Still sick

I'm still suffering the effects of a severe cold. Now that some of the congestion has moved out of my lungs and chest, I feel a little better, but it has all moved to my head. ugh. Anyway, after several days of rest, I went to knitting group on Wednesday night, armed with drugs, cough drops and a new knitting project. Two lovely ladies came by to pick up the order they commissioned from me as a gift for their daughter/sister. Here's the finished product, fingerless lace-up gauntlets from my hand-painted yarn (100% merino, double-faced satin ribbon):


Last night, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I had another sale on my etsy shop. So this morning, went early and was the first in line at the post office to drop off a new order from my etsy shop. yay! - I sold 2 of the headbands I made recently (see previous post). I couldn't just put an estimated postage on the package in order to avoid holiday traffic because the package needed to go to Canada.

In other crafty news, I started yet another knitting project, despite having about 10 other WIPs. I've been planning on making something(s) for my friend Linh in preparation for her drastic climate change from Dallas to Chicago. I settled on a combination of a kid mohair yarn and a 60/40 cashmerino blend yarn, both of which I hand-painted/dyed. I think the lace pattern is called ivy lace.

My next cast on will be a pair of sample Liana gauntlets for the class that I will be teaching based on the kit.

I got a flu shot...

...and I'm sick. Yuck. I guess logically, you can still get sick, just not the flu. I was always sick as a kid, and I guess maybe built up some sort of tolerance, so after 23 I would rarely get sick. I've been in bed for 2 1/2 days now. It started on Saturday morning, but I still woke up at 7am to photogragh and post some reversible headbands and a few of the lacy lace-up gauntlets knitting kits on my etsy shop. (see below, click on photo to enlarge)

After I finished posting the stuff, I went back to bed to get myself feeling better so that I could attend my knitting group's holiday party, where I ate WAAAY too much fondue.

The saddest part of being sick is that though I've been good about resting in bed, my head is too stuffy to work on any of my knitting projects. booohooo. I'm currently working on 3 original patterns, holiday gifts, gauntlets for my sis, and a scarf for my friend Linh who will be making a drastic move from Dallas to Chicago in January. I still have to cast on for a scarf for former colleague, lace scarf for another friend/former colleague, a wrap from my stepmother, and slipper socks for hubby. Other planned crafty projects include a project for a contest and other home improvement stuff. whew! I'm tired from writing that list! Must go back to bed and nap before my head explodes.

Yay! my first 2 sales!

I just made my first 2 sales this week on my etsy shop! I only wish I had more time to post more stuff and to make more stuff for the holiday purchases. Here's what I sold:


I called this necwarmer "Willow," made from a 50/50 alpaca and wool yarn.





I called this neckwarmer "Contempo," also made from a 50/50 alpaca and wool yarn.



I'm crossing my fingers that there will be good light tomorrow. I haven't been able to take good pictures of a few more things I wanted to post in the shop by this weekend.

Resignation

I had resigned from my beloved job about a month ago for several personal reasons. So on Tuesday, my good friends from work took me out for a yummy lunch at , and then they organized a decadent homemade dessert party. YUM! At lunch, I gave my friends special gifts that I made for them.

click on photos to enlarge

We're all showing off our knitted items. L to R: Kim is wearing the seafoam stitch scarf that I made her a while back. This time, I made her a short version of the "Liana" out of hand-painted cashmere/merino yarn. I made Carmen an neckwarmer ascot from a 50/50 alpaca and merinp wool yarn. I don't know if you can see it, but I encorporated dropped stitches into the pattern. Pamila got a lacy merino scarf that I call "Honeycomb" which I knitted then dyed in shades of red, salmon and pink. I'm wearing my clapotis that made back in March.


Left: (ccw) Kim, Carmen, Pamila, Matt, me. Right: Kim looking beautiful as ever, especially with her wonderful scarf ;)


Poor Matt didn't understand why his hat had sticks attached to a cord in the design, and was still attached to the ball of yarn. ha! Aubrey had borrowed my dpns so I couldn't finish off Matt's hat. (I finished tonight a knitting group - yay!) His hat is knit from a cappucino colored 50/50 soy/wool yarn accented by a super soft light green 100% alpaca yarn. I personally think Matt should start a new trend by wearing hats with a circular needle stuck in and a ball of yarn still attached. Tres chic!

The pics below are from the decadent dessert party. click to enlarge.

Left: (ccw) Maria, Matt, me, Carmen. I taught (or tried to teach) all 3 of them to knit. Maria is currently working on a sampler afghan, Matt did some wonderful drunk knitting at our staff training, and Carmen just couldn't do it. Right: Anastasia works in one of our remote offices, so I actually don't see her that much, but I taught her to knit too! Her last project was trying to make a scarf out of a legwarmer knit kit she got at Target, of all places.


Kim and Suzi posing with the gifts the office got me. They got me a GORGEOUS arrrangement of orchids, hydrangeas, curly tulips, monkey tails, and some other lovely fillers. The phallic-looking thing next to Suzi is an amaryllis plant that my former supervisor got me.

I will miss all these people and friends, but not that damn commute!

Yarn Swift Instructions getting revamped and revised

I am temporarily disabling the link to my instructions on how to make your own yarn swift so that I can update them. My blog gets lots of hits from people looking for instructions on how to make your own handmade yarn swift, so my apologies to those of you looking for them. I also extend apologies for those who have linked the file to your blog. I will repost instructions again soon. If you are desperate to make one over the holidays, please contact me. :)

Crawly Yarn and Craft Crawl

So Saturday was Aubrey's birthday. The girls and I drove Aubrey to L.A. for a crafty crawl. I mapped out all the places we were visitng and hoped to squeeze in, but we had so much fun, the crawl was slow and we only had time to visit one yarn store before birthday girl had to go back home for a special dinner.

