The Knotions Winter 2008 Preview is up. I have a pattern in it. My brain does not function right, my head and sinuses are about to explode. See you after the holidays.

I did the best thing I could to make that yarn* arrive. I did go out to buy yarn, not the same, but something else for another secret project I would have liked to start working on. When I came back, there was a note on my door, the delivery people with my yarn! Typical! They came by again today, so I did what you do when very important yarn for a very important magazine arrives, you drop everything else you’re doing and start working on that one design exclusively.

This is the first time we are actually using the same yarn as in my submission swatch, so it was no big surprise. What I had apparently forgotten about is that this yarn is not easy to wind into balls. The strands are kind of sticking to each other, a bit like alpaca, which it’s not.

So, this is what I did this morning: wind yarn, I don’t have a swift, so I wind by hand. The first hank was quite impossible to untangle, so I left it aside and tried another one. Fortunately, that one was better and I managed to ball 2 of the hanks in exactly 2 hours. Wow, didn’t see that coming in my time management plan.

Next, I dived straight into the pattern. I have bits of it already written out, for other (more complex) bits will need the yarn in hand to really see how it’ll go. After 2 rows or so, the gauge did seam weirdly off and I started wondering if I had made a mistake or misread my notes. I don’t have the original swatch anymore (it’s with Interweave), so I couldn’t check that one.

So, I made a new one, just to learn that my written gauge was indeed correct after all.

And tonight, I will try to stay awake as long as my nasty cold will allow me to get as far as possible with the crocheting. The deadline is near and this is not a hat in chunky weight yarn.

So, what picture can I show you (I don’t like picture-less posts, at all)?

Hum, let’s see…..

Ok, here’s my Marquise Top, originally published in Yarn Forward Magazine Spring 2008. It will be available directly from me via Ravelry download in a couple of weeks/months.

*”that yarn” is the one I was impatiently waiting for, it’s for a new IC project. I just realized my last post about it was only in German, so this might not be clear to everyone.

So, heute mal in Deutsch. Ich weiss auch nicht, wie’s am besten wäre, aber dreisprachig und regelmässig kriege ich im Moment einfach nicht hin. Naja. Was kann ich berichten?

- Gestern habe ich seit Monaten zum ersten Mal wieder vor dem Fernseher einen ganzen Film lang gestrickt.
- Meine zweite Sunrise Circle Jacke nähert sich dem Ende. Die passenden Knöpfe liegen hier auch schon eine Weile.
- Ich warte mal wieder auf eine Interweave Wolleladung, die wieder mal super Verspätung hat. Langsam werde ich aber etwas gelassener und denke mir, mei, dann verpass ich halt mal eine Ausgabe und es kommt in die nächste, wenn es denn sein muss.
- Ende der Woche geht es auf Heimaturlaub, ich freue schon sakrisch (wie man dort sagen würde).

So, I am not actually getting better at blogging more regularly, do I? Anyway, a couple of things in no particular order:
- As the fall issue of Interweave Crochet is now out everywhere, I might have some new readers on my juliavaconsin.com blog who might like to know that I still need to sort out the hosting, I will move the site one of these days so that the rss feed actually reflects the url, bear with me… Until then, I’ll keep blogging on both sites, juliavaconsin.com and myblog.de/juju.
- I actually managed to finish the sewn baby bib before the machine did just the same thing as last time. I’ve now definitely decided to get a new one. It helped that the “boy” did buy himself an Xbox. I feel a lot less guilty now about buying something more useful, less aggressive and noisy, that won’t be technically obsolete in a couple of months, plus it’ll be for my birthday or Christmas or both. I still have to wash the bib to photograph it all done.
- I‘ve been watching “Knitting Daily TV” on DVD. It’s very American to me, very “we’ll be right back/big fake smile” every ten seconds. But it’s fun to watch anyway. That’s why I bought it, to see people like Kim Werker and Eunny Jang in “reall life”, moving and talking and all that. Although, they are probably not exactly like that in real life (at least I hope so), but rather like this: Watch the Youtube video (Notice that Kim is wearing my Butterscotch Cardigan? Damn it, that means I have to buy the second season of Knitting Daily TV as well, I mean, I am practically in it.)
- Oh, yes, and I self-published my first pattern, the Phoenix Mitts are now also available as an individual pattern on Ravelry:

Would you believe it? I lost the swatch I wanted to include in my submission to Interweave Crochet. I have no idea where it is. I can’t do another one because I only have enough yarn for a tiny one left, plus by the time I’d finish, washed and dried it, there wouldn’t be enough time left to send it. Damn it!