Catching up after hiatus and upgrading to professional knitter!

As an obligation for all bloggers, it would seem, it's time to apologize for going so long without an update. This one takes the cake, however. 3 years is an awfully long time to leave folks hanging!

In my defense, beyond a demanding work schedule, there's been a lot going on. In summary:

• Boyfriend became very sick in about 2015 and that took over both of our lives
• 2016 my mother died from an aggressive stomach cancer
• Broke up with boyfriend because I couldn't sustain that relationship with so little support
• Started dating again and met an amazing man who is fabulously supportive
• Bought a house out in the burbs with said amazing man
• Got married to this amazing man to be referred to here now as the husband
• And in slightly less life-altering news, got my first commission knitting job

So, it's safe to say that there's been a lot going on that has distracted me from my little crafting and nerding out blog. Life is still plenty stressful with working an increasingly demanding job (I now supervise 4 different people! Team meetings can no longer fit in my little office and we are taking over the conference table!) a battered house that we've been fixing up (gotta catch up on that blog too....) and trying to manage all my hobbies. But I'm also incredibly happy.

If you want to help fund any of these hobbies and help me generate more fodder for this blog, you can support me at http://ko-fi.com/knitnerdrant ! I also have my etsy store where I sell snarky cross-stitch patterns at https://www.etsy.com/shop/KnitNerdRant (and there is another one that I'm developing and just need the time to finish it off, proof, and post!).

But yes, I'm excited to officially become a pro! A friend of the husband found the pattern for a gorgeous feather pattern shawl: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/wingspan-3

Isn't that just gorgeous?!

For the uninitiated, it's a pretty shawl, as an experienced knitter, I was looking at the pattern with its increases, decreases, cables, and such, and figuring that I can make this work.

Friend of husband sent over the funds and the agreed yarn (couldn't do the recommended yarn from the Ravelry pattern because this friend has a serious wool allergy, so we found an acrylic-cotton blend that should do fine if less fluffy), and I downloaded the pattern. HOLY HELL is this intimidating. The pattern is a full 17 pages, mostly dense knitting instructions. I have to give some serious props to the designer, Kyle Vey who did an amazing job writing these. They are incredibly detailed and exact, but also he included an "intuitive instructions" section that really helped me understand the wider picture and overall pattern. The pattern is definitely worth the $10 price for all the work that went into it. After going through the knit-along Ravelry forum and finding some answers to my initial confusion, I got to work. I'm only 10 rows in and ready for the second full page of knitting pattern, but feeling much more confident.

My copilot is supervising

I'm looking forward to getting some real time to work on this over the upcoming weekend as a friend visits for a traditional weekend of crafts, movie marathons, and delicious ciders.