Fiber Dreams

Yarn Thing

I’m going to be interviewed on a live podcast on Thursday! Eek.

Yup. Marly, Yarn Thing, will be chatting me up on the air on Thursday afternoon at 4 pm Mountain time. I’m excited, scared, nervous, honored, totally blown away… I’ve never done anything like this before. It’ll be fun. (It’s my new mantra: it’ll be fun, it’ll be fun, it’ll be fun.) Marly’s great fun to talk to. Dave and I met her at TNNA in Long Beach in January, so I won’t be talking to a faceless voice, which would probably make me more nervous. I’ll be able to see her smiling face while we chat. I just hope I don’t stutter too much, forget simple things—like my name—like I sometimes do when I’m nervous. Eek.

I just got off the phone with Marly, doing a pre-interview chat. She thinks I’ll be fine, and that we’ll have plenty to talk about. Fingers crossed.

Tie tacks

Back in October of 2005—I can’t believe it was that long ago already—I became the proud owner of a cottage cheese contained filled with old tie tacks from the railroad tracks that used to run behind the house I grew up in. Dad has since passed on, and Mom had the shed rebuilt, because the poor old thing was termite ridden, and threatening to come down on its own.

What does that have to do with tie tacks, you ask? I’ll tell you. Starting at some point in the mid 1970s until that shed was rebuilt, there was an old chunk of wood hanging over the shed door with holes drilled in it. In most of the holes were large, odd-looking nails with numbers on the top of them: the tie tacks. When Mom had the shed rebuilt, that chunk of wood and its tie tacks were put in the garage and forgotten until Dave unearthed them when we were visiting last month. Since the tie tacks belonged to me as much as to Dad, I made the executive decision to bring them home where they’d be treasured instead of forgotten.

As you can see, most of the tie tacks were dated in the 1920s and 30s. The oldest one is from 1912, and the newest from 1944. Can you imagine? 1912. Wow. That tie had been there for more than 60 years before Dad and I found it. Totally cool.

I both love and hate having this little bit of nostalgia here at home. It should be hanging over the shed door, and Dad should be inside making or fixing something, whistling, and otherwise being his cheerful self. But time marches on, and things change. Now I have the collection. In ways it’s difficult not to burst into tears when I look at them sitting there on a shelf in this room.

Because of the large number of big, old trees around Mom’s house, there are places that get very little sun. One of those places is the front of the shed. Because of the lack of sunlight, and the abundance of water to keep the foliage alive, there’s quite a bit of moss. I brought home a bit of that moss along with the tie tack collection, as it is growing on the piece of wood that’s home to the collection. I think it looks pretty cool. I wonder how long the moss will last in dry southern California.

The finished brown sweater… isn’t

It took me a while, but I eventually came to the realization that the brown sweater that took me ages to knit, frog, and re-knit, piece by piece, that had eventually been sewn together and worn (sans buttons), had to be completely ripped out and started over. I realized that I’d never be happy with it. And I want to be. I still love the color and the design, but it just wasn’t working. In addition to all that it was too small. I want to be able to wear the thing. I knew I’d never be happy with it the way it was.

Because of the nature of dark colors, and how notoriously difficult it is to see little woven-in yarn ends, I took the sweater out to the driveway, set myself up on a low chair in the sun, and proceeded to remove the collar and button bands, and to rip out all the seams I’d so carefully sewn. That done, I went back inside, made sure Coco was comfy (I needed her support for the next part), tucked a yarn end into the ball winder, and started turning the handle.

All that frogging happened in mid February. I’ve since re-knit the back almost to the shoulders, ripped it out again to the armholes, and am once again close to the shoulders, this time with math and dimensions that I truly believe will work much, much better. Keep your fingers crossed.

Stitches West

Had a simply marvelous time at Stitches West this year. Got lots of yarn. Took two classes. Got lots of time with friends.

