you how to.
I can most certainly take you along on my journey, and I plan on doing so. Over the past month or so I've fallen into a rhythm of posting a "how to" on Tuesday and my weekly goal recaps on Friday. I'm going to mash those two together and post once every Friday with two things:
1) My week's progress & weekly goal
2) Anything major I learned throughout the week that I feel would be valuable to you guys.
I think this makes a bunch more sense and I can't wait to provide value to you all by simply teaching what I know. It will also give me more time to work on my youtube channel, write for the book I will eventually publish, and perhaps even start an Instagram!
Another major thing: I may be changing the title of my blog to reflect the new path I'm on. I've shifted from a focus on writing a book to simply building my knitting career (including a book, youtube, pattern designing, etc).
I hope you guys understand. And if you're no longer interested, no worries! I wish you all the best in your book writing endeavors.
See you all Friday,
Grace
23.10.15
Weekly Goal Recap 5: Planning My Next Pattern
Hey everyone!
Last week's goal was to set up my youtube channel. That has been accomplished! You can go subscribe here if you so desire! I'll be posting videos in the very near future.
Ok, so here's my header:
I'll tell you a bit about the process: The header must be 1560 x 1440 pixels but the words or icon can only take up the center 1546 x 423 pixels so that it'll show up correctly on mobile devices. They have a template available but for some odd reason I decided to do it the hard way (aka adjusting and saving the words like 256388548 times to try and get it right). But I'm super happy with it now, so it's all good.
My lesson for you guys: If you want to create a youtube channel, use their template for your channel art. Please.
This week I've had a chance to design some fun stuff. I've always wanted to try my hand at fair isle chart designing but it took some fabulous inspiration to finally get me started. On Sunday, I caught a glimpse of some g o r g e o u s fair isle Christmas stockings and immediately I was struck with the desire to create some of my own. Now, I'll tell you, I don't totally love sock construction. I love sock yarn, I love sock needles, I love socks, but I don't love sock construction. I got to thinking: I can't be the only one!
So I decided these stockings wouldn't involve any heel turns. Or kitchener toes. Or even working in the round. Yep, they'll be made flat.
That got me to thinking that if a beginner was equipped with some basic fair isle instructions even they could make one! So I figured I should be the one to equip them using, you guessed it, my youtube channel.
Now, I told you on Tuesday how I made the fair isle charts. They're all finished. Now I just need to do the knitting & make the vids. Quite honestly, this'll be a lesson in fair isle for me! There's no better way to cement knowledge into your own head than to teach that knowledge to others.
The pattern will include 4 charts:
-2 colors w/o long floats
-2 colors w/ long floats
-3 colors w/o long floats
-3 colors w/ long floats
They're will be a way to combine all of these for a total of 16 different stocking designs you can make. Basically, you'll be able to challenge your fair isle chops and create a lovely stocking no matter your skill level.
Last week's goal was to set up my youtube channel. That has been accomplished! You can go subscribe here if you so desire! I'll be posting videos in the very near future.
Ok, so here's my header:
I'll tell you a bit about the process: The header must be 1560 x 1440 pixels but the words or icon can only take up the center 1546 x 423 pixels so that it'll show up correctly on mobile devices. They have a template available but for some odd reason I decided to do it the hard way (aka adjusting and saving the words like 256388548 times to try and get it right). But I'm super happy with it now, so it's all good.
My lesson for you guys: If you want to create a youtube channel, use their template for your channel art. Please.
This week I've had a chance to design some fun stuff. I've always wanted to try my hand at fair isle chart designing but it took some fabulous inspiration to finally get me started. On Sunday, I caught a glimpse of some g o r g e o u s fair isle Christmas stockings and immediately I was struck with the desire to create some of my own. Now, I'll tell you, I don't totally love sock construction. I love sock yarn, I love sock needles, I love socks, but I don't love sock construction. I got to thinking: I can't be the only one!
So I decided these stockings wouldn't involve any heel turns. Or kitchener toes. Or even working in the round. Yep, they'll be made flat.
That got me to thinking that if a beginner was equipped with some basic fair isle instructions even they could make one! So I figured I should be the one to equip them using, you guessed it, my youtube channel.
