Trip to Illinois

     Tomorrow I am leaving on a trip. I am abandoning my family for the open road and the search for the perfect yarn store. I go on a few trips like this a year. I am not alone in my quests; I have a friend, who shall remain nameless for the time being. We have to decide on the best pseudonym for her, we will discuss it during the many hours we will be on the road. We thought about Thelma and Louise but that tends to bring up images of murder and cliffs, we don’t want to go there.
       The trips we go on are for fun, we usually have a final destination in mind and eventually get to where we are intending to go. We don’t always take the most direct or time saving route. One trip we took was a 4 hour drive that took us 10 hours to do. We saw yarn and quilt stores along the way and were drawn to them like moths to a flame. We have a Garmin which we have renamed Carmen who gets very upset with us. If you have ever programmed a Garmin for a destination and then not followed her directions you would know she gets VERY upset. She starts telling you, in a very sarcastic voice, to make a u-turn NOW. If you keep going the “wrong way” she gets more aggressive and starts “recalculating” to find you a new way back to the intended destination. We are actually on our second Garmin, I think the first one got so fed up with us, it just gave up and decided it would no longer hold a charge so it would not have to deal with us. Mike would say it was just a machine and could not get upset with us, but I know she secretly enjoyed when we made a sudden turn and she could yell at us. I also think the old one and the new communicated before we left on our last trip. We were at a yarn store, off the path of course, and she was yelling at us to get back to the main highway and she gave us directions to do so, but she instead lead us right into the middle of a trailer park. After we got our breath back from laughing so hard we managed to find our own way back to the highway and continue on down the road. On that trip we also had a small problem when the technology in the car started fighting and we were no longer in control. What was that about computers eventually taking over, never mind Hal? We were trying to make a call with On-star and Carmen decided to tell us where we had gone wrong once again. On-star did not like her interrupting and yelled at us to get rid of the background noise if we wanted to speak to her. Quite an odd experience having the on-board computers gets into a catfight.
      Tomorrow we are on our way to see friends in Illinois. We plan to spend one day traveling to Galena Ill. It is a 9 hour trip as per Carmen. We will see what happen. We will spend the night there and hit the local yarn store and see what else we find. I will keep you all posted as we go. I suppose I should go to bed so I can get up and be ready for a full day of pissing off Carmen.

The girl child turns 21

Hooray Hooray its the 6th of May!

A new baby girl was born this day.

No longer a young pup,

She is now 21 and all grown up!

She has become a lovely young woman

I am proud to say.

We love her just that way.

The Girl-child turned 21 this week.  Overall I am ok with it, but I realize I must have been 12 when she was born.  I don't remember being quite so young but I couldn't possibly be old enough to have a 21 year old.  She is doing well with the boy in the new apartment.  She has grown into a lovely young woman and we are very proud of her.   I am still working in cleaning out the "stuff" she "forgot" when she left.  The craft room is a work in progress.

Hooray! Hooray!

Hooray! Hooray!

It's the first of May

Outdoor Screwing Starts Today!

That, is all I have to say!

Research, Reaserch, Research

     Today I spent many hours sipping juice, (sorry, I am not a coffee drinker) and eating cookies, oh yeah I could not decide between the peanut buttercup and the oatmeal raisin cookie so I had to get both, in the café at Barnes and Noble. Boy, those seats are hard! I don’t think they really want you to stay there for long periods of time. I am sure the idea is for you to get your, half calf mocha latté chino frappe thingy and down it in 2.5 seconds and go boppin on your way as you float out of the store on a sugar and caffeine rush from hell. Well anyway, I had a couple of hours to kill and I did not want to go home and be faced with the dirty dishes and laundry that needs to get done so I went there to get some research done.

     I poured through many books, which I did not buy just perused, to learn about the world of publishing. The irony of me sitting in a bookstore trying to get information about publishing a book that I actually want people to buy and not just look through was not lost on me. I got to the section called Publishing and there was a sticky note on the shelf that said start here.

      I figured it was a sign from god and was as good a place to start as any. I found many, many books that covered all aspects of the publishing field. I learned all about query letters, what they are and why I need to learn how to write them. I even read two different books that showed me bad examples of them. I learned that I really know less about the subject then I realized I did. I do not know that I am any closer to getting my book done then I was last year, (FYI- I had no plans of doing a book last year.).
      Mike did some research online for me last night about the company Bob represents. Remember Bob? (Refer to blog post: the book is becoming a reality.) Now I am not so sure anymore. His research turned up some not so encouraging things about self publishing, actually today I learned the services they offer are not really self-publishing but is called vanity publishing. Now, does that have a bad connotation to it or is it just me? Depending on who you listen to, it is the best or worst thing a person can do to get a book printed and into the hands of the public. I read today that companies like that sell more books to the authors, at a discounted rate but no royalty, then they do to the general public. That is not the news I wanted to hear!! Oh well I guess I will keep writing the patterns, working up the samples and see where this all takes me.
     The moral of my day is this; after several hours of reading and thumbing through books that I thought might help me, I left for work with a numb butt, a sugar high, at least I think that is why I can’t stop tapping my foot, more scared and confused then I was before I started doing research. If you find yourself in a Barnes and Noble café for several hours perusing but not buying books, bring a pillow to sit on and just go for the peanut butter cookie. The oatmeal raisin was good but it suspiciously resembled something healthy.

