Dice Bags for Days

You already know that I have a thing for yarn, but you know what else is super fun and alluring to collect massive piles of?

That would be dice, my friends.

D&D entered my life 4 or 5 years ago and I fell absolutely in love. And like everything I get into, I fell in hard. 

Minis, maps, rulebooks, supplemental guides... I started hoarding it all. But of all the accessories that go along with D&D, dice quickly became my newest addiction.

The beautiful little bastards are little candy colored gems of temptation. You start with just one of two sets and next thing you know you basically need a small suitcase to hold them all.

Unless, of course, you are a knitter. Then you get to make your own dice bags. 

Almost a year ago, John, Vi, Bethany and I started playing our own D&D game. And like a good DM, I provide for my players. So I dutifully made everyone their own dice bag. 

I think I may have even posted about them here before. 

I assumed that one bag each would be enough to tide everyone over for awhile, even though I myself already needed multiple.

I had what I referred to as my DM Dice Bag that held all of the sets I use when I run the game. (Those are the ones pictured above) But I am also playing as a character in our campaign, so I HAD to have a bag to hold all of my sets specifically for my character.

Oh, you wanted to see the dice, too?

My character has a fire and water thing going on, so all of her sets reflect that.

Aren't they gorgeous?

Anyway, as I was dealing with my own minor dice addiction, I didn't realize just how far down the polyhedral hole Bethany had fallen down. She commissioned me for two more bags, one of which was delivered last year. But the other I had to postpone until after Christmas, which she kindly was okay with.

So, I'm counting fulfilling that promise as my Knit or Get Off the Pot project for February.

..................

Oh, you want pictures of the bag?

Well...

...That's about the best I can do.

I kinda maybe sort-of perhaps... forgot...to...take...pictures.

But I can assure you that Bethany is quite happy with it!

And I may or may not have immediately cast on, knit, bound-off, washed, and blocked another one for myself in the 6 hours that followed finishing hers. 

Okay, I know! But listen! I have SPECIAL DICE that needed their own bag!

And I had some VERY SPECIAL pom-poms that needed something amazing to use them on!

So I made myself this.

And now it's hanging out all happy and content with my other bags.

What's that? The lil bag there in the front? Well, that's the dice bag that I made to hold the dice I use for my character's crow companion.

Heck, I think I even shared it here before. But what I didn't share before were the INCREDIBLY ADORABLE AND TINY DICE I HAVE FOR HIM!

To give you an idea of size, a normal d20 is about the width of a quarter.

These...

...Are just a wee bit smaller.

I have discovered a bit of a problem with these bags, though.

They're just too damn fun and easy to make.

Because I have ANOTHER one to show you, this time one I made for Emmy. That I knit right after finishing mine. 

And I *may or may not* have another one on the needles...

For me...

Just to put all my green dice in...

IT'S NOT AN ADDICTION, I SWEAR!

In other knitting news, I had the absolute pleasure of blocking this FUCKING MAGNIFICENT BEADED PIECE OF WITCHCRAFT for Mikayla.

It's so pretty and wonderful and I am just agog at how many beads went into it.

As for myself, I have been working on the ceremony shawl over the last few days. My beads finally came in, so I felt like I should actually get going on it.

I bought two different types of beads, assuming that I'd just decide which one to actually use when they got here.

You know what happened. 

I love both of them so much that I am using both.

The shawl itself is not even a fifth of the way through and it's already over a foot in diameter. 

This thing is going to be a damn cape by the end of this.

Guess I should get back to it.

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False Pretenses

When Vi had asked me if I'd like to go to Harps and Thistles, I thought everything was on the level. It was just going to be a nice day out with a friend.

I made myself up all pretty, even deciding to wear my Ashton shawl, and headed up, completely oblivious to shenanigans happening in my home.

I found some absolutely stunning grey yarn to use for the Boo Knits MKAL I'm planning on doing next month.

Seriously, I need some better pictures. I can't even describe how it actually looks in person.

Anyway, Vi and I stopped for lunch and then headed back home where I walked in to see...

...my entire dining room decorated in a dungeon(!!!) theme for my birthday.

THESE ASSHOLES ACTUALLY MANAGED TO PULL ONE OVER ON ME AND I'M SO ANGRY AND HAPPY AND ANNOYED AND EMOTIONAL!

We chilled out for the rest of the day, playing games and just hanging out.

It was perfect and wonderful. The best way to leave 27 behind.

So thank you, you giant nerds, for such a great day.

Also, remember this when we have our next D&D session this Thursday.

I foresee some revenge...

A Fade-bled Project

Some patterns tend to take the knitting world by storm. The Bee Keeper's Quilt, Hitchiker, Wingspan, Jaywalker Socks... all things that everyone seemed to be casting on at once in the thousands.

In late 2016/early 2017 THE THING to be knitting was a shawl known as Find Your Fade. Minimal lace work, almost no purling, absolutely massive, AND it was written using 7 different colors. Dyers everywhere started making Fade kits in droves and ravelry was just filled with people's projects.

