I don't know, it all just seems to be getting more and more out of control. I spent most of yesterday morning dealing with the aftermath of some stupid people and banging my head against the wall. At 12.30 I sat down and ate leftover curry from the night before then gave up and went to bed for a couple of hours which is something that I haven't felt the need to do for ages.
I am taking your advice though. After WMK told me to dye more yarn I decided that today would be a get your hands mucky day skeining yarn from cones, dyeing yarn and generally playing with yarn. I'm hoping it will be a big sanity check. And spinning fishwife, just as SOON as YF pays me any kind of salary at all the first thing I'm treating myself to is a cleaner / housewife type person. I'm considering stopping paying into my pension at the moment in the hope that I can better use that money to get someone to clean for me. What do you reckon? I must be one of the few people that has paid into a pension every month since they were 18, perhaps its time to take a break for a year until YF can pay me a salary and use some of that money to help me be less stressed. Hmmm...
Oh and yesterday I learned the phrase drama llama. I love it and will aim to use it in conversation every day. I managed it yesterday by telling Lou by text that she was a drama llama when she complained that a shelf full of magazines had fallen off the office wall and onto her. Drama Llama. Go ahead, see if you can use it in conversation today.
I'm going to be busy prepping for the photoshoot on Saturday all day tomorrow so I won't blog again until Monday at which point I hope to be able to share lots of lovely photos with you. Now won't that be nice? Have a lovely weekend whatever you are doing and if any Cambridgeshire people want to come along and help out at the photoshoot on Saturday drop me and email. Michaela, its at a place you know well only a few miles from your house if you want to pop over. x
Thanks for the comments and emails yesterday, Ruth - I didnt get a box of anything lovely but if I had I would be rushing down the M11 with it to share with you right now. I hope you get the tooth / car stuff sorted out..
Its all feeling very mundane around here, I seem to be drowning under the little things. Data entry, laundry, checking and rechecking, laundry, stock takes, laundry, labelling oh and did I mention the laundry? None of it is a major problem, it just all seems to have hit at once this week. Usually my working week is full of exciting and interesting mixed in with the mundane and repetetive. Not this week though... This week we are all about the blah.
Next week promises to be more exciting. We have the yarn forward photo shoot on Saturday and 3 new yarns to launch next week. I'm also off to help shear some sheep at some point over the next couple of weeks (not sure that I'll be doing much helping though) which is really exciting. So I just need to get through three more days of blah before it all starts to get more exciting. I can do that, don't you think?
If anyone is in West Essex today and has a box full of cheer and good humour drop it off to me please would you? I'm sadly lacking in both at the moment.
We had a big day yesterday, Trinity was christened at our local church and then we had 52 people back to our house for a BBQ, party, general fun time. We were so lucky with the weather, most of us were sheltering under the gazebo trying desperately to find a little shade and the kids loved to be able to take off their posh church clothes and splash around in the paddling pool.
Trinity was lovely, she wore the same dress as Brooke and everyone commented all day on how similar they looked. She didn't sleep much all day (which became a bit of a problem at about 6pm) and was so good in church. She did have a good cry when the vicar took her from me and glared at him when he handed her back but apart from that she was so happy all day.
Its lovely to have so many friends and family over to celebrate the day. Lou and her family came over on Saturday and stayed over night (just so that I could have that extra pair of hands to help with the dessert making Sunday morning but don't tell her that!), this was the first time our kids and husbands had met and they got on just as well as we knew that they would. We all rather took over the church as there were only about a dozen people there who hadn't come for the christening!
Trinity was lucky enough to have 2 beautiful cakes. The first made by the ever wonderful Michaela (who had her own party yesterday)
and the second made by our lovely cake making cousin Kim.
If anyone wants cake including with their yarn orders this week that might well be possible as we have SO MUCH left over.
The only problem with having a house full of people on a Sunday is that you don't get time to clear up properly before the week begins. everywhere I look in the house there is stuff. Clean plates to be put away, dirty things to be washed, piles of stuff in the garden etc. This is when working from home is not a good thing, I either spend a few hours sorting it all out this morning or I look at it all day. Ho hum. I have a sick boy with tonsilitis at home with me as well so add that to me being shattered and having drunk rather a lot of wine yesterday afternoon - I think today will be one of my least productive.
There will be a shop update later on today though. I'll let you all know what time later on this morning when I can see how the day is going. I'll add pictures here as well when I find the camera...
Another quick one this morning, my to do list is ridiculous for today and I'm taking this time to blog while the smallest one in the house is still asleep while the rest of us are tiptoeing around trying to get dressed without waking her. Lucky its not my day for the school run (I share with another mum) so if Trinity and Cameron and I are late getting where we are supposed to go that's no big problem..
Have you checked out the yarn forward magazine blog recently? Sarah is busy working on our blog for us and will be giving you lots of insights into what is going on behind the scenes over here. Go and say hi to her and if you have a Ravelry account you can join in the discussion on the Yarn Forward Magazine group over there as well.
Our advertising sales manager for the magazine started with us yesterday, you'll be meeting her on the blog very shortly. The magazine is beginning to feel like a great business with lots of people all taking responsibility for different areas rather than just me trying to do everything. We have one more person starting with us in June and then a small gap before we look for another couple to join us later in the year.
The summer issue is in progress, we have the photo shoot in a couple of weeks time and the garments are pouring through the doors at the moment. Its all looking great and keeping Lou and I very busy at the moment. We are hoping to have it out in time to bring to Woolfest so if you subscribe and are coming to the show you'll be able to pick up your magazine there.
We're changing contact email addresses for HipKnits, for now please send everything to kerrie AT hipknits.co.uk and I will let you all know the new email to contact our posting manager very shortly so that you can email her with any order queries. I've put an auto reply on the other email addresses and I'll keep an eye on the inboxes for the next couple of weeks but (fingers crossed, touch wood and any other superstitions that you might have) this should fix our email issues. Lets hope hey?
We have SO much yarn to put in the shop today, it is going to keep me busy nearly all day photographing, editing the photos and uploading it all to the shop. I'm hoping that the quality of photos will be much improved as I'm embarrassed to admit that months after buying my new camera I have FINALLY worked out how to put it onto macro setting which takes the best photos of yarn. How silly that it should have taken me so long to find that little button...
Here is a preview of some of the silk that we have on the site :
A new pastel colour that was a bit of an experiment. It didn't work out as planned but it is so soft and pretty
A custom dye that was just soooo pretty we couldn't resist dyeing more of it.
Knox. One of my all time favourites which is strange because usually I don't do orange.
Bracken. This is an always popular colour of silk
The shop update is done and on the site. Click here to see all the new products this time. The newsletter list is not co-operating so I'll try again in the morning to send out the notification. As well as lots of lovely summery silk we have some great sale bargains as well. Like these packs of cashmere sock yarn and lace yarn. 200g for just £13.
Pretty pink laceweight
Cashmere socks anyone?
There is also this months choose your own sock yarn club yarn. Cashmere. Yum.
And some ophelia merino sock yarn. Sorbet socks for me please...
