Inspiration comes from everywhere

I find browsing Ravelry is a great start when I am feeling uninspired by any of my current projects. Not just the patterns section either: I love perusing my friends’ projects and seeing how they’re doing with their knitting and crochet skills.

Lately I’ve been finding a lot of inspiration in bright colours. This always happens when summer starts to come, which I’m told is happening even though it snowed last week. This has been especially true at work where I’ve been crochet covers for the arms of my co-workers’ chairs in a variety of bright and cheerful patterns, including one that looks like a snail, out of some old acrylic. This goes undocumented in photos since I work in a place where cameras are Not Allowed.

Recently the cotton/wool/alpaca blend linen stitch shawl inspired me, though that was mostly colour too. Now that it’s finished (photos coming as soon as I get around to weaving in the ends) the colours have become less sparkling to my eyes and thought I love it, I’ve realised it won’t suit me at all. I’m considering doing some kind of giveaway on here for it in case one of my fine readers would suit it better.

Sounds inspire me too, or rather singers do. Merrill Garbus of Tune-Yards fame is who I want to be when I grow up and her aesthetic fills me mind with all sorts of crazy ideas. This isn’t new, but now it’s coming out in a bunch of scribbled fair-isle patterns in my notebook based on her album art work.

Inspiration can come from anywhere. I find it fascinating. Where does yours come from?

Are You A Yarn Snob?

What is a yarn snob?

It’s when a knitter (or crocheter/weaver/etc) has expensive tastes. When the 3-for-£1 offer on acrylic yarn in the pound shop makes a person recoil. Only fancy pants natural-organic-spun-by-angels-crying-with-joy yarn will do.

Confession: I’m really not a yarn snob.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of quality yarn. I knit with sea silk, with baby alpaca, with merino blends. I like locally hand-dyed stuff and get a kick out of meeting the person who made it. I think there’s something wonderful about all the different fibres there are. Having fondled some qiviut, I am in a constant state of lust to own some of my own.

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

But I truly believe acrylic has its place too.

Right now I’m knitting a blanket for my girlfriend’s 30th birthday which, okay, it was totally in July. But I am seeing her in person in a couple of weeks for a holiday – probably the only time I’ll see her while we’re applying for my permanent residency – and it would be nice to give it to her in person. It’s acrylic. Yes, that’s right, I’m giving a blanket made of acrylic to the person I love. There’s no place for yarn snobbery when you need your expendable income for a holiday in Las Vegas, and this blanket is going to be all the colours since it’s based on Avengers. (Yes, there will be pics when it’s done.)

It’s true that the squeaky feel of acrylic is starting to get to me, but I have some delicious dark blue locally hand-dyed 100% silk to knit with when I’m done. Maybe I’m just an occasional snob.

What about you? To you shun acrylic or embrace it?

Related articles

• The Science of Bio-Synthetic Yarn (persephonemagazine.com)
• New Pattern: Cobblestone Hat (danadoodle.wordpress.com)
• Knitters cover Pittsburgh’s Warhol Bridge in yarn (pennlive.com)
• Level Up Your Knitting: The Yarn List (secretlifeofyarn.wordpress.com)
• The Materials I Use (buildabeanienews.wordpress.com)

I’m Not The Only One.

Thinking about the whole nail polish thing I posted about yesterday, I couldn’t help but ask my greatest knitting resource: Ravelry. Specifically LSG which happens to be my favourite knitting group/forum ever for the sheer hilarity of its members.

(LSG stands for Lazy, Stupid and Godless and if it were a face-to-face knitting group it would probably involve copious amounts of alcohol and many gorgeous hand-knitted garments slung casually around shoulders.)

Anyway. It turns out I am not the only one who matches my nail varnish to my yarn-based projects.

Coleva matches her nail varnish to the yarn she’s spinning at the time.

Which I think you’ll agree is fairly terrific.

Annkari is similarly inclined and even matches the luscious shimmer.

Nagarajas matches hers to her knitting projects and her weaving projects. Multi-talented coordination. There are some very skilled ladies on that forum.

Don’t want to match to your yarn but still want to be utterly, spectacularly stylish? Not a problem. Match with your cute little yarn bowl instead, as SlpBeauty does.

Variegated yarn or colourwork? NOT A PROBLEM! Beth825 has a very classy answer to that conundrum.

There’s also someone who matches her nail varnish to the ink in her fountain pen which is a whole new level of awesome.

(I used all these pictures with permission, by the way. I am not a sneaky nail-picture thief.)

Some people are the opposite. Like Ikchen on Twitter, a very lovely lady who replied:

I tend to not knit when wearing nail polish, mostly because it makes my fingers feel wrong (and thus the knitting).

Please share if this is relevant to you too.

I’m way too amused by this, it seems.

Renaissance Dyeing

Natural dyers of fine embroidery threads – Renaissance Dyeing.

Once in a while I’ll come across a site I simply have to share. It’s not because I’m sponsored by them or anything – this blog is purely free range – but because I’m so stunned by what they have to offer that I keep the tab open for days just to occasionally flick through and see the gorgeous things they produce.

This is one of them. Renaissance Dyeing is a company that uses traditional dyes to produce modern yarn. Their reasoning sounds pretty sensible:

Plant and natural dyes give a light and tonal vibrance to your work that cannot be matched by staid chemical dyes and they help not only protect you and yours but the environment as well.

I have to agree with them. Their colours are sublime. Take a look at some of their designer knitting kits such as the Urban Troubadour which is a gorgeous pattern with rich yet not overpowering colours suited perfectly to one another.

2012 is the year I’m going to learn to spin and dye my own yarn, just you watch; sites like this inspire me. I can’t promise I’ll be starting out with vegetable dyes but it’s certainly not something I’d considered much before and this company has changed that. Especially since you can order the extracts online to dye this way!

I stumbled on the site looking for yarn made from Poll Dorset sheep’s fleece, a breed that originated in my county. I stayed for the beautifully rich colours and the ethos of the entire site.

Since I can’t afford these wonderful goods on such a small budget right now, I’m hoping someone can buy some so I can live vicariously through you!