i've got a pattern in 'stitch and bitch superstar knitting'!

more personal news of a crafty/"hey-i'm-published-again" sort: i've got a knitting pattern published in debbie stoller's newly-released tome, stitch and bitch superstar knitting! it's the "empire strikes back dress," which can be found page 293. it was formerly known as the age of acid empires sweater dress (my original name for it), it's the same dress i'm wearing in this ancient wardrobe_remix pic:

i'm so tickled that debbie chose to style the sweater with a contrasty color scheme (and have it modeled by a redhead!). hee hee! :)
thank you, thank you, thank you, debbie for letting me be a part of your book! this one, like all the others, is bound to be a big success...it's chock-full of great info and knitting knowledge and debbie's usual bon mots...and the patterns featured within are pretty frickin' killer. a little something for everyone: cables, lace, beading, and so much more. GO GET A COPY. :)

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and to anyone who ever emailed me, commented at me, or pestered me via ravelry about whether a pattern for this sweaterdress would ever be available, here you go. :P enjoy.
also: if you ever make this dress, or a variation of it, email me! i'd love to see other people's twists or versions of it! :)

around town, out of town

more fun with hipstamatic. :)

liberated log cabin

ages ago (read: many, many months ago), i mentioned i was working on making a bunch of liberated log cabin style quilt blocks, done in the vein of quilter gwen marston. the method i used is detailed in marston's book, liberated quiltmaking II.
anyway, i made over one hundred of said log cabin blocks, with the intention of making a wall hanging of some sort, as well as a queen-size quilt, and then using the remainder for experimentation (table runners? potholders? pillows? art? something else??). all the blocks are made using solid-colored scraps of silk, cotton, cotton corduroy, and cotton/poly that were languishing in my stash.
the first of those intentions to be realized was the wall hanging, which is shown above. it's roughly 3 feet x 3 feet, dimentions-wise. the back has a sleeve for hanging; i'm in the process of finding a nice rod with which to hang it from. i jerry-rigged this up on to the wall of my studio with masking tape in order to snap a photo. :)
the quilt is merely machine stitched-in-the-ditch; when it comes to quilting in a more complicated manner than that, i'm (currently) pretty lost. so i'm keeping it simple. it's pretty much straight-line quilting for me at this juncture (this being, like, my 3rd finished quilt-like project ever). i'd love to learn how to stipple and have it look nice! just need to get more practice, probably...?
overall, i'm pretty darn happy with it. making the liberated quilt blocks is tremendously easy, and wickedly addictive. making each little block feels like one is making a little piece of art. putting them all together is a nice exercise in and of itself; one gets to fiddle around with and observe the interplay/balance of colors featured within. it was easy to just let go and let the piece come together intuitively.
(if you're so inclined, you can peep at some close-ups of the quilt here, here and here.)