I will just say it straight up. I am awful at photographing red. But this red is true and perfect and has depth. Even the muggles were oohing and aahing over this red.

My 12 year old hand model is trying to show you the beauty of the lace stretched out here, but it doesn’t quite work.

Even with some pins in place you can’t really see just how lovely this is going to be. I cannot wait to block it. You can see if you look at the pic above that I’m transitioning into the edging. I’ve been doing some serious late night charting to make this edging unique and gorgeous.

But enough about Red. She’s beautiful but not quite ready yet. But what is ready are the first two prize winners. We’re just gonna go in order so…

Jennifer wins the handspun from DigitalNabi.

And Melodie wins the adorable sheepy stitch markers from Knittin’ Pretty.

I’ll be emailing my winners tonight! I hope your Vittorio projects are coming along. I swear I’m gonna spend some time this evening perusing all the projects so I can see all the pretties. Next drawing next Monday!

I need to do some work on the blog as well – get things in order. I think how I will spend the next few moments is really nailing down some sort of daily schedule that helps me to get everything done. I bought myself a new notebook today to do that. My iPhone is nifty, but I really don’t find it helpful when it comes to my monster to-do lists. Is there a to-do app or somesuch that you use that helps you stay in line? Or are you old-fashioned like me and prefer pen and paper?

But now suddenly Carnival weekend is upon us. Carnival weekend being the weekend where our church throws their annual spring Carnival and all good volunteers basically move in at the church for a weekend and let their children run rampant on the midway. Thankfully my children are old enough to run rampant on the midway! But it might be a bit quiet around here until Monday. But hopefully somewhere in the midst of all the crazy I can get this pattern together.

Oh and if you’re local come and see me at the carnival! The desserts in Sister Regina’s Irish Tea Room are to die for!

So this week I cleaned out my studio. It was a disaster, and because it’s in the front of the house it had become a dumping ground for just about everything.

So I pulled nearly everything out of all of the various nooks and crannies and eventually ended up with a quite tidy office/studio space that looks like this:

And the other half of it looks like this:

I got rid of the crazy multi-colored bins that I had inherited from the boys who had outgrown them. And I kept just the turquoise and red ones. I think when push comes to shove I will work on getting all neutral wooden and wicker baskets for those storage units. And I think that I will be buying some pretty sheers for the window. But other than that, I’m stumped. I *finally* have a space of my own – a space that is just mine and I’m a total loss as to what to do with it.

It’s days like this I wish I was rich enough to afford an interior design.  Oh and in case you were wondering, it’s 3 days later and the office is still exactly that clean. Go me.

Actually pinterest seems broken for me today, which is a good thing. But then I went and burned all the fingers on my left hand making breakfast, so the sewing and the knitting that I need to accomplish today is going painstakingly slow. Emphasis on the pain. Why can’t I seem to stop burning myself? The place at the base of my thumb where I touched the element is *still* not healed.

So what am I working on? Well one thing is sooper seekrit so I can’t show you or else I’d have to kill ya. So let’s skip that. I made some progress last week on my Elsewhere cardigan though. Nearly done with the second side panel. The nice thing about this pattern is that it’s all knits and purls. So it’s easy to set down and pick back up and not be lost. You can also amaze the muggles with your ability to knit without looking. Plus I love the fact that I will end up with a cardigan that is super wearable.

And I must just say that I adore the super squishy-ness of the Malabrigo Worsted. That yarn is perfection. Look at those beautiful little squooshy stitches. Perfection.

And then there’s this other thing I’ve been working on. I’m putting together a collection of patterns that I’m very, very excited about. See all those little orange tags? They are all for stitch elements that I’m considering for inclusion in this collection. (The pink tag is for a potential Petite Purls pattern). It’s only 7 patterns, so a ton of them won’t get used of course, but I’m so inspired right now!

Right now I’m in the swatching stage and I’m trying to balance preparing this collection with the sooper seekrit knitting and the bajillion activities that the boys are involved in and making costumes for the menfolk who are going to MegaCon and oh my goodness the laundry and the cooking and the cleaning and I really need to wash the dog. You’re probably tired just reading that sentence, aren’t you? See what I mean about the hats?

I do.

Just to be clear I am hopelessly unfashionable. Today I am wearing jeans, stripey Valentine socks, a grey dry-fit Nike workout tee and a thin black cardigan. No fashion plate here. But my feet are warm and grey and black go together! Right?

