Every year I set myself some fiber-related new years resolutions to enhance my crafting. Fiber Goals for 2023: 1. Toys 2. Hand-dyed, hand-spun 3. Complicated Cables 4. Patterns I (already) own Continue reading
Maker Objectives and Key Results
Work made me do a training on “Objectives and Key Results” which is just a business-y version of the goal setting techniques I learned in grade school: choose something big you want to do, even if you’re not sure all the steps to get you there or it’s not a thing that ever finishes, then … Continue reading
Pikmin hat
I know the yarniverse is all abuzz with a very pink movie coming out this weekend, but my kid and I are more excited about Pikmin 4, so I made some fanart at my kid’s request. Continue reading
Incarceration history for kids
This essay made me cry: https://lithub.com/japanese-american-incarceration-for-children-brandon-shimoda-on-reading-with-his-daughter/ I own a lot of those books. They’re mostly too long and serious for my kid still. He prefers books about dogs and animals and science and silliness. And that’s ok. The books will wait. So many of the books about people we get from in the library “mystery … Continue reading
Two tiny two at a time nested socks knitted one inside the other
I wrote this up last year/summer of 2022, never quite finished it, and never published it as a result. I don’t know if I remember enough here to finish writing this up properly without knitting the socks again. I don’t want it languishing in my drafts and I’m not sure when I’ll feel inclined to write it up as a real pattern. So I’m just gonna publish it anyhow and I hope it helps someone else who wants to play with a fun technique! Continue reading
Fiber Goals 2023: Mid-year check-in
It’s the middle of the year, so it’s time for a mid-year look at how my 2023 fiber goals are going! This year’s goals were: Most of these are going pretty well. Toys I’ve done a lot of these! I already talked about a few in April, and last week I finished this summer’s mystery … Continue reading
Embroidered Floral Necklaces
Still catching up on finished projects! These three necklaces were from a kit that had been in my stash for a while, and I wanted something tiny and colourful after finishing up last year’s year-long constellation embroidery project. I probably won’t wear them as necklaces. They’re small enough but a bit heavy and long, and … Continue reading
Constellation Embroidery
Last year, I decided to do this constellation embroidery sampler from Kiriki press as a year-long project, doing each zodiac constellation as it came up in the year and occasionally doing the other non-zodiac ones. (It took me a bit more than a year because I didn’t see any point in rushing during December when … Continue reading
What ever happened with those book reviews?
Last summer, I had a moment where I put my book reviews on here. The first book post explains why: I’ve been taking pictures of my library returns pile and doing little reviews in the captions of my Instagram, which is fun for sharing what I’m reading right now with my mom and friends but … Continue reading
Some projects for my kid: heart, good bear, egg
A few kid presents I made so far in 2023: Heart Amigurumi Made these for my kid around Valentine’s day (although we don’t really celebrate that one). Ravelry project link: https://www.ravelry.com/projects/terriko/heart-amigurumi Good Bear This is a Susan B Anderson pattern with a kit from her store (Barrett Wool Co.). I love these kits: they’re well … Continue reading
2023 Rose City Yarn Crawl MCAL – Hekataion
Some notes from the local yarn crawl’s Mystery Crochet-a-long project. Continue reading
Vulnerability Scanning for Free (as in Puppies)
I’m giving a talk at pyCascades this afternoon and I just wanted to share the slides for folk who like that kind of thing. PDF: https://drive.google.com/file/d/125cCmmk8k5UtfV3QajNOXml1YW5nxM2i/view?usp=sharing ODP (LibreOffice Impress) : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u3_5LQUYYPiv9hSCbcgG_gOGn96a-di2/view?usp=sharing (Contains notes but they’re an early talk draft) Google Docs version (not the original, probably has minor formatting issues but may be easier to … Continue reading
Rainbow Heart Mitts (Glitz Mitts)
I live in a part of the Pacific Northwest that doesn’t get *that* cold, so I mostly get by with fingerless gloves. But then I got a dog and when I’m doing the last dog walk of the night it can be a bit nippy, so I switch to full mitts, the same ones I … Continue reading
Winter Skies Cowl
My first finish for 2023 was the Winter Skies Cowl. This was an advent kit combining West Coast Yarn with a modular knitting pattern from PNW Knit Designs. It was pretty neat to get charts on little cards for easier mixing and matching! The colour palette was listed beforehand so I knew I’d be getting … Continue reading
Pixel rainbow quilt layout
A pixelated rainbow quilt and also a test of the Mastodon poster I’m using. Continue reading
Kicking off the GSoC 2023 season
I’m once again spearheading the Google Summer of Code effort for the Python Software Foundation. The website is updated as of yesterday so you can read about it there and I’m not gonna write any more blurbs: https://python-gsoc.org/ Continue reading
Fiber Goals 2022: how did I do?
