Adventures in Pattern Writing: Episode 3, Perfectionism Rears Its Ugly Head (Again)

I'm what you might call a selective perfectionist. Some things I can just slap together and not care, but when it comes to knitting, I'll redo, redo, redo until I'm happy with the results.

While this tendency can product some particularly excellent results, but it also has been the cause of massive amounts of frustration, and copious amounts of inappropriate, foul, colorful language.

After finally conquering inserting my charts from Microsoft Excel into Word, I started working on importing all of the heel charts (numbers 0 to 9) into the pattern. Then I looked at my Matthews jersey, hanging on the drying rack, I looked at the 52, I looked at the charts for the 5 and 2, I looked back at the 52, back at the charts. They didn't look the same.

Sure, the 5 and 2 I charted looked like a 5 and a 2, but not like the ones on the jersey. The numbers on the jersey were, blockier, had more straight edges. At that point, I already knew what was coming, but I fought it for awhile. Maybe it was the jersey's problem, not mine. I decided to compare the numbers on my Rodgers jersey (yes, mom, MY Rodgers jersey). Again, my charted 1 and 2 looked like a 1 and a 2, but not like the ones on the jersey. Crap.

The Original Five

I wasn't ready to face reality just quite yet, though. Clearly, I must own two faulty jerseys, so I dug out Husband's jersey, and the dog's jersey. Nope, the numbers were consistent from jersey to jersey and not the same as the ones on my socks.

Once again, I fought the inevitable. It wasn't really going to matter, I told myself. No one is going to look at the numbers on the heels of these socks and point out that they are not shaped exactly like the numbers on the players' jerseys. What kind of person notices that sort of thing? Most likely no one would ever know, and if they know, it is even more likely that no one would ever care.

Edited Five

Except for me. I would know. And I cared. And I knew what I had to do.

I printed out ten blank heel charts. Then I went to the Packer's website to find pictures of jerseys, and I recharted all of the numbers. And the process started all over again, hand drawing, charting in Excel, cutting and pasting (using Paste Special, at least I remember that) into Word.

And, I'm glad I did it. Otherwise it would have bothered me, and I would have ended up doing it at some point anyway. We all know I'm crazy like that.

In other news, the knitting on the Spatterdash fingerless gloves is done and I was lucky enough to find buttons for them. I just need to block, weave in ends, and assemble. Yay!

Adventures in Pattern Writing: Episode 2, Cue the Panic

Who'd of guessed that these socks
would cause so much trouble?

If you follow my blog regularly, or if you browse back through some past posts, you know that last July, I designed and made a pair of Green Bay Packer socks for her birthday. Ever since they came off the needles, I have been meaning to transfer the pattern from scribbled notes and crude graphs into an actual pattern, usuable by someone not residing inside my head.


Last November, I finally took the time to convert the graphs from paper and pencil drawings to an Excel spreadsheet. I then converted one of the graphs into jpeg form, to make it easier to insert into my finished pattern. and promptly allowed myself to become distracted by something else (I'm hoping it was at least something shiney).


About a month ago, during a very slow day at the Motor bank, while my co-worker was shopping online, I took my notes and typed them into an almost readable format. And by "almost" I mean, the basic instructions typed into a Word document with notes like "insert instructions for heel  here," "probably should figure out the actual stitches and rows per inch," "Chart A to go here," and "find a better way to word this" scattered throughout the pattern. At least I had all the pattern pieces were saved now.


Or so I thought.


The other day, I sat down to finally try to put all the pieces together, and went to pull up my charts. They weren't on my laptop, or my desktop, or my thumb drive, or my other thumb drive.


Cue the panic. I wasn't even sure if I still had the paper verisions. Was I going to have to start all over on these charts. I mined through my previous posts to see if maybe, just maybe, I had posted all of the charts on my blog.




The one chart I could find.

 Nope. Just the heel chart. Okay, well, at least I had a method to retrieve the heel chart. That was something. Then it occured to me, last fall there was a stretch of time when the screen of my laptop was out of commission, and I used my old laptop. Maybe, possibly, hopefully the charts were saved on there.


So, I dug out the old laptop, and the charger and let the machine charge while I went into work. I got home, booted up the machine, and, thankfully, the Excel file with the charts was safely saved.


Thank you. But the fun wasn't over yet.


I only had the files saved as Excel sheets, and inserted them directly into the Word document using copy and paste was creating all sorts of trouble for me, charts extending over several pages, distortions. And of course, for the life of me, I couldn't remember how I did the last time.


After some research (and cursing), I did figure it out. I think I actually used a different method this time, but seeing as it worked just fine, I'm not going to fret about it. The charts, in both Excel and picture format are now safely stored on my laptop, and my desktop, and both my thumb drives.


And, in case future me ever desperately returns to this post, wondering how I managed to convert the stupid Excel cells into a much more Word (and pattern) friendly image, here's what I did:


From Excel, highlight the cells you need and click copy.


Go into the Word document, select Edit, and choose the "Paste Special..." option. This gives you the choice if you want to paste the chart as an Excel spreadsheet or as an image (or some other ones). So simple, why on Earth did this cause me so much stress?


Now, future self, go buy me a beer for all the stress and time I just saved you. And stay tuned for Episode Three of Adventures in Pattern Writing, where I attempt to put everything together.

Adventures in Pattern Writing: Episode 1, Chart It!