At the time, I didn't really want to make one. It didn't really appeal to me. Not to mention the very real concern that my loose knitting would mean I'd end up with a finished object that would better be served as a sail rather than a shawl. So I gave it a hard pass.

Well, until this year at least.

After finishing Mojito and wanting to sob from all the intricacy, I needed something plain to soothe my poor battered soul. I started pulling skeins out, looking for inspiration, and loved the idea of using a bunch of colors, but didn't want to do actual color work. My brain snapped to Fade and I decided why the hell not.

It was intended to be a long-term, travel project. Instead, it became the only thing I wanted to work on. I was also deep into planning for the D&D campaign and my character ( a tiefling bard named Aralith) had a whole fire and water thing going for her, so this shawl quickly became Aralith's shawl.

It took me quite a while to finish it, as I've said in a previous post. But last Wednesday (at 3 in the morning, mind you) I finished my bind-off and finally laid Fade out.

And...

Well....

I'll just let the photos speak for themselves.

When I measured it before blocking, it was already 112 inches wide.

I really shouldn't have been all that surprised since I really should have been using something like a size 2 needle instead of my usual 4's.

But could you imagine doing a large scale fingering weight project on the knitting equivalent to toothpicks?

Blocking itself was a total nightmare, with nothing going right, and a frustrating lack of room. It was the closest I ever came to having a total meltdown and just throwing a whole damn project out.

It's final measurement was a whopping 12 feet and 8 inches wide.

At first, I was angry and upset and just so damn frustrated. How the bloody hell was I supposed to wear this thing?! But as I kept playing around with it, draping it in different ways, I figured out exactly what this was.

This was FUN.

Listen, this thing is absolutely ridiculous. It's never going to function as a "proper" shawl. But it IS just so dang enjoyable to toss around me in various dramatic ways.

It's great for tossing around multiple people, too. Especially ones you like to snuggle with.

And I just absolutely ADORE the way all of the colors work together.

Especially because this shawl was 5/7ths stash yarn.

It also fits my character perfectly, but alas, I can't say too much since my party reads my blog.

So thank you, Fade, for being as ridiculous and over-the-top as your creator.

Stars know we could use some levity in our lives right now.

P.S. Isn't my new letter board totally awesome?! I can't wait for the various shenanigans that the possibilities of this board holds.

Creatively Untitled: A List Post Project

Do you know what D&D actually stands for?

That would be Dead and Devoid of all energy.

It's been taking up so much of my time and energy over these past two- wait, no three... yeah, three  months (we took that long for character creation, one-on-one starter sessions, and me personally working on the campaign setting) that I really haven't been focusing on much else. But we finally, FINALLY have started and from how well things are going, I think I'll be able to take a breather and  actually work on other things alongside this.

So, to get y'all caught up....

LIST POST TIME

*confetti cannons here*

1. First, let's talk about my knitting.

My intention was to have this finished in time to wear to the Destination Yarn open house later this month. Especially because this shawl would feature two different DY colors. 

But after doing the math and having a heart-to-heart with myself... well, for the first time ever, I'm not going to finish a shawl in time to meet my deadline.

I'm surprisingly okay with it. It had to happen at some point and I'd rather it be something that was more of a "this would be nice" thing than a "OH MY GOD THIS RUINS EVERYTHING" sort of deal.

2. I ended up making another moth.

She's quite a bit bigger than my first one. And yes, she does look a little like the Centipeedle in Steven Universe. It was unintentional at first, but as I went along, she kind of grew into it. 

I adore her and she now lives on my lovely new shelf along with my other plushies.

3. I made a mini dice bag for my miniature dice that I use for my crow companion for my character.

Yes, I know that the yarn obscures the cables, but I REALLY wanted to use only scraps for this. It's made mostly with the teeny little bit of yarn I had leftover from Polar Bear in a Snowstorm.

4. We ended up taking both Bethany and Vi with us to Origins last month and it was so much more fun like that. I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves.

5. I'm SUPER friggin proud of this crow painting I did for Lily.

6.  John and I actually did something crafty TOGETHER!

These are traveler's journals we made. And I do mean "we." He did almost all the work on his own! My little crafty goddess heart nearly burst with joy.

7. I've been meeting real life mothy friends and I couldn't be happier. 

8. We've been playing Pokemon Go again. Vi and I have been painting the town yellow.

9. It's actually been a few days since I've started writing this and I'm now on the 5th color of my Fade shawl.

10. I may or may not be planning out the yarn for like a dozen more of these.

11. Yes, that's highly unusual.

12. No, I DON'T know what the hell is wrong with me.

13. And I TOTALLY didn't go off my cold sheep personal pledge and buy another skein of Rios just because the colors were singing to me.

14. NOPE NOPE NOPE TOTALLY DIDN'T

15. 

16. ..............................

17. Damnit...