Masterful Marbles – Craft Gossip

I recently picked up the latest issue of World Art Glass Quarterly magazine. It’s their anniversary issue and is full of some of the most incredible glass art I’ve seen in a long time. You’ve got the regular cast of masters… Dale Chihuly and Paul Stankard as well as The Lundberg Studios. Many artists are shown. The marbles of Mark Matthews really had me mesmerized. The detail and craftsmanship of these marbles is incredible. Sure he does twists with complex canes of filigrana, but his geometrics and his animal prints are breathtaking.

Check out his web site to see more of his work and get some of his history. The page of animal spines known as the Life and Death series, where he collaborates with blacksmith Joel Sanderson are incredible. The combination of the marbles and the metal work so well together.

I find his work compelling and inspiring. It makes me want to get on the torch and play. Maybe I’ll get a little marble out of it.

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I love a good themed sock, even though I don’t knit them all that often. I guess maybe it feels like why take all that time to knit something I can only use for a couple of weeks a year?

But honestly a lot of things we knit don’t get a ton of use and we still love them. And I’m all about bringing the whimsy whenever possible, so why let people who buy themed socks have all the fun? (Also people are not looking at your socks so go ahead and wear the seasonal socks all year. Probably no one will notice unless you tell them.)

The Hey There Pumpkin socks from Fiber and Fern Designs would be cute to knit and to wear throughout the fall. They’re not strictly Halloween socks, but you could wear them for that. You can also wear them to the pumpkin patch, and to any even through Thanksgiving that needs a little more fun.

Of course if you wanted to make them Halloween socks you could use duplicate stitch to make little faces on some or all of the pumpkins. Or even just one one random pumpkin on each sock to give a reference to Halloween but still make them wearable and on theme throughout the fall.

The socks use three colors and have a German short row heel. There are options for knitting them as short socks or calf length socks. The pattern has three sizes for small, medium and large women’s feet (roughly US shoe sizes 6.5 to 7 for size small, 8 to 9 for medium and 10 to 11 for large).

The pattern is written with instructions given by stitch count or the placement of markers, so you can use whatever your favorite method is for sock knitting in the round, whether that’s magic loop, DPNS, a short circular or two circulars.

You can find this pattern at Fiber and Fern Designs on Etsy.

[Photo: Fiber and Fern Designs]

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