Am I looking for you?

January 15, 2008 By

Are you one of these people? Do you know one of these people?

Judy J.
Sally S.
Karen S. L.
Michele H.
Gail B.
Cathy G.
Daisy L.
Paula O.
Aimee A.
Illanna W.

These people are all Spin Out 2007 Winners, but they have not contacted me about claiming their prize. I’ve sent two emails – PLEASE CHECK YOUR SPAM FOLDERS!!!!

If you think you might be one of these people, or think you might know one of these people, please leave a comment or contact me by my email: cara at spin-out dot net OR cara at januaryone dot com.

THANK YOU!

Filed Under: Contest, Spin Out 2007

Toot! Toot!

January 7, 2008 By

That, my friends, is the sound of my own horn! Many of you have been so kind and sent me congratulations about this:

Yup. That’s right. Those are my notecards! In the exalted pages of Vogue Knitting! (Page 8 to be exact, the Winter 2007/08 Issue!)

It tickles me to no end that my Color Collection appears in the magazine where the issue is all about COLOR!

THANK YOU VOGUE!! What a great way to start the year!

In order to celebrate, I’m going to have a very COLORful contest! I’m giving away SIX BOXES OF CARDS! The only thing you have to do is leave me a comment telling me what your favorite color is and WHY. Or maybe the color you hate more than anything and WHY. Or how about a color you’ve always wanted to wear or knit or love but have been afraid to for whatever reason. Tell me the color and the REASON. Not too hard, right?

There will also be two GRAND prizes. TWO $25 gift certificates to The Loopy Ewe! One grand prize winner will be picked at random, the other will be picked because I like your entry the most. So, four lucky random winners get cards, two get cards + the grand prize. Please, one entry per person. Comments will be open until Wednesday, January 9, 11:59 PM EST. Winners will be announced sometime on Thursday.

Thank you and have a wonderfully COLORful day!

PS – If you’d like to skip ahead and just buy a box of cards, ordering information can be found in the sidebar or here. THANK YOU!

Filed Under: Contest

Everyone’s a Winner!

July 31, 2007 By

Well, not really. But

FRAROCHVIA

and

EARTHCHICK

are the winners of the shawl kits!

Thanks everyone for playing!!!

PS – Click for big on that bee picture up there. It really is fantastic, if I don’t say so myself. I love all the pollen on the bee’s head!

Filed Under: Contest

Ah Honey Honey!

July 27, 2007 By

Move over Monkeys! Bah Bye Babette! THE BEES ARE IN TOWN!

You know, there’s a reason my knitting generally turns out so well – my particular talent is putting genius together! Great yarn + great patterns = FABULOUS knits! It’s really quite easy. I’m QUITE proud of my latest trick! The other day I was talking to my genius friend Tina (the one responsible for my favorite sock yarn) about my genius friend Anne (knit designer extraordinaire!) We were talking about my finished Moth Shawl and I was asking Tina if she had seen the new Bee Fields Shawl and oh my god isn’t it FANTASTIC?!? Then I subtly dropped some hints like “Wouldn’t it be amazing if you were to dye up a colorway that was ACTUALLY honey?! Hmmm. Could you do that?” Tina, never one to shy away from a challenge, said OF COURSE she could!

I am so, so pleased to introduce Oregon Red Clover Honey!

I took it out of the box yesterday and for about fifteen seconds I wondered if it was too dark, but then I went to the cabinet and took out some honey. It’s UNBELIEVABLY PERFECT!

By sheer genius, Tina has managed to capture all the subtleties of honey – the bronzes, the reds, the blonds, the golds! I snapped a few pictures and immediately started winding it up! Imagine how pleased I was to find that it completely resembled a honeycomb in the yarn cake!

It took forever to wind! There is A LOT of yarn in this baby. It’s Blue Moon’s Laci yarn (100% Extra Fine 80’s Merino), and it comes with a whopping 1750 yards. I’ve been assured that while the Oregon Red Clover Honey colorway isn’t up there this second, it will be up on their website sometime today. ETA: IT’s UP! (You’ll be able to find it in the shaded solids section.)

It was all I could do NOT to cast on immediately, but I had some errands to run. As soon as I was home that baby hit the needles. I’m using size 5 needles (Addi Lace Turbos) and for the provisional cast on, I used Eunny’s directions found here – the second crochet cast on.

This is not a lace pattern for the faint of heart. I’ve never used a life line in my lace knitting before (and yes, I’ve had to rip plenty) but with this one – this one I’m getting out the dental floss! I’m about 16 rows into it and it’s quite enjoyable – I can already see the border and pattern emerging – but it takes a lot of concentration. Actually, now that I think about it, Monkeys and Babette might be the perfect partners for The Bees.