I set myself 4 fiber goals for 2022: 1. rainbows 2. advents past 3. skipping the pattern 4. finish the sabbatical quilt. So how did I do? Continue reading
Spring Rainbow Shawl notes
I bought these lovely yarns from the ChemKnits Spring Mini Series. My kid and I have been enjoying her tutorials for dyeing yarn with food colouring, and so I thought this would be a nice way to support the channel and give me and kiddo a week of videos to watch. Plus he loves rainbows. … Continue reading
Steven the Bat socks
Years ago, a friend named the local bat who appears in the evenings at our house “Steven.” Since I can’t identify humans in the dark let alone bats, we have henceforth declared that all bats are named Steven. Which is why it’s especially appropriate to have two Stevens on your socks. This isn’t a complete, … Continue reading
Books: Aug 21, 28, Sept 4, 11
Well… So far moving book reviews to the blog hasn’t been going great, but part of that has been that I haven’t been as consistent even on Instagram. Still, here’s some cut and paste. I’m still not caught up writing reviews because my in-laws have been here all week (including coming to library day!) But … Continue reading
Books: August 7 & 14, 2022
Two weeks at once! August 7 Quilt as backdrop even if I didn’t end up starting the embroidery yet. Here’s this week’s library returns and reads, a few days late because I didn’t feel like writing reviews. My books: Dyeing Wishes — a knitting plus a bit of magic cozy mystery. Includes a moody ghost, … Continue reading
Queer Enough Shawl
This one’s for all the folk who might not “look” queer: the bi folk in “straight” relationships, the trans and non-binary folk who maybe don’t “look” queer to outsiders, the ace folk, and everyone else who struggles with whether they’re really “queer enough” for a LGBTQA+ space. This free shawl pattern is intended as a … Continue reading
Books: July 31, 2022
Playdate sweater has 1.5 sleeves and I sewed the pocket linings in, but then my hands decided sleeve knitting was uncomfortable so it’s taking a break and I’m working on the rainbow shawl which has made it all the way to purple! I actually have most of a blog post ready to go with the … Continue reading
Counting the countdowns
As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a sucker for tiny daily packages of yarn, but my enthusiasm for opening them is a bit beyond my ability to actually use them. (Oh, let’s be honest, my enthusiasm for all things yarn is beyond my knitting and crocheting speed.) I’m glad to see a few more countdown/advent style … Continue reading
Books: July 24, 2022
Library day + the sweater has one complete sleeve and I like the rainbow cuff as much as I hoped I would. 🌈 Kid reads: Mr. Postmouse’s Rounds was a big hit with all the details in the drawings plus my kid’s enthusiasm for getting mail. (We even play a game where I deliver packages … Continue reading
Books July 17
I’ve been taking pictures of my library returns pile and doing little reviews in the captions of my Instagram, which is fun for sharing what I’m reading right now with my mom and friends but it’s not searchable or easy to find later, and Instagram is notorious for mystifying and often racist moderation policies so … Continue reading
Mid-year fiber goals check-in: the “other” ideas
As in previous years, I chose four Fiber Goals for 2022. That small number always leaves me with a bunch of ideas that I toss out there on the post that I wasn’t committing to finish but also wanted to record as ideas. A year is a long time so some of those always manage … Continue reading
Mid year check-in: 2022 fiber goals
For the past 7 years I’ve done fiber goals instead of new years resolutions. It’s been a fun way to guide my crafting plans. Here’s a link to my 2022 fiber goals. We’re nearly halfway through the year, so let’s talk about how it’s going. Goal 1: Rainbows 🌈 Started strong with using half of … Continue reading
Remembering my Grandma, Lorna Smith
I lost my grandmother last week. When she was starting to get dementia, one of her persistent fears was about being forgotten. I don’t know if that’s just the way her brain reacted to the things she was forgetting herself, or if it was from her own experiences working as a nurse in a seniors … Continue reading
Sleep apps for parents
One of the hardest parts of early stage parenting is the sleep deprivation. When you add in a pandemic where “safe” childcare suddenly wasn’t easy to come by, then all time and especially sleep becomes a zero sum game between me and my co-parent. And the whole world is having sleep problems. Work provided me … Continue reading
Fiber goals 2022
Fiber goals time! Still more fun than new years resolutions. Previous years: 2021 Fiber goals 2020 Fiber goals 2019 Fiber goals 2018 Fiber goals 2017 Fiber goals 2016 Fiber goals are in bottom of 2017 post above. Rainbows 🌈 — I’ve taken to trying to find a rainbow project for pride month every year, but … Continue reading