Happy New Year!

Knitcircus #8 winter edition

I got my copy of the magazine with my design in it! It is exciting to see something I created in print, know that lots of people will see it and maybe learn from it. Knitters who follow the pattern will still create something unique, something that is still just as much them as it is me, who created the pattern. It is a good feeling to give something - well, and it didn't hurt that I even got paid in the process.
The magazine looks good and has lots of great designs in it! I even found something that I will most probably knit. Yes, me, the one who has never followed a pattern before (other than my own).
It also inspired me to get more patterns ready, and come up with newer ones....
So, yes, I'm more of a knitwear designer now than a writer, and I haven't done any translation in a very long time... though this might change when I see my story in print next month....
For now I'm enjoying the knitting and designing process. I even came up with a design on paper, though I'll have to make it before I can really write it down. This is the opposite of what I'm usually doing, which is knitting something then writing down the pattern I came up with...
I also have more new yarn to play with; I love the yarn shops in this town! Jessica Knits has a great sale going on, I was there with my friend a few days ago. Unfortunately I couldn't quite finish my shopping, since my daughter called from school to pick her up; she wasn't feeling good. I still walked out of there with some beautiful yarn, probably enough for a new project - of course I'm not sure what it will be.
I finished a mini-shawl using the mohair I got from Tempe Yarn and Fiber. I used a very simple stitch, since the yarn itself was sooo wonderful! It came out great, too bad it was in the high 80s this weekend, so I couldn't wear it to Swan Lake. But I'm going to see the Nutcracker with my daughter in it, so I'll get an opportunity to wear it soon..... hopefully by December it'll be a little cooler, not 90 like tomorrow.... love the desert, but by this time I'm really done with the heat!

Cables and Stripes

I am so excited! My first published design is coming out next week in Knitcircus magazine, issue #8! Here is the professional picture, courtesy of Knitcircus.

Here is the link to the magazine:

http://www.knitcircus.com/currentissue.html

Aspens

They are sooo amazing, so beautiful, especially in autumn. With their bright yellow leaves fluttering in the slightest wind, their smooth white trunks shooting up to the sky.... they are unlike any other tree on our planet.

Did you know that most of them are not growing from seeds, like other plants? Aspens are all clones, or a better way to describe it, they are all part of a whole. One seed germinates and if it becomes a tree, it starts to clone itself. Its roots start to shoot upward and in time they become trunks of a new tree. Over time the root system expands and a whole aspen forest is grown, with identical trees. Aspen colonies can survive almost anything; cutting them down just kills individual trees, the root system remains intact; deer and elk may destroy individual trees, but not the colony; extreme temperatures cannot harm them since deep underground temperatures are always the same; forest fires cannot destroy the either, the root system underground is safe from the heat and as soon as the fire is over, new aspens shoot up towards the sky. Did you notice that aspens are the first trees back in a forest after a fire? I did, since I started to pay attention...

I was always fascinated by aspens. I've seen them in my homeland, grew up with them around me, drove through neverending aspen forests in Russia - one of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen - ; the Kachina Peaks have a few aspen forests, most dense and beautiful around Lockett Meadow....

They live almost anywhere, in temperatures of -78F as well as 110F, in moist soil, as well as desert environments. I've read that scientists have dated aspen colonies. The oldest one is 80,000 years old! They named it Prando. It lives in Central Utah, in Fish Lake National Forest and it has about 47,000 aspens....

Some amazing facts, right? I've read about this subject after hearing a ranger talk one night at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon about aspens a few years ago..... but with or without knowing all these facts, aspens are still some of my favorite trees, especially at this time of the year....

I'm still here.....