Because I’m very impatient, I also ordered yarn from Anne over at Wooly Wonka Fibers. This is the Buckwheat Honey colorway of the yarn Anne and Anne used for The Bee Fields Kit.

Since I jumped the gun, I’d love to share this kit with you. Leave me your favorite bee story – whether it’s a bee sting, a honey recipe, anything goes, and I’ll choose a winner at random on Tuesday. Please, one entry per person. You will receive the Buckwheat Honey yarn and the Bee Fields Pattern. Entries will be accepted through 11:59 PM Monday, July 30.

ETA: This just in!! Tina has generously donated a skein of Oregon Red Clover Honey, and I’ll supply another copy of Anne’s pattern! So we’ll have TWO winners! YAY!

Have a fantastic weekend!

Filed Under: Contest, The Bee Shawl

SPIN OUT 2007: CONTEST!

July 23, 2007 By

Are you a graphic artist that LOVES fiber? Are you a fiber artist that dabbles in graphics? Live with a graphic artist, but all you think about is fiber? I NEED YOU! Announcing a LOGO contest for SPIN OUT 2007!

I need a logo for this year’s SPIN OUT. Get out your WACOS pad and draw away – I want it to be FUN! COLORFUL! SPINNING related!

The logo needs to include the following items:

– SPIN OUT
– September 29, 2007
– Central Park
– New York

The graphic should also include something related to spinning – either a spindle or spinning wheel.

Here are the logos I used last year:

So as you can see, anything goes. I need a digital file – anything that can be read by Photoshop. If you win, you give me permission to basically do whatever I want with your file – t-shirts, posters, pins, magnets, bumper stickers, etc. Your logo will appear on januaryone.com and spin-out.org for an indefinite period of time.

Enter as many logos as you like. BE CREATIVE!!!

There will be ONE winner. Said winner will receive $100 Gift Certificate courtesy of WEBS! That’s a lot of fiber and yarn!

The winner will be chosen by me. All entries must be received by WEDNESDAY AUGUST 8, 2007. All entries must be sent to logo@spin-out.org as an attachment. All questions should go to the same email.

THANK YOU!!!

Cross Posted at spin-out.org.

Filed Under: Contest, Spin Out 2007

244

June 17, 2007 By

That’s the winning number. And Alison hit it RIGHT ON! Congratulations Alison! I also happened to pick up two prizes while I was out west, so there’s a random winner as well. Congratulations Rachel! I know you’re dying to know what you win, so without further ado…

That’s two skeins each, Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock in the, what else, TAHOE colorway, a very cute Lantern Moon cake tape measure, and a box of The Color Collection notecards by me. Hope you like your prizes as much as I LOVED my vacation. Thanks everyone for playing!

244 photographs isn’t really that much for me, but the truth is is that I’m not much of a landscape photographer and Tahoe screams landscapes. I’m also not one to carry my camera with me wherever I go. I love what I photograph – children, yarn, flowers (occasionally these days) but that’s it. And I’ve been working a lot lately with many jobs lined up in the next months so I wanted to relax. Photography is serious business for me – it’s not relaxing. Anyway, that’s the story behind the number. On a job it would be WAY more. WAY WAY more.

The vacation was wonderful and while I’m always happy to come home and sleep in my own bed with my own pillow, I’m already missing Georgie. Monday is going to be very hard when we both go back to work and aren’t together all day. Yeah yeah. We’re gross and in love. Deal with it.

There’s lots to talk about – I worked hard on my Moth shawl while I was away and I’m loving EVERYTHING about it. I’m just about through the first chart – I’ve either got half a repeat or one and a half repeats – I’ve got to count the stitches. I came home lots of yarn to start a new project, which will have me doing my best James Bond impression. Any guesses? And, well, it’s always nice to get back to the blog after a break. I missed you guys.

Here are a few pictures of the lake. The first two were taken at our hotel and the third was taken here. I miss Lake Tahoe. And we really miss SF. We’ll be back again for sure.



It was incredibly fantastic to knit my moth shawl (the fir cone section) surrounded by pine trees while lounging at the banks of the crystal clear lake with snow covered mountains in the distance. My photographs hardly do it justice.

Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Contest, Vacations

By The Numbers

June 13, 2007 By

Number of days on vacation: 3
Number of yarn stores visited: 3 – so far here, here and here.
Number of bloggers I had an impromptu meet-up with at Artfibers: three – Cookie, Hannah and Jeni – LOVE you guys! Thanks for coming out! (And hi Matt! Great to meet you!)
Number of yards of yarn purchased: 3064
Number of rows I’ve knit since I’ve been on vacation: about five
Number of gorgeous Offhand Designs knitting bags purchased: one – it was on sale AND it’s fucking fantastic!
Number of wines we tasted: four
Number of boxes of pockies we bought in Japan Town: one – green tea
Number of times we drove over the Golden Gate Bridge: one
Number of times we drove over the Bay Bridge: two
Temperature in Sacramento: 99 degrees
Temperature in Lake Tahoe: 65 degrees
Amount lost at craps table: $85
Amount won at craps table, all while I was the shooter: $100
Amount I’m ahead at craps: $15. Yeah money!
Number of pounds of camera equipment I lugged across the country: 25
Number of photographs I’ve taken since I got here: 0.00

Guess the number of pictures I will take by the end of my vacation and win some kind of fabulous prize. I haven’t figured it out yet, but I’m sure it will be FANTASTIC. Leave the number of pictures in a comment on this post and the person who gets closest without going over will win. One entry per customer. Contest ends 11:59 PM EDT Saturday, June 16.

Number of Curious George Riding a Bike T-Shirts that say “Divine Love” purchased on the street in Berkeley, CA: one and it’s priceless.

See you Sunday! We’re having a blast!

Filed Under: Contest, Vacations

The Final Four + One

April 30, 2007 By

First, send out a hearty congratulations to Margaret! She won the contest with a guess of April 29, 2007 at 12:53 PM. She was ONE MINUTE OFF! Way to go Margaret! Just a leetle scary how close you came. (By the way, check out Margaret’s GORGEOUS new sweater while you’re over there.)

It turned out that by Friday, both jobs I had this weekend had rescheduled (that’s what happens when you work with kids – something always comes up and I’ve made it my policy to be very flexible.) So I had plenty of knitting time. And Georgie took me to a FANTASTIC dinner to celebrate – screw the sushi – hands down – best steak in the city. Seriously.

Without further ado, since you’ve all waited so patiently, I give you the last five squares:


Square #26

This square was based on this picture:


Kay called this next square my ode to Lilly Pulitzer. I really love this one.


Square #27

My kindergarten square:


Square #28

And the blue square:


Square #29

Last, but certainly not least, is the square based on the picture of my finger:


Square #30 – THE LAST SQUARE

I’m thinking this square is my signature square. It’s got the one red row to symbolize the blood spilled (so DRAMATIC) and also, I want this square to anchor the piece. The border will probably be dark-ish – I’m hoping this square will blend with the border – just like a signature.

So. I finished knitting the squares. I haven’t cast on for anything new, but I do have a bridal shower coming up this weekend and a planned project for a gift that I haven’t started yet. If I can get yarn today, I’ll start on that. The squares are all laid out on the floor and I’m moving them around all the time and hopefully I’ll have pictures of what will be the final layout tomorrow. I don’t plan on spending too much time on laying things out. I want to take a picture and get it off the floor so I can start on the seaming. I have no idea how long it will take to seam this baby. I’m sure it will go a lot slower than the knitting. That’s all right with me. And I’m undecided what to do about the border, but I hope that will reveal itself as I sew the thing together.

This has been a marathon and to say I’m sad to be finished the knitting is an understatement. This project really has taken over my mind and my heart. I’m so glad to know you’ve enjoyed it too. Thank you!

Filed Under: Contest, Madness

Leftovers

April 24, 2007 By

I don’t have a new miter to show you today (maybe I’m dragging things out because I don’t want the knitting to end!) so I thought I’d answer some questions about the project, and maybe, just maybe, if you’re patient, they’ll be a little contest at the end of this post. Firstly, I’d like to say – what the hell did I blog about before I started this project? Everyday I think about what I’m going to blog and the only thing I can think about are the damn mitres. And what’s with the spelling of mitres/miters? Does it matter? When I spell it miters, do I look like a bumbling American? I mean, I AM a bumbling American, but do I really want to put that out there in the world?

Alright. The miters. I currently have 28 unused colors. I have FOUR SQUARES – actually 17 MITERS – left to knit. That’s potentially 20 different colors. I’m not going to use all 28 because I know I’m going to repeat some – but still – I started out with 95 different colors – I think I did pretty good.

One of the questions I’ve been getting nonstop since I started this project is about my leftovers. What am I going to do with my leftovers? I’ve been offered money for them. One beautiful knitter offered to take my leftovers and knit me something from them. Others have been so kind as to take them off my hands – FOR FREE! As if I didn’t want them. PEOPLE. I’m KEEPING the leftovers. I’ll do something with them eventually and if I don’t, they’re still mine. It’s like when you read a book – you don’t give it away when your finished. You put it on your shelf and there it sits forever collecting dust because it’s now a part of your soul and you can’t ever part with it. Yarn is just like that. At least the yarn for this project is like that. So give up on the leftovers. They ain’t goin’ nowhere, no how.

