Goal accomplished?

I am many things in this world. I am a woman. I'm a girlfriend. A sister, a daughter, a friend. I'm also a knitter, a wannabe crocheter, a spinner and now apparently a pattern designer! Yes, that's right! I've written and published a knitwear pattern. It's not the most complicated pattern ever, but its still valid that I wrote it out, knit it and it works. It's sort of a test run for an actual pattern that I'm going to write for a hat that I want to make. I've looked high and low and can't find the perfect hat pattern that I can see in my head. So I decided that I would make it myself and then if it worked out, publish the pattern. I'm also reverse engineering a stuffed animal that I've seen in a magazine that I can't find the pattern for. I've named him Mr. Wrinkles and I can't wait to get started on knitting him up. The shawl pattern which I just finished will be put up on Ravelry for free and the hat is probably going to be free for now, however if it turns out awesome, I'd like to sell it via Knitpicks in their $1.99 pattern section. I'm using their yarn to make it up, so it makes sense to get it sold on that forum. Mr. Wrinkles will probably be a Ravelry paid download because I suspect that he's going to be somewhat difficult to engineer. If you want to test knit and you haven't already let me know on Ravelry, please leave a comment with how I can get in touch with you and I will offer you both Mr. Wrinkles and/or the hat to test knit. I would just ask that you provide decent photos of your finished project. I've heard somewhere that sometimes people ask you to pay for the yarn and knit the thing and then they want the item. I most certainly don't want your item. If you're local and you want me to photograph it, I'd be happy to, but the item and pattern is yours to keep.

In other news, I'm in for another rough two weeks. My manager, who is also a friend of mine just suffered the tragic and sudden loss of her father in a very unpleasant situation. The week that it happened, she was at work and altho it really didn't affect me personally, it was very taxing trying to keep the junk off her desk, people away from her office and attempt to comfort her in an appropriate and professional way. She's been away for a few days and now she's back for a week and a half before she goes back to Ontario again. I'm again tasked with taking care of her workwise as well as again attempting to provide comfort, distraction, some laughter and an over all feeling of safety for her. It's exhausting. I would do it for the rest of my life for someone I cared about if it was required, but that doesn't take away the fact that it's a difficult function to perform, made all the more complicated by the fact that we work together, so it's not like I can just drag her to a coffee shop or a lounge and chat and drink away the afternoon. (which would be nice!)

I got started on working on another WIP (work in progress) that has been languishing since last March... it's a beautiful beaded stole and I can't wait for it to be done... unfortunately in the year that it was hanging around not getting any attention, I guess it got angry and the entire ball of almost 1000 yards of yarn turned itself into one gigantic loopy knot. I can't do anything about it (because I'm not ept for detangling), so I emailed a fellow knitter who LOVES to detangle stuff (there are a LOT of those types of people out there!) and she's going to fix it for me. In the meantime, since I don't have any other projects in progress that can be 'on the go' or 'mindless knitting', I am casting on my ribbed legwarmers! My friend Sara is teaching me how to knit two things at once on one circular needle... exciting! I'm waiting to cast on any type of lacey something (which is almost exclusively what I knit) because I'm waiting for my 700 yards of Sweet Georgia Merino Silk Laceweight to show up so I can start Echo Flower. Girasole is on hold until my kp order shows up so I can use the bigger needles for the rest of it, and the crochet portion of my round shawl is stalled indefinately because there is NOTHING for me to wear it with any time soon, so it will just go in the heirloom knitting box. I've just initiated a KAL (knit-a-long, wherein everyone knits on their own version of the same thing at the same time) to do the new Knitty pattern Annis. It involves casting on 363 stitches, but I think once we get over that trauma, it will work out nicely and it's a really really pretty pattern. It will also help because on my fantastic Echo Flower, I need to do nupps and I've never done them, so I'll practice on this... it's relatively cheap yarn I'm using (not the quality, which is great, but the actual monetary cost) and then be wicked awesome for the big times!