Now, I told you on Tuesday how I made the fair isle charts. They're all finished. Now I just need to do the knitting & make the vids. Quite honestly, this'll be a lesson in fair isle for me! There's no better way to cement knowledge into your own head than to teach that knowledge to others.
The pattern will include 4 charts:
-2 colors w/o long floats
-2 colors w/ long floats
-3 colors w/o long floats
-3 colors w/ long floats
They're will be a way to combine all of these for a total of 16 different stocking designs you can make. Basically, you'll be able to challenge your fair isle chops and create a lovely stocking no matter your skill level.
My Goal: Week 6
Create all the outlines for my fair isle videos. That's right, outlines. My videos will essentially be scripted. Why? Because I do. not. like. "ahs" and "ums" in videos. I want to make these videos super duper helpful & concise not only for the beginners who'll find me through the stocking pattern on Ravelry, but also for people who just search "how to knit fair isle" on youtube.
I'll need to write and organize 3 outlines:
1. How to knit 2-color fair isle
2. How to catch long floats in fair isle
3. How to knit fair isle with more than 2 colors
It's going to be a lot of writing! I'm ready!
Until Tuesday,
Grace
20.10.15
How to Create Fair Isle Knitting Charts in Microsoft Excel
Hello everyone! Today I have a tutorial for you.
The past few days I've been playing around with graph paper. I know, that sounds like SO much fun, right? Actually, yes! I'm working on some free fair isle Christmas stocking patterns I'll be releasing. I'll be posting some how-to-work-fair-isle videos to go along with those patterns on my youtube channel. It's gonna be awesome people!
Anyway, in order to put the design I created into a PDF for Ravelry, I needed to digitalize my pencil-and-paper chart. Here's how I created my fair isle chart using Microsoft Excel 2010 on my PC:
The very first thing you'll need to do when you open excel is alter the cells so that they're a bit more square-ish. They're fairly long rectangles by default and that won't work for us today. So, click on the triangle in the corner (indicated by the red arrow above) to select all the cells, then drag the cells to 3.00 (or 26 pixels). (To drag, hover your mouse in between the "A" and "B" and a little toggle will appear. Click and hold to drag!)
Now that your cells are the size of stitches, you can begin filling them in to create your design. To do this, right click on any cell, and click the paint bucket. You can click the tiny little triangle next to the paint bucket to change the default color.
While you're in the process of designing, you can use the slider (down in the right corner) to zoom out and see how it's lookin'. :)
Once you're all done, you'll need to add some black grid lines so your chart is easy for people to read. To do this, you'll need to select your entire design by clicking the top left corner and dragging it all the way down to the bottom right.
Then, open Paint (a program that comes standard on most PCs), click the paste button, and your chart will appear! Then, click the little floppy disk up in the corner to save it as your desired file type, and you're done!
How awesome is that?! Creating these charts is my new obsession.
I'll talk with you guys again Friday!
Until then,
Grace
The past few days I've been playing around with graph paper. I know, that sounds like SO much fun, right? Actually, yes! I'm working on some free fair isle Christmas stocking patterns I'll be releasing. I'll be posting some how-to-work-fair-isle videos to go along with those patterns on my youtube channel. It's gonna be awesome people!
Anyway, in order to put the design I created into a PDF for Ravelry, I needed to digitalize my pencil-and-paper chart. Here's how I created my fair isle chart using Microsoft Excel 2010 on my PC:
The very first thing you'll need to do when you open excel is alter the cells so that they're a bit more square-ish. They're fairly long rectangles by default and that won't work for us today. So, click on the triangle in the corner (indicated by the red arrow above) to select all the cells, then drag the cells to 3.00 (or 26 pixels). (To drag, hover your mouse in between the "A" and "B" and a little toggle will appear. Click and hold to drag!)
Now that your cells are the size of stitches, you can begin filling them in to create your design. To do this, right click on any cell, and click the paint bucket. You can click the tiny little triangle next to the paint bucket to change the default color.
While you're in the process of designing, you can use the slider (down in the right corner) to zoom out and see how it's lookin'. :)
Once you're all done, you'll need to add some black grid lines so your chart is easy for people to read. To do this, you'll need to select your entire design by clicking the top left corner and dragging it all the way down to the bottom right.
