Dog Drawings against Breast Cancer!

Hey check this out - my friend the brilliant and talented Maria Sputnik (aka Sascha) is offering custom schwag to anyone who donates to support my breast cancer ride! She says -

if you donate money, I will draw a picture of your dog! And if you don't HAVE a dog, I'll draw a picture of what your dog would look like if you DID have one.

She started doing this for another friend who's doing a 39-mile breast cancer walk in Colorado, and she's generously offered to extend the favor to my readers here, too! Here are some of her awesome drawings:

You can see she's mad talented - can you guess who asked her for a yeti?

If you want to play along too, here's how:

make a donation of any size on my donation page to support Tour de Pink.

Then leave a comment on Maria Sputnik's lj page telling her what kind of drawing you want.

Thanks, Sascha! Thanks, everybody!

A Big Bike Ride Against Breast Cancer

Hi everybody -

This October, I'll be participating in the Tour de Pink, a 200-mile charity bike ride the whole way from Hershey, Pennsylvania to New York City to raise money for the Young Survival Coalition.

Those of you who know me pretty well know that I would probably find it easier to ride all 200 miles uphill and in the rain than hitting up all my friends, family, co-workers and blog readers for donations. But here goes: Breast cancer stinks. My grandma had it, my mom has had it, three of my five aunts have had to deal with it. Like everybody else, I hope for a time when my nieces and nephews won't have to worry about breast cancer. So please consider supporting me - you can make a donation here.

The ride benefits the Young Survival Coalition, the only international, non-profit network of breast cancer survivors and supporters dedicated to the concerns and issues that are unique to young women and breast cancer. The event costs are underwritten by the corporate sponsors, so anything you give will go straight to supporting the Coalition's vital work.
Thanks, and all the best!

Wheee!

My sis just sent me a bunch of photos of my niece posing with the baby blanket I made her. Wheee!


Thanks, Abbie! SO happy!

The big baby blanket post is here, and the pattern is available here.

Hyperbolic Knitting (Fuzzy Math)

Inspired by the forms of the crochet coral reef but prefer sticks to hooks? Here are 2 experiments in hyperbolic knitting.

Both of these shapes are made using the same basic pattern. If you can knit in the round and work an increase, you can do this, too. Here's how to play along:

Pick a number of stitches to cast on.
Pick another number, which we'll call (X).

Using double-pointed needles, cast on to work in the round (start out as for i-cord and add more needles as you need them)

k(X), increase 1, k(X), increase 1 , k(X), increase 1...

That's it! Bind off when you feel like stopping or you run low on yarn or needle-space. Since this is an exponential form, each round will ruffle more than the last and use more and more yarn.

The smaller the number you choose for (X), the sooner and sharper your form will ruffle. The bigger (X) is, the skinnier your form will be.

In each of these models, I cast on 4 stitches. For the tall skinny one, (X) is 15. For the fat one, it's 5.

I used yarn-overs for the increases because I wanted the random-ish pattern that the increases make to be visible. Using kfb or a lifted increase will be less visible and will make the ruffling more pronounced.

Have fun with it!

Floppy Math

Because a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.

Happy Pi Day everybody!

I made my first dodecahedron too big and it turned out floppy under its own weight. It holds its shape pretty well hanging from a string in my window, but tips over when I set it on a table. The pattern is sound, though, and I'm a huge fan of making things homemade and lumpen that are usually made with rulers, but I'll hafta do a smaller, stand-up-on-its-own one before the pattern's ready to publish. So I miss my self-imposed deadline of this very minute. How come none of the other mathematical constants get their own day? When it's impossible number day can I put my clothes on inside out and walk to school backwards?

Dodeca is a departure from my usual way of designing, which is as close to one-piece as possible so the thing you're creating basically appears in your hands - this one's got lots of pieces and grafting galore, which is its own kind of fun.

Oh, and happy White Day, too!

Like This, but Knitted

I'm taking a quick break from googley-eyed creatures and faboo scarves in honor of Pi Day and indulging my crush on Norah Gaughan with a dodecahedron of my own. It's gonna be like this, but knitted. See you Friday!

Shaker Tape

This weekend I knitted the first half of a dodecahedron (stay tuned - I'll post the pattern Friday for Pi Day) and fixed an old footstool that I got from my mom with Shaker tape to match my rocking chair.

I love Shaker stuff 'cause it's really simple and really strong - you just weave the tape around on both sides like a lawn chair and wind up with something strong enough to stand on. The only tools you need are a hammer, a couple of carpet tacks, and sometimes (if your weave is pretty tight) the back end of a spoon.

The rocking chair was my mom's when I was a baby, and it used to have a wicker back that got destroyed when I was living with Silas - it was the perfect size for his little fingers to pull on. The stool came from my Grandpa's house, and probably from my great-Grandpa's before that. It had leather lacing on it that had fallen apart with age. Now they're both souped up to last another bunch of decades.

More shaker-y goodness here.