knitting while black

Home of #knittingwhileblack, spotlighting the stories of black knitters/crocheters/spinners/dyers. This is meant to be a safe space so if you need something tagged don't hesitate to let me know.

[knitblr]

If you only write patterns up to a size XL and never go any bigger, you’re not a good designer.

Come at me. I said it.

[sosuperawesome]

Amanita Mushroom Mugs, Bowls and Plates, Oil Bottles and Salt and Pepper Shakers, by Vanda Valerie on Etsy

[canadianmomcrochets]

Oh so pretty! 😉

[fuzzy-flirt]

Last min baby shower gift

[plutoblk]

Me, avoiding Black Panther spoilers until I see it Sunday

[misfitgee-deactivated20190317]

LMAOO

[lazy-vegetarian]

Kindness is Everything by Jaala Spiro (free pattern on Ravelry)

[npr]

Finland Takes Olympic Chill To The Next Level: Team Knitting

During the weekend's slopestyle competition, Finnish snowboarding coach Antti Koskinen was casually knitting at the top of the course.

[argonauticae]

Things That People Have Said To Me Since I Started Working In A Yarn Shop

“i need more of the rowan felted tweed, i’m making some first-world-war balaclavas and i’ve run out”

“i’m making my husband an x-files themed jumper for christmas and i can’t find a good colour for the spaceship”

“do you have any wool/acrylic blends on sale, i’m making hats for the seamen’s mission to give to sailors and i know they say to use acrylics because they’re cheap but it gets awfully cold at sea and i worry”

“i need some black wool for gloves, but it has to be flame-proof because i’m making them for the beltane fire-jugglers”

“could you see if you have another copy of this pattern for a baby shawl, i’ve knitted it in different colours for all of my six children and twelve grandchildren but it’s started to fall apart a bit"

[from a blond, six-foot surfer dude] “yeah, do you have any really light needles, i’m going backpacking around argentina and i want to do some socks while i’m on the coach but there isn’t much room in my rucksack”

“which of these colours do you think would be best for a knitted corgi”

“do you have any patterns for dog hats”

[argonauticae]

like honestly you don’t even understand how happy this makes me, like half the time these women are really self-deprecating about it - “oh this is probably a really silly question”, “you’re going to think this is really weird but -” - and i’m just like no!! this is amazing!!! yes, we do have patterns for dog hats!!! please tell me all about why you’re knitting a dog hat!!!! 

and i mean, some of the stuff they make is unbelievable. there’s one lady who knits wedding-ring shawls, these enormous lace shawls they do on shetland that’re about six feet across and made out of yarn that’s basically thread, which you can pull through a wedding ring because they’re so fine. and there’s another lady who knits dolls about three inches tall and she’s like eighty and she’s done maybe two thousand of them and i found this out yesterday when she came in for a pattern for an entire knitted nativity scene, including the animals and the star. and there’s all the ladies who knit clothes to donate to the refugees and tiny, tiny clothes for premature or stillborn babies at the maternity unit and hats for the seamen’s mission and jumpers for the homeless, and all the ladies making this incredible stuff for their friends or their relatives or just because they feel like it, and it’s just, they’re my favourite, every single one of these people is my favourite

[marybegone]

lovely.

[fannishknits]

9 Tips for Knitting Stranded Colorwork Socks - Interweave

Stranded colorwork is the knitter’s version of painting by number—and just as simple. It's a great way to add patterning to your knit socks.

[knitting-while-black]

Hi my dears this is my son James! He is the kindest, sweetest dude I know. A loving big brother and friend he always does his best to help people smile but he is dealing with a pretty difficult situation. James’ dad is struggling with mental health issues and it is deeply impacting their relationship. As a single mother I am doing what I can but I think a big show of love could help bring his smile back to its full brightness.

If you would like to help just take a picture near your most famous landmark with the following message:

“James, Mommy’s love for you is so big it has reached all the way to (your country/state/province)!”

You can tag the pic or submit it and once I’ve received 50 I’ll be making him a book. If you don’t want to take a pic a signal boost is also appreciated.

