FaceBook Friends Needed!

To confirm that I indeed write this blog, I need at least 8 more friends to verify it for me! So, if you add me as a friend - I'm Kari Kail, (no profile pic, mention CraftyGinger in your "add friend" message please!) I'll be indebted to you forever! Thanks blog buddies!

Squee!!! A Comic Book about Knitting!!

I'm super excited to announce that I received my sneak peek of HandKnit Heroes, and I have to confess that I love it so, so very much, on the geekiest, nerdiest level inside of myself!!!

See, I worked at a comic shop when I was 13; putting backing boards and books into bags, and taping them shut... for 5 cents a piece! So naturally, I developed quite the efficiency for this task. In the few years I stayed there, I saw so many books it could make your eyelids want to peel off... if you're a girl, and you believed in modern feminism - as I did, and still do.

So anyhoo - back to the book! I wondered what it would be like, signing up for the preview; and I have to say I'm not disappointed! It's a real comic book, with great characters and a well written story, and it's about knitting, AND it has a pattern at the back! Can it get any better than this? I kinda doubt it... although who knows for sure what's next, for the web and knitting worlds??? It's actually funny, too - which I always found to be lacking in old comic books. They'd try alright... waaaay too hard. HkH got it just right! Can't wait for issue #2!

The pattern, the POW! Hooded Scarf (link works for Ravelry folks only - sorry!) is simple and yet so adaptable; picking different colors or fibers of yarn could make it so different, depending on your taste and needs. I'd even think about lining the pockets with sewn fabric, just so I could throw this on to head out grocery shopping - and NOT have my keys snag in it!

Another day, another year gone by...

Wow, I've become one of those bloggers... you know, the ones that say they want to write and post more, but who never seem to get around to it??? Yep, that's me. Nail on the head, there. And really, I wish I had more to show for this year. I had such big plans, and I managed to screw up a major portion of the year, somehow.

I know that my late vacation this year had something to do with it, but it didn't even feel as relaxing as last year's (it had to be the food. Last year we had a kick-ass waitress and a semi-private table, this one we had a private table and the worst waiter on the ship. Seriously.) And in general, food has been my Achilles heel this year. I'm terrible at just getting enough food in me to not feel sick a lot of the time, and even though I know I'm a picky eater, I think there may be some underlying causes to this. I don't really want to go into them here, though.

Another component I think I may be missing out on is finding new blog-buddies, as it's been forever since I went out and commented on one that's new to me (or new in general!) So, that's definitely going to be a part of my new year strategy. I hate to be the "New Year's Resolution" kind of person, that only makes a goal because it's the new year; but the timing is actually good for this, and I really need some new friends! (Can you sense another contest coming soon?!?!?!)

Do you have plans for the new year? Are you trying to focus on one thing or another in your crafty/personal life? How do you balance the daily grind with your creative life?

Only a Few Days Left to buy Cocoa Stripe print!

Cocoa Stripe print
Originally uploaded by fortune_32

I know a lot of you are probably still in tryptophan-induced comas, but there are only a few days left to buy my custom designed fabric via Spoonflower's Etsy store! Thanks so much to Kim and Stephen for giving us designers this opportunity!

Go buy some and make something with it! I'd love you forever if you do! Hahaha! Such a shameless tactic, begging! Pretty please, though! (With a cherry on top!)

Plagiarized?!?!???

I was alerted recently by a good friend that a LJ user had plagiarized my book review for Yakuza Moon.(Which I wrote over a year ago!) Not juts bits and pieces, but the whole 3 paragraphs, word for word. You can see it briefly here - as I'm not a LJ member, I cannot comment. But, I will however be asking of you - MY friends who happen to be on LJ to tell this girl what she's done is WRONG with a capitol W. I will be filing a copyright violations form against her, but expect that to take several days to go through.

Even if she didn't realize reposting it as her own was wrong, she should have asked for my permission about the review, and posted a link back to my site when I (ineveitable would've) said yes. Because I wouldv'e shared had she asked (nicely, hehe.)

Thanks guys, you are the best. What a Happy Thanksgiving for me. oy.

ETA: This piece was removed either by LJ or the OP. Oh well, at least it's over fast, and someone alerted me right away. Phurfelz - please let me know how I can thank you for looking out for me on this one! Me email addy is K | Fredrickson | AT | gmail | dot|| com (without all the text garbage... sorry, looking out for web spiders!)

Cocoa Stripe - winner!

Cocoa Stripe - winner!
Originally uploaded by salutor

I'm so happy to report that my fabric design won Spoonflower's first ever Fabric of the Week Contest. That means you'll be able to buy it in their Etsy shop for ONE WEEK ONLY - and that's it.