Denise and Anita and I drove up on Wednesday. Well, Denise drove to my house, I drove Denise’s car to Anita’s house, then Anita drove the three of us up to Santa Clara. We left Anita’s house just after 5 am Yeah. Early. Neither Denise nor I even bothered going to bed the night before. We both knew we’d be up late packing, and if we did go to bed getting up in time to be ready would have been more of a challenge than either of us was up for. What was wonderful was that Dave stayed up, too, to keep me company, and to assure himself that I’d be ready when Denise got here at 4:15 am. Isn’t he a dear?

I have a bit of yarn pron to share with you from my exposure to the Market. Just a bit. Ready? Here it is.

I have the individual yarn pictures from that big picture broken out in my stash on Ravelry. The list goes something like this—in the order I pulled them out of the bag to list here:

• Artfibers Ming, 600 yards, color 17
• Dye Dreams Twinkle Toes, 1 hank, Lavender
• Wabi Sabi Tallulah Hand-Dyed Sock, 1 hank, Crimson
• Skaska Designs 50/50 merino/silk, lace weight, 1,060 yards, green
• Yarn Place Dolce, 1,093 yards, Berry Shake
• Madelinetosh Tosh, 1 hank, Baltic
• Blue Moon Fiber Arts Silkie Socks That Rock, 1 hank, Rook-y
• Socks That Rock, 1 hank, Vancouver Violet
• Blue Moon Fiber Arts Silk Thread II, 1 hank, Vancouver Violet (though the same colorway as the sock yarn, it’s truly amazing how different the resulting color is
• MacKintosh Yarns Brigit Lace, 1,000 yards, Lich
• MacKintosh Yarns Celtic Sock, 1 hank, Maude
• Brooks Farm Yarn Acero, 840 yards, a nice muted burgundy color

You’re probably wondering about the picture on the right. Got that at Stitches, too. Ten hanks of Malabrigo Twist in Olive all in the same dye lot. More than enough for just about anything I can figure out to do with it, cables, long cardi or pullover. I might even have enough left over to do a coordinating scarf.

I’ve been wanting—and needing!—a silver shawl pin to use when Nicole models my creations. Just draping things over her works most of the time, but sometimes gravity wins and pins are necessary. I’ve used straight pins, and done my best to hide them, but a lovely shawl pin would be ever so much nicer, don’t you think? I finally have one. This one is from SweaterKits up in Canada. It’s a handmade pin in silver-plated copper.

I also got some wonderful old buttons from The Button Lady. I can’t find a web site for her. If you go searching, she’s the one in San Mateo, California. Anyway, the buttons I got are fabulous. Nine antique black glass buttons from Czechoslovakia, still on their original card.

Then there are these buttons. I got the only three that I found. They’re a dark gray, charcoal-y color. She told me about these buttons. She found them in a warehouse, bought everything they had. These buttons were made here in the U.S. just before we joined World War II. Before they went into production, the factory was re-purposed to make military buttons, and they never got back to these. But they were kept, stored safely for decades before The Button Lady found them.

These three beautiful flower buttons are made of some kind of horn. I don’t know what they coated the horn with, what they made the gorgeous designs from, but here they are. They’re stunning. I have no idea what they’ll eventually end up on, but they’ll steal the show. Perhaps a plain stockinette or lightly textured cardigan, so that the buttons can be shown off in all their glory. They deserve it.

One of the very best things about Stitches this year was reconnecting with my friend Barbara. We recently found each other again on Facebook. This was the first time we’ve seen each other in more than 17 years. You know how sometimes when you don’t see someone for a long time you’ve both changed a lot, and things are awkward? Well, this wasn’t like that at all. It was the other way. In many ways it seemed like it had only been 17 days, not 17 years, since we’d last seen each other. Barbara managed to get away from work on Friday afternoon. We had lunch, then I sent her into the market while I went to class. We went and played in the market together after my class. We were joined for dinner by Mary Beth Temple. The three of us had a blast. We laughed and laughed. It was great fun.