[talesofthestarshipregeneration]

My ’70s Health-Nut Parents Didn’t  Vaccinate Me. This Is What My Childhood Was Like.

I am the ’70s child of a health nut. I wasn’t vaccinated. I was brought up on an incredibly healthy diet: no sugar till I was 1, breastfed for over a year, organic homegrown vegetables, raw milk, no MSG, no additives, no aspartame. My mother used homeopathy, aromatherapy, osteopathy; we took daily supplements of vitamin C, echinacea, cod liver oil.I had an outdoor lifestyle; I grew up next to a farm in England’s Lake District, walked everywhere, did sports and danced twice a week, drank plenty of water. I wasn’t even allowed pop; even my fresh juice was watered down to protect my teeth, and I would’ve killed for white, shop-bought bread in my lunchbox once in a while and biscuits instead of fruit, like all the other kids.We ate (organic local) meat maybe once or twice a week, and my mother and father cooked everything from scratch—I have yet to taste a Findus crispy pancake, and oven chips (“fries,” to Americans) were reserved for those nights when Mum and Dad had friends over and we got a “treat.”As healthy as my lifestyle seemed, I contracted measles, mumps, rubella, a type of viral meningitis, scarlatina, whooping cough, yearly tonsillitis, and chickenpox. In my 20s I got precancerous HPV and spent six months of my life wondering how I was going to tell my two children under the age of 7 that Mummy might have cancer before it was safely removed.So the anti-vaccine advocates’ fears of having the “natural immunity sterilized out of us” just doesn’t cut it for me. How could I, with my idyllic childhood and my amazing health food, get so freaking ill all the time? … My two vaccinated children, on the other hand, have rarely been ill, have had antibiotics maybe twice in their lives, if that. Not like their mum. I got many illnesses requiring treatment with antibiotics. I developed penicillin-resistant quinsy at age 21—you know, that old-fashioned disease that supposedly killed Queen Elizabeth I and that was almost wiped out through use of antibiotics.*

[ladymarianor]

“If you think your child’s immune system is strong enough to fight off vaccine-preventable diseases, then it’s strong enough to fight off the tiny amounts of dead or weakened pathogens present in any of the vaccines.”

[allydsgn]

jesus, take this as a warning protect yourselves please. please vaccinate!

[dalishwolfhound]

#secretmessage 😉

[knitforbrains]

Love it 🏳️‍🌈

[deleted653589793238-deactivated]

Holy shit

[the-movemnt-deactivated20170912]

Artist Daniel Rarela creates “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” memes to stop people from whitewashing MLK

follow @the-movemnt

[rabbitgoblin]

fucked up how cooking and baking from scratch is viewed as a luxury…..like baking a loaf of bread or whatever is seen as something that only people with money/time can do. I’m not sure why capitalism decided to sell us the idea that we can’t make our own damn food bc it’s a special expensive thing that’s exclusive to wealthy retirees but it’s stupid as hell and it makes me angry

[rabbitgoblin]

bread takes like max 4 ingredients counting water and sure it takes a couple hours but 80% of that is just waiting around while it does the thing and you can do other things while it’s rising/baking plus im not gonna say baking cured my depression bc it didn’t but man is it hard to feel down when you’re eating slices of fresh bread you just made yourself. feels like everything’s gonna be a little more ok than you thought. it’s good.

[pluckedanarchist]

bread is amazing and it’s also been sold to us as something really hard to make? Every time I tell someone I made a loaf of bread I get reactions like “you made it yourself???” and “do you have a bread machine then?” I haven’t touched a bread machine in probably 10 years. You CAN make your own bread, folks, and it’s actually pretty cheap to do so. I believe the most expensive thing I needed for it was the jar of yeast. It was about $6 at the grocery store and lasted me MONTHS (just keep it in the fridge.) The packets are even cheaper. destroy capitalism. bake your own bread.

[boonbucks-city-beach]

You can also make your own yeast by making a sourdough starter, so that cuts cost even more.

