Saturday, June 23, 2007

Pattern sales and camera issues

I dropped off a set of Felted Nesting Bowls at Great Yarns, my local yarn shop, and Fontelle, the owner, told me that she had sold two of my Felted Lizard patterns. I was so excited, my first sales, the pattern had just gotten back from the printer.

To celebrate I bought myself a new book, Viking Patterns for Knitting by Elsebeth Lavold. I know, usually I would buy myself more yarn but I'm feeling a little full right at the moment. And I didn't have a good way to sneak it in past my husband. Now that I think about it though, my friend Shelley was with me and she could have brought the bag in to the house and said it was hers. Oh well. I'll use that next time Shelley and I go out to get yarn, which happens alot. She's my favorite yarny co-consperator.

Once the bowls have been photographed that pattern'll go off to the printer too. Then Great Yarns will carry two of my patterns. Yeah! Fontelle is going to be putting them up for sale on the website pretty soon too. I'm sure once that happens I'll get all excited and blog about it then too. There has even been talk about kits.

Now I have to finish the pattern for the frogs.

In other news my camera is still not talking to my computer, so no pictures. I got the drivers, I got the cables, I put in fresh batteries, it's still not working. I just need to get the full install disk from the camera manufacturer. It could happen. My friend Leonard is going to help me figure it out tomorrow. Maybe he can get the camera and computer to talk to each other.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

I've lost a pattern...

Well and truly lost it.

I'm almost done with this great bag. It's cotton with one of those mesh patterns in the main body that looks and sounds complex, but after repeating the two rounds once you've got it and don't need to carry the whole pattern around with you anymore. Especially after the 52 rounds of mesh knitting. Then at the top you do a few more rounds of garter stitch, some decreases and the handle.

Which is all fine up until the point where you go looking for the pattern and it's not on your clip board where you left it. Nore is it in the work basket where you left the clipboard, or the chase lounge where the basket lives, or under the chase on the floor. So I went looking. Let me list the places it was not found. It was not in the stash, not under the bed in one of the three boxes of yarn, in the yarn cupboard, in the basket by the couch, or any of the boxes in the closet. It was not under the couch, I moved it out, twice. It was not with my knitting books, pattern binders or magazines, I even moved the bookcase and realphabetized everything. It was not in any of my work bags, I have two under the vanity, one by the couch, one shoved in the yarn cupboard, a work basket in my room and I have knitting in my purse, just in case.

The sucker was gone. I even looked in the truck of my car. Found my daughter Girl Scout Handbook, no pattern.

So I looked online. I got the pattern out of the Spring 2007 issue of Knitscene. They do not have their patterns on the web. But they do have some very nice pictures, and pattern corrections. Come to find out that the pattern I had pulled out of the magazine was wrong any way.

And being the sort of person I am, after tearing apart my house looking for the dumb thing, I gave in to total impatience and faked it. I finished the bag up this morning sans pattern and it looks fabulous.

Now all I need to do is buy a new cable for my camera so I can put up pictures of it.... :)

Saturday, June 16, 2007

End of the week blues..

Ever have one of those weeks that doesn't really seem busy but at the end of it you feel really drained and then you look back on your week and discover that it actually was really busy and that's why you're so tired?
OK, maybe that was a silly question.
My week looked like this. On Sunday I went to my friend Steve's birthday party. His Uncle cooked, it was fabulous. Before my husband and I could go we had to arrange for the redispursement of the children, and that was hectic. Monday was recover-from-the-weekend and laundry day. I did about 7 loads. Tuesday I got called in to work and started this blog. Yeah! Got home and then had to do the random kid shuffle again. Tuesday is Dinner-with-Dad night. Then I get to go out to dinner with my friends, who were sick, so I took dinner to them at home so they could stay in nightgowns. Wednesday I worked in the morning got home and discovered that tending to sick people makes you more suseptable to colds. I drank lots of fluids and did the dishes. And my eldest son invaded for his weekly Dinner-with-Mom. Thursday I read a book, served leftovers for dinner and spent alot of time talking to my youngest sons teacher and father. Oh and I went to Costco. Friday my youngest son had a field trip to the beach. My son's teacher specifically requested that I attend to keep him in line. Literally, it was two special ed. classes taking a city bus down to a state park. Hearding cats is easier than hearding twenty 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grade autistic kids. We walked alot and it rained.

Now don't get me wrong, I love my life, I love my kids, I even had fun on Jarret's (my youngest) feild trip. The kids thought it was funny that Jarret's Mom was knitting while walking on the beach and one of the teachers wanted to know what stitch pattern I was using for the mesh on my bag. Knitters are the universes way to keep other knitters from going insane. Knitting loves company? It was a busy week and I'm tired.

In the world of knitting I managed to knit a set of felted nesting bowls for Great Yarns, my LYS. I finished the cuff and the heal flap on a pair of socks in Opal on size 1's. And got most of the way done on a cotton mesh bag, the 'Rutabaga Bag' in some issue of Knitscene. Then I discovered I've gone and lost the darn pattern and have to tear my apartment apart to find it so I can finish the bag. Usually I get more knitting done.
On the book front I finished reading 'No Idle Hands: The Social History of American Knitting' by Anne Macdonald. I'll post a reveiw later when I have more brain cells. I'm also reading 'The Second Summoning' by Tanya Huff. I read the first in the set 'Summon the Keeper' and howled. I'm mostly done with second book and so far they're both a scream.

I should pen some sort of pithy closing but it's quarter of one and I'm out of pithy right at the moment. It'll have to wait for the next post......

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Begin at the beginning.....

..and when you reach the end, stop.

So this is my first post on my first ever blog. It only get's better from here. I'm still trying to find my way around the site so any feedback is greatly apreciated. Once I get through the shakedown post this site is going to be about yarn. And knitting, and all of the fabulous things you can do with yarn and knitting. And yarn, did I mention the yarn?

But not crochet because that's just vile.