Barbara and I had such a wonderful time together that she came back to Stitches on Saturday. After I got out of my class we spent the entire evening together, then proceeded to talk well into the night. OMG. It was fabulous seeing you again, my friend. Really, in spite of the otherwise fabulous time at Stitches, the highlight of the entire weekend.

A little more yarn pron

While I had the camera out yesterday, and was taking pictures of yarn anyway, I pulled out a few hanks that I’ve neglected for a bit. The first, bad, bad blogger, was a birthday gift from Denise: 2 hanks of Koigu KPPPM in a lovely olive green. Next up, the October 2009 sock of the month yarn from Woolgirl. I designed the sock she used that month, Birches, so she sent a copy of the kit to me. Wasn’t that wonderful? It’s an awesome kit, too. Finally there’s another hank of Silkie STR. This one is in a color that I love but would never have purchased, Muckity Muck. I traded for it with a woman on Ravelry. I sent her my hank of Mudslide, and she sent her Muckity Muck to me. Awesome. I’m looking forward to seeing what becomes of the orange yarn. It seems to want to be a scarf…

Yup. I bought a pile of luscious yarn at Stitches West last month. I’ll tell you all about it, but not today. Today I want to tell you about what I saw in the latest Vogue Knitting magazine this morning.

I’d just finished the last three pages of Steinbeck’s Cannery Row, and was looking around the room for something to read to get me through the rest of my breakfast when I laid eyes on the Vogue Knitting magazine that arrived yesterday. I took the magazine back over to the table, sat myself down, and started going through it page-by-page from the front of the magazine. I didn’t get very far. In fact, I only got to page 18. And there I saw it. A whole paragraph about me, my Basket Whip cowl pattern, and the KAL on Ravelry. There’s even a link in the article to this very blog. Squee!

Just released: Diamanten. You can also see it on Ravelry and on Patternfish.

I found these diamond stitch patterns when looking through a book of old German charted designs that date back to the early 1900s. I updated the designs to use both left- and right-leaning decreases, used a modern method of denoting the stitches in the charts, and wrote out the stitch instructions for those unfamiliar with knitting charted designs. Since the design was inspired by German knitting techniques, I named the pattern Diamanten, which is German for Diamonds.

Both scarf and shawl are knit from the cast on edge straight through to the bind off edge. Edge points are made by a series of increases and decreases worked into the lace.

Other stuff

If you’re planning on participating in the Pacific Islands KAL on Ravelry, it starts on Friday. If you’ll also be participating in Ravelympics, be sure to have everything ready so you can cast on during the opening ceremonies.

I totally blew it. When I sent out the newsletter announcing Diamanten’s release, I forgot to change the url on the photo. It still points to Hesperia. Doh. I hate it when I do stuff like that. I guess the good news is that it still links to one of my patterns on my web site, and from there it’s fairly easy to get to the right page. Still though…

My offer still stands. I’ll be at Stitches West in Santa Clara at the end of this month. If you manage to track me down, and ask for a Fiber Dreams button I’ll give you one. Subject to stock on hand, blah, blah, blah, so catch me early if you can!

In some ways this is a bit of ancient history, in others a work in progress. It all started when my next door neighbor, Stephanie, was moving her office from building A to building B a couple of weeks before Christmas. Her desk didn’t fit in the new office, so she asked Dave to pick it up in his truck, so that the desk could be given to charity. He did. When he saw the desk he knew that the “charity” was going to be me. He drew out the basic shape, took a bunch of measurements, got help loading the desk—it’s a large, multi-part thing made mostly of particle board with a decent laminate that’s quite heavy—into his truck, and brought it home, knowing that if I didn’t like it, didn’t want it, or it wouldn’t fit in my home office, that it would be a simple matter to then take it down to Stephanie’s favorite local charity, and give it to them.

