Still Plugging Along

Wow, it’s March? How did that happen? Not that I am complaining mind you? The days are getting longer and it’s almost spring. Anyone who knows me, knows I am not a friend of winter. It has been a gray and wet winter here in Nashville, but at least no frozen stuff to speak of, so that’s good.

I have progressed to the inner border on my fingering weight re-knit of my Honeydew Lace Square pattern. I am halfway through that and making edits to the charts to update that pattern when I am finished. I just added the third skein so I may be able to complete the whole thing with only four skeins. That is what I hope for anyway.

The festival season will be starting back up for me in just 10 more days. I have three shows lined up for the second half of March. I will be at the Carolina Fiber Fest on March 13-14; from there I will be in Pittsburgh for the Pittsburgh Creative Arts Festival on March 20-22; and then it’s on to Hartford, CT for Stitches United on March 26-29. It’s a two drive home from there. I am working through my preparation list and have completed most of the tasks. I am mostly just focusing on that and trying not to think too much about being away from my loved ones for almost three weeks. :-( I enjoy what I do but that is the hard part.

Checking in from Pittsburgh

Good Morning! I arrived safely in Pittsburgh yesterday afternoon. I am here for the 15th annual Pittsburgh Knit & Crochet Festival AKA Pittsburgh Creative Arts Festival now, since it has been expanded to include all kinds of needle arts. We are expecting an exciting year, with lots of fun activities in the new Green Tree location. I will be heading over to set up the booth at noon but wanted to use part of my free time this morning doing a quick catch post for you.

As you see I didn’t quite get my Holbrook finished for the show. I am about 70% done on the border. The biggest set back was due to coming down with some cold/mild flu thing on last Wednesday night. I had a large mill dyeing order that I was trying to get done that I had picked up on Tuesday. I went out Wednesday and did prep work for that and got 4 of the 12 batches dyed before quitting for the night. After a light supper and bath I felt a fever coming on and went to bed early. Thursday morning it was clear not work was gonna get done that day. I was down with a fever off 100. I so didn’t have time for this. UGH. I was not able to get that work done until Sunday due to continual fever. I did manage some less strenuous tasks from my to-do lists that were mainly printing patterns, and other computer oriented stuff. I didn’t even feel like knitting the first two days. I am fine now, just have a bit of a lingering cough.

I did manage to DRAG myself out to Best Buy on Friday when my pre-ordered Samsung Galaxy S10+ was ready for pickup. I tried not to breathe on anyone, LOL. This is the first time I splurged a bit and went for the Plus. It was mostly the 4100 mAh battery that I wanted it for. I love it! I hate taking selfies as a rule but I was playing around with the camera in my room last night and took a couple for experimentation. I was surprised that I managed to not totally hate the results, LOL.

Okay it’s time to get to work. See you soon!

Where the H*LL is Spring?

My last day in Nashville on Tuesday, we had the windows open and it was about 80 degrees. The grass already needs mowing and the trees are budding out. Today I am in Pittsburgh for the Pittsburgh Creative Arts Festival and this is what it looks like here.

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Seriously? What is this Narnia before Aslan returned? Always winter but never Christmas? Yuck. Let me tell you, 28 degrees with gusting wind feels pretty darn cold after 80 degrees. I am praying for some change for the better in the very near future, and lots of patience in the mean time. The bright side is that the venue is very nice and bright, and I don’t have to load and unload the trailer in the elements. The loading dock is inside. I will be going over in a couple hours to do the booth set up.

I have written the pattern for the Honeydew Lace Square, which I think is what I will be calling it BTW, and hope to have it ready within a week. I have finished the first draft and consulted my friend Dee O’Keefe, designer extraordinaire, who was generous enough to help me with some edits. If I get any time this weekend I will be making her suggested revisions. As soon as it is ready I will announce it here, on Facebook and my newsletter.

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I took these in the hotel room this morning to try out how it looks against a darker background. I really need to get some pictures that weren’t taken in a hotel room for the pattern at some point. ;-) These really aren’t half bad though.

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Okay I better get to work. See ya later!

 

Home again

I arrived back home from Connecticut safely, after another two day long drive. I saw much snow on the ground all along the way, even as far south as Wytheville, Virginia. When I was maybe 50-75 miles from Bristol, the state line into Tennessee, it began to look like spring at last. Now home in Nashville, for the last three days, I am enjoying seeing grass and trees budding. We have still got so much rain that every thing is pretty soggy, but at least it’s not cold. I did have to turn on the heat last night because the overnight temperature dipped into the 40’s, but we have had some windows open, up until then. I am afraid I will once again see wintery weather when I am in Pittsburgh next weekend for the Pittsburgh Creative Arts Festival. I am hopeful that it may be warm, as it was last year, but I will be packing sweaters, scarves, and gloves just in case. :-)

I am spending my week at home enjoying my family, and catching up on dozens of business related tasks. At the top of my list, with hopes to have it ready for next weekend, is the pattern for the new lace square shawl. I have begun work on it and have got the pattern basically written as far as the overview and procedural steps. I just need to finish up the charts and insert them and it will be ready to publish. I still have as a working title for it, Honeydew Lace Square, which I know is kind of boring, but I am putting all my energy into writing and will hopefully come up with something better later. I did get a few good suggestions which I will take into consideration at that point.

I was very pleasantly surprised that there were so many people who liked and wanted to make it. Quite a few actually went as far as to buy the 7 skeins of Classic Merino Lace required to make it, even with the pattern not written yet. But no pressure right? LOL! Many knitters have also emailed asking for it, so yeah, I feel obligated to make it a priority now. :-) Thank you to all who have encouraged me to finish it.

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In addition to all the family and business stuff, I have managed to make some progress on my two knitting projects I have going. Here’s the progress on Carolan. It is looking pretty good, I think.

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And here is Tiriltunge, which I work on when I don’t want to be bothered with referring to a chart.

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