After that, if I sell it myself, it'll be pricier - to cover overhead cost increases (not a lot, but I can't charge the same as them.) I'm thinking of doing a hand-drawn selvedge on it, though... how fun would that be??? That's my only misgiving about Spoonflower, is that there's no selvedge, unless you add it into your design. huh. Maybe some more people will now?

How does -
Smokey Stripes Collection - Cocoa Stripe Copyright 08 Kari Kail Printed by Spoonflower.com - sound? I can't do the color bubbles, like a normal selvedge, but I thought it might be worth a try anyway, i have fun handwriting.

Vote for mine - cocoa stripe - please?!?!?

Fabric-of-the-week contest: week 1
Originally uploaded by salutor

I was so surprised to read this morning that my Cocoa stripe fabric made it into the top 3 for the first week of Spoonflower's exclusive sale contest!

It really made me feel awesome, so a great big thanks to June, for spotting it for me, and Stephen and Kim for featuring it. Now it's up to you folks! There's 3 choices, and while I might be a little biased, I think they're all great designs!

If you'd like to be able to purchase my Cocoa Stripe fabric - exclusively through Spoonflower's Etsy shop, for one week only! - please vote for it by clicking the link above and scrolling down to the "If you haven't voted yet, you can do that here" part. (Or, you could be lazy and just click the underlined here. Hehe.)

Sorry for all the italics and bold, guys - I'm just super jazzed and excited about this opportunity! (Plus, I love contests!)

Quickie Check-in!

aka - what I'm up to!

I wish I'd gotten around to organizing all of my pictures into a pretty blog post, but I just haven't been able to get to it, unfortunately. 2+ weeks of dirty laundry is a lot to get through, not to mention I haven't had a stitch of good food in my house all week. So, why the post? I wanted to update all of you, my good blog buddies, briefly, with what's up with me!

• Planning a paper tutorial that'll be super fun and relatively easy! (The biggest secret to cutting thicker paper is a very sharp knife... more on that later.)
• Redesigning my blog and logo - yeay! But also, kinda (very) scarey!!! Think more refined, but not too traditional - like mid century modern furniture!
  
• Designing a whole new career for myself, and I'm so lucky and proud to be working with a very good friend on it! OMG, so not ready to spill on this one yet!
• Shelving the book plans for now, I'm still trying to collect projects and patterns, but I don't have the right contacts to pull it off in the high quality style that I'd really like to. Maybe later...
• Working my way through the 700+ rss posts in my feed, I have to apologize that I haven't been able to comment on as many as I'd like yet!
• Finding all of my old high school friends through Facebook. This I have to admit, I find both super cool and a little creepy - all at the same time. Huh.

What's new with you guys? I'm totally thinking about another contest to bring you lurkers out of the woodwork again! What kind of prize or contest really makes you comment? I must confess, I always feel like I have such a small chance on the big blogs, I don't really bother trying anymore!

Sorry...

... no feature this Friday - I'm leaving for vacation tomorrow! I was hoping to have a bunch of posts lined up and ready, so I could just schedule them to publish, and not leave the poor blog empty for the next couple weeks. But, it just didn't happen that way... I have a bunch of ideas for posts, and even a few already written, but not a lot of pictures of any of it yet. So, when I do get back I'll have lots of fun stuff to share!

I was even thinking I had so much fun doing my last contest, that I should have another round or two - so if you missed out on the last one, or just didn't win it - you'll get more chances! So, stay tuned for a mystery fabric stash giveaway, a bath & body themed gift-box and maybe more!

A great big thanks go out to all of the wonderful commenters recently! You've all been so sweet, and I haven't had the time to thank everyone personally; but I hope I can remedy that after my trip. So, thanks again! You guys are great!

Feature Friday - I need your features!!!

I've been running around like a chicken with my head cut off the last few days, because I'm going on vacation - a week from tomorrow! I can hardly believe it, because it's been about a year since my last vacation! This time, I'm headed on a cruise through the Panama Canal; and my husband and I somehow snagged a table for two at dinner! Score! I'm so excited, but I also need a little help!

So, I need your features and recommendations for Acapulco and Huatulco, Mexico and Puntarenas, Costa Rica. We'll be stopping in a couple more ports than that, but we have some shore excursions planned already - how does a helicopter tour of Aruba sound? Pretty good, you say? Yes, yes.

Obviously then, it's not my first cruise; but it will be my first time in those 3 ports, so I need some help figuring out what to do and eat in those places. Give me a good one, and I might even have to repay the favor and send you a little somthing special... (hey, a little incentive isn't bad, is it? Hehehe.)

Feature Friday - Baggu Bags

When I read about these Baggu bags on Not Martha's blog, I wanted to try them out for myself. I've been wanting to buy a set of reusable bags for quite some time, and the fact that I could pick from such a wide range of colors really sealed it for me. Plus, I got a fun storage sack, too!

