Back to it

Well that was a lovely little break. I have been working, but really, not much. I'm kind of amazed by how long it has taken me (is taking me) to get back to my usual work rhythm. Partly, I was really wiped by Fibrefest, and partly, life just sort of took over. It's the curse of the work-at-home-mom -- if an errand needs to be done, then the one who works at home is going to be the one to give up work time to do it. And I get that, it makes sense. I don't need to book time off with anyone, rearrange meetings, file paperwork with HR. But still, there have been a lot of little things -- holidays that preschool takes but not any other business, illnesses, etc -- and they have taken over 50% of my usual three days a week working time lately.

But I'm back to it! I spent Tuesday communing with the dyepots, and dyed 8lbs of corriedale. The current batch is possibly even lovelier than usual; Hello Yarn is such a great supplier, so reliable and affordable. Can't say enough good about them and their product. Here is some of what I have dyed:



The current batch of BFL is sort of intriguing. It has an incredibly soft hand, and the fibers are long and very fluffy. It's wonderful to spin, soft, a bit soapy/silky to draft. However, there are these regular little tufts of very short hairs. Any spinners know what those are? They must be something that's usually combed out, that wasn't in this batch. Anyway, it's spinning up fine, but I'm having to slow down and be careful when I get to the short-ish bits.

In other news, I have signed up for the comprehensive spinning class at Place des Arts starting next week. Here's my little secret -- I'm a beginner spinner. I can do a couple types of yarn rather well, so I'm confident about what I offer for sale, but my range of skills is not high. I'm looking forward to this course, so that I can learn the basics right from the dirty-fleece stage, fill in gaps in my basic knowledge, and extend my skills so that I can spin different types of fiber with confidence. I have learned as much as I can by myself, with YouTube videos and experimenting, and I'm looking forward to learning from a real live teacher in a classroom situation.

And to close -- here is some yarn to look at. I am still trying to perfect the colourway "Ianto." Torchwood fans -- waddya think of this batch? I didn't get the charcoal element in, quite, but if you see it as just a tie-shirt combo, it's rather good I think.

I love him.

I will tell you all about Fibrefest, I promise, but I'm still recovering my language skills.

Today, my mom has gone home to Ottawa and my daughter is in preschool all day. I have the day to myself, and I will not be working. I have knitting plans -- the Kauni stranded scarf I started at Fibrefest, maybe, or the double-knitting scarf I started a while back. Don't-bug-me knitting projects, both of them. I have reading plans -- the Spring issue of Bitch magazine came to my house yesterday.

And as to my title -- when I came home from dropping my daughter off, the house was empty, and on a couch cushion was an envelope. On it, my beloved husband had written "Go to a movie, K," and inside was a free movie pass.

I love him.

I've decided to see Juno, all by myself. I love to go see movies by myself. No one to consult on the movie choice, no one to negotiate snack-sharing with, no one else to worry about in any way. It's only-child nirvana.

I made a wool tree!

Is it wrong to be just a little in love with myself today? 'Cause I am. 'Cause look what sprouted up in my dining room:


I'm very proud of my work. I'm also certain that I haven't done nearly enough to prepare, I don't have enough stock, I'm going to be doing a lot of handing out my business card and hoping people contact me later, but hey, I can't do anything about that now. I have worked my fingers off the last three weeks, I bought as much supplies as I could afford without digging into high-interest credit, and I've accomplished quite a bit. It's a balancing act, doing this small business. I want to keep enough stock around so that anyone who finds me can probably find something to their taste, but not so much that I have more than i can afford tied up in the stock. I want to buy enough supplies to keep my stock high, but not so much that the business is living on credit. So, a balancing act. But an interesting one.

Look! Yarn:

I feel pretty...

Well, not me precisely. Me, I need a haircut, my roots are severely grown out, and I'm still fighting an unpleasant multi-symptom virus that had me cancelling class on Saturday and, what's more not meeting my spinning quota for the day, but the part of me that I'm all focussed on these days -- the wooly part of me -- that feels awfully pretty. Here is my upstairs half-wall thingy:


And my back patio drying racks:


And two bigass bins o' yarn in my spinning room:



I am actually feeling not completely panicked, not entirely inadequate, not like I am about to be cleaned out of my meagre supplies within moments of Fibrefest's doors opening, leaving me with 15 hours in which to apologize to potential customers that I have nothing to show them.