He gets home with this thing, and shows it to me while it’s out in the truck—bad blogger: no pictures of it in the truck! Drat. Anyway, we plotted, we planned, we figured that it would fit in here. We got it out of the truck and into the house, and plotted and planned some more. The next day was moving day.

We started by removing almost everything from my office.

Then we somehow got the main desk piece down the stairs, around the corner, down the hall, and into my office. Egads. The thing weighs a ton—even on a dolly it’s hard to move around.

After getting that piece down here, the rest were relatively easy—emphasis on “relatively.” Each piece weighs a lot.

The desk has a return. And a large conference/work area. That’s the thing that Dave’s standing on here. He’s attaching the foot to the conference portion, turning it upright. It passed Ricki’s inspection. That’s a critical step in any furniture acquisition—feline approval.

The return was the last piece to be fit in. There’s still room in my office for the oak printer table my friend John made for me back in the mid 1980s. That’s the dark thing with the shelf over on the far right. Look at the color difference. I do like the color of the oak better, but how can I turn down perfectly wonderful office furniture simply because it’s not the color of aged oak? Well, I can’t. Obviously.

The main parts are now all assembled, and in place. After doing all that, we slipped the oak floor under the conference table—easier said than done—up to the spot where the computer will be, so that I can easily roll from one part of the desk to the other.

My worktable is still where it was, but instead of having the “shipping center” under it, it’s the new home to my lateral file cabinet. I thought at first that it would be nice to keep the top of the cabinet cleaned off, so I could see the pretty wood, but it turned out to be a bad idea. Ricki got herself caught back there. The cabinet isn’t all the way against the wall, and there’s a spot back in there that is apparently irresistible if you happen to be a cat. Naturally, when she got herself stuck back there Dave was in bed asleep. I had to clear everything off the top, move the counter aside, and pull the cat out. Gads. There’s a blanket on top of the file cabinet now. It’s inelegant, but effective in keeping Ricki on this side of the cabinet.

So here it is. My office is still a disaster, but the new desk is awesome. There’s actually a part of the new desk that’s still next to the front door; I guess you’d call it a hutch. It’s huge, bigger than any other single piece, and we’ll need assistance (male) to bring it down here. No way I can help without hurting myself big time. When it comes down here it will stand against the wall on the edge of the return. It has a couple of cupboards in it, where I’ll store knitting books and other stuff so that they’re handy. In the meantime, I’m waiting to bring all the rest of my regular office stuff back in here. It’s a little frustrating sometimes. I have to go into the next room for just about everything, but eventually Dave will finish building the support needed for the hutch, so we can finish the installation, and move all my stuff back into this room.

I’ve already made good use of all that extra space behind me. It’s an awesome thing to have a sweater, scarf, blanket, laid out on the table, and to be able to roll back and forth between it and the computer to write down measurements, stitch counts, all that stuff. Pure heaven.

Thank you, Stephanie. You’re awesome.

P.S. Ricki loves the new arrangement. Not only does the new desk provide an awesome horizontal playground for her, but having a bookcase next to the desk provides its own source of feline entertainment. You can see her sitting on the shelf behind and between the telephone and the stereo. I’ve threatened to leave that shelf permanently empty, dub it Ricki’s Shelf. For some reason Dave doesn’t like that idea. Silly man.

You’ve probably all heard about the deluge of rain California has been hit with recently. Rain wasn’t the only thing we got. At higher elevations there was also snow.

While we obviously got a lot of rain, for the most part our neighborhood came through just fine. There were some very small areas were a little dirt trickled down, but unlike the new people on the hill above us, most people make sure there’s some vegetation on their hilly yards to help hold them in place. These (expletive deleted) people removed every tree, every shrub, every scrap of anything green and living from their downhill slope two months before the winter rains were due to hit. What were they thinking? A significant amount of their topsoil ended up in the street below their house, which also happens to be right in front of my house. It wasn’t so much soil that it blocked the road, but it certainly narrowed it quite a bit, and made getting in and out of my driveway… interesting. The next non-rain day they had people come and remove some of it, but still. Wouldn’t it be better to have some plants, and keep that hard-to-come-by topsoil in their yard in the first place?

