Busts, Bitching, and Subversive Seamsters: My Birthday Favorites

Bust Magazine is my favorite!

Since I'm supposed to be using this precious naptime to frantically clean the house so that our dear friends attending Syd's birthday dinner tonight don't realize how filthy we are, I am obviously blogging instead. The very first book I picked up to put away is overdue at the library, but it's an awesome how-to book and I wanted to scan some projects from it and blog about it, and if I'm doing that I might as well blog about the other reference materials I've found recently, and, well, here we are...

I'm a big fan of the Stitch 'n Bitch franchise: I'm not a scarf-and-sweater gal, but I'd actually make a ton of these projects if I could do more than knit back-and-forth in a straight line until someone casts off for me, and the editor, Debbie Stoller, also does Bust magazine,which I adore. Son of Stitch 'n Bitch: 45 Projects to Knit and Crochet for Menis the best of the bunch, in my opinion, because I prefer wearing masc clothing, and this book is all about projects to knit and crochet for men-like people. My favorites are the beer gloves, which are the type of fingerless gloves I rocked in junior high, and the Cobra and Pub Crawler sweaters, which are very understated and comfy-looking. I'd totally make someone knit my kids the Ernie sweater, though, which is, yes, the one of Bert-and- fame.

The Vogue Knitting The Ultimate Sock Book: History*Technique*Design (Vogue Knitting) is also appealing, even though most of the patterns aren't to my taste, because of its lengthy, cogent, and illustrated instructions for sock knitting, which I reaaaaallly, reeeeaaaaallly want to learn. I keep building up the supplies during sales at the crafts store--I bought circular needles when they were 50%-off, only to have my friend Molly the Knitter tell me that it's double-pointed needles you use, and so then I bought a pair of double-pointeds at a different sale only to see in this book that you need more like two or even three pairs...Sigh.

Matt is getting frustrated with sneaking back into work at night to print me some business cards on the fussy and easily-broken color printer there, so I'm thinking about investing in these 2.75"x1" Moo cards--you can upload a beautiful photo, and put your business info on the back, and get 100 for about 20 bucks. That would be nice, because using an actual product photo or a photo of the kids would be much more relevant and evocative of my work.

I'm thinking about applying to sell at Yarncon in Chicago. Even though I don't knit, I'm really getting into the possibilities of creating with felted wool yarn, and my friend Molly the Knitter knits, so... I did apply to the Shadow Art Fair in Ypsilanti. Even though it's quite a drive, it fits my criteria because Matt's granny lives just around there, near Ann Arbor where my favorite store ever is.

The book I just can't stand to return to the library is Subversive Seamster. I had the library buy it, which means I get first dibs, but then someone else went and requested it before I could renew it! The best thing about this book is that one of the creators is an ample woman like I am, so I'm confident that most, if not all, of the designs are ample-woman friendly. This contrasts with some other remaking clothing books like T-Shirt Makeovers: 20 Transformations for Fabulous Fashions, in which I've tried to make a project or two, but I just don't think they work with my body. My favorite projects in Subversive Seamster are the duct tape dress form, which I totally have the duct tape to do, the turtleneck bolero jacket, the Hawaiian shirt pillowcase, the poncho skirt (I'd wear it over jeans), the men's dress pants shorts, the Catholic schoolgirl plaid skirt tank top, the bridesmaid's dress tie, the muumuu peasant top, the sports jersey toiletries bag--yeah, I really like this book.