Arabesque baby blanket

Recipient: Alejandro (Alex) Mendez
Designer: Moi
Pattern: 'Arabesque'
Completed: September 12, 2006
Colours: White
Yarn: 100% acrylic from Zellers, sportweight
Completed status: Given September 12, 2006; baby born September 27, 2006
Notes: Either to be submitted to Knitty or The Knitting Vault
Pictures: None

2007-Jan-27

Happily, Amy was at the SnB on Wednesday, so I got to ask her (hopefully in a tactful, non-bugging kind of way) if she'd received the submission of this pattern for Knitty. She had indeed, and told me that she was unfortunately unable to use it. I was kind of surprised, since I'd submitted a baby blanket pattern on purpose, figuring it would be a great idea, since you hardly ever see blankets in Knitty. However, Amy let me know that this 'blanket dearth' is intentional, since a blanket is really just a rectangle (or a square), and anyone can go just about anywhere to pick up a blanket pattern. For Knitty to take a blanket pattern, it needs to have a real 'hook', something which makes it really unique and stand-out-ish, like The Hoover Blanket (a historical recreation), or Lizard Ridge (incredibly funky, and which takes advantage of the cool properties of a specific kind of yarn).

While this news naturally kinda sucked from my point of view, you have to admit, it really is great that Amy has such a strong vision for her magazine. She certainly doesn't slap just anything up there. I suspect this is one of the big reasons it has such a following.

So, I'll see what else I want to do with this pattern. I have to admit that, even if I submit it elsewhere and it's accepted, re-knitting it in a nice yarn for publication really isn't the sort of thing I have the time to do right now. So I might just make it available for free here and see whether anyone likes it. But I'm still a bit undecided, so stay tuned.

2006-Dec-20

My co-worker very kindly brought the blanket to work with him yesterday, and it is now in my front hall waiting to be weighed.

2006-Dec-12

The pattern proposal for Knitty got done and sent off on Saturday. Yay! I am excited and nervous as all hell. I did actually manage to find notes that told me how big it was after blocking, but I cannot find any indication of how much yarn I used. (Nor can I remember weighing it after it was finished.) I did make a guess for the sake of finishing off the proposal, but I know that greater precision would be much better.

So Monday morning I slunk shamefacedly into the cubicle of my co-worker (the recipient of the blanket) and asked him if he had a small-weights scale at home, and, if so, could he please weigh the blanket for me so I could give Knitty a more precise estimate of how much yarn I used, assuming they're interested in taking the pattern. It turns out he doesn't have such a scale, but he did offer to bring the blanket in and lend it to me (he was very clear about the LENDING part - he absolutely wants it back, which certainly warms my heart) so I could take it home and weigh it. What a nice guy. And what a total dork I am. :)

2006-Dec-8

My goal tonight (other than finishing this blog entry, of course) is to finish up the proposal to submit this pattern for Knitty. I'm very excited, but I'm also a bit stressed, because I have no idea where my pattern notes are, I can't remember how big the final product ended up being, and I'm pretty sure I never recorded how much yarn I used. (Genius. Pure genius. Way to think ahead, Kathleen.)

Actually, on second thought, I'm a little too wiped to work it all out tonight. Tomorrow. Yes. Sometime amidst all the baking and laundry and wrapping and shopping and...

2006-Oct-10

At some point after my last real blog entry, DH went out and picked up more white sportweight. Unfortunately, despite the fact that it was the same colour, the same ply and (supposed to be but I have my doubts) the same weight as the original, you can still tell where the first ball ended and the second ball began if you really look. However, I don't think many people will be really looking.

I finished it up the night before the celebratory lunch for my co-worker, washed it, blocked it, and started in on the fringe. I'd done a fair bit along one side before deciding that it looked like crap. (DH concurred. That is to say, he certainly didn't use the word 'crap' by any stretch of the imagination, but he did agree with my assessment that the fringe wasn't as dense and 'oomphy' as one might hope.) This combined with the fact that it was already getting rather late into the evening decided me: there would be no fringe. I declared it finished and went to bed. In the morning I added a tag, gift-wrapped it up all nicely, and brought it to work. My co-worker was thrilled.

I will be submitting the pattern to Knitty as soon as...okay, I admit it, as soon as my brain allows me to remember to do it. (Sigh.)

Little Alejandro (Alex for short) was born two weeks after the party and unfortunately had to stay in the hospital for awhile because of some kind of infection. Aside from having to be on antibiotics, though, he apparently seems healthy, so my freakout has been reduced to a minimum. I'm hoping he's either already home or will be sent home soonsoonsoon with a clean bill of health. Go, Alex.

2006-Aug-8

Yarn has run out. Okay, well technically I still have some left, but all the rest is in pretty short lengths. Alas, there has still been no real opportunity to take a trip to Zellers and pick up more. Soon. Soon.

