Fall is hands-down my favorite time of the year, and this year I’ve tried not to let the typical fall frenzy get in my way. I’ve been taking time, even if it’s just a few minutes, to notice the beauty New England has to offer in the fall and enjoy it. The boys and I have spent some lovely afternoons on our back patio soaking up the sun – them running through the leaves playing tag, me soaking up the sun with some knitting in my lap.
I’ll be able to share some of the knitting soon – I have sweaters finished in some lovely Jill Draper Makes Stuff Rockwell, and in Spirit Trail Fiberworks Zalti. Look for them both over the coming week – I’ll be releasing the Jill Draper sweater first, and in the meantime here’s a peek of the Spirit Trail:
(Have I mentioned how freaking excited I am that CustomFit can now adjust for cable suckage and I can design with them again? SO EXCITED.)
But the big news today is that I’m finally releasing some pretty big improvements to CustomFit that we’ve been working on for some time. The improvements are mostly under-the-hood, and shouldn’t be disruptive to anyone using the site – so! If you’re not curious about the details, or just want the tl;dr version:
I’ve improved the way the pattern text gets generated and things should be cleaner and more sensible to read, starting some time this evening. No action necessary!
But on the other hand, if you’re curious about the details:
We’ve spent the last little while rewriting, and then testing (and testing, and testing, and testing some more), the part of CustomFit that actually takes the individual bits and pieces and assembles them into a whole, finished pattern. The result is that all pattern instructions have been streamlined, clarified, and improved. And even better, because of the way I designed the site, these improvements apply retroactively to all existing patterns as well as new ones. (Yay!)
There were lots of tiny clarifications, but some of the more major updates include:
- There are now more, and more helpful, row counts throughout CustomFit patterns. My personal favorite of these is that neck and shoulder shaping instructions now include row counts from (and including) the *last armhole shaping row* when possible.
- The parts of CustomFit that detect overlaps in shaping are a lot more robust. Several kinds of overlap that previously didn’t get a warning now get one.
- When different portions of a piece *do* overlap (say, the neck shaping starts before the armhole shaping ends), you’ll now get two types of warnings:
- First, at the start of the piece you’ll see an overview and summary of all overlaps.
- Then, during the pattern itself, you’ll see the more conventional (and scan-friendly) “At the same time” warnings.
- We can also now do kind things like say “Reattach yarn to WS of held stitches”, instead of that action just being implied.
I’m sure I’m forgetting more – we’ve spent a couple of months, now, going through everything with a fine-toothed comb, and improving language to be more clear and consistent. (Major kudos go to the most phenomenal tech editor ever, Kate Atherley.) I’m so thrilled with the update both for its own sake, and because the new way things are written allow me to expand some of CustomFit’s design flexibility. It’s happy dance time all around, here.
Again, you shouldn’t notice any problems, and in fact can mostly just ignore this deploy, but as always with a big change like this – if you do see something wrong, please email me at [email protected] and I’ll look into it right away.
And now, some happy sheep pictures from Rhinebeck weekend:
Happy knitting!
Amy Herzog Designs