Another question I’ve been getting – did I have all this yarn in my stash? Well, sort of. Last January, I bought four grab bags of Tahki Cotton Classic from WEBS on the advice of the mitre master, and then stuck them in my closet. I had no idea what I was going to do with them. No project in mind at all. Then one afternoon I mitered and the rest is history. Pretty quickly I started buying up all the different colors I could find and I ended up with 95 different colors. I think. I have to go back and check, but I’m pretty sure that’s the final color count.

More answers: I will be putting a border on it – I’m thinking a dark garter stitch. Single color. Simple. Maybe black. I haven’t given any thought to a back. I don’t think I’m going to back it, but you never know. Never say never. I have thought about mixing up all the squares and making it completely random, but that’s a different blanket. The rules stay. I will not be placing the same color miters in a particular square at opposite corners ALL THE TIME. I will do this occassionally, whenever I see fit. Chuck Close has been mentioned before. I like Chuck Close. Have seen his work up close and personal. In fact, once, a long time ago I was looking at a Chuck Close at MOMA and Vincent Price was looking at the painting next to me. I have noticed – especially when finishing one miter and starting another – that the color of a yarn can look SO different depending upon which color it’s up against. Very much like it’s a different dyelot, but I can assure you, I’ve only used ONE SKEIN of each color I’ve used. I mentioned before that I’m getting five miters out of a skein – four dominant color mitres and one background color miter, but your mileage may vary. Everyone knits different and just because that’s what I’m getting – you may knit loser or tighter or whatever and get a different result. Some of the squares have a color repeated twice in the background and some of them have four different backgrounds and I’ve made these decisions on a square by square basis. The rule that there is one constant MAIN color has remained constant. And will not change.

I think I answered a lot of the questions I’ve been getting, but if I missed yours, please ask again.

CONTEST!CONTEST!CONTEST!CONTEST!

It’s been a while since I’ve given anything away and I’ve got a bunch of fairly new readers and I used to give stuff away all the time so I’m feeling guilty about not giving stuff away and you’ve all be SO SUPPORTIVE of this project and while you say you love it and I believe you, I know that some of you can’t stand to look at another freaking miter, so I’m going to share the love.

GUESS WHAT DAY/TIME I WILL FINISH KNITTING THE LAST MITRE AND YOU WILL WIN:

Your own 10 skein/10 color grab bag of Tahki Cotton Classic and a copy of Mason Dixon Knitting.

I mean, really, what’s the good of being MAD if you can’t share it, right?

This is how to play – SEND AN EMAIL to

MITERMADNESS@JANUARYONE.COM

In the body of the email give me a date and a time – like this: 4/29/07, 11:53PM – (THAT’s MONTH/DAY/YEAR because I’m a BUMBLING AMERICAN!) for when you think I will finish the LAST MITER! (Not the border, not sewing it all up – just knitting the miters.) And you can say hi if you want but it’s not necessary. ONE ENTRY PER PERSON! The person who comes closest to the winning time WITHOUT GOING OVER will win. IN THE CASE OF A TIE – I will choose from the winners AT RANDOM.

ETA: I SCREWED UP ABOVE and said that I had only 4 miters left to knit. As of this edit, I have 17 MITERS to go. If you entered the contest before 11 PM EDT and would like to re-enter based on this CORRECT information, please do so. Thank you and sorry – I’ve got miters on the brain and I can’t think so good.

THE CONTEST WILL CLOSE APRIL 28, 2007 at MIDNIGHT EDT. Any entries received after that will be discarded.

REMEMBER SEND EMAIL HERE: MITERMADNESS@JANUARYONE.COM

PLEASE – DO NOT LEAVE YOUR ENTRY IN THE COMMENTS. Entries left in the comments will not be counted.

A couple things to know – I will be working (photo shoots) both Saturday AND Sunday this weekend, but I will be sleeping at home. Have fun. Play safe. Peace out.

Filed Under: Contest, Madness

Smile!

February 15, 2007 By

No cavities! YAY!

CONGRATULATIONS

ANNA!

Anna won the Valentine’s Day contest – but really we’re all winners. Seriously. Those stories are all fantastic and I encourage you to read through the comments. Some great stuff there! Thanks for playing everyone!

Hopefully lots of CPH pictures coming soon. I’m going to bust ass on some work today so I can do the second button band tonight and tomorrow the sleeves will hopefully be ready for seaming! YAY! I can’t wait to wear this sweater – it’s really cold outside.

ETA: Sorry this wasn’t clearer – but I chose the winner at RANDOM, as I usually do. Unless otherwise specified, all winners of my contests are chosen at random. I like to play fair. Again, thank you all for playing.

ETA AGAIN: Fuck it. I’m all about the LOVE.

Filed Under: Contest
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