2006-Jul-31

Triumph - I am three-quarters done the body and it is looking really cool. Despair - I am fast running out of yarn and DH did not have a chance today to swing by the store and pick up more.

Pictures of this project continue to be absent from the blog due to the fact that I'm planning to submit it to Knitty (sorry, Carrie K). I've even worked up a first draft of a concept proposal. I'm pretty freakin' excited about this!

2006-Jul-28

This is coming along really well, and got some favourable comments at the SnB, which was nice. I'm now halfway done the body of the blanket. Today I started switching back and forth inconsistently between English and continental knitting on this, and so far I haven't been able to tell (admittedly, I've been a bit too nervous to look too closely, but generally speaking it all looks even, so I'm pleased). Basically I tend to go with whatever seems to be the best with wherever I am in the subway car at the time. ("Best" being a combination of personal comfort and not poking my fellow passengers.) All other things being equal, I go with the 'need for speed' and choose continental.

2006-Jul-26

Anyone who is being particularly observant about The Schedule will have noticed that I was supposed to have completed about three-quarters of this project by the beginning of July. Instead, I procrastinated for over a month on completing the design of the pattern, let alone starting the project itself.

This was not so great, because now that the baby shower party for my co-worker expecting in August is finished, this means that the gift for my co-worker expecting in September should be finished about a month from now.

Eep.

(And yes, despite my concern that giving something with a hispano-araby motif to someone from South America may be offensive, I've decided that I'm probably overthinking things and that I just need to get over myself and not worry about it.)

So this past weekend I got serious about this project. I did some swatching for the motif I had in mind, which helped me make the final decision on how the chart should be laid out. I also made a decision on what yarn and needles to use, so I did a swatch with that, too. I measured, did some math, cast on a bunch of stitches and have been going great guns ever since. I'm not even close to being completely caught up, but I'm getting there.

Sadly, this project makes for awkward commute knitting because I'm using straights. This is because all my circulars of the same size are currently in use. One of these days I'm going to figure out which projects are using the circulars I need and cannibalize a needle for this blanket, so I can stop being paranoid that I might poke my fellow subway riders.

The pattern, incidentally, uses lace to outline the motif. I think the effect will be extremely interesting when it's all done. Unfortunately there will be no pictures of this project posted here, because I'd like to submit it to Knitty when I'm done. If I'm lucky, you'll see the design for the first time there at some point in the future.

2006-Jun-12

I recently found out that another co-worker is expecting! Now, I know I said I was going to limit myself this year and not knit for every baby that crosses my path, but one of the projects already in my yearly plan is a self-designed baby blanket, using a lace design based on a hispano-araby motif. I could use this project as the gift for my co-worker, at no cost to The Schedule or my sanity. Perfect, right?

Well, the first step towards consolidating this decision is to finalise the actual lace design. So I'm going to have to do some fiddling and come up with something that I definitely like.

The second step is to determine whether it is culturally appropriate and considerate OR culturally insensitive (given the horrible history of Spanish conquest in south America) to give a guy of Mexican heritage a blanket for his baby which has a Spanish design feel. Anyone want to help me out with this one?

2005-Aug-15

I realised this weekend that I've been forgetting to mention this new (yes, another one, don't hate me because I'm stupid) project in the past...week? Two weeks? Something like that.

It occurred to me that baby blankets really are just about the smartest thing for me to design if I want to publish something sooner rather than later. A baby blanket is big enough that, if you want, you can really go to town and incorporate a clever pattern. But it's also small enough that it's not going to take you forever to knit a sample to photograph for publication. Another huge plus is that the structure is super-simple - a rectangle. You don't need to mess around with shaping, or test-drive how something is going to work in three dimensions. You don't even have to have tremendously accurate gauge. And best of all, instructions for a blanket only need to be written in one size.

Add in the fact that a baby can never truly have too many blankets, and you have a stand-out winner of a pattern idea. So...what the heck, thought I, why don't I design a baby blanket in between doing patterns for my book, and see if anyone will publish it?

No, there is no impending baby which needs this blanket.

No, I have not suddenly finished a whole bunch of my current projects to be able to have the time to actually work on this.

No, there isn't really any force in the universe that can stop me when I get it into my head that I really want to do something. (Especially logic. Logic is particularly useless in this regard.)

The blanket will contain a repeating lace motif, which I am currently testing to see if it will look nice. So far, so good. However, snags I have encountered include: a) I'm not sure what kind of a pattern I want to do for the edging, and b) I've been keeping my test knitting on our kitchen table, and this morning I inadvertently upended an empty bowl of Cheerios - containing an entirely unexpected amount of Cheerios 'dust' - all over the damn thing.

But other than that, I have great hopes.