Hello, hurrah for August and welcome to new subscribers. 

Events

• It was warm (In the UK – not a regular event!)
• We won at cricket (The England Cricket team – not a regular event!)
• It’s time for returning to work/school/college/ (a welcome event?)
• I’ve been knitting – (a very regular event) 🙂 

  So here we are in the last gasps of the summer. It’s not over and there are still a good few weeks of mild weather to go before autumn really shows herself, but the end of August always feels like it’s time to ‘get ready for school’.  I don’t think it’s a legacy of working in education, I have a sense that this is a universal feeling that descends as the new term approaches.  I expect that children and adults in the southern hemisphere have the same experience at the end of January?     I’ve had a very busy summer knit wise and website wise.  I really only got going properly with the site in June, so it’s been a summer project.  Similarly, this mail list is new and I’m enjoying the process and learning a lot about mailchimp along the way.     My main news is that the test knit of Tanilba Bay is done and a wonderful set of knitters really did me proud.  It is really amazing to see the results of someone else’s ideas alongside your own pattern.  There were versions in neutral undyed yarn as well as dreamy silk, beautiful colour variations and one with stripes.  All of them brought a unique look and feel to it.  I cannot thank them enough.  I spent a while devising a campaign for the launch of the pattern that I then managed to completely cock up by pressing ‘publish’ on Ravelry on Friday afternoon.  I had made an incorrect assumption that I could  schedule the publication for a future time and date.  You may be able to do this but not once you have clicked the publish button!  As I used to say to my staff years’ ago after some minor, or major upset – ‘treat it as a learning experience’.  This must have been pretty annoying but I thought I was being a. smart and b. supportive. whereas I was probably being c. irritating and d. of no bloody use at all!  Apologies to anyone who happened to work with me in the past.     So after what seemed like a marathon test, Tanilba Bay is now live on Ravelry with a 10% discount till the 10 September. I am pleased with the pattern that started out as a vague idea of lacy stripes.  I initially had the name of ‘Low Tide’ but anything with such a generic name has at least 30 variations already.  I then went though my photos from our Australia trip over New Year and there was the Curlew by a shallow rivulet in Tanilba Bay, (see the header image).

On the website a colleague and I are collecting stories from anyone who engages in craft, or art, or anything creative, about how the process makes them feel.  I’ve just started doing a couple of individual chats and they are really interesting.  One recent comment from someone who is also a knitter is that it provides a ‘total shut-down of thoughts about other obligations’.  I think I can empathise with that.  If you are interested in offering your thoughts, then please answer this very short questionnaire.  As part of the research for this I discovered Stitchlinks.  This is a great site that is focused on the therapeutic effects of knitting.     I’m busy doing corrections for another pattern to be open for testing  soon.  It is proving to be an exceptionally complicated pattern.  This is surprising as it was exceptionally easy to knit. It’s clarifying the pattern that is complex, not knitting it!  Hopefully it will be ready on Yarnpond soon – depending on how many times my tech editor has to send it back to me for more changes.     At home we went to the third Ashes test (cricket) here in Headingley.  This produced the most amazing finish with one batsman, getting the winning runs against Australia when all the rest of the team were already out and a lost cause.  Interestingly he said in his first post-match interview – ‘it’s not over till it’s over’.  Not a bad motto for keeping going and getting it done.  You could apply this to any aspect of life, work or learning.     So good wishes from me and I hope the approaching autumn is giving you lots of renewed energy for all those projects that were abandoned as the weather improved.  See you in mid-September.