Spring is Here, Oh, Spring is Here!

...Life is skittles and life is beer! --Tom Lehrer, "Poisoning Pigeons in the Park"

 

This is what I've been hiding all week--I'm calling it "A Hint of Spring".  I haven't sent it off to my swapee yet, but I've warned her away from anywhere she might see it.

And what did I spend all day doing today, to the point where I nearly didn't have time to make dinner before I had to be somewhere?

Writing up the pattern!  It's for sale! I've already sold one tonight!

I AM A KNITWEAR DESIGNER!

Well, I was before, too, but this one has me shouting from the rooftops, blogophorically speaking.

This isn't a stitch pattern I pulled from a dictionary and called a new pattern.  I charted this one from the ground up.

This is the first time I've made a chart in a spreadsheet with a knitting font.  This is the first time I've written out directions from a chart--and boy, did I go cross-eyed proofreading that.  This is the first time I've really been pleased with a picture of me modeling one of my own designs!  (Give a hand to my husband on that one, I made him throw on his coat over his pajamas and come out on the balcony in the bitter, bitter cold to get the shots!)

And this is my first pattern for sale through Ravelry, which is very exciting to me.  I had a pattern for sale once through Chiagu, but it was a poncho, and it sold very, very poorly, mostly due to being published at the tail end of the poncho craze.  Notice how it's not on the site anymore, nor on my patterns list over there?  There's a reason.  Though I may very well tinker a bit on it to make it a stole and offer it for free.  Just because it was a poncho once doesn't mean the lace pattern can't be saved!

Anyway.  Dancing for joy. Squealing with glee.  You get the idea.

And now there's just the one secret knitting project on the needles!

If you need a little encouragement, well, there's a little button right here to tempt you.