We visited:
1) Suss Designs outlet - none of us bought anything at the clothing sale, but we did get some yarn. I bought 3 pairs of big needles for $4 each, 4 skeins of Lamb's Pride (navy and green) for $4 each, and some buttons for $0.50 each. Picture of the booty ---------->
2) Brunch at Cafe M de Chaya - yum yum yum
3) Felt Club's XL Holiday extravagana - I bought some "make art not war" and "make craft not war" buttons for me and the girls, a hand-screenprinted t-shirt of a frog for my sister, and a 200yd skein of hand-painted mohair for $10! Ok, I really don't know if the girl can be selling hand-painted mohair for $10 a skein because mohair ain't that cheap, even at wholesale prices, and does she count her time and labor? Well, at least I benefitted. :D See picture of my Felt Club booty on left.
4) Stitch Cafe - a small, cute and overstuffed LYS in the valley. Aubrey and Zona both bought yarn. I showed self restraint and didn't get anything.

That's all we had time for. If we had had more time, we also would've tried to visit Black Sheep Knittery, Unwind, Skein, That Yarn Store, and Alamitos Bay Yarn Co. I guess that means we'll have to try an plan another crawl some other time!

My etsy shop is open!

Whew! After much delays and a very messy house in getting all the stuff done, I finally listed some stuff on my Etsy Shop (I joined and opened an account 2 months ago! - so sad!) Having never done this before, I didn't realize how much time and effort it would take to list and post on sites like etsy. I still have a ways to go, such as listing my lacy gauntlets kits and other really nice yarns that I dyed, but I guess this is a good start. :)

The next difficult task upon me is knitting and making holiday presents for all my friends and loved ones. I am really behind!

Knisterville

KNITTY GRITTY, Season 8, episode #12, "I Do Knits"
Yesterday, Aubrey and I spent the day at the studio of Screen Door Entertainment for the taping of the wedding-themed Knitty Gritty episode. The guest of the day was Suss Cousins of Suss Design, who demonstrated how to knit a lace wedding veil with a crocheted border. Both Vickie Howell and Suss were really nice and very energetic. The producer of the show was Sonia, who also happened to be the associate producer of our "Shapeshifting Sweater" episode of Uncommon Threads. The associate producer was Joy, who was super nice too and really took care of us.

Part of the fun in doing these shows is that it not only removes you from the monotony of everyday life, it also allows you to meet lots of really creative and fun people. We met and got to know Brenda, the 3rd knister on the episode. Brenda is a newlywed and she got to show off a shawl she knitted for her wedding last December. She also currently organizes the Los Angeles chapter of The Church of Craft. While we were sitting and waiting (which happened quite a bit), we met another cool crafter, Cecily. Cecily is also an Uncommon Threads alumni -- she and her friends demonstrated various crochet projects for 3 episodes of the first season of Uncommon Threads.

Click on photos to enlarge.

left: Me and Brenda in between taping. right: The 3 knitsters!


above: Some behind-the-scenes shots.


left: Aubrey's self-portrait right: Me and Aubrey posing with Vickie and Suss.


left: Aubrey knitting and lookin' sexy . right: Vickie knitting a scarf on set.

Not yet published

Still no news on which month Magknits will be publishing my pattern. They said either February or March 2007...it's still very far away, but if it's February, it's less far! I love how you can get really cute free patterns from Magknits and Knitty, don't you? I guess my next long-term goal is to try and get something submitted to Knitty and/or Interweaves or some other reputable knitting magazine.

Teacher, Teacher!

I just finished my first-ever craft fair as a vendor this past weekend. And boy, I am tired! I had attended the same craft fair as a spectator a couple times in the past and as a cheerleader for my friend when she had her booth in October, and there were more people in attendance then this one, which really surprised me because this one's a holiday fair. My booth is pictured above. (I don't know photoshop well enough to get rid of the bluish tint in the photo.) I should mention that my logo was designed by my sister and the sign was made for me by Zona's husband, who also set it up for me!

I suppose, considering the low attendance, and my first attempt, I didn't do to terribly -- not as much as I had hoped, but enough to make me want to try it again. (Did I just really say that? Eek - another craft fair means no sleep for me!) Anyway, the response and interest I received was encouraging. A few people commissioned me to make them some knitted projects of my own design/pattern. I priced and quoted the commission work a little low for the amount of labor involved. But since they were my first craft fair commission work, I wanted to just get some repoire and establish relationships, so I really don't mind that I undervalued my time/labor a little bit.

I sold mostly hand-painted yarns, some knitted items and a few sewn items. The item that got the most response is the lacy lace-up gauntlet "Liana" that I designed to be worn 2 ways and to feature my hand-painted yarns (see picture to right). I sold it as a kit and be will posting it on my etsy shop along with some yarns by the end of this weekend (hopefully). Towards the end of the second day of the fair, some ladies approached me and asked if I would be interested in teaching a class featuring "Liana." Of course, I jumped a this opportunity to add more notches onto my belt. So, in January, I will be doing a demo on the gauntlets and some of the wonderful things you can do to show off hand-painted yarns. Then in February, I will be teaching a class on my pattern using the kit. The photo on the left shows the packaging I chose and designed for the gauntlets.