I had a little burst of energy yesterday and I managed to dye another 4lbs of corriedale, in awfully pretty colours. Not having much in the way of creativity left, I dyed colourways that have been popular in the past and all 4 batches turned out just like I wanted. I spun 12 skeins of yarn as well, and felt generally cheerful in the process.

Did I mention the unexpected not panicking? That was nice.

Today, I'm starting with some relaxing spinning -- a very pretty Shetland roving:


And in case you missed it: Fibrefest is in Abbottsford on March 7-8, *not* at Tradex where it used to be. Follow the link for driving directions, and come visit me there!

I'm hearing the theme from 2001

Alright, so it's not quite the neverending shot of that spaceship, but I'm pretty sure it's more wool than has ever been on my drying racks all at once. What you see, from back to front: some 2-ply aran weight yarn, which I'm very excited about, a bunch of dyed corriedale, some spun corriedale, and a pile of dyed BFL. All drying a heck of a lot faster outside, now that it isn't raining 24/7 and hovering around zero degrees, than it would inside. I'm out of space, though, so if I manage to get any more yarn made and washed today, some of that fiber will have to be relocated into my "drying closet," aka my guest bathroom which has a lovely powerful heater and a fan.

We're in the soup now. I have a daily quota of at least 10 skeins of yarn to be spun every day for the next 7 days, and that still won't manage to get everything spun and ready. I have had my first experience of sitting down at my wheel and saying to myself, oh no, not more spinning. I promised myself I'd pull back if I ever got to that point, but this is a special time, so I'm just trying to put my head down and meet the goal.

I have a good amount of spinning-entertainment on hand. I've been watching my episodes of Torchwood Season 2 (and we won't talk about how I acquired these eps, which are not being broadcast in Canada yet), I plan to maybe finish of my re-watch of Buffy Season 7 (on re-watching, the season held together a little better than it seemed to at first), and I'm listening to a lot of music. The new Radiohead album is on constant-repeat, and I'm finding that 'vintage' UK punk makes for a rather good spinning rhythm.

My daughter is home today and tomorrow, though, so I expect I'll be watching more Boohbah than I normally would on my own.

The Countdown Begins

As of today, there are three weeks until Fibrefest. And I cannot begin to envision being ready.

The business has had a strange three months. My sales have seemed to be very low. My December and January farmer's market days were slower than the late summer and early fall days. My Etsy sales, which had been becoming steadier, seemed to drop off completely. And yet, when I look at the account books, my monthly net sales for each month have been about the same. The apparent difference is only that -- apparent. The pattern has been changing, though. Rather than a steady stream of small sales, I have had larger sales at greater intervals. So I have nothing actually to complain about, but this new pattern does get to my nerves somewhat.

I seem to panic about two things: 1) that I'm not selling enough, and I should pack up this silly home-based craft business and get a real job, and 2) that I'm selling too much, and I won't have enough stock for my next market date, craft show, or wholesale order.

Clearly, I'm just in a mood to panic.

I am trying to get a grip. But having three weeks to go until my biggest show to-date, and having in the last month sold some 75 skeins to Three Bags Full, and 21 to a couple other people, I have bare, bare cupboards. So I get to find some (barely) legitimate reason to panic about *both* problems -- not enough stock and fear of no sales -- at the same time. For three weeks.

Maybe I got off the prozac too soon.

Feb 10 Coquitlam Market

Just a quick note from me to any local readers: I won't be at the Coquitlam Farmer's Market on Sunday. My family suddenly had a chance to take a short trip to Portland, to visit family, so I cancelled my scheduled market day. It's too bad, I love being at the market. I also love my once-a-month chance to stock up on organic beef, artisan bread (have you *tried* the fennel raisin bread? It's to-die.), and beautiful tasty little potatoes. I'm gonna miss the March market too, because it conflicts with Fibrefest -- I think I'll need to send a personal shopper to buy my stuff for me.