They really can hold 2-3 times what a regular plastic bag would, and didn't even snap a thread when I stuffed 2 2L pops (I know, hcfs sucks - that's for another day!) plus 51L bottles of water in one bag! I'm seriously impressed, they hold up superbly, look great; and I thought it was pretty easy to fold them back up to put them in in their boxy pouches.

All in all, I have to give these a glowing review. Except for the fact that the bagger looked at me like I was crazy for having such large reusables; I just thought to myself," if you put things in, in the right way - they stand up on their own just fine!"

How I really feel inside...

I really, really don't like sharing this stuff here, but for lack of a better outlet, here goes nothing...

So, it all started a couple years back when my grandmother died. My mom spent a ton of months taking care of her before that, even though my grandma would say the meanest things sometimes. Now, I wonder if that had to do with some sort of pre-frontal cortex damage or issue - that meant she just didn't have that internal censor that everyone else seems to. That's how my family used to always describe it anyhow. Now, I wonder if it was a scientific part of who she was. Part of me feels bad for not trying to be more accepting of it...

After that, my mom went on a last minute cruise to Greece, which I thought would be great for her, and I think it was, although she won't tell me anything but the good parts... so who knows? Thing is...she left my sister in charge of EVERYTHING. I even offered to watch her dog for her (which would have saved her a considerable amount of money,) and she refused. Even when I offered to drive the 25 miles to her house everyday to check up on the house and dog, she brushed me off like I wasn't capable of taking on the task. That really hurt.

Then, when my step-father lost his glasses in Greece - who'd they call to have another pair Fedex-ed over? Not me, it was my sister. Just like it was my sister who I had to talk to during the couple weeks my mom was overseas. And, I'd have to say, that was the beginning of the end of my relationship with my mom. All my sister would say is how much they talked on the phone EVERY day, and how she felt lost without that. Nevermind the fact that I was trying to do my best to be there for her, and she's never said thank you to me, for that once. Or anything else I've tried to do for her, or my mom this past year.

After that, she got pregnant (my sister, not my mom - I'm turning 28 at the end of the year!) And that was really hard news for me - because it wasn't long before we found out that it was going to be a girl - just EXACTLY what she was hoping for. I even went to Hawaii last year, and had a bit of escape from my family mess, but as soon as I got back, it went straight back into - "Let's put all of our focus on her, and not you." And, I really struggled with that attitude hanging in the air. But no one saw it, or recognized it.

Just to be clear, here - I've been trying to tell my mother these feelings for over a year, in fact, ever since my sister started trying to get pregnant; but to no avail. She dodges my points, makes excuses why she can't be there for me now. The tricky bit is - she was ALWAYS there for me as a younger child, and even though I'm older now, I literally feel like a bird who was just kicked out of the nest, and left to fend for myself. Totally alone within my family unit.

See - here's the other side of the story - my dad was always there physically, but not ever in an emotional sense. My parents divorced when I was 3 years old. That is to say, my visitations with him were sitting in front of the tv, not talking to him at all. In fact, I could say something, and he just wouldn't hear, or process it - to the point that I sometimes wondered if I'd ever said it all. This left me feeling pretty damaged and alone as a child, and the fact that I never felt my sister wanted me as her sister never helped. I just wasn't good enough of a daughter or a sister to either one of them, and I've felt shunned most of my life.

So, when I told my dad just how angry and upset all that crap made me (like at 25, a few years back,) instead of saying, "Kari, I want to have a rational, real conversation with you about this," he told my sister he disowned me. The dickhead didn't even have enough cahones to say it to me direct. He just said "I only have one daughter." - even though we're twins. Great parenting skills there.

So, at the beginning of this year my mom asked me to help plan my sister's baby shower, and at that point - I was just starting to feel like my jealousy was coming from a place of perspective - that I felt like the whole world was saying. "Yeay Jenn, you'r pregnant!" When I didn't have anyone telling me, ""Yeay Kari, you're following you're own path, even if it is non-traditional!" Well, except my husband, and one very, very close blog friends. Thank you both, from the bottom of my heart. You've kept me sane this year, really.

Oh yeah, and even though I stifled all of my feelings until after the baby shower, because i wanted my sister to have an enjoyable one, no matter the relationship we share - here's the kicker... my mom left for a week's vacation the day after the baby shower - without telling me she was even going. I had to find out from my sister - who I certainly didn't feel comfortable sharing those negative feelings with, especially then (she was 7+ months pregnant!) I really needed to be able to share my feeling with her (my mom,) that week, and she made it perfectly clear through her actions, that she wasn't interested in listening to them. Then, or now, (it's been 6 months since the shower.)

But, it doesn't 't help alleviate the pain I feel that my family thinks baking a baby is more valuable than trying to define for my OWN self what's going to make me happy. Can't I be my own person, with my OWN desires and goals, and aren't they just as valid as everyone else's???

