Book Countdown: Month 12

month12-103015I’d like to thank everyone who came out to one of my workshops or hunted me down on the market floor of one of the shows I did this year. It’s been a great year full of big shows finished up with a nod to my origins — a couple of classes at a great little LYS in Westport, CT. Honestly, I don’t quite know how we fit 16 people into a shop that size but we managed it. I was glad I brought the projector.

A little bit about the photos above:

The first is part of the crown of the textured hat in A Hundred Ravens Aesir. The hat is called Eureka, for reasons which will become obvious later. I am happy to have it finished, since Kate from A Hundred Ravens will be visiting the Common Cod Fiber Guild at their November meeting and I was hoping to show it off there. And I’ve got enough yarn in the skeins to do another hat if I want to! Also, now that I have this shining example, I have enough ideas to write up and teach a new class which I’ve listed on my website.

The second is a snippet of the magnum opus, the final pattern in the new book, a double-knit lace shawl provisionally called “Adenyth” — it’d be called “Adenydd” but nobody knows how to pronounce Welsh and it’d just be confusing. These are the final colors, a much more attractive pairing of very pale blue and turquoise in Galler Yarns Prime Alpaca Heathers. Star at Galler Yarns provided the yarn in exchange for me talking up her yarn online, which I have to say will come very easily. This is clearly not blocked but when it is, this will be a stunning piece and everyone will want to know how to make one. And one really neat thing about it? It’ll work just fine in standard lace if you just ignore the color changes and only work it in one yarn.

The last shot is small — this is actually finer yarn than either of the other two — because it’s very much in progress and there’s not much else to show. It’s the beginning of a double-knit intarsia hat — because as long as I’m teaching double-knit intarsia, I may as well teach it in the round — originally called “42 Skidoo”. But I’ll probably need to rename it because the 42-pair panels have had to change size in the final version. The yarn is Walk of Snipes in Dirty Rainbow by Alisha Goes Around.

I am not at all sure I’m on target here — in less than 3 weeks I’ll be traveling to Thailand for almost a month, and I’ll be unable to bring Adenyth with me for fear of losing or damaging it. It’s the piece that needs the most work but it may be a while before it’s finished. Nevertheless I am determined to have it in the book so even if I have to wait to photograph it until much later in the process, it will go in. Instead, I will be bringing 42 Skidoo or perhaps the second revision of Ferronnerie.

In the coming weeks and months, I will need to double down on my knitting work. For this reason, I’m going to be setting aside at least 2 consecutive hours each day for “office hours” — for knitting or otherwise working on my knitting business or the book. This will especially be necessary as I attempt to catch up on time “lost” while on vacation.

I’ve also had some good conversations with the focus group I created last month, and I anticipate many more to come.

Finally, for those of you who want to come and see me in person, I’m excited to announce next Spring’s appearances at the big shows — and there will be more, I hope, as the year goes on. You’ll find my workshops at Vogue Knitting Live NYC, Stitches West, Interweave Yarn Fest and Stitches South — and you can find more complete info on my calendar.

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