Once you have your design selected, click the little square in the task bar, then select "All Borders." Boom! Chart made! Now, in order to save it as a picture file, you'll need to select it all again (click and drag from corner to corner) and then copy it (by right clicking and selecting copy).
How awesome is that?! Creating these charts is my new obsession.
I'll talk with you guys again Friday!
Until then,
Grace
16.10.15
Weekly Goal Recap 4: YouTube
So last week I told you that I was going to be photographing the first 20 pictures for my e-book. Well, I have some news: That didn't happen.
I know, I know, but it's ok. I'm over it. Life happens. However, I did come up with an even better idea.
YouTube.
Well, I didn't invent youtube. That's obviously not what I mean. I am going to start a youtube channel!
Now, let me tell you, I'm passionate about youtube. I really am. Every single time I need to learn something, I go to youtube. Goodness, youtube has taught me just about everything I know. That sounds pretty sad, but it's really not. There are some major experts out there and, through youtube, you're treated to a master class. Now,, I'm not calling myself an expert, but I know a few things about knitting and crochet. There's no doubt in my mind that I've surpassed the 10,000 hour mark (a lot of people speculate that it takes 10,000 hours of doing something to become proficient at it).
I remember back to when I was just getting into knitting and I would look up absolutely every little thing I was confused about. I'm eternally grateful to the people who taught me those things, and now I want to do that for others.
Here are 3 major things that I want to make certain I do in every single one of my how-to videos:
1. Write 500+ words for each video & create an outline.
My very favorite teacher in the world, Sean McCabe, always says the key to short, concise how-tos is writing a very, very long "un-concise" body of words explaining everything and then, once your thouights are all out on paper, condesing it all into a very thought-through tidbit. Once you've written this huge body of work, you can...
2. Make the steps quick, to-the-point, and easy to remember.
The only thing that frustrates me about some youtube videos is that some people take f o r e v e r to get to the point. I'm going to keep my intro very short and then get right to the point with very thought-out instructions. Also, since I'll be making an outline to speak from, it'll keep all the ahs and ums to a minimum.
3. Every few videos, provide a fun, quick pattern to practice what was just taught.
I'm not sure how many videos I'll put up every week, but I know that every few videos I'll be creating a unique pattern for people to practice on. Rather than just saying, "go make a scarf" in order to practice, I want to create patterns that even experts would be attracted to making. Then, I'll put a link to the Ravelry page for that pattern in the youtube description.
My apologies, this was kind of a brain-dump post. This week has been crazy for me and I really just needed clarity on all this. Thank you for being my sounding board!
Hopefully this youtube adventure will begin over the next few weeks. Youtube is a fantastic place to extend your online reach, and I'm looking forward to doing that!
I may even create private videos demonstrating the trickier parts on my patterns (or even techniques for my e-book!). People who purchase would be granted the link. Endless possibilities! :)
My Goal: Week 5
This week I'll be setting up my youtube channel so it's ready for videos. I'll need to create an icon and header, and write up a channel description. This channel will be beginner-focused so I want it to be easily identifiable as perfect for the novice.
Until Tuesday,
Grace
13.10.15
My Book: The Mermaid Stitch
I mentioned in my last post that this week I'll be taking the first 20 pictures for my book. I think it's time that I tell you about what will be contained in those pictures.
First, let me take you back a while. As I said in my introduction post, I've been knitting and crocheting since I was in elementary/middle school. Now, I'm still pretty young. For me, "since elementary school" doesn't mean I've been learning fiber arts for decades. However, I was homeschooled and constantly encouraged to learn everything I could about the things I liked. So in the few years I've been knitting and crocheting, I've learned a lot. Like, a LOT a lot. I used to read blogs and come up with some grand afghan idea every week (I never finished any of them by the way) and sit in my room talking to myself pretending I was teaching a class. I LOVED it and quickly learned at least a little bit about every world within the fiber arts.
One of my very favorite crochet techniques back in the day was the crocodile stitch. If you've never ventured into the crochet world you may not know what this is. Basically, the crocodile stitch creates a fabric of of little scallop-y scales that all fit together staggered on top of each other. It's b e a u t i f u l. A lot of people use it to make triangular shawls. Here's a picture of the stitch I saved the longest time ago (I can't remember where I found it but full credit goes to that person... this thing is gorgeous!):
*jaw hits floor* I know, I know, same here. I could eat it it's so pretty.