The day most of their topsoil slid into the street was a day when it seemed that someone with an impossibly huge bucket of water dumped it on the county. I was out in it. I never let a little rain slow me down, so I was out running errands. It was truly amazing how hard the rain came down for a little bit there. There’s a small back street that wanders through a neighborhood that I take to go to the local post office branch. It wasn’t a street that day. It was a river. Seriously. There was so much water that it was level with the sidewalks when I went through, and it was all flowing like a river toward the drains, and draining away. Thank goodness the drains were open, and not clogged with debris as they sometimes are. It made navigating the street interesting, though, I’ll tell you that.

Anyway, other than a new leak in one of the upstairs rooms—Dave thinks it’s coming in around one of the roof jacks where the sealant is letting loose a bit—and another in the garage—he hasn’t found that one yet—we seem to have come through it all just fine. Whew. What a ride.

What about the knitting you say? Yes, I have been knitting. I knit a sweet little thing that I can’t tell you about yet, and a bunch of swatches. I’m planning another project that I can’t tell you about, and while all that’s been going on I’ve been plugging away at Wanida from Cookie A’s book, Sock Innovation. I’ve finally turned the heel on the second sock. The gussets are nearly done. Soon it will be that seemingly endless straightaway before the toe decreases start.

I also cast on for another pair of socks recently. This project I can tell you about. The yarn is a merino sock yarn from Lush Yarn down in Australia. They contacted me a couple months ago about doing a special project for them, and sent up some yarn. This is the one that didn’t go into the special project. I’ve been looking forward to knitting with it ever since it arrived on my doorstep.

You’re probably wondering about me a bit. I don’t normally go for anything remotely yellow. First I knit up Domus Aurea in that luscious silk from Claudia Hand Painted Yarns, and now this. Okay. Caught. No, I don’t go for yellow, but one of its biggest drawbacks for me is how horrible I look in it. Really disgusting. So I never, ever choose yellow. But when it ends up on my doorstep, and it’s a glorious hand-dyed yarn with a beautiful hand? What’s a knitter to do? I ask you.

I’ll tell you: knit with it.

So far I’m definitely enjoying knitting this pattern, in no small part because of how lovely this yarn is, but also because the stitch is pleasing. I’m just not sure if it’s good for a sock. Any thoughts? I’m not sure, either. I’m still plugging away at it. Perhaps it will be easier to tell when it’s a bit bigger.

Have you noticed my little Fiber Dreams buttons on the sock pictures? I got a button making machine earlier this month, and made a bunch of these little guys. Are you going to Stitches West in Santa Clara at the end of February? I am. I’ll take my buttons with me. Tell you what. If you see me there and ask for a button, I’ll give you one. Offer limited to supply on hand—I have about 30 of them—and all that jazz. They’re small, only about 1¼ inches, so they’ll fit nicely on your badge holder. Hint, hint. Plus, my url is on them, so you’ll be able to find my patterns later. Hint, hint. Nudge, nudge.

There’s so much to catch you up on, I don’t even know where to start. I’ve been knitting like a mad woman, designing new things, printing and stuffing patterns into sleeves, and shipping them off to my distributor, labeling blocking wire tubes and getting them shipped out (I’m currently behind by about 300 labels), coordinating a test knitting project, and on and on and on.

Earlier this month Dave and I went to TNNA in Long Beach. I love having Dave with me at these conferences. Unlike me, he has no qualms at all about walking up to people, introducing ourselves, and asking questions. It’s fabulous. Though that part of Long Beach is only about 30 miles from here, we opted to stay at the hotel on site. We’re so glad we did. We had late nights and early mornings, and would have at best been zombies on the days in between if we’d stayed at home. I don’t even want to think about what could have happened in traffic or during a late night trip home. No. It was crazy expensive, but worth it in the end.

