Red Faery

Remember when I was carrying on about not wanting to duplicate any more projects?  Yeah, I take it all back.  I found the love again, and its name is Faery Ring. 

What better gift could knitting give to me, than a reminder that I still love this design?  I might even love it more, now that I'm not creating it for the first time.  It's relaxing; almost as if I'm making someone else's pattern.  There is a huge luxury inherent in the assumption that the pattern you are making will actually turn out to be the design you expected.  This is not something designers get to enjoy when making a brand-new project.  Not having to count every single stitch eight times because it's being written down for someone else to follow is really nice.  I can remember what it was like to knit before I was a designer, and the freedom and joy that go with diving into a project for which the heavy lifting has already been done.

When I made my first Faery Ring, I had no guarantee at the beginning that the sweater I got at the end would be any good.  This one is a different experience, with that element resolved.  I know it will be good, because the first one is proof.  At last, I understand the advantage of making the same thing twice: If I liked the first one, the second will be even better.  I even think I may be starting to understand how some knitters latch onto a pattern and make it over and over again (horrors!).  There is a huge degree of comfort and reassurance in knowing a recipe so well that you can make it by heart.  What could be better than knitting like that?
 

It's Like Deja-Vu All Over Again

Here is the beginning of Faery Ring, Part Deux.  It's a birthday present, whose completion is slated for August 16; a goal whose optimism defies all reason, and most logic.  Still, Hope springs eternal, no?  Wouldn't be the first time I gave someone a box of  unfinished sweater pieces for a gift.  For that matter, I have also been the happy recipient of such boxes, too.  Just how we roll in my family, I guess.

This week has been a serious meat-grinder, work wise.  I managed to miss a publication deadline, not because the project was off track, but because I failed to change the page on my calendar, of all things.  The deadline that I had firmly planted in my consciousness of 07-09, turned out to be 07-06, instead.  So while I totally met my goal, the magazine editor had different ideas about when my project should have arrived.  Oops.  That sucked.  A lot.

My day job has also begun to more closely resemble the seventh circle of hell.  Co-workers on vacay = more for me to do.  Again with the "only so many hours in the day" problem.  I actually dreamed last night that I quit my day job to become a stripper.  I was the Gypsy-Rose-Lee-Burlesque kind of stripper, with long satin gloves and a bustier.  It was great, too, because I only worked on Friday nights, and I made all the money I could spend.  Funny that my subconscious has decided that life as a stripper is less debasing and humiliating than my current occupation.  Makes me wonder...

I've been beating back the suspicion that my knitting is burning me out.  And by beating back, I mean completely denying it.  I only realized this when I finished the on-time-but-still-late-anyway project, and happily turned to the Faery Ring.  I have been promising myself that I would give it the attention it so richly deserves as soon as this other thing was done.  But when it finally was time to relax into its fleecy embrace, I found I couldn't fully succumb to its many charms.  My mind kept wandering off into other territories, and I began to ask myself what was really going on.

Now, those who know me well will nod appreciatively when I tell you that I don't like repetition.  I am the woman who will drive an hour out of my way to avoid going down the same street as yesterday.  If I could afford it, all my bedsheets, automobiles and shoes would be disposable.  I just get sick of things being always the same.  So it was with considerable shock that I realized that the Faery Ring Part Deux is no less than the FOURTH project in a row that I am making more than once.  That's right: "Sommelier" = two different versions of the same pattern.  "Desert Rain" = made a second sample so I could model one while the other was on display. "Juliette" (you'll see it this winter)= dye lot problem and failed overdye attempt resulted in a complete reknit.  "Faery Ring"= well, granted, I finished the original in January, but it's still a repeat project.  No wonder I'm going batshit.  I can't believe all these do-overs.  It's completely unprecedented, and way bizarre.  The Knitting Gods are clearly toying with me.  How sad is it to make FOUR projects twice before noticing that you are repeating stuff? 

I'm going for a motorcycle ride. Preferably on a road I've never seen before.
 

Adventures in Wine Country

If anybody had told me when I decided to turn serious with my knitting, that I would need also to become a photo stylist, talent scout, logistics manager and graphic artist, I would have laughed myself stupid.  But, there it is. Over the weekend we finally held our much-delayed photo shoot for the Sommelier project.  The weather was perfect, everybody was healthy, and best of all, we really had fun.  My special thanks go to my devoted husband, Phillip, who managed the many aspects of scheduling and execution, right down to keeping the glasses filled and the talent happy.  If the three lovely and talented friends who helped us were Charlie's Angels, then Phillip was definitely Bosley.  Behind the scenes, quietly making it all happen.
 

Phillip is crouching at the base of the wine cask on the right, making sure it doesn't roll down the hill, model and all. Whadda Guy.
 

The "Angels" gamely climb onto teetering wine casks while I hold the wine and make smartass remarks.

Phillip keeps us laughing during a break in shooting.

The photo shoot crew, kindly photographed by our actual Sommelier at Cooper Mountain.  He even stayed late so we could borrow some wine glasses.  Clockwise, from top left:  Model Amy, Photographer Jen, Facilitator and Clown Phillip, Model Kerin, and Me.

True to my promise, I paid everybody in wine, and we feasted at the pub afterwords.  It was so much fun I can't believe it.  Man, I love my job.

And if all that weren't enough, There is now, finally, a real-live pattern for sale.  You can find it on Ravelry now, and later today on my newly-added Patterns page.  For all who have promised to love this design, thank you for your patience and support:  Today's the day!