Catching up on 2021

I’m back after a break! I had a very busy summer of 2021 and now it’s already the holiday season and fast approaching the end of the year. Here is what I’ve been crafting:

Knitting a lot

I’ve done a lot of knitting recently. So far this year, I’ve knit 2 shawls, 4 sweaters, and am currently working on a pile of hats. I aim to have all of my projects photographed soon, now that it is cold enough to wear my new makes. 

I spent time on Ravelry exploring different knitting patterns. Some of my favorite designers that I learned about this summer were Stephen West, Laerke Bagger, Layla of Qing Fibres, and Joji Locatelli. I love how each one of them mixes different knitting techniques, textures and colors in their designs.

I’ve enjoyed knitting because it can be repetitive once you get into the flow of the pattern, which allows me to think about other things while doing something with my hands. I’ve discovered that I don’t enjoy complicated knitting patterns or reading colorwork charts. I’ve been looking forward to improving my knitting skills to a point where I can start to improvise and create my own color/texture combinations. I found a sweater knitting pattern book that has some basic sweater patterns and in the past couple of months I’ve gained the knit confidence to explore different color combinations in my projects

Summer 2021 Sewing plans 

My summer sewing plans were to stashbust. While I didn’t clear out my bag of scrap fabric, I made a serious dent in the pile and came out with some wearable projects. Here are some of my makes from the summer:

Seamwork Hayden- I made this top entirely out of scraps! The printed fabric is a cotton poplin that I used as lining for my social distancing raincoat. I added grosgrain ribbon trim to the side seams, and used a leftover scrap of stretch wool for the hem 

Seamwork Weston- I added a scalloped hem to the legs of these shorts, made from scrap ponte. It was not easy, and if I were to try this again, I would use a thinner fabric for the hem facing. 

Seamwork Clarke- I made two of these tops out of linen scraps

Slowing Down  

My Fall 2021 plan was to go crazy with pattern hacking. I thought that I would revisit some of my tried and true patterns (like the Seamwork Rachel that I have made multiple times) and modify the pattern to add design flourishes or change the shape of the garment. In fact, I wanted to challenge myself to always include a hack when planning a project. I made a list of potential projects and hacks to try, and paired fabric and vintage buttons to use from my collection. 

What actually happened this Fall: I didn’t get very far into my list of projects I had planned, and have one completed project to date. Every sewing weekend, I would look at my list and feel overwhelmed with choices. Then I would go back to knitting a sweater or browsing aimlessly online. It felt like my rules were bogging me down. My sewing momentum slowed down a lot, and I didn’t feel like writing about sewing or photographing my progress either. 

Now I’m easing back into it. I found a sign that I had made in 2020 to remind myself that the weekend was here- this was back during the early pandemic days when weekdays and weekends all blurred together. I remember how good it felt to pull out the sign and set up my sewing zone for the weekend. I’m trying to make the things I’m currently most excited about, and also take it slow and enjoy the process of sewing more- even the parts like ripping out seams and recutting pattern pieces. I used to steamroll through a project, feeling like I had to commit to and thoroughly execute my original idea. Now I am trying to leave open the possibility of last minute changes for the better.

I hope to rebuild my sewing momentum and roll it into 2022!