Wha? Where did the last 10 days go!

I think I've been too obsessed with Twitter lately. Not that I haven't spent plenty of time neglecting my blog in the past, but Twitter kind of lets me get my chattiness out of my system. Not much left over for poor blog.

It has been an eventful week-and-a-half. My lovely girl turned 7 (can't hardly believe it!) on the 20th. We celebrated by going to see the Harlem Globetrotters.



The game was fun, but now that we've done it, I don't feel the need to ever do it again. Sydney was moderately entertained, but Owen was mostly interested in the junk food and trying to climb on the railings in the middle of the aisles. We had a moment of panic when we got there and discovered Bill had grabbed the wrong tickets (he brought our Walking With Dinosaurs tickets, which are for this coming weekend), but fortunately the kind folks at the box office were able to get us replacements. Whew!

In other fun non-work-related news, I signed myself up for an intro-to-curling class at the Lloyd Center Ice Rink. There's a curling league in Portland that practices there a few times a week, and my goal is to get myself into a novice league this spring. I have curled a few times, years ago, back in St. Paul (we went for work team-building events, the brilliant idea of one of our Canadian-born managers who rocked the special curling shoes with one slippery sole and one sticky sole). I'm really excited at the possibility of getting back into it. My grandfather used to curl in Duluth, MN, so it's in my blood!

I also stopped whining about never going skiing and decided to take the bull by the horns. I've realized that I'm an adult with a driver's license and can go skiing any time I want to, right? I bought a new pair of ski boots (something that I've been using as an excuse not to go skiing for years), got my edges tuned and bases waxed, and am ready to hit the slopes. I was going to head up to Timberline today, but they've been getting lots of snow up there and I'm not sure I'm ready to handle chaining up the van tires on my own. I'm thinking of heading to Ski Bowl this afternoon since their night skiing is closer and cheaper (no chains required). It seems silly to pay full fare at Timberline (over $50) when I'm probably only going to be able to handle a couple hours in my current state of out-of-shapeness. We'll see what happens!

As for work, I'm currently feeling over-scheduled and under-motivated. So what else is new? We made a big decision this past week to expand back into the retail pattern business instead of focusing on wholesale-only like we have been for the past few years. I love the idea of wholesale-only, and I like to do everything I can to support local yarn shops, but I'm getting totally overwhelmed with printing, packing and shipping. I need to get back to designing before I totally crash and burn. We'll still be offering patterns to shops who want them but won't be exhibiting at the trade shows anymore and hope to move much more to a digital-only, paperless existence. I'm so sick of ink emergencies and sheet protectors.

To that end, all Gardiner Yarn Works patterns designed by me are now available in the Ravelry pattern store (you'll need a Ravelry login to get there) and will soon be up (hopefully by next week) on the Gardiner Yarn Works website to purchase directly as downloads. It was a tough decision, but such a relief for me. I didn't start designing so I could spend all my time printing, sleeving, packing and shipping!

I'm trying to take a cue from Hot Rod, aka Relaxicat.



If you're still following the blog tour, we've got a few more stops and a few more opportunities to win a copy of Toe-Up! Check out Faina's interview with me over at The Designer's Studio, and visit the bluegirl knits blog later today for a guest post from me where I talk a bit about the stories behind a couple designs and how they got repurposed for the book.

I'm off to mentally prepare myself for skiing tonight. If you're up at Ski Bowl later, I'll be the one trying not to break a leg, make friends with a tree or destroy my ACL!

Winter Olympics, I love you so...

I'm not sure how much more I could love the Winter Olympics. I enjoy the Summer Olympics as well, but as a former winter sports fanatic who grew up in snowy Northern Minnesota, my heart will always belong to the colder of the two Games.

I will admit that watching the Winter Olympics is always slightly bittersweet for me. You wouldn't know it to look at me now, but I was an expert skier in my teens and early twenties before life intervened and I stopped skiing every weekend. It was rare indeed that I found a slope I couldn't ski, even when my family took our twice-annual trips to the mountains (we'd generally alternate between Jackson, Wyoming, and Red Lodge/Bozeman, Montana - lucky me, right?). It was one of the few things in life I was really good at, and it's a huge regret of mine that I let it go. We live relatively close to good skiing now, but I'm so out of shape I'm a little afraid to try it again (and the rest of the family really isn't that interested).

It does make watching the alpine events (like the moguls) a lot more interesting because I know exactly what it takes to ski like that, and so I know exactly how incredible those performances really are! It's sheer insanity. I doubt I ever would've been competitive at that level (there was absolutely no opportunity to get any kind of elite-level training or even compete on a team where I lived), but I was good enough that I've always been sad that I never got the chance to really give it a try.

