In my never-ending quest to Automate All the Things, I just discovered how to quickly share from The Old Reader straight to your WordPress blog’s post editor using the “Send to” menu below every post. They don’t have WordPress listed in the official documentation, but with some digging I found out the correct URL to use. It’s this:
Just go into your Old Reader settings page and click the “Social” tab. Then plug that URL (replacing your domain, of course) into the form at the bottom of the page and save. Now when you invoke it, you’ll be taken straight to your Press This editing window with the relevant URL and title pre-populated!
Hmm. I dislike change for change’s sake, but I do see what they’re going for here. And they got rid of the clunky pagination that always tripped me up. I’ll give it a chance…
As of this morning, we’ve launched a site-wide redesign with three main goals: clean, attractive pages that highlight our best stories; a stronger emphasis on beautiful images; and intuitive navigation and search so you can find what you’re looking for quickly.
Many thanks to my friend Bez for a tip-off on Twitter this morning:
Excited to see a @web_goddess mention in @TheAmpHour #257. “There can’t be two self replicating mitten projects, right?”
I had to go investigate. It turns out The Amp Hour is a weekly podcast about electronics from a guy in Sydney and a guy in Cleveland. In Episode #257 they talked to Fabienne Serrière of KnitYak (which I actually backed and mentioned on the blog a few times in the past). At one point, the Australian host Dave starts talking about steganographic knitting and basically quotes a bunch of stuff from my Ignite talk last March. It happens around the 42:15 mark if you want to listen yourself. Dave also made special mention of the mittens, which reminded me that I hadn’t actually moved that page over from my old web host. (It’s fixed now, which is why you can see it on the blog.)
Very cool! I tweeted at Fabienne and the Amp guys to thank them for the shout-out. If you haven’t seen my Ignite talk, here’s the video:
After giving a talk on geek knitting in 2012, I was inspired to try my hand at knitting a QR code. The code on these mittens actually scans and points the viewer to the pattern on this page so they can make their own. Hence, self-replicating mittens!
Sizing: I made these to fit my own hands, which are normal adult women’s size. To adjust bigger or smaller, simply change the number of stitches you cast on and how many you increase for the thumb.
Tension: Come on, it’s a pair of mittens! You’ll notice that these are knitted with slightly smaller needles than you would normally knit 8ply/DK wool. That’s to make the fabric more dense and keep the air out.
Instructions
Using the 3mm needles, cast on 44 stitches in your 8ply/DK wool and join for knitting in the round.
Knit 28 rounds of K1P1 rib.
Switch to 3.75mm needles and knit 2 rounds plain (stocking stitch).
Now we’re ready for the thumb increases. Your thumbs are on opposite sides of your hands, so you need to knit each one differently!
R mitten:
Increase Round 1: K1, M1, K1, M1, knit to end
Increase Rounds 2-4: Knit plain
Increase Round 5: K1, M1, K3, M1, knit to end
Increase Rounds 6-8: Knit plain
Continue in this pattern, adding 2 more stitches between the M1s each time until you reach 58 stitches.
Knit 1 row plain.
Now we need to remove the thumb stitches and set them aside for later.
Next round: K1, slip next 15st onto scrap wool, cast on 3 stitches, continue to knit round.
Knit 25 rounds plain.
Time to start the decreases!
Decrease Round 1: *K1, SSK, knit 23st, K2tog, K1,* repeat for other side of mitten.
Decrease Round 2: Knit plain.
Repeat in this pattern until 22 stitches remain.
Use Kitchener stitch to graft closed and then weave in your ends!
L mitten:
Increase Round 1: K42, M1, K1, M1, K1
Increase Rounds 2-4: Knit plain.
Increase Round 5: K42, M1, K3, M1, K1
Increase Round 6-8: Knit plain
Continue in this pattern, adding 2 more stitches between the M1s each time until you reach 58 stitches.
Knit 1 row plain.
Again, it’s time to remove the thumb stitches and set them aside for later.
Next round: K42, slip next 15st onto scrap wool, cast on 3 stitches, K1
Knit 25 rounds plain.
Time to start the decreases!
Decrease Round 1: *K1, SSK, knit 23st, K2tog, K1,* repeat for other side of mitten.
Decrease Round 2: Knit plain.
Repeat in this pattern until 22 stitches remain.
Use Kitchener stitch to graft closed and then weave in your ends!
For each thumb:
Put 15st from scrap wool on needles.
Knit around all stitches, picking up and knitting 3st to close the gap at the top of the thumb.
Knit 16 rounds plain.
Decrease Round 1: *K1, K2tog* repeat around.
Decrease Round 2: Knit plain.
