Skip to main content

October 2 - Blog's First Birthday

My first ever blog post took place on October 2, 2011.  The main motivation behind starting a blog was to use it to record photos of the projects I completed in a way that will allow me to find them.  Simply adding a folder in my electronic photo storage device was not good enough because it was hard to search.  I didn't label the photos very well and didn't link whatever pattern I used to the photo.  In addition I thought in some small way the blog might be a record of me.  Since this is a public space perhaps someday my children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren might enjoy remembering me through my writing.  Maybe?  Were these goals too lofty, perhaps, but I don't regret for a moment having started down this path.



Excluding this post there have been a total 133 posts with 5,894 pageviews as of October 1, 2012.  The most popular post is "The Dachshund" with 594 pageviews (Really it is because people are searching for badger).  Then "U900's Rabbit U" with 64 pageviews (Quite a drop!  This is due to the fact there's a band named U900, I'm sure).  The month with the most pageviews was September 2012 with 789 (because after the incident I sent people the link to figure out what I did), followed by January 2012 with 785 (beats me), May with 679 and July 582.

A wide variety of search engines have brought people to this blog, and as I reviewed the sources I have found new engines to use myself, like Stumbleupon and Pinterest.

Google Analytics tells me people from all over the world have checked into this little blog.  Here's a table with the top 10 countries.
    • Canada -- 2,404 (all pageviews) Way to go Oh Canada~~or is that too ostentatious?
    • United States -- 1,996
    • Brazil -- 499
    • Russia -- 479
    • United Kingdom -- 133
    • Germany, Latvia, Australia, Malaysia and Spain all less than 100
So to celebrate this first anniversary I've changed up the look of the blog (again). There's a simple knitted background, a crisper black, white and red-orange (or is it orange-red) colour theme.  I like that the archives, followers and blogs I'm following are all available on demand as it were, on the right side of the screen along with the search function for the blog.  I think this more sleek and classic look is likely to be one I can stick with for more than a handful of months.

Additionally I've added a couple of new pages including my own personal WIPs with photos of how the designers expect the finish products to look.  There will be a few WIPs I won't share because they are gifts, so rest assured the WIPs list will never be all inclusive.   Then I've added the list of over 45 knitting and crochet books/booklets/pamphlets I own.  This list is more for me than you; hopefully I'll avoid duplicating books I already own.   I'm satisfied still after a year that this is another right venue for me to create in addition to the knitting I do.  Thanks for looking in and for your continued support. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Anatomy of a Sock

I've been knitting socks for a relatively short time.  One of the disconcerting things for me as I started following patterns for socks is the pattern designer assumes the knitter (in this case that would be me) knows all the parts of a sock.  So I thought I'd devote a post to improve my own knowledge about the anatomy of a sock and maybe some of you will learn something about the humble yet necessary sock as well. Here's the names of the parts of the foot as I know them. #49 ankle, #50 heel, #51, instep, #52 ball, #53 big toe, #54 toe, #55 little toe, #56 toenail. There are some parts more important for this discussion; first the heel of a foot is generally used to refer to the entire C-shape from the ankle to the instep.  Speaking of the instep, it refers to that curve near the bottom of the foot.  And what seems to be missing in the design above is the sole which generally refers to the bottom of the foot in total or plantar aspect in more technical terms...

Yarn Barf

It's back to quirkiness and time to step away again from the cuteness for a while.  But as you see I'm someone who slips from one to the other without much effort so anticipate this back and forth to be my new normal. A dramatization of me in the midst of my startitist frenzy Yarn barf .  I'm willing to bet you hadn't thought of putting those two words together, had you?  It just so happens yarn barf can be a reoccurring pain for those of us who use yarns that come in a skein instead of a hank.  (No pun intended regarding the current Noro virus, well maybe a little pun.) Skeins of yarn wound by the manufacturer These are hanks which need to be wound into balls  If you look closely at the picture on the right you'll see the start on the millet yellow skein at the centre right of the photo.  Its start can easily be seen coming from the centre of the skein onto the violet skein to the left.  Easy to find, right! ...

Knitting-Related Guinness World Records

I had to share some of the Guinness World Records connected with knitting.  It is amazing to me the type of skill, stamina and unique characteristics these record holders have in common. How about trying to knit with these SPNs?? Ingrid Wagner and her large needles and knitted swatch The largest knitting needles measured 3.5 m (11 ft 5.8 in) long and had a diameter of 8 cm (3.15 in). Ingrid Wagner, a rug and art creation artist, from the UK used the needles to knit a tension square of ten stitches by ten rows at the Metro Radio Arena, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, on March, 10 2008.  (And I complained about getting certain SPNs stuck in my clothes.)  See how this swatch was done with merely 5 people managing the needles.  And what about the yarn?  It is truly ex-bulky.  It looks like they're knitting in a warehouse, but with a wingspan of almost 24 feet or 7 m, you'd need all that space.  Or h...