Last summer, I tried my hand at designing a pair of socks. They were Green Bay Packer Socks knit for my mother's birthday. While there are several things that I would change about them, overall I considered the whole undertaking to be a success. The socks were such a huge hit with my mom, she has already requested more!


However, despite the socks being such a huge hit, I still haven't gotten around to actually writing down the pattern (though I have gotten several requests for it). My notes and hand drawn charts were placed in a pile and left to sit.


Today, I noticed that the pieces of my pattern notes were getting scattered around the house, and I realized that it would be only a matter of time before either the whole pattern or several key pieces were destroyed or go missing. I came to the decision that I needed to sit down and actually write out the pattern.


Now, because on good days, I have the attention span of a gnat, I know that the best way to take on any large project is to take little baby steps. To decide on where to start, I considered what would be the biggest pain to reverse engineer in the event that pieces of the pattern are lost or destroyed? With that question, the answer was clear, the charts.


On these particular socks, there are several pieces that I charted out, the Go Pack Go band around the top of the leg, the numbers on the heel flaps, and the large G on the top of the foot. 


First, I did a little research on the easiest way to make charts on the computer. After looking at several methods, I decided to use Microsoft Excel for charts. It is easier to add and delete rows using Excel, and the charts can then be cut and pasted into Microsoft Word when I start on the final pattern. The next step will be converting the Word document into a pdf file (there's probably no real need for this, I just prefer my patterns in pdf form), but that can't be too hard, right?


Now, non-knitters may not know this, but knit stitches are slightly wider than they are tall (if you look at the pictures really closely and know what you are looking for, you can see this), so I needed figure out what sizes to use for the cells. I ended up making the cells 15 pixels wide by 10 pixels tall, giving me a 3:2 ratio, which should work pretty well. After re-sizing the cells, I then turned on the border for each cell and was ready to start charting.


I started with the leg band, mainly because that was the one chart I didn't want to make any changes to. It went pretty quickly, so I was able to move onto the chart for the top of the foot. I knew I wanted to make the G look a little less jagged around the edges and a little more symmetrical. I started with the original chart in the spreadsheet, and made changes, square by square until I was happy with the result. 

The original heels needed some more work.

The heel flaps made me a little more nervous, as I was making big changes to that piece of the sock. I wanted to switch from a heel flap to a short row heel, which would change the entire shape of the available stitches from a rectangle to a triangle (upside down triangle, in case you are trying to picture it). Like with the top of the foot, I figured the best thing to do would be to block out my available stitches.


From that point, I decided what size to make the numbers. During this process, I had to consider the triangular shape I was working in, and the fact the the numbers on the original ended up being too low. 

One of the revamped heel charts.

I ended up settling on 8 squares wide by 14 squares high (though I will actually have to knit another pair to be sure that this size will work).  I took these figures and went back to my paper and pencil. It took awhile until I was happy with the way the numbers looked, but it was worth it to get the finished charts saved in Excel.


There is still lots more work to do to get the pattern written. Plus, after writing the entire pattern, I want to make another pair, following the revamped pattern to see how those turn out. But I am really hoping that at some point I will be able to post an entire knitting pattern on this sight for others to use. 

Lucky Socks 13-0 Baby!



A seeminly typical pair of socks

This weekend was the first Packer/Viking game of the season. Because it was in Minnesota, our token Viking fan friend, Terry was allowed to host it. After work, I was changing and noticed that my socks were still wet (after being washed out in the sink the night before, but that's another ball of wax). I certainly wasn't going to wear wet socks, and I never tumble dry hand knit socks, so I did the next logical thing, put them in the oven to dry.


Yup, in the oven, at 350, for about five minutes per side.


Now that may seem like a lot of work just for a pair of socks, but these are no ordinary socks. These are lucky, seemingly magical Green Bay Packers socks. On game days, I get facebook messages from friends and family to ensure that they are on my feet.


I thought some of those friends and family might be unfamiliar with the humble beginnings of the lucky socks.


They weren't intended to be anything special. The yarn wasn't bought with the Packers in mind, it is Knit Picks Stroll, in a colorway called Turtle Multi, which they don't even make anymore and isn't even that good of a representation of Green Bay's team colors. The pattern is Nagini (named after Lord Voldemort's snake companion) by Monkey Toes. A pattern named after a snake seemed appropriate for a variegated green with a little yellow colorway. In short, they were just another pair of socks.


I was working on them during a Packer game last season, and my mom made an offhand comment that they would make good Packer socks. Figuring shades of green and yellow were close enough, I finished them and wore them to the next game. The Packers were playing the Giants and needed to win the next two games to make the playoffs.


They won the game. As a result, I wore the socks for the next game, and the Packers won. I kept wearing the socks on game day and the Packers kept winning, six games in a row, through the playoffs, to the Superbowl. The socks were deemed lucky and safely tucked away until football started up once again.

The non-oven drying method.

I didn't break out the lucky socks until the regular season started up again. But the pattern continued, when the socks were on, the Packers won. Going into the bye week, my socks have seen 13 Packer victories, and 0 Packer losses. I'm not sure how they manage it, but the facts are in.


Skeptics may say that I should not wear the socks one game day and test the theory. However, I cannot imagine that there is a true Packer fan in the world willing to take that chance. My husband certainly isn't, he was the one that insisted I wear wool socks in 70 plus degrees.


Now, if only I could get the socks on the Packer's payroll. League minimum would be just fine, they don't need a fancy contract or a signing bonus. Anyone have the number?

Go Pack!