Yes, I'm still here, though extremely busy being a mom.... checking homework (and helping when needed), driving to ballet classes, rehearsals and shows, sitting in a gymnastics studio watching four year olds jump around, playing with my own four year old - ok, that part is fun, most of the time - and knitting for my sanity while doing some of this.
To be honest, I did take some time to go to a yarn shop with my friend. I had a great time! We even had lunch together, something I don't do very often without the kids. In the yarn store I felt like a little kid in a candy store.... we were touching everything we saw, and ended up with some wonderful mohair yarn... for mohair it is very soft and its colors really impressed me. I picked a dark blue haze with purple undertones..... it will look wonderful no matter what I'll make from it.... it calls for a very lacy, wisper light something - yes, for me..... I wanted to get way more, it was hard to walk out of there with just a few skeins, but I do need to downsize some of my stash before I can do that..... it also helped that we were together and talked things over before jumping to buy everything soft that we touched. I know I'll be back there though - my days of shopping for yarn at Joann's are over...
I did manage to knit/design a new hat and matching fingerless gloves, I'll try to post them soon, though learning from my past mistakes, I asked one of my friends to test knit them for me before I'll publish them. I learned in the meantime that this is what real designers do - and they also have a technical editor..... I wouldn't need one for a hat or gloves, but for a more complicated sweater it might help.... there is quite a bit of math - algebra, to be exact - involved in figuring out all the different sizes for a sweater... I should have my kids do it, they need the practice....
so... I'm still here, but I'll go to bed soon, and hope to post just a little bit more often.

more good news....

Knitcircus has accepted one of my sweater designs for publication.
"Cables and Stripes" (ok, not very original, I admit, but I couldn't come up with anything more sophisticated before their deadline) will be published in their fall issue, coming out in November. I think this makes me an official, "real" knitwear designer???.... It was the first pattern I ever tried to write down; after a few tries I did it.... but then I had to do more math, to figure it out for at least two more sizes..... that part is definitely not as much fun as knitting and making it all up..... but it still made me feel good to realize that I could actually do the math!!! I didn't loose all my brainpower (yet)....
I need to get working more now.... I have lots of projects waiting for my time; but kids come first!..... so at the moment all this is still just hobby/part-time fun. As the kids get older though, I'll get to it a bit more often; and yes, I will update this blog a bit more often, too..... I hope...

good news..... in the writing world

One of my children's stories, "Noise in the Night", was accepted for publication. It will be published in the December issue of Stories for Children magazine.

I wrote the story a few years ago, when my youngest child was still in the wonderful habit of napping.... then as she got older, and the other two had more issues, my writing got pushed in the background and I ignored the finished stories.... no, they were not gathering dust, since I never printed them out, they were just sitting in a file in my computer. They were waiting patiently until I had a discussion with my friend about writing, and I decided to show her my stories... she is a writer herself, I thought she would appreciate seeing them. She did. Seeing them on paper, made me think about sending them to some magazines, in case someone might think that they would be worth reading... So far this was the first one I sent out... and it will be published! It was worth sending it, if I never did, how would I have known that someone liked it? Now I have to do the same with the others and start writing again.... in my nonexistent spare time....

New Adventures

Well, I set up a separate blog for my patterns, called Réka Knits. That will be my patterns site, while I will keep this to just write.

I am a writer before I am a knitter... yes, I have even been published (in Hungarian though) a few times.

The new design site is lucky so far. I've posted a design there of ballet legwarmers, with a link to Ravelry, and lots of people love it! I didn't quite expect much, since they are just simple legwarmers, that I thought would only be of interest to dancers, but I was wrong.... they do look pretty good, thanks to my model.... I won't post a picture here, I already have a few on Ravelry and on EmeseReka Designs... anyway, next step will be to set up a store, where I can even sell some of my patterns. My knitting friend likes them, so I thought maybe others will, too. If I can set it up soon, I will have all proceeds go to sponsor my friends' team for Race for the Cure.... I didn't say it was my team, though it should be, but to be honest, I can't count on my family being in town that specific weekend, besides I have a problem with crowds. I do have something I call crowd-phobia, I definitely don't feel good with too many people around me... I know I'm not the only one; I know someone who has to leave a store if it is crowded - well, I've done that, too...

