six weeks till Black Sheep

I leave for Black Sheep Gathering six weeks from today, and much to my surprise, I'm on track with my preparation. Amazing how a skein or braid of roving here and there can add up when you start early enough. My goal was to bring triple the amount of fiber that I had last year, and it looks like I'm on pace to have closer to quadruple. My BFL/silk blend (like the photo above) is definitely popular, so I'll have a lot of that.

What a change from how I felt around this time last year. During the runup to BSG, I was stressed about where my business was going, what I was investing for little emotional return, never getting enough sleep, and so on. If Black Sheep didn't go well, I was going to quit.

But it did go well. Better than I had dreamed of. I'd hoped to equal my Sock Summit take; I ended up selling almost 50% more. And even better were the comments that people made about my yarn, and my fiber. Those words, sometimes said directly to me, sometimes overheard as friends were talking to each other, have carried me through a lot of late nights.

And now I'm a full-time dyer, thanks to the magic rejuvenation of BSG. Thank you, Black Sheep friends, for reinspiring me. <3

honest, Fate, I'm not trying to tempt you

I'm afraid to say this, but I think I might be caught up. I mean, not totally, as in I have nothing on the dye schedule, because I still have a lot, but that sense of panic has eased up. Fiber club is shipped, yarn club is shipped, and three wholesale orders (including the one shown above, which is now up at Pulling at Strings, here and here) went out the door last month. I have a couple of small custom orders to work on tomorrow, and then I might safely say that I'm back to my normal level of frenzy. I'm starting to think ahead a little bit, including hiring a local friend/web designer to do a standalone site for me, so that's a good sign.

I need to build in a little more leeway into my schedule. I'm not sure exactly how. My husband did offer to go back to a 4-10 schedule so he could help me wind yarn and reskein one day a week. That would be a huge boost to my productivity; I hope it works out.

In my ongoing efforts to prevent the Perfect from being the enemy of the Good Enough, I'll be listing a few things tonight on both Etsy and my HC store. Still trying to find the balance among building show inventory, completing wholesale orders, and tending to my own retail sales. We'll get there.

I'm not going to whine ...

but I will say that taxes this year are hurting my head. Plus I'm pretty sure that I have to figure out estimated taxes for the 1st quarter of 2011 by tomorrow. I don't know if the tax return deadline of April 18 applies to estimated taxes, too, and the IRS web site is down right now (no surprise). [Edit: the estimated tax deadline is also 4/18.]

I do think that I will finally be able to set up a decent tracking system for expenses so that Schedule C will be a lot easier to do in future years. I've been browsing different software programs, but I think that if I can just get the right spreadsheets set up, consolidate my spending to downloadable electronic formats (i.e., my business checking and PayPal), and never use cash for business expenses, it will be so much easier. I'm also planning to spend some time reading sites like Money Crashers and Basic Accounting Help to figure out some of this stuff. I'm actually feeling a little excited about learning more about accounting, which is a first.

It really wasn't my intent to leave taxes till this late, I swear. We usually do them in March, after I've recovered from the first round of tax frenzy prompted by the state business tax deadline of January 31. But my husband had the flu for a week before I came down with it, so that was three weeks where the household was just trying to tread water with one functional adult.

On a related business-y note, we've launched the My Better Earth blog, which focuses on helping handcrafting businesses to grow. I'm one of the primary writers, so some of these business-related ramblings may evolve into full-fledged posts over there. We'll be posting about twice a week at first to build up some more content, and then settle down to a weekly schedule.

2011 Whidbey spin-in

2011 Whidbey spin-in, a photo by connormarie on Flickr.

I spent 10 days during the second half of March in bed with the flu, which was pretty much zero fun and I had to miss my Cookie A class because of it (sob). Then as soon as I got back on my feet, I was catching up with a few projects and prepping for the Whidbey Weavers Guild's spin-in this weekend. I tried to tell myself to just be happy with what I already had dyed, but of course I didn't listen. At any rate, I remembered both to bring my camera and to actually use it to take a photo, which is the first time I've been two out of two in quite a while. This photo was taken after almost the silk hankies had been snatched up (I think I was out of them within the first hour of the spin-in).

