Issue 25, letting projects sprout up here and there

hey everybody,

This week has been like a welcome, tiny taste of cooler weather, with overnight temperatures in the civilized fifties and sixties, and daytime temperatures in the comfortable seventies. I wish it didn’t have to end! But right now it’s enough to be reminded that the hot and humid days of this North Carolina summer won’t last forever, that the days of wearing knitted and crocheted accessories and sweaters aren’t too far off. My freeform shawl in plant fibers is getting most of my attention in anticipation.

It started with a curvy strip of garter stitch using Kelbourn Woolens Mojave yarn. Now I’m adding wedges of freeform crochet that incorporate some of the spirals from 2023’s 100 Day Project. Each wedge will be bordered with a bit of garter stitch in the Mojave, then more wedges will be added. It’s extremely satisfying to be using these experimental spirals in an actual project.

another wrap that combines plain knitting with freeform

While the first wrap is all plant fibers, this one is 100% sheep. It’s based on my formula pattern called Favorite, an asymmetrical triangular shawl that offers endless flexibility for yarns, colors, striping, and gauge. This pattern is one I return to over and over, including a few variations that include a freeform crochet band on the long edge. My learn-the-basics-of-freeform-crochet guide called Freeform Favorite was developed from those projects.

For this newest version of the Favorite plus freeform, I’m binding off when the mood strikes, adding a swath of crochet, then picking up stitches over it and continuing on in formula. Oh, and I’m adding a random row of feather and fan stitch into the formula sections to add waves to the edges of the freeform parts.

The formula sections will be knitted with bulky weight Malabrigo Mecha. Freeform crochet sections will be made with various lighter weight yarns for balance.

Purples, greens, and grays make up the palette.

it was proclaimed that my trip knitting would be socks

For our recent trip to New Orleans, I made the decision not to take a FF project. Instead, I took a sock in progress, my notebook of ideas, and little bits of yarn for experimenting just in case inspiration hit. It was a really small knitting bag for such a long trip, but I knew that I would have easy access to the lovely yarn shop in Jackson Square. There would be lots of available knitting time, but I knew I’d be covered with the sock project and the notebook, and I wouldn't have to pack a big knitting bag with the yarns and hooks required for freeform.

I ended up knitting about 100 stitches during the trip, total(!), and I probably opened the notebook only once or twice. This surprised me since I knitted quite a bit on our nearly identical NOLA trip last year. The break felt good, though, and it was probably just what I needed. 2024 has been a bit of a wild ride because of my eye issues. I won’t go into all the gory details, just know that the end result is that everything is finally sorted out. This trip was the first time we’ve been more than two hundred miles away from home all year. It might have been nice to finish that sock and start the second one, but relaxing into the trip and enjoying feeling more or less normal again was a great way to recharge my battery after a challenging year.

what I love about this

This fabric wall piece has been hanging in my home for 20 years or so. The artist, Kathryn Conte, was a lovely quilter who lived my old neighborhood in Durham. I visited her home during one of our neighborhood art walks and bought the piece. Right now it’s hanging over my studio desk. It’s a mini quilt that uses a stack/sew/cut technique and is mounted on black felt. As much as I’ve loved it and looked at it over the years, this is the week that it gave me some ideas that might find their way into a freeform crochet wall piece.

I’ve been thinking about doing wall pieces for a long time, especially since I started using freeform crochet with plain knitting for artistic wearables that are more subdued. It’s lots of fun to make the wilder stuff, I just don’t ever to seem to actually wear it. Art pieces, however, are great for indulging in bold, textural freeform work.

My notebook has pages and pages of ideas and questions and possibilities that, so far, exist only in my notebook. I have a tendency to want to work out the details in my head before picking up hooks and yarns. It’s hard to work out a design without actually physically trying things out, though, and even though I’m fully aware of that fact, I continue to be the way I am, and procrastination abounds.

Finding inspiration in Kathryn Conte’s mini quilt is renewing my interest in the wall pieces. It might be time to review the pages of notes and drawings and see what happens when I grab yarns and hooks and jump in.

one more thing

Thanks for your input about online classes. I hope to have some dates to offer in the next newsletter. But it’s not too late for you to weigh in on what types of freeform classes you’re interested in and what times you’d like them to be offered. Click here and scroll almost all the way to the bottom of the page to the section on freeform classes. You can leave your input in the comments on that page or click back here and leave it on this one.

That’s it for today, thanks for reading!

Lisa

PS: In a recent issue of the newsletter, I wrote about possibly running my own personal 100 Day Project. Or something shorter, maybe a 50 or 30 day project. I have to admit, though, the idea of doing my own multi day project seems a bit lackluster; the energy associated with doing a project at the same time as the thousands of others that participate would be missing. At this time, I’m not going to force it. If an idea should surface in the future that generates enough energy on its own, I’ll consider running with it. Hey, maybe 25 days of wild freeform for wall pieces?

PSS: Was anyone else thinking about doing their own multi day project?