I had knitted samples in three booths this time, and don’t have a picture of a single one. I had a number of things in Bryson Distributing’s booth, of course, since he’s my distributor now. I also had a shawl in Fibre Isle’s booth, Sevilla. Silvie loved my design almost as much as I enjoyed knitting with her Kami Bison yarn, so having the shawl in her booth was wonderful for both of us.

The real surprise was that my sweater, Denim Lace Tunic, was one of only two samples hanging in Love of Knitting’s booth. My sweater was evidently quite a hit with the magazine’s staff. It was fun seeing it on display. They didn’t tell me beforehand that it was gong to be there, so it was a complete surprise.

While at the conference we went to the AKD panel discussion, Yarn Group and Designer/Teacher Group meetings, and the TNNA general meeting. We learned all kinds of new stuff. And we met people. Lots of people. Talked to tons of folks. We finally got to meet Julia from Patternfish. She’s a delight. It was a blast meeting Marly of Yarn Thing the first night. I think we must have run into her half a dozen times every day after that. It seemed that every time we turned around the Ravelry group (Casey, Jess, Mary-Heather, and Sarah) was there. It got to be pretty funny after a while. We also spent a bit of time in the Bryson booth, mostly meeting and starting to get to know the staff who were there, as well as some of the other designers whose work he carries.

I got yarn to play with. Some really luscious yarn. I don’t know what’s going to come of all of it yet, some might end up being involved with secret projects, so I’m not going to tell you what all I got. Know that it’s all gorgeous, some quite special, and all wonderful. And soft. Oh-so soft.

Back home again, the testing of Gloriosa, my first cardigan pattern, is progressing. Not quickly, not without its bumps (all my fault), but it is progressing. Let’s just say that my test knitters this go ’round have been very patient with me. There are a lot of people who wouldn’t agree, but I find grading sweater patterns to be a lot more difficult than anything to do with designing lace shawls. The pitfalls are seemingly endless. We’re slowly making our way through them, so with any luck at all it won’t be too much longer before the pattern is ready for the general public.

A shawl design that I came up with late last year is now done with test knitting, goof-catching, and photography sessions. I hope to get it out later today. More about that little project then. I’ll leave you with this progress picture of it.

Dave came in a moment ago. We’ve been promising each other an outing to see Avatar. We’re finally going to go do that today. We plan on catching the noon showing. See you there.

Edited to add stuff!
There were two things I forgot to tell you, so I’m updating this post to add them while I’m thinking of it. First, I need volunteers to test knit a garter stitch baby blanket for me. The blanket is knit in panels that are attached to each other as they are knit—no seaming! Except for the border, the rows are short and knit up quickly. I found it to be a rather addictive knit. Here are some photos of it. The finished baby blanket isn’t very large, only about a yard in each direction. The pattern is based on a quilt block, like Pinwheel is. If you want to volunteer to test knit this pattern, please contact me for details.

The second thing I forgot to tell you is that there’s going to be a knit along for my Pacific Islands pattern on Ravelry. If you’ve been on the fence about knitting this one, now is the perfect time to start planning. The KAL start date is February 12, 2010, to coincide with Ravelympics. If you’re participating in Ravelympics, this could be the perfect project for you. Non-Ravelympians don’t have to worry. There’s no specific end date for this KAL.

Here I go again. Another boring blog post after a long absence, and promises of near future real blog posts. My intentions are good. Events are conspiring against me. Continue to keep your fingers crossed. There’s still hope.

In the meantime, I have another pattern out there in the world that I want to share with you. I had what I thought was a lovely named picked out for it, but the magazine, Love of Knitting, had something boring in mind: Denim Lace Tunic. <-- Go visit my pattern page for more photos.

