Violently Domestic

Ensnared

13 April 2009 · No Comments

The newest socks, Ensnared, are done and available for sale. I think I’m in love!

Filthy Lucre

11 April 2009 · No Comments

Yes, I’ve decided to start trying to sell some of my patterns. You knew it was coming. Even the underpants gnomes are in it for the bucks.

I’ve given this a lot of thought over the last several days and I’ve reached a few conclusions. I am not hoping to turn socks/ pattern writing/ knitting into a job or even into a substantial source of income. There are a few people out there who have managed to do that, but I don’t think I have the luck, the skill, or – and probably most importantly – the drive to do that. I want knitting to be a hobby and a source of relaxation, not job and a source of stress. I would like to earn enough money to offset the cost of my knitting materials and supplies, and maybe enough to buy a few extras.

There is a bit more to it than that though, and this part is harder to explain. I think people in general, and women in particular, tend to undervalue their time and their talents. Knitters know this. How many times has someone seen you knitting and asked if you’d make something for them. A friend of a friend once asked me to knit her a pair of knee socks. When I demurred, saying it would take about 30 hours of work, she offered to bake me a pie in return. She even added that she sold her pies for fifteen dollars at the local bakery. Fifteen dollars for 30 hours of work is fifty cents an hour. My time is worth more than that. I think people need to learn to value their time and talents. It seems only fair I do the same.

To that end, I want to attach a value to the time I spend working on these patterns. I’d likely be making the socks even if I had no intention of writing the pattern, so I won’t count the knitting time. To produce a pattern I have to write the text of the pattern, create appropriate charts, take photos, work with test knitters, edit and revise the pattern in light of the test knitters’ suggestions, and jump through the technological hoops needed to make the pattern public. All told, it probably takes about 20 hours of work to create the pattern, refine it, and make it available. I want to value that time.

So I’m trying something new. The original versions of the patterns for Popped, Slant, and Dippers are still available for free. There is also a much improved and more polished version of Popped available for a small fee (click on the socks in the sidebar for more details). Lets say the pattern took me 20 hours of work and the yarn cost me twenty dollars. The minimum wage is $6.55 an hour. $6.55 per hour X 20 hours + $20.00 for yarn = $151.00. I’m selling the pattern for $4.00. If thirty eight people buy it, I will have made back what I spent on yarn plus what I would have earned in the time I spent working on it if I were getting minimum wage. More than twenty five hundred of you have been willing to download it for free.

Are thirty eight of you willing to buy it for four dollars?

In the future, some socks will be released for free, some will be free for a short time and then available for a fee, and some will only be available for a fee. I’m new at this, and everything is subject to change, but I want to see if I can make this work.

Administrata

7 April 2009 · No Comments

This website came into being with approximately 45 minutes of effort at 2:30 in the morning at the end of a very long week. I thought it would be a place to host one wee tiny simple pattern. I thought I’d be thrilled if a few dozen people found the pattern, and ecstatic if anyone ever actually knit the things.

Turns out it’s good to have low expectations. They are easier to exceed.

One pattern turned into three, and a fourth is in the hands of test knitters. According to the server stats, a few thousand people have found the pattern. Most exciting of all, I have actual photographic proof that several people have real live actual non-imaginary socks that came into being from the instructions in my patterns.

So with that in mind, I’m going to be redoing the website to be closer to a proper blog (the first and last time that word will ever be used here…it’s a strong contender for my coveted ‘least favorite word’ award). One with handy things like internal organization and more than one page and other such goodies. Right now I type this stuff as straight html in a text document. It’s not hard, but it is a bit slow, and so very 1997. Making it faster will leave more time for the much more interesting knitting. Look for it after the weekend.

Secret Benefactor

6 April 2009 · No Comments

Someone, unbeknownst to me, featured my Popped socks on Whip Up as part of their Week of Socks! I only found out about it because someone on Ravelry was kind enough to to bring it to my attention. I was quite thrilled. There may have been squeaks of delight and hops of glee. Maybe. I could be far too dignified for such things. Possibly even stoic. I must see if I can contact my secret benefactor and find out how she found them in the first place. I’m dreadfully curious.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, a new sock is on the needles. It is called Ensnared and was inspired by the fantastic costumes on the show The Tudors. Don’t worry though, neither knitting nor wearing them is likely to result in beheading. At least not without some very extenuating circumstances.

All that and he fixes cars too…

3 April 2009 · No Comments

My car is, well, I don’t want to say elderly. Perhaps proto-vintage is a better term. He (His name is Theodoric and he does not truck with nicknames. In fact, he prefers you to use his full title, Theodoric King of the Ostrogoths, but I don’t encourage this.) will be ten this September. We have a complicated relationship. He’s not yet broken 60,000 miles, yet the total of his repair bills would basically finance a new car. I find this distressing. We’ve been in counseling, and seem to have reached an understanding, but, heeding the once burned twice shy theory of car maintenance, I still approach the mechanic’s shop with caution.

Theodoric just had his 50,000 mile service and passed with flying colors. He was rewarded with a nice soapy carwash of course. Alas, a few days after the service, I started noticing an exciting array of organic material whizzing out of the air vents. A pine needle to the cornea while zipping down the highway is rather distracting. Part of the service had involved a new air filter (or at least that’s what the sticker on the filthy thing they left on the seat in a plastic bag seemed to indicate). I called the mechanic and asked if the two could be related. He said something alarming about small animals building nests in cars which I promptly forgot (lest I suffer another fit of the vapors) and suggested I bring it in for them to take a look. I gathered up my courage (seriously, most mechanic’s trips run around $500) and headed in.

I had been assured it would be a 10-15 minute visit at most, so I planned to just wait. I had, of course, brought my knitting and proceeded to settle in and quietly knit. A few minutes into the wait, Mr. Dreadfully Important Businessman arrived. You could tell he was Dreadfully Important because he tried to cut in line and talked over the mechanic at least three times and was astonishingly huffy when he was told that his car would be ready at the agreed upon time, not at the instant he decided to show up. He flounced (seriously, best flouncing ever performed by a 40 year old bald guy in a suit, very amusing) over to the chair next to mine and proceeded to play with his four phones /organizers /electronic ego boosters.

These proved insufficient to hold his attention and he began to fidget and sigh. These were no ordinary sighs. They were truly epic. They involved every muscle in his body and stirred the leaves of the plant on the windowsill. These were pay – attention – to – me – lest – I – DIE – of – neglect sighs. Now it’s important to note that I have a younger sister. She, in her youth, was a master of this technique (sorry sis, you were a very sigh-prone six year old, mom will back me up). Thanks to heavy early exposure, I am generally immune to this tactic.

Sensing my resistance, Mr. Dreadfully Important Businessman changed his approach. He leaned way over into my personal space and asked what I was doing. Knitting, I replied. Not discouraged by my one word answer, he asked why. Because I like to, I answered. Then, further cementing my opinion of him, he asks “Oh, why don’t you do something useful instead?”

I glanced at his iphone, at that moment displaying his facebook page, then at another phone on which he seemed to be playing some sort of shooting game, then at him and said “Useful…like updating my facebook status and shooting aliens? Thank you, but I’ll pass.” He started to inflate preparatory to what would no doubt have been impressive blustering, but just the the mechanic came by to say my car was ready. Then, in a move that will forever endear him to me, the mechanic (having overheard the previous discussion) said rather loudly that he just loved handknit socks. Marvelous.

In a final stroke of good fortune, the detritus seemed to just have been crud shaken loose in the service and was not the result of nesting creatures. No charge to fix it.