The Creative Process of The Crazy Penguin Lady.

The Crazy Penguin Lady has been on a creative jag for the past few months. When she gets this way, little else matters.

Honestly, a lot of other things matter.

I rarely accomplish much else but getting the pattern ideas onto the needles, finished, photoed and written down as a, hopefully, coherent pattern.

Sometimes coherency is not an easy thing.

If I do not get them out, they keep me up nights, running around in my head, bouncing off my skull, while I attempt to sleep.

You really don't want to see me sleep deprived. Trust me, it isn't pretty.

 

It takes a lot of fiddling around with graph paper and computer programs and swatching and rejecting and swatching and rejecting and swatching and coming up victorious. 

Did I ever mention that I absolutely hate swatching?

Then I get to knit the first draft and scribble notes on the original draft of the pattern and frog what didn't work, then knit what I scribbled on the original pattern, then look at it after I have knitted on it for a couple of days and decide that I hate the gauge and frog it again and start over with a different needle or yarn or both.

This happens more times than I care to think about.

 

Then I knit a "proof" sample of the pattern to see if all the bugs have been worked out. I generally knit up some of my stash yarn for this.  Great way to burn stash.  IF, and that is a big IF, that "proof" makes me happy, then I knit it in a yarn that is readily available at The Scarlet Skein. 

Sometimes this is a very long process.

Sometimes this process keeps me from posting patterns that I published on Ravelry months ago. For this I am truly sorry.

Here, for your knitting pleasure, are a shawl, a scarf and a pair of slipper socks.

  Saguaro Shawl

$5.00

Mobile device compatible version available.

The lace pattern of this shawl is reminiscent of the Giant Saguaro Cacti found only in the Sonoran Deserts of South Eastern California, Southern Arizona and Northern Mexico.
Shown as knit in DK Weight yarn on size 6 U.S. (4.0 mm) knitting needle, but Saguaro can also be knit in Lace Weight yarn on a size 4 U.S. (3.5 mm) knitting needle.

Filigree Frippery

$4.00
Mobile device compatible version available. 

Super easy lace pattern for newbie lace knitters.  Knitters  have a choice of either a picot edge or a plain garter stitch edge.

Detail of lace.

The Slipper Which Shall Not Be Named

$4.00

Knit with Worsted Weight yarn on size 7 U.S. (4.5 mm) needles, these toe up slipper socks are great for the beginning sock knitter.