Decrease Round 3: *K2tog* repeat all the way around.
Break off wool and run end through remaining stitches, draw up tightly and fasten off.
QR Code (make 2 of these):
Note – the QR code is knitted back and forth using the fairisle/stranded knitting technique. Yeah, you have to use two colours on the purl side, but it’s a small pattern and you’ll survive. Wherever there is a float longer than 5 stitches, I recommend “catching” the floating wool with the working wool. However, since this is going to be sewn to the mitten, it’s not crucial and you don’t have to do it. Just make sure your floats are loose enough not to draw in the design too much!
Using the 2mm needles and your baby wool, cast on 33 stitches.
Knit 4 rows of garter stitch.
Keeping a 4st border on each side in garter stitch, begin working the QR Code Chart in stocking stitch.
Once the chart is finished, knit 4 rows of garter stitch to complete the border.
Cast off and weave in your ends.
I recommend BLOCKING THE HECK out of your QR codes, otherwise they may not scan. I cut two pieces of paper exactly 3 inches square, then wetted my patches and pinned them out to this size. Once they are dry, simply sew them to the back of your mittens!
I’ve been going to Girl Geek Sydney events for six years now. The first was at Google back in 2009, and I went with my friends Tia and Issy. None of us really knew what to expect. I remember feeling apprehensive because I’d recently left development to work as a business analyst, and I was intimidated to be surrounded by so many smart and talented women. Back then I didn’t have a lot of women friends. (I had some women knitting friends, but most were older and not working in tech.) I was still in my Cool Girl Feminist phase. Most other women were either dumb and boring, or Competition For My Spot. I’m not proud of it.
So I started going to Girl Geek events, and then I started speaking at them, and then I started helping to organise them, and along the way things changed. I grew up a lot. Maybe not entirely due to GGDSyd, but it was a big part of it. Nowadays I’m not ashamed to say I have girl friends, and they are amazing people: Jody and Sera and Amy and Peggy and Daphne and Lucy and Donna and Georgi and so many more. I genuinely like helping the younger generation (women and men!) starting careers in tech. I am thrilled to see my peers building cool stuff, speaking at events, and winning awards. It’s not a zero sum game anymore – we can all be successful. And I stopped caring so much whether I looked the Cool Geek Girl part (I had a terrible habit of denigrating girly-girls mostly because I was desperately envious of them), and I discovered that you can wear dresses and Taylor Swift’s red lippie and still be taken seriously in tech (by the people who actually matter).
So that’s a very long preamble to the real point of this post, which is that last Tuesday we hosted the July meetup for Girl Geeks Sydney at the Canva offices – and it was honestly one of the proudest moments of my career. I was the emcee for the night, and it was like getting to introduce two friends that you just know are going to get along terrifically. The attendees seemed rapt to be there, and my fellow Canva women all crushed it with their phenomenal talks. Even my male colleagues were telling me the next day how inspired they were.
I’m just going to end with an excerpt from a chat conversation I had with Jody a month ago, prompted by our wonderful friend Kelly:
So that’s my new mantra – saying nice things to people. To all the girl geeks I’ve met over the past six years: you are all awesome and smart and talented in different ways, and I think you’re super inspiring. I wouldn’t be where I am now without your examples. And to my colleagues at Canva: I feel lucky every day to get to work with you. Thanks for putting on a great night for all my friends. 🙂
AWShine Hack is an upcoming hackathon put on by AWS through their “Amazon Women Shine” and “AWS Startup Community” groups. It’s going to be held on September 5-6 in Sydney (and September 19-20 in Melbourne). While the hackathon is open to all, priority will be giving to women entrepreneurs and developers. Pretty cool! I’m participating as a Business Mentor for the Sydney event and I’ll be handing out some Canva swag on the day. You should register now!
A happy belated FIFTEENTH(!) blog-birthday to Matt at Scrubbles! His blog is one that I’ve read, well, pretty much ever day for a decade and a half now. I’ve got Mama Cat on my bookshelf and several LitKids prints on my wall. After years of only knowing him through his blog, it was great to finally meet Matt (and Christopher!) when we drove through Phoenix in April of last year.
You may not know, but Matt actually created the web-goddess logo for me (a barter deal for a custom knitted scarf). His anniversary reminded me that my own milestone must be coming up soon. The oldest post at this site is actually from September 7, 2000, but it was originally from a separate blog that I started for alumnae of my college dorm. The first personal blog post I wrote was on January 7, 2001, which was hosted at web-goddess.co.uk since I was still living in London then. (Wow. Some Internet marketroid has got the domain now. At least it isn’t porn, I guess.) And hey, my first first mention of Scrubbles was on January 31, 2001…