Maybe, it will be a child someday, I can't say it's something I'm totally disinterested in; but after this experience, with my family that I get to say on paper is my family - even though I barely ever felt, and now I totally don't feel - a part of them, in any way. I've said to my mom that I feel extraneous and worthless, in my role as her daughter, and she won't/ or can't address it as a point - which makes me feel like my feelings are completely invalid, and wrong.

She wants to talk in person or on the phone, and basically said that she doesn't think we can work on anything regarding our relationship through email. But, I'm a very guarded person with my feelings, and if I keep trying to share them with someone who I don't feel is listening, or really hearing what I have to say... I don't know any other coping device than to shut down, and pre-reject them all, because rejection is all I've felt from them for years. My dad, sister, and now - most painfully of all - my mom.

Mom - I can't see you, or talk to you on the phone right now. I NEED it to be through email, because I'm so hyper-sensitive to everything you say, and every inflection in your tone and body language. I know you're not trying to take your life stresses out on me - but that's what it's felt like for a long time. You always made a point to make the other twin feel special when something great was going on in the other's life... but where are you when I need you? When the whole world is cheering her on for something almost every woman on the face of the earth is doing - whilst I'm toiling, trying to find my own meaning of happiness and fulfillment. Why is that less valuable to you? Why can't you show me the support I need, especially right now? And, especially in the way that I NEED it, instead of just the way you're willing to give it to me...

Feature Friday - Planet June Amigurumi

I might be biased, because June's a very good friend of mine... but I just can't help but include her blog & store in my Feature Friday posts. She's a very talented crafter who makes things out of lots of different materials (a crafter after my own heart!) But, her main focus is crochet patterns done in a certain style, called amigurumi.

Aren't these guinea pigs adorable?!!!

There's lots of people who make amigurumi, but I'll tell you why June's patterns are different. First off - some are in fuzzy/fizzy yarn which lends such a wonderful finished effect. Not many people tackle this kind of novelty yarn - especially in crochet! Secondly, her instructions are clear and concise, with lots of pictures (which is my preferred learning method.) And, the range! She's published so many patterns, and she's only been crocheting since 2003! I find that pretty inspiring and amazing, and I hope you do, too!!!

Please do go check out her pattern store, she's just updated with these Halloween themed cuties! She has such a wide range of animal patterns available, though - there's enough there to please anybody I'd bet!

My favorite is the Polar Bear, they're so endangered and special - they may be gone in as little as 60 years! (I have to say a very close second goes to AmiDog Shiba Inu. June was sweet enough to make me one to match my Shiba Inu, Ginger. Trust me, having a cute little dog that doesn't poop or talk back, is awesome! Hehehe.) She has many more breed styles as well, though.

*All images are copyright June Gilbank, and used only with her permission.

Rip It... Rip It Good!

These days I find myself needing to rip back large portions of a knitting project, for one reason or another; and I thought I'd share what I've learned (so you don't have to spend hours untangling an unholy mess of one ply lace weight wool. ugh.)

I'm not even done ripping yet... I'm going all the way back to the armholes!

I use this technique when I'm mid-project, and don't want to rip the whole piece out, just a large enough section that would undoubtedly tangle, were I not to utilize this simple method. In fact, it's just a piece of card stock (letter sized, 8.5"x11"",) rolled into a tube and taped shut. I place a cut on one end to hold the end that's closest to the ball, that's not being ripped, to hold the yarn in place.

Then, I just rip back and wind the loose yarn onto the tube, being careful to pull tight enough to slightly pull the curl out, but not so tight that it actually constricts the tube. I try and start at the end of the tube closest to the ball. I work my way towards the other end of the tube as I go, so when I knit it back together, I can just pull a few loops off the tube at a time. Jeez, I hope that made sense! If you have any questions, or just want to call me wordy - feel free! And wish me luck while you're at it, I still have a ton left to rip out!

October, already?!?!?!?!

I can hardly believe it! Partly because I'm going on a cruise in a few weeks, and partly because by the time I get back, it's going to be the holiday season again! Ack!

So, does anyone remember my contest? Well, I still haven't heard from one of the winners - Vickie S. who's blog is Red Hot Polka Dots. If you don't email me by the 8th, I'll have to redraw another winner.

I want to be able to have all my contest winner's packages out and on their way before I go on vacation! So - anybody craving a cashmere tsumami kanzashi bracelet, or a pair of tree branch earrings - stay tuned! If I haven't heard from Vickie in a week, I'll put up another contest post and redraw another random winner.

Where did this year go, I mean... I know it's mostly gone - but damn! I wanted to get so much more done already by now. So many goals and ideas just floating in my brain, getting crammed into little corners here and there. I really hope I can get more of them out of my head and into reality from now on...