Yawn

It seems like this is all blogland can talk about (although I've read numerous blogs today which have nothing to say on the matter.) I was reading Domesticali, and she mentioned it, in conjunction with her husband telling her that knitting was 'not sexy'.

Leaving aside the fact that not everything needs to be, or should be, 'sexy', and that I object to the word as used to mean 'a good thing'. (Maybe I am a Good Feminist after all)

I was thinking about and - I'm tired. I mean, I would still like to engage with the people within the discussion - both the women who craft and the women who don't. But it's starting a little bit to feel like that thing where every winter the Media discovers knitting again, and decides that it is - wince - 'sexy'. And then they get a photo of some skinny, glamourous woman knitting a garter stitch scarf in chunky wool and looking ecstatic in her body-hugging clothes and stilettos.

And part of me wants to say: Leave us alone.

One of the things I love about the internet is, if you don't like something, you can just go away. And I think that if these people don't like watching us craft, then... they should just go away.

But I suppose that if we are damaging the fabric of feminism, then thye can't, in all good conscience, do so. Can they?

Maybe it's just because it's the end of the day. However, in the spirit of letting them watch me craft if that is what they feel like doing, here is what I did on the weekend.

'Nautie' from knitty.com

Knitted for a friend (at her request). I finished the shell ages ago, and then broke one of the (plastic op shop) needles. So I didn't have the right size DPNs. I finally just used 3.25s. I thought that his head might be too little for his body, so I cast on an extra amount of stiches, but I shouldn't have - it made it a bit too large, and it puckers a little. I thought it was going to look pretty bad, but with the i-cord tentacles (I hate i-cord) and eyes, he actually looks pretty cute, I think.

You can't really see in this pic, but because the yarn is dark and the stuffing is light, it shows through a little. I was already making plans to knit it again - with aran wool and instead of increasing every regular amount of rows, I would do it properly, like in nature - exponentially or however it really is done (research needed) since it's a bit of an awkward increase, anyway.

Then I realised that I didn't really enjoy knitting this anyway, the second time, and what would I do with it? Maybe I'll do it someday, but not anytime soon.

Box bag from the tutorial from dragoknitfly.

Yes, I have been sewing. I have in fact sewn a bed warmer a la dogged knits, but since I'ts warm, I have not used it (plus, it's a little dodgy. Pictures later. Maybe) I have been bonding with my sewing machine.

What I learnt from this experience: even though these two projects were essentially two large squares, I have absolutely no capacity for spacial visualisation. I called my mum twice while sewing this bag to get her to help me figure out how to, eg, fit the thing through the machine, or place the fabric so it looks right when turned right side out.

Also, I should have used heavy-weight interfacing. Medium-heavy just doesn't cut it.

Even with this meager sucess, I am having daydreams of a string of these and the zaka-style pouches from the crafter's companion to house all my various WIPs and FOs. Wouldn't that be fantastic!

And it will totally happen, too. Totally...