Darn! January 27, 2011
Posted by La in Miscellaneous.2 comments
No sooner did I post the news did we get an update. Looks like a Stitches event won’t be happening in September, in deference to the Vogue Knitting Live! event scheduled and already booked for that month. I’m disappointed, but can totally understand.
Benjamin did state that they want to do an event in Southern California. I’m hoping it’s sooner rather than later. I’m hoping (fingers crossed) maybe as early as November or early December. I know that November is hard on the heels of Stitches East, but seeing as they wanted to do a smaller event here, perhaps it’s doable.
Now I’m off to emailing the vendor coordinator for Vogue Knitting Live! Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. I hope my blog didn’t jinx it!
Please, oh please!!! January 27, 2011
Posted by La in Miscellaneous.1 comment so far
Southern California can be an ideal place to live for several reasons: temperate weather, beaches, mountains, top-notch entertainment wherever you go, and a rich history. However, if you’re a fiber artist, you will soon realize that there is one thing totally lacking: fiber festivals.
Don’t get me wrong, we have several retreat events: Griffin Dyeworks Fiber Retreat and the Studio 66 Fiber Retreat (both of which I someday hope to attend) as well as a few small, localized events like Griffin Dyeworks Fiber Frolic (which are held 3 or 4 times a year), and WeFF but nothing on the scale of, say, Maryland Sheep & Wool, Rhinebeck or Stitches. It’s enough to make a SoCal knitter travel the country, and I have.
Well, that MAY be about the change! Earlier this week I stumbled on some exciting news:
STITCHES MAY BE COMING TO SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA!
Sorry for the all-caps, but I am so excited about the prospect that all I can do is shout it. Read all about it here, and definitely leave a comment to let XRX Knitting Universe know that there’s not only a market for a Stitches event here, we are STARVED for some larger-scale fiber festivals here. If you’re shy about leaving comments on blogs, not to worry. There are several threads on Ravelry (okay, so some of them I started) that you can voice your resounding “oh hell yes” on the subject, but the main one is here.
If this Happily Ever After DOES come true, expect to see me there at Dizzy Blonde Studios in the marketplace having a great time pimping our wares! In the meantime, I plan to keep a sharp eye on the turn of events, and keep you all posted, and you should go tell Benjamin Levisay, in any form you can, (he’s on Facebook, Twitter & Ravelry and very friendly on all three) that yes, we need Stitches in our region!
Can’t Stop The Cuteness September 8, 2010
Posted by La in Accessories, Design.2 comments
I am slowly but surely drafting up the patterns that I am obsessively knitting. Someone needs to invent something that writes down your steps and charts your stitch patterns as you knit them. Can someone get on that asap please? Because I probably have 4 more designs in need of written patterns. And by “written pattern” I mean non-chicken-scrawled, speshul snowflake angel shorthand patterns.
However, I have completed one pattern, and it’s ready for it’s debut!
Full Tilt
This is bound to be your child’s favorite hat! The clever use of cables and lace has given a traditional knitted winter hat a fun and new slant. Knit in super soft, super warm 100% superwash merino, it’ll not only keep your little one comfy and warm, but will wash up wonderfully time after time.
(I’m having a hard time deciding which is cuter, the model or the hat. Okay, I admit it. The adorable model wins, but just by a smidge… 
)
If some of you are saying “hey, that looks kinda familiar,” you’d be right. I took a page from Hollywood’s book and decided to reinvent a pattern I had previously written and submitted to a design contest. I re-engineered it to use my Dirty Blonde line of yarn instead of a discontinued yarn. Also, I took the slant of the cables and lace in a different, more pleasing direction. And now it fits a wee head much better than the original did.
Pattern Stats:
Skill Set:
→Basic Chart Reading
→Basic Cable Knitting
→Basic Lace Knitting
→Ability or Willingness to Knit in the Round
Needles: US size 5 [3.75mm]
Yarn: Less than 1 skein [260 yds/238m; 4oz./100g.] Dizzy Blonde Studios: Dirty Blonde DK Superwash Merino; Martha colorway
Gauge: 24 sts/30 rows in 4 inches, stockinette
Finished Dimensions: 16.5” circumference; 6.5” fitted height
The pattern is selling at the introductory price of just $1.49, and you can find it on Ravelry, at Dizzy Blonde Studios, and eventually here in the sidebar.
BTW, the adorable model is my darling 3-yo step granddaughter, Little Miss M. Yes. She’s already 3.
Another Country Heard From August 18, 2010
Posted by La in FO, Knitting, Miscellaneous, Other Crafty Pursuits.3 comments
That’s what my mom used to say when I was growing up, when one of us had been unusually quiet for quite some time, who suddenly pops up with some sort random outburst, rarely having to do with the immediate conversation.
