If you're new here this is an Entertainment Website/Blog run by me (You can call me Zach or Zachary) where I talk about my interests, life, hobbies and so on. Some of my big topics on here are film, video games, travel, books, knitting, and just stuff I'm passionate about in general. One of my hopes with this blog is that it allows you, the readers, to explore their interests through mine. Basically I'm a big nerd and this is my nerd blog, hahaha. Who knows I might get you guys hooked onto knitting or something if you're not already... Or should I say casted onto knitting? Because saying getting hooked onto knitting doesn't make sense unless you crochet and knit. You can follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest to keep up with me (I'm mostly active on Facebook and Instagram.) and this is also a great way to keep notified on when I post a blog. My blogging schedule at the moment is Monday, Friday and Wednesday at 11:00 AM Central American Time, which would be 12:00 AM Eastern American time and 9:00 AM Pacific American Time.
Quick reminder that today is the start of the epic DCTV cross over on the CW, It starts with Supergirl tonight so don't forget to check it out if you're into DC superheroes like I am.
So I recently got into knitting over two months ago now and I've enjoyed learning how to knit and knitting in general so I don't plan on stopping any time soon. I've actually got a library of finished projects building up. Amazingly I've already finished 7 projects! You can check them all out on my Ravelry ZAKMan. The 7th finished object was actually finished on Saturday... I actually did this entire project in one day's sitting.
This is an experiment dishcloth/swatch I made to practice some lace! You see I'm trying out all sorts of lace patterns in order to help myself create an awesome edging for my WIP Shawl that I mentioned in my previous blog.
My shawl is growing at a pretty nice pace. I'm loving how the variegated colors of my Knit Picks Imagination Pixie Dust yarn is coming out on this. It won't be too long before I'm ready to start my edging (Okay I got a lot to go this is going to be a decent sized shawl.) so I'm preparing to make my edging my practicing different lace patterns.
This is book three of The Stitch Collection (I have the entire collection by the way.) written by Debbie O'Neill (She's on Ravelry as DebbieO). This collection of 5 books teach you how to do knitting/purling, cable, specialty, ribbing and lace while giving you cool patterns to experiment with. I've been reading, studying and practicing patterns from this book in order to give me some awesome ideas for my shawl as well as teach me some awesome lace techniques. I don't know if I will be using this zig zag technique on my shawl or not yet but it really taught me cool ways to manipulate stitches.
The pattern I used out of this book is the Zig Zag pattern, it's an intermediate pattern I guess because it does take a lot of concentration. What I did with this swatch was I casted on 25 stitches (Because the pattern calls for cast ons with multiples of 6 + 1) knitted 4 rows of garter stitch then began the pattern, ending it off with an additional 4 rows of garter stitch before casting it off.
There are quite a lot more patterns I want to try out of this book, reading through this book is pretty fun and I really enjoy how simple the book makes it seem without lacking any vital information. These books can be pretty portable too I realize I can have it in my knit bag and take it around with me. Each book has tips and tricks for each kind of knitting so it's a great read for any beginner knitter and a great reference guide for experienced knitters too. Oh yeah they also have an abbreviation guide that will teach you all the different knitting terminology.
Of course I forgot to mention that the yarn I used for this swatch was some of my Peaches and Creme Candy Sprinkles yarn which I showcased back in October on my Dishcloth blog. This is the same kind of yarn I used for my very first dishcloth project and is the same color mum used for her's. I decided to use this because why not? If I'm going to make a swatch to try out some patterns I might as well make them in yarn I can use for dishcloths that way my swatches are useful afterwards. I also used size US 6 (4.0 MM) straight needles.
One last thing I have to mention and obviously you've probably already pointed it out... When I did this pattern the zig zags actually made the dishcloth all wavy. I have absolutely no idea if making a border on either side would of fixed this or not. Actually I kind of like the waviness of the dishcloth, it's unique and awesome so it's not such a bad thing. Though how would this pattern affect the shape of my shawl? Would it make my shawl go all wavy and weird? Or would it give my shawl a nice pattern on the edge? These questions have been floating around inside my head.
Anyway that's my current Lace work and Shawl progress! I'm also buckling down on my Sock, I'm at the home stretch now!
I only have about 2 inches left before I start on my toe and finish of this sock. I'm hoping to get it done today or tomorrow so I can finally start on my second sock. The total length of the foot of this sock, not including the toe, is going to be around 9 inches. Haha, yeah I have big size 11 feet and my toes aren't exactly short either. Of course my first socks would be for myself aka Big Foot himself but it seems to be breezing by pretty quickly, especially while listening to some podcasts.
One podcast I recently came across that I've become and avid listening of is a knitting podcast called The Knitmore Girls. An Audio podcast done by Jasmin and her mother Gigi as they talk about whats happening in their life and what they're knitting. I love the whole Mother and Daughter dynamic and the episodes I've listened to have been pretty awesome and enjoyable. The way they've set up their podcast is pretty cool too, they got multiple segments where they talk about what they're knitting, what they're wearing as far as knitting, they're yarn attacks and more. You can check their podcast out on iTunes and on their website http://www.knitmoregirlspodcast.com/
So yeah a couple more podcasts and I'll be officially done with this sock, really can't wait to start on the next one, which will hopefully knit together faster then this first sock. I mean I love knitting them and all but I feel like I've been dragging a bit... Or maybe time just seems to be moving slowly when really it isn't. Christmas always seems to slow down to a crawl for some reason.
Aside from knitting what I've been doing in my spare time is I'm continuing my journey through the Unova region in Pokemon Black 2. I currently just got my 6th Gym Badge from Gym Leader Skyla and I got to ride in an airplane... Seriously this is the first and only time you get to do this in Pokemon. So yeah that's pretty fun, I've also been picking up and playing some Super Smash Bros for Wii U lately, forgot how fun this game can be.
Anyway Time to wrap up the blog for today! Hope you enjoy your Monday, it's Cyber Monday so more crazy deals are happening online... Though not sure what on, everything sold out online, like everything, on Friday morning. Always seems like such a frustrating time to shop, I mean people are up at crazy hours, and I mean near midnight hours shopping. I can actually give out a little hint toward's Wednesday's blog... It may or may not involve the DS. The Nintendo DS, and I'm talking the old grey fat DS too. So stay tuned for that and...
See you on the next blog!
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