So I am renaming this blog, I think, to accommodate my writing... OK, I will try to keep it mostly about knitwear design, since that is what I'm doing most at the moment.

I do not knit much, though. I never was much of a knitter in the summer. Since I've lived in a hot zone, I can't even touch anything warm between May and October. Before that, when I lived in a temperate zone, I had other things to do in the summer, like taking trips, going places, just being outside.... In the winter I always enjoyed sitting down with a pair of needles and some yarn... just knitting, not really knowing where it would take me...

I have a wonderful friend who got me hooked on designing, or who made me realize that I am a designer. It first started when she got some of us, her friends, together, to form a knitting club. The first time I knitted with them - in public, of course - I realized that what I was doing was unique, at least around here. I learned that people followed patterns. They actually have written patterns and knitters follow them. That was quite a revelation for me, since growing up I didn't know many knitters who had ever followed one. We all just started knitting, and when a knitter would see another one doing something she (or he, but to be honest, I haven't seen a man knit in public, though I've known a few who did it in private) liked, she would ask how it was done, observe, then try it out. That was how knitting was done in the "old country", at least when I was a kid.

I consider the first real designed pattern I ever followed one that my brother drew out for me. He was an art student, I was studying languages, and knitting on the side. I decided one day that I wanted to make a black & white sweater with a very classy, but way different design on it. So I asked my artist brother to draw the design that would go on the front. He did indeed draw a very intricate design. Trouble was, I got the sweater long enough and only got to the middle of the design. I finished it the way it was, and I loved it. I still have the sweater, about 25 years later. My brother, on the other hand, was a bit disappointed, since it would have looked best if it had the whole design on it....

Since then I never thought of anything I made as designed by me or anyone for that matter. Everything I made was just a unique piece, made for someone specific, with love. Now, I am learning that I can write down these patterns I've used and others may enjoy them. I am becoming a teacher again, I think... and I like the feeling.

Camping

My family loves camping. We especially enjoy Sunset Crater, just outside of Flagstaff, in the shadow of Kachina Peaks (also known as San Francisco Peaks). The air is filled with the scent of pine, you walk around and set up your tent on black lavabed.... what more can you ask for? Oh, yes, cooler temperatures than Phoenix, right? You got that, too. We camped there this past 4th of July weekend. We enjoyed the cool temperatures, hiked a little, the kids rode their bikes, and the little scooter. The first afternoon we even got the rains. We enjoyed the clouds coming in, then sat in the tent and watched the storm, starting with heavy, male rain, which turned into softer, female rain (I did not make these names up, I learned them from a Dineh guide in Chinle). The rain cooled things down even more than we expected. We could actually wear long sleeved shirts and long pants! By nighttime the rain stopped just in time for the last rays of the setting sun to illuminate Sunset Crater so we could enjoy the colors that gave it its name.
We didn't go to see fireworks this 4th of July, instead, we gathered around a campfire that we made, enjoying the fresh, pine scented, cool air, and each other's company.
We stayed an extra day, but the rain didn't come again. In fact, even the clouds stayed away. Still, it was a wonderful, though sunny (if you don't live in Phoenix, ignore the "though") day, with temperatures just reaching the 80s.
I didn't hike as much as I usually do on camping trips. Instead, I got to read and knit a bit. I started two knitting projects, I hope I will finish them by the end of the summer, though one is a summer top that would be nice if I would get to wear before the fall...
We're back in the heat of the desert and the city. You know, even the desert would be way cooler if we didn't have all the concrete jungle around us. You guessed right, I don't necessarily like the city, but it's all right, as long as we can take trips away from here pretty often. We have possibilities in the city that we wouldn't have if we lived in a small town or in the middle of the woods; I know. My kids get more opportunities to try out different activities than I did, since I grew up in a small town. So, we deal with the city, the traffic, the noise, but the best part is that we live close enough to some wilderness, that we can just take weekend trips and be out of here. It is a pretty good deal, after all.