Knit Tagging

Yesterday I took up knit-tagging telephone poles knitta style. Regrettably, it isn't a political statement, it's not a counter culture, guerrilla style assault on mass consumer ideology. I'm just envious of the big, beautiful flower planters across the street from Loblaws and wanted a little instant gratification neighborhood beautification on my strip of road. I'll join the local BIA and try and get some development money for my little section of the neighborhood. Then, if we are still neglected, I'll initiate some yarny protest.

Anyway, my first tags are just old gauge swatches sewn together and repurposed. I'm working on my first real tag, in all of it's day-glo arcylic spendour. everything has it's place grasshopper.

Patternrific!

PATTERNFISH is a new online vendor that sells very reasonably priced patterns from all kinds of designers and companies

i found a new source of free patterns, Knit on the Net

• Giles cabled bag
• Maree Sweater
• Cables & Chains Wrap Jacket
• Little Black Dress
• Limulidae Hat & Cowl
  

S.R. Kertzer has loaded some of their patterns as free downloads. there are some good patterns including market bags, a lopi sweater, etc.

made a crochet baby blanket last week from scrap rowan dk cotton hanging around the house.

I was in the basement last monday, poking through my stash, cleaning up random boxes, and added some stuff for the Yarn Swap on Saturday (July 26th).

while i was down there i found an old project that had been languishing. the yarn is Diakeito Dia-Something.

Here it is inside out. i think i like it better this way.

hmmm, let me see, what have i been getting up to ........

stitch 'n pitch never ceases to provide me with distractions. organizing people is hard! who knew?

my dog walking gig is over. last week i was hauling myself back and forth to the beaches to take care of my cousin's dogs. they were very cute, i miss them, but the commute was a pain. it takes forever to get there & back, the TTC service sucks! but the scenery, oh my god the scenery! walking the dogs on the boardwalk by the beach is an absolute pleasure! except when the dogs chase the rollerbladers. and the poo, it's still poo, no matter where you are, you're still picking up poo.

my little gardenlette on my deck is doing nice, despite my almost killing all my plants while i was loitering in the beaches. poor parched plants, every day the weather report said it was going to rain! does basil ever grow well! the stuff is almost indestructable! pesto for all. i'm looking forward to eating my lettuces! they're about 2 inches tall and leafy!

i finished the surplice sweater in mission falls 1824 cotton swirl. i'm feeling a bit burned out and have to get down to writing the pattern out.

I'm sorry I've been distracted lately and haven't blogged. It's not that I've found better things to do, I've just been busy. Making Stitch 'n Pitch happen is a constant stream of work. Just when I think I've done for a while a new problem crops up or it's time for the next phase. I haven't been able to do any pattern writing/editing and my knitting has been a little stymied too. It's time to work on someone else's pattern. My creative energies have been slipping into Embroidery. I'll take some pics & post them later.

Liane made me these two rugs for the store. It took her a couple of days to really understand how much I absolutely LOVE them! She's given me the pattern and I'll edit it and put it up on the website and make it into kits. Thanks go to Shelna who gave Liane a big pile of displaced grey wool. Kits will not come with my very cool shoes.

Ok, back to life.

If you are in the Mood to make a hat MnMs on Ravelry was just diagnosed with cancer and is asking people if they'd make her a hat and mail it to her to help keep her morale up. I just finished my sweater and think i'll take a break and make her one.

i am becoming an espresso bar-fly. i'm thinking of getting walkie talkies for the store. i can leave one in the mailbox and take the other with me when i go to loiter at Scratch. customers can send me a ten-four on the talkie and tell me to get my ass back to work and hook them up with some fibre. or maybe i can get a pager like all the other dealers?

The new Berroco Ultra Alpaca Booklet (279) looks NIIIICE!

me likey Unity




Umbretta ... not crazy about the 2x2 rib, but that can be changed.

Thank You for the Good Vibes!

wow, i love people! thank you for the supportive comments, they have a magical quality. mean people suck but my faith in humanity is restored. well, it was never really lost, just eroded, but you've definitely helped to buttress it and maybe even make it stronger.