That being said….hello again! It is my theory that I was suffering from summer ennui, compounded on not having a whole hell of a lot, fiber-wise, to talk about, having spent the last couple of months helping my husband (and by helping, I mean, suppressing the urge to smack him around a little) pull his new Roman reenactment group together in time for our first event ever: Old Fort MacArthur Days.
So as not to bore you with my utter Rometardedness, the fiber-applicable picture I left large, the rest are thumbnails that you can enbiggen by clicking.
(Go ahead and click on the gladiator picture, you know you wanna cuz they’re hawt!)
Shiny hubby’s hard work payed off. We won the Esprit de Corps award! The highest award this event bestows and a fete that is practically unheard of for a small, first-year group such as ours.
So now that I have my life back, I have been knitting and have the evidence to prove it!
May found me cranking out a couple of Noodle Cozy (Rav link) for my nephews. The first one was for 10-year-old Michael who needed it for his portrayal of Paul Bunyan in his school play. So, of course, the minute I gave it to him, his little brother, Joey just had to have one too!
The Red is knit out of Lion Brand Vanna’s Choice with the original stitch count and gauge to accommodate all those brains Mikey must be encompassing in that melon of his. Joey’s is knit out of Lion Brand Wool Ease and finishes off his “radical skater dude” look perfectly! Dang my brother sure makes some cute kids!
June was a dye fest for the first installment of the Mean Girls Yarn Club: The Mean Girl Strikes Back which was due to ship in July. (You can find the “big reveal” here)
July had me back to the drawing board working on 4 new designs. Well, okay, that’s a lie. 1 old design which I am reengineering to be knit in my Dirty Blonde yarn; 1 finished design that I just need to stop dragging my feet on and finish writing up so I can publish it; and 2 more old design that had been sent off to be published in a book, only to have the book deal fall through for the author, returning the licensing of that pattern to me. (psssssssst, this means you may be seeing some new patterns coming your way in the very near future!)
Even with all that going on, I was able to whip out a February Baby Sweater, aka Baby Sweater on Two Needles (rav link) from Knitter’s Almanac by Elizabeth Zimmerman.
The entire baby cardi took 1 ball of Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino. 1 ball! That’s it!!!! Granted, Meilena was 3 weeks premature and a petite little thing, so I used a sport weight instead of the DK that is recommended using US size 6 (4.0mm) needles, but she was still swimming in it.
However, despite the 100+ degree temps, the minute we put it on her for the picture, she stopped fussing, calming right down. A few seconds later, she was thoroughly engrossed with the daisy buttons, and decided the cardi was good enough to eat! I believe she has extremely good taste!
Hard Pressed July 23, 2010
Posted by La in Books & Magazines, Design.7 comments
…as in seriously hard-pressed to find my writing mojo. Between Ravely, Facebook, Plurk & Twitter, I’m all worded out. The social media thing seems to be the in thing and phasing out the blog thing. But sometimes there’s news of such a stupendous level that plurking & tweeting just doesn’t seem to be enough, and today I have just such an occasion. Well, 3 to be exact. All of them have one common theme: Press
First, the release of Annie Modesitt’s new book: 1000 Fabulous Knit Hats. Even though none of my hats were amongst the winning ones, I have 4 of them in there. I know! I contributed a whole .04% of that book. I only wish I knew which of my hats are featured. I think I submitted pictures of at least 6 of them. I guess I’ll have to buy the book to find out. Just think, I can now include the sentence “As Featured in 1000 Fabulous Knit Hats” to the pattern of those selected!
And as if that isn’t enough, one of my patterns has been selected to be featured in the 2011 Knitting Pattern-A-Day calendar. My Clamber cap is Miss February 21, 2011! She is all a-twitter…see?
And last, but certainly not least, I’m getting published in a honest-t0-goodness magazine: I will have a pattern in a upcoming issue of Yarn Forward. I’m not quite sure yet which issue the pattern will be in, so if anyone subscribes to Yarn Forward and sees an Eton Cap pattern by Laura Wilson-Martos, please let me know!
Also, if anyone has any extra pattern-writing mojo, can they send it my way? I’ve got 2 patterns I need to transfer from my head and scrawled notes into charts and written instructions, and also test knit 2 more sock patterns before publishing them. But, it seems like all I want to do is knit on the February Baby Sweater for my newest little niece, Meilena.
Look at the hands on her! She’s a natural-born knitter if ever I saw one! You’d be hard-pressed not to go all melty at the adorableness!