But, exciting name or a boring one, the pattern combines my two knitting loves—cables and lace—and can be found in the Love of Knitting’s Spring 2010 issue. The totally cool thing? My model tunic was displayed in the Love of Knitting booth at TNNA this month. I didn’t know it was going to be there. I sort of wondered if it might be, since I hadn’t received the sweater back yet, but no one said a thing, so I didn’t know. Know what I mean? I was at the show, walking down an aisle with Dave, rounded a corner, and there it was, hanging on a hanger next to only one other garment, and under big signs showing previous issue’s covers on the back wall of their booth. Squee!

I do truly hope to be able to get back to at least shorter gaps between blog posts soon, and posts with a little juicier information in them. I’d even continue right now, I have so much to tell you, but I’m freezing. In spite of wool socks and felted wool slippers my feet are so cold the goosebumps are traveling up to my thighs, and my hands are so cold that typing is… interesting. Besides, it’s after 11 pm, and I have knitting to do, an episode of the Tudors to watch, and a cuddly afghan to curl up under. So, more will have to wait. Hang in there. I’ll be back. I promise!

I originally designed and released the Tilia shawl (here on Ravelry) pattern in collaboration with Dee of Posh Yarn using her Diana lace weight yarn (50% silk, 50% merino = yum!). She distributed it as a limited edition kit, which sold out almost immediately. The period of exclusivity is now over, and the pattern is available for individual sale. You can get it online at Patternfish. The printed patterns will start trickling into shops across the U.S. sometime about the middle of January or so, so be sure to look for them there, too. The shawl is knit from the bottom up, starting with a huge cast on, and decreasing to the top where a handful of stitches are grafted together to finish it up. The pattern includes oodles of nupps, but those can either be left out or replaced with beads (instructions for the bead option not included).

I know. I’ve been one of the world’s most pathetic bloggers lately. I have tons to tell you, lots of photos to share, all sorts of things to write about… and no time to do it in. I’m hoping to have more time after recovering from next weekend’s TNNA convention in Long Beach. If you’re going to be there, please let me know. Maybe we can hook up!

KALs

If you’re on Ravelry already, and want to participate in a KAL for one of my lace patterns, be sure to come and vote for your favorite. Voting will be closing after I get back from TNNA, so that everyone has time to get yarn and needles, and be ready to cast on in early February.

Also, if you wanted to participate in the Basket Whip cowl KAL, but were too busy with holiday knitting in December, never fear. The KAL is still going strong. We’re currently at 357 members and 151 projects, and going strong.

I’ve been a bad, bad blogger. But then, I’m quite sure you’ve noticed this. Life has been more than a little out of control of late. I’m here this time just for a very quick update. I have a new pattern release to report. This time it’s a freebie. About this time last year I discussed doing a pattern for Classic Elite Yarns’ web-letter. Things got in the way of a quick release. Honestly, if it wasn’t one thing it was another. We all finally got our ducks in a row, however, and the pattern is out! Classic Elite added a bit to my simple pattern name, and released it as Fresco Basket Whip Cowl, as last week’s free pattern. I don’t know about the people who aren’t on Ravelry, but of those that are quite a few have already marked this pattern as a favorite, and put it in their queue to knit up.

On Wednesday morning, my good friend Denise (sadly blogless) talked me into sponsoring a KAL for this pattern. If you’re on Ravelry, please join us for the Basket Whip KAL. If you’re not on Ravelry, please join so that you can knit along with the group! The official start date is December 1, 2009, but one person has already finished her first cowl, and many others won’t be starting until after their Christmas knitting is done, so there’s plenty of time to get in on the action.

If you’re interested, I have more pictures of Basket Whip on my web site. Also, if the pattern seems vaguely familiar that’s because it is! I used the same stitch for three other patterns, which I have begun referring to as my West Coast Swing Collection: Flying Lindy (socks), Sugar Push (fingerless mitts), and Syncopation (shell).