It was a fun weekend--great to meet more local spinners and knitters, including some people that I've known online for a while, as well as seeing some familiar faces! It was the 40th anniversary of the spin-in, and one of the original organizers confirmed that the name had been inspired by all the 1960s sit-ins (I'd wondered). Judith MacKenzie was the featured spinner this weekend, and it was an education to listen to her. (How nice that the vendors were able to listen in, too!) I don't own a wheel so her talk on wheel mechanics was completely new to me, and I learned a lot. I wish I'd taken notes. Judith imparted so much information in a disarmingly casual manner. One thing she said that I found particularly interesting was that the diameter of a spindle's shaft is directly correlated with the diameter of the yarn that you're able to spin. I had thought it had more to do with the spindle weight, and there's probably some connection there, but not as direct a correlation as the shaft. And that the bigger the wheel, the finer the yarn you could spin.

I'll be spending this week dyeing the March (I know) fiber club, the April yarn club selections, wrapping up a wholesale order, and entertaining my child on his spring break. I was thinking about dyeing some silk hankies tonight, but I think maybe I've earned a break.

new superwash worsted yarn and thoughts about Japan

For the past year, I've been trying out different superwash worsted yarns. I have Trillium, which I love for its softness and amiability during dyeing; it is very gracious about accepting dye, unlike some yarns that need to be coaxed, begged, or threatened. And it's one of the few truly squishy yarns that I've encountered--four plies, so it's very smooth, tight enough to avoid splittiness, yet with plenty of give. Its one flaw is that it's aran weight, and a bit heavy for some sweater patterns.

I've had a custom mill run done for me, in addition to trying most of the ones on the market. None have yet had the perfect combination of twist, hand, and general knitting enjoyment that I'm looking for.

Yet another candidate arrived today, and I think this might be The One, at last. It will go into the dyepot this week; I have high hopes for this base.

It does feel terribly trivial to be thinking about yarn, given what's happening in Japan. I gave some money to one of my favorite charities, International Medical Corps, which has a tsunami relief fund. I'd like to give more, but I'm not really sure which organization is best equipped to help right now. And I am transfixed by the struggle to keep the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant from complete failure. I still have intermittent daydreams of working in emergency management (I was a public information officer for my county's EM department for years), so I have a professional perspective that's slowly coming to bear as I work through some of my emotional and visceral reactions.

As usual, the NY Times has some incredible interactive graphics. Before and after satellite photos that show the impact of the tsunami and what happens during a reactor meltdown are two really good ones.

knitting news, for a change

I finished Rogue's first sleeve! I may really end up with a completed sweater this time. Though for some reason, I keep thinking about the Grimm's fairy tale where seven (six?) brothers are turned into swans, and their poor sister has to sew them all shirts by the appointed day, or else they'll stay swans forever. To add insult to injury, the poor girl has to remain mute for the seven years that she has to work on the shirts; she can't even complain about how unfair it is, or how her shoulders hurt from hunching over her sewing all that time. At any rate, she manages to finish them all except for one sleeve on the last shirt, and that brother has a swan's wing instead of an arm for the rest of his life.

This fairy tale has been intruding on my thoughts ever since I started working on the sleeve, and I've decided to interpret it as a cautionary tale from my subconscious. I don't want to have to sprout down feathers to stay warm because I was struck down by Second Sleeve Syndrome.

In other news, I signed up for a class at the end of March with Cookie A at Wild Fibers in Mt Vernon. It's Knitting on the Bias. When I called, there was still one spot left in Cookie's Advanced Cables class in the morning, as well as spaces in the afternoon class that I'm taking, in case you're local.

introducing the Huckleberry Knits fiber club

Nothing surprised me more last year than how well my spinning fibers sold at shows. It was amazing, and humbling.

It does leave me in a bit of a bind for online sales; since my fiber essentially sells out at each show, I'm always building up inventory for the next show, and don't have much to list at Etsy.

So I'm introducing a fiber club, beginning this month. The subscription is for three months. Each three-month period will have one untreated fiber, one superwash, and one luxury or exotic fiber.

I'm excited about the club--I love dyeing fiber and watching the colors meld. Happy spinning!