Now, since my blog is still fairly new, you may not know this about me: I like to reinvent wheels. When coming up with new patterns I always always always ask myself if what I'm designing is something the world has never seen before. If not, I drop it. I want each and every one of my patterns to be one of those, "Ugh! I should have thought of that!" type things.
So maybe you've guessed it by now. You're a smart person, you probably have.
I am in the process of writing a book about the knitted version of the crocheted crocodile stitch. I'm calling it: The Mermaid Stitch.
Now, I'm not gonna lie, if you google "knit crocodile stitch" a few tutorials will come up. I'm not the first person to think about this. But do you see that loveliness up above? No one has created a knitted version that even comes close to looking like that, with the scallops perfectly scallop-y and all nested in between each other. It doesn't exist.
Well, actually, it does. It's sitting next to me as I type this.
I developed a technique that looks just. like. the crocheted version. And let me tell you, it took a while to nail this down. It was tough to come up with! But I've simplified it so it's super duper easy and fun and addictive (and unlike any other technique I've ever seen). I cannot wait to share it with you all and with the rest of the knitting world!
I will be releasing the very first pattern of the e-book on November 27th (the day after Thanksgiving). I'll tell you this - the very first pattern will be a cute little project perfect for the Christmas season. I'll reveal more about it as the day gets closer so stay tuned!
Ok, that's all I have for you guys today. Be sure to head over to my Ravelry group and let me know what you think.
I hope to talk with you there!
Grace
First, let me take you back a while. As I said in my introduction post, I've been knitting and crocheting since I was in elementary/middle school. Now, I'm still pretty young. For me, "since elementary school" doesn't mean I've been learning fiber arts for decades. However, I was homeschooled and constantly encouraged to learn everything I could about the things I liked. So in the few years I've been knitting and crocheting, I've learned a lot. Like, a LOT a lot. I used to read blogs and come up with some grand afghan idea every week (I never finished any of them by the way) and sit in my room talking to myself pretending I was teaching a class. I LOVED it and quickly learned at least a little bit about every world within the fiber arts.
One of my very favorite crochet techniques back in the day was the crocodile stitch. If you've never ventured into the crochet world you may not know what this is. Basically, the crocodile stitch creates a fabric of of little scallop-y scales that all fit together staggered on top of each other. It's b e a u t i f u l. A lot of people use it to make triangular shawls. Here's a picture of the stitch I saved the longest time ago (I can't remember where I found it but full credit goes to that person... this thing is gorgeous!):
*jaw hits floor* I know, I know, same here. I could eat it it's so pretty.
Now, since my blog is still fairly new, you may not know this about me: I like to reinvent wheels. When coming up with new patterns I always always always ask myself if what I'm designing is something the world has never seen before. If not, I drop it. I want each and every one of my patterns to be one of those, "Ugh! I should have thought of that!" type things.
So maybe you've guessed it by now. You're a smart person, you probably have.
I am in the process of writing a book about the knitted version of the crocheted crocodile stitch. I'm calling it: The Mermaid Stitch.
Now, I'm not gonna lie, if you google "knit crocodile stitch" a few tutorials will come up. I'm not the first person to think about this. But do you see that loveliness up above? No one has created a knitted version that even comes close to looking like that, with the scallops perfectly scallop-y and all nested in between each other. It doesn't exist.
Well, actually, it does. It's sitting next to me as I type this.
I developed a technique that looks just. like. the crocheted version. And let me tell you, it took a while to nail this down. It was tough to come up with! But I've simplified it so it's super duper easy and fun and addictive (and unlike any other technique I've ever seen). I cannot wait to share it with you all and with the rest of the knitting world!
I will be releasing the very first pattern of the e-book on November 27th (the day after Thanksgiving). I'll tell you this - the very first pattern will be a cute little project perfect for the Christmas season. I'll reveal more about it as the day gets closer so stay tuned!
Ok, that's all I have for you guys today. Be sure to head over to my Ravelry group and let me know what you think.
I hope to talk with you there!
Grace
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