Despite being in Portland, I plan to post new things to my shop, at least once a day, for the next 10 days.

In the queue

I had intended to post a bunch of the soft-spun corriedale that I've been making -- loads of new colourways, all gorgeous, I'm very proud -- but they all got bought before I could post them. Hardly a problem, but a bit of a surprise. It seems that the half-size (as in, 55g instead of 110g) skeins are selling marvellously well at Three Bags Full, much better than the full size, and they wanted to re-stock a mere two weeks after they bought their last batch from me. I'm delighted, but the cupboards are bare. Pictured above is what I managed to spin in four or five days of being at home with a sick child. It's not my usual high rate of production, but the variety is high. I should be able to post one new yarn a day for the next week or so. Which is good, because I'm going to be unable to get any spinning done until Tuesday.

I swear, I haven't gotten a decent stretch of work days since November. Christmas, visitors, illness -- it conspires to take away what little time I have. And getting the two year old to understand that she has to let me spin is a tough sell.

One month until Fibrefest! My goodness, I am *so* not ready. Much work and stockpiling to be done.

7.5 pounds of wet wool

It doesn't sound like a good time, seven and a half pounds of wet wool, but it depends on what wool, and why it's wet. Check out what I spent 5 hours doing yesterday:




It's hard to tell until it's spun, but on that rack are rovings that will become new batches of Kyoto, Gummy Worms, and Time Held me Green and Dying, as well as a bunch of new colours. Also coming soon, the return of Booberry. I got a couple skeins just right, and four that are too pale -- I'm calling those Son of Booberry.

I'm off to class this morning, and I'm theoretically looking forward to it, but if I had a time machine and could freeze this day a little longer, I'd do it. I have a pounding head, a dripping nose, and a great sense of being very sorry for myself.

Knitting will help, surely. It usually does.

Classes Starting This Week

I really love teaching knitting, it thrills me like I can hardly explain. I've been in love with knitting since I was a little child. I loved sitting quietly and knitting away, feeling like I was producing something, and I loved experimenting. I've never stopped experimenting and trying to learn new things. There have been times when I sat back for a few months and just made stuff with the skills I already knew, but I was never satisfied for long doing the same thing. Fast forward 27 years from the day I learned, and here I am, with a ton of experience under my belt, able to produce just what I see in my mind (give or take!), and able to empathize with knitters at all skill levels as they go through their own learning curve. Able to give all kinds of useful tips and tricks, the ones I wish someone had been able to tell me when I was figuring out this or that on my own.

So having the opportunity to teach these skills, for decent pay no less, at a lovely establishment two blocks from my house, on my own schedule? It's like I'm living in a happy fiber dreamland.

Which is all to say, here is a little reminder that my classes are starting this week. When I checked last week, the Sweaters class had 4 people and the Knit Cafe had 3 -- so there's room for more, if you're interested. Or if you know a friend.

I'm also planning my summer classes. I'm thinking of taking a scattershot approach, and offering a ton of fun, short, workshop-like classes. Most of them will be 2 hours each class, and the emphasis will be on practising the skills taught -- lots of swatching, lots of experimenting, lots of hands-on playing with yarn.

So far, I'm proposing the following:
Knit Cafe: 5 classes
Adult Beginner Knitting: 5 classes
Stranded Knitting 1: 3 classes
Stranded Knitting 2 (steeking!): 3 classes
Sock Knitting 1: 4 classes
Sock Knitting 2: 4 classes
Freeform Knitting: 3 classes
Basic Sweaters: 8 classes
Cables 1: 2 classes

I'd love to hear ideas and opinions. What sorts of skills do you like to learn in a class? That is, what will cause you to take a class in something rather than buy a book and try it on your own? What length of time do you think is good -- is 2 hours too much? Is 1.5 hours too little? Do you like single-day classes, 2-3 day classes, or longer sessions, like 8 sessions to complete a larger project?

I have big, if vague, plans for the Fall too. I'm hoping that I will have had enough people take my Basic Sweaters class, and some take the Stranded knitting and Cables classes, so that I can offer an Advanced Sweaters class which includes work in cables, colourwork and steeking.