Knitting and Crochet Blog Week :: Crafting Balance kcbwday7

Are you a knitter or a crocheter, or are you a bit of both? If you are monogamous in your yarn-based crafting, is it because you do not enjoy the other craft or have you simply never given yourself the push to learn it? Is it because the items that you best enjoy crafting are more suited to the needles or the hook? Do you plan on ever trying to take up and fully learn the other craft? If you are equally comfortable knitting as you are crocheting, how do you balance both crafts? Do you always have projects of each on the go, or do you go through periods of favouring one over the other? How did you come to learn and love your craft(s)?

I both knit and crochet. 
I always have a knitting project (or five) on the needles, but not so often a crochet projects. Right now the only crochet projects I have is blankets that I never seem to finish... Don't know why as I know it wouldn't take me long to crochet the squares I need as crochet goes much faster than knitting ;)

I learned to both knit and crochet when I was around 7-8 years old I think. My mom and my grandmother learned me. I remember being at my grandmothers house with my cousins and we would all sit and crochet :) I have one memory I remember very well. I and one of my older cousins sits together in a chair and crochet one the same piece. I do the first move in a single st, going through the loop and grab the tread to make two loops on the hook. But I found the move to pull the yarn through both loops so hard that my cousin had to do that part.

Knitting and Crochet Blog Week :: Improving Your Skillset 3kcbwday6

How far down the road to learning your craft do you believe yourself to be? Are you comfortable with what you know or are you always striving to learn new skills and add to your knowledge base? Take a look at a few knitting or crochet books and have a look at some of the skills mentioned in the patterns. Can you start your amigurumi pieces with a magic circle, have you ever tried double knitting, how's your intarsia? If you are feeling brave, make a list of some of the skills which you have not yet tried but would like to have a go at, and perhaps even set yourself a deadline of when you'd like to have tried them by.

As a child I learned to knit, purl and somehow turn a heel. I also learned the basic crochet stitches. I remember that I loved craft classes at school. I used to knit small doll clothes and when I was 13 and my little sister was born, I knitted her a jacket almost by myself.
In my teens I didn't knit much, so it's the last 12 years or so that I have been knitting almost daily due to having kids ;)
I still feel that I have lots to learn. As spinning. The above picture was taken last May and I'm sorry to say that I haven't thouched it since... I really want to learn to spin my own yarn, but I haven't given it a proper try yet.
When it comes to knitting and crochet, I feel there are a few things I still have to try learn:

- Entrelac. I'd love to make myself a pair of Entrelac mittens.
- Sew in a zipper. I avoid patterns with zippers because my sweing machine and I are not friends....
- Broomstick lace
- Double knitting. Imagine the thick and warm mittens I could knit.. Like these or these.
- Naalbinding - I'd love to learn this!

Knitting and Crochet Blog Week :: Something A Bit Different 3KCBWDAY5

It's back, and this time it has the most amazing of prizes (look for the prize for 'most creative post'). This was a massive success last year, and for many it was the highlight of the Blog Week, so this year you are challenged, again, to find a new way of blogging.
This is an experimental blogging day to try and push your creativity in blogging to the same level that you perhaps push your creativity in the items you create.There are no rules of a topic to blog about but this post should look at a different way to present content on your blog. 

1. the knitter"s tale, 2. Portrait of two women, 3. VV8946, 4. PG10840, 5. U999343INP,
6. U163631INP, 7. IH014745, 8. U774751ACME, 9. HU032662,
10. 8 Katherine Hepburn knitting, 1935, 11. Knitting, 12. Look at our knitters face., 13. BE034407

Knitting and Crochet Blog Week :: Your Knitting Or Crochet Hero 3kcbwday3

Blog about someone in the fibre crafts who truly inspires you. There are not too many guidelines for this, it's really about introducing your readers to someone who they might not know who is an inspiration to you. It might be a family member or friend, a specific designer or writer, indie dyer or another blogger. If you are writing about a knitting designer and you have knitted some of their designs, don't forget to show them off. Remember to get permission from the owner if you wish to use another person's pictures.

Well, I can't say I have a hero. But I get a lot of inspiration from all of you knit and crochet bloggers here on the www :)
But both my mom and my garndmother have always been kniting and crocheting, so ofcourse they are the ones who inspire me in my daily life. My grandmother will be 90 next year and even though she is getting a bit forgetfull, she still knits. It's just small squares one can sew together as a blanket, but I'm sure her love of knitting and crocheting have kept her mind so clear for so long!
The bedspread in the picture below is one of my treasures. My grandmother crocheted it to me years ago.

My mom, even though she has a full time job, seems to knit faster than me ;) She knits sweaters and jackets to friends and family in a speed I can just dream of. This Marius jacket is her latest project of the needles. It's for my brother and I think I might have to ask her to knit one for Erlend.

Knitting And Crochet Blog Week :: Photography Challenge Day! - 3kcbwday2

Today challenges you to be creative with your photography, and get yourself in with the chance to win the photography prize. Taking interesting photographs in this instance isn't about flashy cameras or a great deal of technical know-how, it's about setting up a story or scene in a photograph and capturing something imaginative. Your photograph(s) should feature something related to your craft, so that might be either a knitted or crocheted item, yarn, or one of your craft tools.

The kids love Star Wars and have quite a lot of legos of it too. The idea is not totally mine... I once saw a drawing of the same plot, but wanted to capture it with mini figures and real yarn ;)
If you like this, please nominate me for the Photography Challenge Price here . Thanks :)

Knitting and Crochet Blog Week :: Colour Lovers - 3kcbwday1

 
Colour is one of our greatest expressions of ourselves when we choose to knit or crochet, so how do you choose what colours you buy and crochet or knit with. Have a look through your stash and see if there is a predominance of one colour. Do the same with your finished projects - do they match? Do you love a rainbow of bright hues, or more subdued tones. How much attention do you pay to the original colour that a garment is knit in when you see a pattern? Tell readers about your love or confusion over colour.

When I look through all my projects at Ravelry, I see that I knit in pretty much every colour. And I guess with all those socks in stripes and knitting for the kids it must be so :) But, I love to browse through other knitters projects pages who just knit in grey or greyish colours. I mean I love grey, but I don't knit with it as mush as I would liked too. I like more bright colours too, such as pink, blue and red. And if I knit for myself I often end up with red or black...
When it comes to original colours in patterns, I usually pick my own colours. Mostly because I like to use up some stash yarn or because I like another combination.
My stash is a mix of all colours. I guess it's a result after years of buying a pretty skein or ball of yarn when you spot it at the lys ;) And after getting skeins of yarn in any colour combination in various yarn clubs. Now, the challenge is to use it all up...

Some of my latest yarn buyes :)

For more post about Colour Lovers, just Google 3kcbwday1 :)