The kids are starting to show quite a bit of interest in watching the Games with us, which is really fun. They both want to be ski jumpers, which is going to be slightly difficult because the nearest jumping facility is in central Washington. Too bad we're not still in Minnesota where ski jumps are ridiculously prevalent (ironic, isn't it - you'd think ski jumping would be more common in the mountains). Must be the influence of all those Scandinavians who settled in the upper Midwest a few generations ago. We can always send them to live with Bill's family in Saranac Lake, NY, so they can train in Lake Placid! Or else I need to get them interested in Curling (I'm going to try to join a league next winter, so you never know...).

I'm ready to settle in for a long day of TV-watching and knitting - we're battling yet another cold bug here at Chez Gardiner, which I started to really feel last night. I've got two baby showers coming up this month, not to mention countless submission deadlines (and of course the next book to work on), so I've got plenty to do. I love having the excuse of the Olympics so I don't have to feel like such a bum for watching trash TV all day, even with the excuse of being sick.

Upcoming stops on the blog tour - check out my lovely tech co-editor Amy's interview with me on Tuesday, and I stop by The Designer's Studio on Thursday (in the meantime, stop by The Designer's Studio hostess's blog to enter to win your signed copy of Toe-Up!). We've added a few more dates, so if you still haven't nabbed your copy there will be more chances to win!

Knitspot!

The latest stop in the blog tour is at Knitspot today. I had great fun writing a guest post for Anne that's all about the fun we had scaring the neighbors with our crazy photo sessions. Good times! There are also 2 more chances to win a signed copy if you comment over there by Sunday.

Visionary Round-Up

What a week! I just spent 8 days in the company of other knitting-and-fiber-related book authors (and aspiring authors) up at Cat Bordhi's Visionary Retreat for self-publishers. It's always an exhausting, emotionally-draining, inspiring, crazy week and this year was no exception.



I adore the chance to head up to Friday Harbor, one of my favorite places on earth, and spend the week on-island. We got lucky on our drive up and snagged one of the last spots on the ferry deck. I love this shot of the cars separated from water by only a thin net fence. Hope their parking brakes are solid!



Once on the island, we settled into our cabins and the lodge at Lakedale, another gorgeous, inspiring spot.



I brought Donna with me this year for moral support (and because she's helping with the next book, including by standing by as the voice of sanity and organization amidst my perpetual chaos), which was really nice. I love hanging out surrounded by all that crazy creativity, but sometimes I just need to hide my introvert self and chill out. We had a little cabin to ourselves with a bedroom downstairs for Donna and a loft upstairs for me, and a living room and kitchen with fireplace and DVD player for the necessary chilling out. I got to wake up in the morning and look out the window to this view:



It was too cold to enjoy the fire pit but not too cold to enjoy the ducks and various other waterfowl. I took a few walks (the first steps in my pre-pre-marathon training) and generally enjoyed being out of the city. We also took a drive to the west side of the island one afternoon and stopped to see baby alpacas and eagles along the way. I didn't remember to grab my camera, so no alpaca photos (they were incredibly cute!).

I was lucky enough to spend two mornings learning about book design and typography from small press owner Deb Robson (she is just as delightful as you'd guess from this photo of us on the ferry).



It's amazing what a good time can be had talking about setting baseline grids in InDesign and selecting the perfect font for display text. I'm such a font novice, but after Deb's typography class, I was ready to spend the next three days surfing MyFonts.com! But first I need to get a little bit more of my next book written...

I'll save the rest for another post - I've got a little guy who's been missing me all week waiting upstairs for some before-bed snuggles. If you're following the book tour (and are still waiting to win your own copy of Toe-Up!), head over to my tech editor Amanda's blog for a fun little interview and to the Knot Another Hat blog for some Olympic knitting inspiration. Also, check out Knitspot over the weekend for a guest post involving wild tales of book photography.

Until next time, here's a final view of Friday Harbor. Can't wait to get back there!

Thursday's blog tour stop

I have to say, honestly, today's blog book tour stop made me a little bit nervous. Grumperina, she calls it like she sees it, and while I am a big fan of brutal honesty...well, let's just say I needn't have worried.

Go to the amazing Grumperina blog for a fantastic review of the book and a chance to win your own signed copy. I'm totally a Midwestern-girl-of-Scandinavian-descent-who-can't-take-a-compliment, but I have to say this review made my morning. Thanks, G!

Stop back on Monday when I will be doing a guest post over at the Knot Another Hat blog. Until then, have a great weekend, y'all!