The gooey brownie was reeeeeaaaalllly good, but it didn't do the rick. some friendly custoemrs came in before closing, but that didn't do it. pluto gave me kisses, which is always good, but didn't do it. i went to gym after work and had a good workout, and that was good for me but didn't really get me back to baseline. i went to the green room, sat down and ordered a big platter of nachos and a quesedilla and my favourite peach juice. the waittress gave me the fish eye for ordering so much without even glancing at the menu, which made me laugh and helped a bit. all i'd eaten that day was the latte & brownie and getting something in my stomach helped a bit. my boyfriend met me to eat 3/4 of the food i ordered, and that's did the trick. withing 5 minutes of john's sitting down i'd forgotten all about it.

so i guess when people are the problem people are also the solution. and laughing. we went for a stroll along the college street corso after our pig-out. i had the best gelato i've had since i lived in Italy at Dolce Cafe at College & Montrose. I highly recommend! It's pretty, comfortable, friendly, has WiFi, the pastries look great, and the gelto is .... transcendant. i could sit there all day in a fantasy world and pretend i'm back in Siena strolling to Nannini every night and then hanging out in the campo.

but coming in to your comments today makes a huge difference. i love knitting and crocheting and all the other fibre arts that i don't have time to partake in. i volunteer for these things because i like helping other people get the same enjoyment from it. i also do it because for whatever cultural reason it is very hard to connect with people in Toronto. but life is about relationships, connections with other people is what we need most. i suppose i do it to make the world the kind of place i want to live in. as long as i know that the work is making a difference to people like you i'm happy to leave the mean people to their dark little world and find some compassion for them.

later gator! gotta go make some magic happen :-)

P.S. Happy Gay Pride Weekend Everyone! John lives in that neighbourhood and the streets have already been blocked off and preparations are well under way. Looks like it's going to be a AMAZING party! i like a nice party, we should do it more. r

OY VEY!

i am catching so much shit for this stitch 'n pitch thing! the powers that be asked me to help, i tell them i'm bad at these things, that i have a business to run, and that i'm really bad at these things. they whined, i gave in. i tried to weasel out of it and they pulled me back in. i'm not getting paid, there is nothing in this for me.

now lets be explicit, none of the stores who sell tickets make anything off their sale, the distributors who donate free stuff don't make any money and i'm not sure if the ball park even makes money off of the discounted tickets. every cent goes directly to pay for the tickets, we're just kind hearted intermediaries who facilitate an event for all of you. we are intercessors.

so i have to send out info about the event to every source i can find in southern ontario and the environs. and i'm thorough, i leave no stone unturned. I'm not a communications director or a marketer. i was trained for a decade as an academic, i can sit alone in a small room and amass massive amounts of information, organize it and make sense of it. i can cultivate and apply prose, but i was trained to communicate with other academics in that vernacular and within the boundaries of that culture. i don't know shit about publicizing an event.

i write a blurb that is as lucid a possible: who, what, when, where, why, how much, and so what. i assume that most people don't spend their days cruising every knitting forum online. i post the notice in every conceivable place a southern ontarian or someone who may like to visit Toronto may be. I send it to Meetup knitting groups and in all the groups on Ravelry that are related to ontario or may have a large contingent of southern ontarians.

Now people are yelling at me! one store owner is pissed because her clients are going to think she's selling tickets to the event, but she doesn't want to sell tickets, and she doesn't want to field phone calls from her clients. sorry, i thought knitters at your store might want to know about a knitting event in their area, feel free to send them to your competitors for the tickets. someone in a forum says it is inappropriate to post about this event, a canadian event in a forum about canadian knitters who all happen to like something or other that is canadian. sorry, it made sense to me, have ontario knitters seceded from the federation of canadian knitters? someone from an online knitting group in a place near toronto tells me "never to solicit them again". so sorry, i figured a public online group of knitters who want to meet other knitters to knit with in person might possibly want to receive a private e-mail to the moderator letting them know about an event near them where knitters get together to knit together in person. so sorry to you all, my logic must be flawed.

but the worst was an actual embarrassment. i open my ravelry mail today to find a note from the yarn harlot. paraphrasing: "dear haley, i hear i am throwing the first pitch at the ball game. this is news to me, what up? YH." fuckity fuck fuck fuck. "Dear YH, i apologize profusely! the baseball guy seems to have passed me erroneous information. christ almighty. i'm going to hang myself now. with best intentions, haley." it's good that the most influential person in my industry thinks i'm a deranged opportunist, this will pave the way for a brilliant new career as a real estate agent.

i don't need this. i'm going next door to scratch for a chai latte and a gooey brownie.