That said I get tons of compliments where I wear my designs out and about. Those who don’t know me well will ask me where I bought my scarf. Those who do know me well will scoff and tell them that not only did I make it, I designed it. I find that shawlettes especially are infinitely wearable. Especially if you live somewhere where there is real winter. We’re having fake winter now here in Florida and I must admit I kind of love it.

Here you see my sad and unfashionable coat. It’s a corduroy peacoat – quite lightweight – but I love it and it’s perfect for Florida “winters”. But doesn’t it look lovely dressed up with my Berlioz? I especially love the Berlioz shawlette because I have super sensitive skin and the silk content in the Swoolk Yarn makes it feel all soft and delicious up next to my face.

So yes, lace is quite useful, quite versatile, and quite lovely. Knit yourself up a lovely shawlette to use as a scarf and you too can scoff at those who ask where you bought it!

By the time it hit me on Monday I was done for. No breathing, no sleeping, all achey, fever and chills. If I didn’t know better I would say I have the flu. It might have been. Today I’m still having a smidge of trouble breathing but it seems to be leaving town thank goodness. And so far it doesn’t look like the boys have it. Or the man. Perish the thought!

I’ve been working on sooper seekrit knitting – which goes really slow when you can barely keep your eyes open. But I managed to snap a few pictures with my new lens on New Year’s Day. I’m still learning how to work with such a small area of focus when I’m shooting wide open. It’s kind of cool to have new things to learn though!

One of my resolutions this year is to learn how to master this camera. Another one is not leave deadline knitting to the last minute. You never know when you are going to catch the plague.

We would have slept in nice and late on Christmas morning. The boys being 12 and 13 they don’t get you up at the buttcrack of dawn like little ones do. But unfortunately 2011 will be remembered as Merry Poopmas or Poop-Pocalypse 2011. Rufus the wonder beagle is afraid of boxes. When we’ve moved in the past he has made this quite evident. I think the stress of our recent move and the big boxes for the man’s Christmas presents sent him over the edge. We woke up way too early to a dog who had filled his sleeping crate with poo. So the dog and the crate and the surrounding floor got washed very early. Thank goodness the floor was tile.  He looks so innocent here, but don’t let it fool you.

The boys were very happy with their presents – the big dude had a very video game Christmas. He even got video game inspired t-shirts. I am totally not happy with how fast he is growing up.

The little dude got a lot of wrestling related gifts and tees. He is still all about the wrestling. They even got to go and see the Smackdown taping here in town a few weeks ago. He desperately needs a haircut, but I’m loathe to chop off his curls.

The man got manly things, like firepits and toolboxes and things for the Jeep. Hence the big boxes that caused the poo. I had a totally camera Christmas. Sadly the 50mm lens that I got for Christmas was flawed, so I had to send it back. But a new one is already en route, so no worries. And even with the flaws, did you see that awesome pic I got of Rufus up there? Love it!

But now I’m thinking about 2012. Not in an end the world sort of way, but more in a what do I want to do with the year sort of way. I already have a motto for 2012. And a buzzword. My buzzword is mighty. And my motto?

She believed she could, so she did.

Need a last minute present for a knitter? Ravelry has an awesome gift option where you can send a pattern to another Ravelry member! Of course I highly recommend gifting my patterns… but today is Christmas Eve, so I have a gift for you.

Use the coupon code “thanks” to get any single PicnicKnits pattern for free! Or, alternately you can use the code and get $6 off of Sideways Shawlettes, Seven Songs, or Blue Brim Hats.

I’ll leave you with my very favorite Muppet Christmas song – with apologies that I think I share this one every year. But the sentiment is worthwhile. I wish you a Merry Christmas, and a blessed and joyous New Year, and I hope that you are well and happy wherever you are and whatever you do.

That’s the “formal living room” in the new house. It will be my office. We are even thinking about seeing if we can put french doors up. I feel like I will finally have a real office, and that it will help with treating my business like a real business. Speaking of being a real business, I”m going to start offering PicnicKnits patterns at wholesale prices for yarn stores. To that end, I have chosen to make the prices consistent. All PicnicKnits patterns will be priced at $6 beginning on October 10th. Some prices will go down, most prices will go up 50¢ to $1. But hey, it’s not all bad news. To soften the blow of the small price increases I’m having a sale until the 10th!

All individual PicnicKnits patterns, the Blue Brims Hats e-book,  and the Sideways Shawlette e-book are on sale – 40% off! The coupon code for this sale is house. Yep, house. Because I swear I spend money every single day on this house and we haven’t even closed yet! The only thing not on sale is the Seven Songs e-book. So stock up on some PicnicKnits patterns! And if anyone has figured out how to squeeze more hours out of a day, let me know. I’m dying over here!