First, meet the chair and the hallway which will now serve as my knitting photo-taking spot. The walls are nice and white, there’s no clutter, and the chair gives me something to place things on. This’ll get replaced if/when I ever build myself a light box.

Jaywalker Socks: I am incapable of doing the Double Decrase described in the pattern. I’ve now given up on that and instead am doing a K2tog followed by a (an?) SSK. Doesn’t give that neat ridge of the pattern sorta disappears in the dark non-varigated yarn. I’ve been tempted to do another pattern but I’m going to stick with it. Being decisive is always good.

Clapotis Deux: While I’m not technically working on this right now I realized I haven’t taken a photo of it since September 10th. I’ll pick this up again in a few weeks.

Evening Bag: The shiny yarn’s itchiness is still driving me nuts but I’m making progress. I do a row every other day or so which is better than totally ignored it, right?

I didn’t actually get much knitting done today though I did figure out what I did wrong. I picked up stitched a half round too late (or was it early?). I very slowly frogged the three rows I had done incorrectly and got one single round re-knit. But I did get all of my Thermo and the rest of my Materials homework done.  So that’s something. The photo below was taken while I was partially through picking up the provisional cast on edge.

My rotation has already died. There are two big factors: shiny yarn (literally) and socks. Both are the direct result of my attending the sleepover at Yarn Lady on Saturday night. I was a very last minute addition, literally showing up there with my payment in hand. Jan was nice enough to let me join. We ate junk food, drank soda, did a little knitting, and met new people.

I either bought or won all of the things in the photo below: beaded stitch markers (won after I bought the plastic ones), plastic stitch markers, size 7 40″ addi natura, and a skein of Regia sock yarn. The needle is to replace the one I’m currently using for Erin’s Clapotis. Much nicer than the slippery metal one. Stitch markers are one of those things I always need, especially with two Clapotis going at once. Who actually has the thirty-six stitch markers that would be required?

Jan very patiently taught me how to pick up stitches along the shaped edge of the bag. You use two strands of the very shiny, very non-friendly to my skin Rowan Luxe Shimmer. It’s great yarn but having to use two balls at once makes it a rather importable project. It will remain my do-at-home project, however. A hole that had to be filled…by purple socks.

Yesterday morning, after much research on toe-up socks, the Jaywalker pattern, and how to create short rows toes I took the plunge. I’m now in the process of my first toe-up Jaywalker sock. I’ve gotten to the first knitted rows after you create the toe. I think I screwed up somehow as the “bumps” are on the outside versus the inside of the sock. I assume it’s supposed to be stockinette or zig-zag, no garter stitch. Oye. I’m gonna need some help before I continue.

Oh, I met two girls who go to my school (and live near Yarn Lady). We have big plans to get together and knit between classes and homework. They’re both really sweet and energetic and I’m hoping will help me with the mini sock crisis.

So the rotation is reworked. Stay at home project: evening bag. Portable project: purple Jaywalkers. I think my future may always include socks as a portable project and something more involved for at home. The Clapotis for Erin will soon become a work-while-at-home-only project. Quite sad. I’ll miss getting to work on it at school.

Speaking of school, I should really get off WordPress and work on homework. Materials due tomorrow and French and Thermo due Wednesday. Yeah, I didn’t do an ounce of homework this weekend and I’m starting to panic.

I first heard about setting up a crafty rotation in the cross stitch over on LJ. People would rotate between two or three projects. They’d work one for a week or until some big milestone was complete, then go to another. At least one project would be an Un-Finished Object (UFO) in most cases. The rotation forced you to complete things you “needed” to finish and didn’t leave much room for starting new projects.

I decided it was about time I set up a crafty rotation. I wrote down every single craft project I have going on, including a few that I’ve been wanting to start but haven’t. I won’t bore you with the whole list but it’s fifteen projects long (sound familiar, Anastasia?). I numbered them in the order I thought of them, wrote the numbers on paper scraps, and literally chose randomly from the pile numbers.

The first five projects are as follows: Evening Bag (knitting – for me), blue and green fractal (cross stitch – for ?), Clapotis (knitting – Erin’s), motifs sampler (cross stitch – Sterling), and Sheldon (knitting – for my dad). I’ll work on each for a week or until I reach a big wall (like not having enough of the right floss colors or needing help with a technique). I’ll work through the entire list of fifteen items, starting back at the beginning after that.

The Evening Bag (From Knit2Together) was started in June. I fell out of love with it quickly. Stupid ribbon yarn. Yesterday I realized I’d followed the directions incorrectly so I frogged all progress and restarted. This time I used my aluminum US 10.5 needles instead of the bamboo ones I’d been using. What a difference! Today I’m very proud to announced I haven’t worked on a single other project, haven’t started anything new, and I got both “sides” of the bag knit. Sorry, no photos ’cause, well, it’s hard to take photos at night of black yarn. Poor lighting plus really bright flash and my bad photo skills. Sadly, the project must be put aside until Wednesday when someone can show me how to pick up stitches (Marlyn?) to work on the rouching along the bottom of the bag. I’ll be moving on to the blue and green fractal until then.

We’ll see how long this whole one-project-at-a-time thing lasts. I give it a month.