My book will become a reality!

    I moved a step closer to getting patterns completed for the book last night, or this morning, it was about 2 a.m. but I had not really been to bed yet, so I am not sure which you would call it. I got a call from Bob, Bob is my wannabe publisher, or at least the agent assigned to sell me as much as possible to “help get my book published. He called to offer me a deal that I could not refuse and to, in his words “light a fire under me” to get the process going. I have decided the best thing for me is to start out self publishing with an on-demand company. I have learned quite a lot about the publishing industry lately. On-demand means you pay them to help you put together a book and they offer it for sale to bookstores; on-line and brick and mortar. Then whenever someone orders a copy they print it and send it. I make money off the sale of those books, if and when they get ordered. Bob’s job is to sell me a package to get the book printed and edited and maybe, for a little bit extra, advertised. He is also there to keep me motivated and actively working on the project.

     So, the progress I was talking about, remember, that is how this all started, I have been searching for months for a program that will allow me to put my crochet designs in a graph format. I finally found a couple of them last night. The first one was for sale for $160.00 and on a disk they would send; the second was available for immediate download for $3.95. Can you guess which one I went with? Bells and whistles are overrated. This program will allow me to write my patterns in word form then to translate them into graphs. This is exciting because more and more patterns coming out right now are offered in both forms. It helps those of us that are very visual, to read patterns more easily. Graphs have a lot of X’s and O’s and squiggly lines all over. These graphs sort of look like a football playbook. Actually, I think I have seen some patterns that would make a pretty good football play when graphed out. Note to self: get a hold of Chilly and let him know about those. Hey they can’t be any worse than some of the plays he called last season!! Maybe I can even design one that Bret can throw and AP can actually catch. Hey I may have a whole new career going here. Football plays disguised as graphed crochet patterns. Ok settle back down to earth and deep breath, whewwwww moving on. So the long and short of it is I am getting to work on my patterns! The book may become a reality. Check that, WILL become a reality. I guess I should not spend any more time procrastinating here I should be working on writing patterns.

Losing your computer cord sucks!

      I was at a wonderful quilt retreat last weekend and got 3 whole projects completed. It was great! I made a MN Wild (that’s hockey) wall hanging for Mike. I also made two bags, one was very easy and one we lovingly referred to as “the bag from hell!!” They both turned out great and I love them. The main problem with the bag from hell was the writing of the pattern. It was so poorly written it both confused and frustrated us to distraction. It took two of us 4 hours to cut out the pieces. Then we spent another 8 hours putting it together. Now that I have done it once, I know what changes to make so it will go together easier.

     Once again I seem to digress; the point of this blog was to tell you I have not posted since my trip because somehow I lost the cord to my computer and it does like to run without power. I ran it completely dry and had to wait till I could get a new cord. The way things work in my world, I am sure because I bought a new cord I will find the old one.

Where have the last 10 days gone????

Where has the time gone? It has been 10 days since my last post. I can’t believe it. It has been a very busy 10 days. Let see what I have accomplished in that time...

 

• I got the girl-child motivated to get packing for her big day of moving. You would think she would be just chomping at the bit to do this but she needed some daily prodding. I gave her 3 choices for everything in her room, 1- goodwill, 2 – garbage, or 3 – going with you. This was hard for her, but her “stuff” is not staying here. We went shopping and bought several hundred dollars worth of things she needed for the apartment, we actually moved her bed in and got it set up, we dropped some boxes off but did not unpack them.
• I  talked to the girl-childs landlord, got in to see the apartment and answered the questions I needed to know.  No, there are no lights in the living room, they do need lamps. No, there are no curtains, they do need these, there is not a shower curtain, and yes only one dresser will fit in the bedroom.  She will need to reevaluate the amount of clothes she plans on bringing with her. Unless the boy plans on not ever wearing any clothes.  What they do in their own home does not matter to me but I think work and school might have something to say about it.
• I set up my summer schedule for crochet classes at Yarn Harbor. 4 of the classes I have planned are for new projects, I need to write the patterns for these projects and get samples made. Having to teach a class will give me good motivation to get them written.
• I cleaned house and cooked multiple times, these are worth mentioning cuz they are not things I tend to do on a regular basis, my family will attest to this. (Mike does most of our cooking; he’s good at it and likes it so why fight him on it????)
• I have been to the grocery store 11 times. (We really need to do one big grocery buy instead of always getting what we need for supper)
• I have been to the gas station 6 times. (Running to Two Harbors really eats up gas!!)
• I helped the boy-child get through the third quarter; I think we passed all our classes. With all the homework I read and did with him we better of passed them!
• I taught 4 crochet classes and 2 needle felting classes at Yarn Harbor.
• I started writing 3 patterns and testing them, they are in various stages of production.
• I bought and read a book about writing crochet patterns and how to get published. I started setting up some of the guidelines that the book suggested; I started editing some of my current patterns to fit these guidelines.
• I made contact with two publishers to get information about my book process.
• I taught two after-school recycled art classes to a group of 15 Kindergartners.
• I have done 11 massages.
• I took my mother to physical therapy 5 times.
• I started and completed 2 crochet projects; one for me one for a gift.
• I packed for my quilt retreat this weekend. I think I have everything together; maybe I better go back and check bags.

 

I think I better go now because I still have to go to the bank, get my hair cut, teach a craft class, and go to the grocery store today. Dang!! I need a nap!