This Is My Secret: The Blog and Website of Writer Kristin Cashore

For those of you who read my blog posts via Twitter, sorry if I've been flooding you with old posts. The feed I used to use (Twitterfeed) is shutting down soon, so I've had to start a new feed (dlvr.it). I'm pretty sure it re-posted a lot of stuff right away. Apologies, too, if new posts tweet twice for a few days. I want to make sure the new feed is 100% working before I cancel the old feed.

So, I knitted someone a blanket last Christmas. It was my first ever non-washcloth knitting project and it was a massive undertaking, not to mention a great success.

And after I gave the blanket to its intended recipient... I missed it. :o)

So I decided to make a blanket for myself, slowly. I'm knitting 63 individual squares, each lined in black crochet. Here's where I am so far...


Most of the squares have a simple pattern of vanishing squares.

But some of the squares are specialer.




I'm honestly not sure how much I like it. It's sort of like a book; until I finish it …

Season 3 of The Great British Baking Show (known as The Great British Bake Off in Britain) was my favorite yet. I cried through the Final (in a good way). Here is the chocolate well created by a contestant in Episode 9...


...with a bucket that drops to the bottom to collect liquid white chocolate for dipping the biscuits in.


The judges told the contestant (whose name I'm not saying because it would be a spoiler) that it needed more decoration, frills, and furbelows.  Dear judges: Wrong.

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At Reuters: France defends burkini ban on tense post-attack beaches. Wow, does this make my blood boil. Dear French officials: Stop telling women to uncover their bodies and calling it feminism. Stop telling women what to wear, period, and calling it feminism. Racism, misogyny, and religious intolerance are especially disgusting when you claim to be doing it on behalf of these women, who will now not be able to go to the beach.

***

In better French news, at The Guardian: How a 3-D clitoris will…

So, the movers are coming tomorrow, and though I'm surrounded by exquisite disarray, I feel this is the moment to blog pictures (taken by Kevin) of a very special (perhaps even magical) hat. Because now is the time to celebrate beautiful things. :o)

My regular readers know that I knit. Well, my mother knits on the superwoman level.

She made me this hat.


Look at the hearts, the intricate designs that went into the making of this hat…

The adorable tassel.

Furthermore, it's some sort of special Scandinavian double hat, basically knitted as two continuous hats that you shove one inside the other, and actually quadrupled around the ears, not to mention that it is made of Icelandic wool, all of which means that I will never be cold again. But also, the first time I sat with the hat (which my mother had given me without comment), examining and appreciating it, I found myself wondering whether she had knitted any fancy designs into the inside hat.

So I pulled the inside part out…

…

A few links for your Monday...

Jon Almeda at Almeda Pottery makes the teeniest, tiniest stuff on his teeny potter's wheel. Here's his Instagram. Ack! So beautiful. (Thanks Alison!) ETA: Here's a gorgeous collection of pictures at Bored Panda.

In a similar vein, Althea Crome at Bugknits knits with needles sometimes practically as thin as a human hair. Her miniature knitting galleries are so much fun to peruse. Teeny, tiny knitting art! (Again, h/t Alison! ^_^)

The theme of the 2016 Met Gala was Manus x Machina and the clothing choices were appropriate. For example, Karolina Kurkova wore a "cognitive dress" with LED lights, the colors of which changed in real-time depending on the moods of users commenting on the gala via Twitter. Here are a whole lot of pictures (collected at the Huffington Post) of people dressed up for the gala.

I really liked reading Andi Zeisler's opinion piece in the Washington Post, "You can wear high heels and be a feminist. But pl…

I also found a new home. I'm moving! (To the next town over.) Cambridge, I love you and I'll miss you. But you're too expensive, and also, you're LOUD.

May all the goodness continue... though I wouldn't complain of a slower pace.

And that's the news from here.

I haven't been able to find any online Weeping Angel patterns that satisfy me, so I'm making my own angel up as I go along. This will be a loooong washcloth. Assuming the additional white yarn I've ordered arrives soon, I think it will say "DON'T BLINK" at the very bottom. It might not end up being the most artistic of the washcloths, but it will be a true original. Here it is at about maybe 2/3 of its final length (we'll see!).


You can help supply refugees with necessities by bidding for the washcloths -- and other fun and useful things -- at the Writing for Charity Refugee Benefit Auction!

What is the author knitting?














So here's the thing: I have the coolest friends. Recently, a friend who was about to undergo a double mastectomy told me about Knitted Knockers, which are soft, comfortable knitted prosthetic breasts. Did you know that silicone breast prosthetics are hot, heavy, and expensive, and can't be worn until weeks after surgery? Knitted prosthetics, on the other hand, are soft, light, and pretty, and, thanks to the organizers at knittedknockers.org and a lot of volunteer knitters, they're free for anyone who needs them. I just checked out the order page on the website, and there's a drop-down menu that seems to allow for every country, so I think the organization provides these worldwide! Check out this website, it's the coolest thing. And if you're a knitter, all the resources are there for you to knit them yourself. The website accepts donations of money and of knitted prosthetics.

if you're an inexperienced knitter and find this proj…