But you have to feed the starter daily/weekly and that means it grows quickly, but there are tons of recipes online for what to do with your excess starter. Cookies, pretzels, crackers, pancakes, waffles, you name it!!

[unbossed-deactivated20251218]

Here’s a link to The Home Baking Association’s site. It has recipes and tips.

[petermorwood]

Make it even easier - “No-Knead Bread”. All YOU do is mix the ingredients together and wait until it’s time to heat the oven. The yeast does all the rest.

Here’s @dduane​’s first take on it and the finished product. We’ve made even more photogenic batches since.

Kneading is easy as well; either let your machine do it, or if you don’t want to or don’t have one, get hands-on. It’s like mixing two colours of Plasticine to make a third. Flatten, stretch, fold, half-turn, repeat - it takes about 10 minutes - until the gloopy conglomeration of flour, yeast, salt and water that clings to your hands at the beginning, becomes a compact ball that doesn’t stick to things and feels silky-smooth.

Here’s what before and after look like.

My Mum used to say that if you were feeling out of sorts with someone, it was good to make bread because you could transfer your annoyance into kneading the dough REALLY WELL, and both you and the bread would be better for it.

Then you put it into a bowl, cover it with cling-film and let it rise until it doubles in size, turn it out and “knock it back” (more kneading, until it’s getting back to the size it started, this means there won’t be huge “is something living in here?” holes in the bread), put it into your loaf-tin or whatever - we’ve used a regular oblong tin, a rectangular Pullman tin with a lid, a small glass casserole, an earthenware chicken roaster…

You can even use a clean terracotta flowerpot.

Let the dough rise again until it’s high enough to look like an unbaked but otherwise real loaf, then pop it in the preheated oven. On average we give ours 180°C / 355°F for 45-50 minutes. YM (and oven) MV.

Here’s some of our bread…

Here’s our default bread recipe - it takes about 3-4 hours from flour jar to cutting board depending on climate (warmer is faster) most of which is rise time and baking; hands-on mixing, kneading and knocking-back is about 20 minutes, tops, and less if using a mixer.

Here ( or indeed any of the other pics) is the finished product. This one was given an egg-wash to make it look glossy and keep the poppy-seeds in place; mostly we don’t bother with that or the slash down the middle, but all the extras were intentional as a “ready for my close-up” glamour shot.

I think any shop would be happy to have something this good-looking on their shelf. We’re happy to have it on our table.

Even if your first attempts don’t work out quite as well as you hope, you can always make something like this…

[rae-napier-deactivated20180822]

can we have more posts like this in future please? this is really useful and could help those who are struggling

[bujnik]

You got a clean jar and some full fat cream?

Make your own butter as well and really have a good time.

[knitting-while-black]

Got a $125 gift card for Amazon today and cannot wait to finally buy a set of interchangeable circular needles!!!

[kimani2]

#PinkySet

[knitting-while-black]

This has been such a busy and productive month, 4 cast on and 2 completed!

Really excited about this one because it’s for my son and it’s my first full size blanket! It was a toss up between The Ten Stitch Blanket and this Colorblock Bias Blanket but Kiddo preferred the look and texture of the Bias. Can’t wait to see how our colorway shows up in this!

If you’d like you can follow my progress on Ravelry and if you try it I’d love to see your progress!

[knitting-while-black]

Update on Kiddo's blanket. Work is approx. 43" wide and ready to start making it longer. I didn't like the edge at the beginning of the WS rows so about a quarter of the way in I changed it. I'm now slipping the last stitch purlwise on RS rows and ktbl at the beginning of WS. The change isn't very noticeable so I didn't frog anything but I'm much happier with the neatness of the edge.

So far I've used about 1.5 yarn cakes, the ends you see are from me snipping out knots where the joins were created in the cake. I decided to start new cakes randomly rather than trying to match the color changes, that fits with Kiddo's personality and seems to be working rather well with the overall work.

I'll update again when I finish this cake, happy knitting!