Where blog tours collide...

Today we have a perfect storm of blog tours. My own Toe-Up! tour is off and running with a little q-and-a session over at We Heart Yarn (the blog of my fabulous photographer, who dug up some favorite shots that we just couldn't manage to squeeze into the book). My interview with the lovely Debby Accuardi of At The Kitchen Table should also be going up sometime today. Finally, I missed tweeting about our Friday stop due to much craziness (I was supposed to teach at Yarn Expressions in Huntsville, Alabama, over the weekend, but when I arrived at the airport on Friday all flights from Atlanta and Memphis into Huntsville had been canceled, meaning there was no way for me to get there that night...which was a good thing, since I ended up with a horrible cold and spent the weekend in bed). My Portland designer friend Larissa, author of the wonderful Knitalong, was our Friday hostess at her lovely blog Stitch Marker.

Now that that's out of the way, I've got a different tour, for another book that I was involved in that's coming out in May. This one's all about lace based on the stitch patterns of the late lace expert Dorothy Reade (who also happens to be an Oregonian, hailing from Eugene). It was written by Donna Druchunas, author of Arctic Lace and Ethnic Knitting Discovery (two of my favorite knitting history/culture books), and you can find additional stops on the blog tour and more info on the book at her blog. I had the good fortune of being invited to contribute a design to the new book, and I'm going to tell you a little bit about that design here today.



The book is called Successful Lace Knitting - Celebrating the Work of Dorothy Reade and features 25 patterns, each utilizing an original Dorothy Reade lace motif. I got to design a top in luscious Lorna's Laces Lion & Lamb, using a lace pattern called "Inset Diamonds". Called the Diamond Swing Top, it's knit seamlessly and was originally designed as a maternity top. It turned out to be perfectly cute for the non-pregnant as well, so Donna decided not to limit its audience by labeling it as "maternity". I particularly love the length of this sweater, which covers my least-favorite body area (aka hips, love handles...the area that having kids really wreaks havoc on!).



This poor book has been through several iterations and several potential publishers, but it will be worth the wait. Back at the beginning, Donna sent all the designers a little questionnaire about their design - here are the designer notes for the Diamond Swing Top:

Please write a short description of your project, mentioning any
special inspiration and any special or unusual techniques that you used.

This is a scoop-necked top with a front opening to accommodate a pregnant belly through all stages of pregnancy and beyond. One of my goals with this project was to design a sweater that could be used beyond the nine months of pregnancy, since I was always sad to give up my favorite maternity clothes after each of my kids were born.

This top is knit completely seamlessly with sleeves knit from the armholes down for easy fit adjustment.

What stitch pattern did you use and why did you choose it?

I chose the Inset Diamonds pattern simply because I love diamonds! I was not disappointed - this was a very fun pattern to use.

Did you make any changes to the chart, or use different decreases than Dorothy Reade used? If so, please explain the changes you made and your reasons behind them.

I did not - I knit exactly as Dorothy charted them.

What yarn did you choose for your project? What made this yarn particularly well suited for this project specifically, and for lace
knitting in general?

I used Lorna's Laces Lion & Lamb, which isn't necessarily the first yarn you'd think of for knitting lace. However, the lace pattern was beautifully defined and the knitter doesn't need to be intimidated by small yarn and needles. I think lace looks fantastic in heavier yarn weights, and this project proves that!

Do you have any special lace knitting tips related to your project?

Since the sweater's skirt is knit flat and the sleeves are knit in the round, the lace will be knit a bit differently so keep that in mind when reading the charts. You can also substitute SSK for the k2tog-tbl for the left-leaning decreases, although I didn't think this was necessary with this yarn.


What kind of knitting needles do you prefer for lace knitting and
what makes these needles work well for lace?

I use my Addi Turbo needles for just about everything. Some will prefer the sharper point of the Addi Lace needles for lace knitting, but I don't - the blunt tips of the Turbos work great for my particular style of (English) knitting.

Would you like to add any personal comments about designing this project? Perhaps you'd like to comment on any connection between Dorothy Reade's foundation and your own creative spirit.

One of the things I loved about working on this project was the strong feeling of being connected to the past and participating in the passing of these gorgeous lace patterns on to the next generation of knitters. The silhouette and techniques used in this sweater may be modern but the lace pattern is truly timeless.

You can pre-order Successful Lace Knitting from Amazon. The book will be released in May, while Donna is teaching on an envy-inducing Alaskan cruise. I think they still have room, if you're not doing anything in May and want to go to Alaska! (Bring me with you?)