Afternoon all,
Many stitchers are now on social media sites and chat via Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, blogs (so many different types of blogs) and it's so unfortunate that we don't have a single port of call like the knitters Ravelry.
While trying to find or create a one-stop place for all our stitching adventures, we discovered so many of our brethren can or do only access via basic web usage or email. After much deliberation, Mariann, Tina, Kay and I have set up a new Yahoogroup email list called All Stitchers Lounge and is now open for you to join.
With this new group, we have attempted to keep the best parts of previous groups as well
as trying some all new features. We believe All Stitcher's Lounge to be a place
where you can hangout, relax, kick back and chat about your stitching projects,
share latest stitching gossip, list new finds, or discuss old favourites :-)
We really aim for this to be a one-stop place where you can share your blog insights, new designers you have found, your thoughts on recent releases and old favourites that have been in your stash for years.
As moderators, we are actually very excited with the opportunities a new group
can afford us, and we are playing with the new Beta Applications area of Yahoo
Groups. If this sounds promising to you, please feel free spread the message and join in :)
We've been working on this group for the past few weeks, so please drop in, look around, make yourself comfortable and let us know if there’s anything we’ve forgotten to do to get it all ready for you :)
Feel free to contact Mariann, Tina, Kay or myself if you have any questions :)
EDITED TO ADD: In a blatant act of promotion, I am running two draws of free goodies open to those who spread the message about a new group.
Anyone who writes a blog post regarding the new group or mentions a link on their blog back here goes into a draw for a chance to win a section of threads and fabric (around $50 US). Please add your blog name and post in the comments here to be in the draw.
Any stitcher on twitter who retweets my message linking to this blog post will go into a draw for a chance to win a smaller selection of threads and fabric (around $20 US).
Both draws will close 11pm Australian Western Time on Saturday 5 March 2011. Winner will be notified after breakfast on Sunday :)
Saturday, 26 February 2011
Tuesday, 22 February 2011
Mel's Sunday Update Now I've found my Camera
Yes OK so it's Tuesday - how was I to know I hid the camera on myself by actually putting it away where it belongs. I never put it there :)And that is fairly indicative of my health issues this past fortnight; I haven't been at work due to migraine pain and changes in migraine medication. In between the usual drudgery of housework and fighting with medical receptionists I did manage some stitching.
Draco the Protector is finished. He took me 10 days from start to finish - I think that's my fastest stitch that wasn't needed for a deadline! Pictures are here and here.
Also I did Part 3 of the Stitch Specialist's Tree of Stitches. Part 3 is French Knots. This part only served to turn my distrust of French Knots into outright hatred and loathing. I will continue to replace any and all French Knots in any design with pretty beads. Now and forever Amen.
Mariann's Round Robin has turned up and I will start that on the weekend - I still have the migraine pain, but I'm back at work tomorrow so I doubt there will be much stitching this week.
Just to cheer everyone up (especially me) Stephen and I went into Perth this week and bought me the Giant Microbes Christmas Set and I also bought a sperm cell. Doesn't he look cute?
Monday, 14 February 2011
Weird dream
Had the strangest dream this morning. If I could have remembered it , it would have made a great novel or series of short stories (If I had the writing skills not to make it too derivative)
I was working in a small hand-made chocolate factory. I was the HR person, I was involved with hiring and firing, employee motivation etc etc.
The company made small individual hand-made chocolates - like you see at high-end chocolatiers. No blocks or bars, just dainty little well petit-fours in chocolate. I did have to let go three staff during my time there. One worked contract and felt that as long as he turned up he didn't need to do any actual work, so I didn't renew his contract when it ended. Another was so odious that he could not work with anyone else. Hated the job and everyone there, so I helped him apply for jobs in other areas of the company that he felt he would be happier in. I can't remember why the third one was laid off. Inappropriate sexual advances I think.
Of the people who I worked closely with, there was the manager, lovely fabulous person and manager but the only definite thing I can remember is she felt a failure because she was managed projects instead of having children - and this turns her into a cliche. Wish I remembered more than just feelings. THere was an old guy in his 90s who should have been retired years ago, but he had a nose that couldn't be beaten, and was still our chief tester for new products. His grandson was one of our newest chocolatiers and there was a whole raft of others that I can't remember now.
Head office (which was probably some big multinational) decided we weren't profitable and shut us down. The newest member, the grandson suggested we change our format, and produce ice cream in the taste of our chocolates. Not big tub of litres of one flavour, but finger length creations. One of our best sellers was a cherry and chocolate (kinda like a cherry ripe but in individual form - not bar form). When we turned this into ice-cream we put three small scoops about the size of ferrero rochers, into a a little tray made of the same ice cream. It ended up being a finger length long and maybe 1.5 finger widths wide and was eaten in two bites. We planned on selling our ice creams like trays of chocolates, each was just a taste, a morsel of decadence at the end of meal. Very quality over quantity. THe manager scouted a new location. An island with an abandoned factory - we cleared out the inside but left the crumbling exterior to hide our activities. The manager also got us all excited about this new idea and way of working.
We worked long weeks discussing and shaping various delicacies that were reminiscent of the chocolates we used to make. I remember at one point she praised the grandson for his innovative way of putting two different flavours together - flavours she wouldn't have dreamt were compatible. THe old grandfather gets a new lease on life, absolutely captivated by the new line of products and eagerly looking forward to coming to work again. Its not just an excuse to be out of the house anymore!
Then,a few weeks before we were ready to unveil our new company to the world, the odious guy I helped get a job in another area, started following us and discovered what we were doing. He reported us to head office who thundered down that we had no right to go off on our own initiative. SHe set up a new arm of the company run by these three people I had laid off (ie those who had an axe to grind) to investigate selling innovative new forms of beer! Using the full backing of the parent company they were to crush us.
Now I get a bit hazy here, whether the company laid us off and we formed our own company, this there would be a charge of intellectual theft seeing as our previous chocolate creations would be the intellectual property of the company and we many not have had a legal right to use the same flavour recipes for our ice creams. Or it could just be that dreams are weird. I mean how can they destroy ice-cream makers by setting up a beer company? Surely the two were aimed at different sectors of the market and could co-exist and even cross-fertilise ideas quite comfortably.
Anyway, my colleagues are getting increasingly nervous so I talk with each of them about their fears (as HR person I seem to do a lot of emotional hand-holding as well as process documentation) and then the big day arrives.
We unveil our company, it is a huge success. We obtain huge orders and adulation on our opening day. Everyone is ecstatic, even the manager who was rather keen to point out that the birth of a new company is longer and just as stressful as having a real baby.
I think about my future and the future of the company and decide that I'm not needed anymore. They are a cohesive working family, there are no disruptive elements, there are no external pressures pulling them apart. They re working as a family of friends.
I write them a letter stating my reasons for leaving (far more eloquently than I am doing here) and I mention each one of them by name and thank them for a service or kindness they had done over and above to get the new company off the ground.
It galls me now that I can't remember that letter, because inside it contains all the hooks I need to remember all the other parts of the story. All the bits I've forgotten. Why did the guys I lay off hate us so much, why was the parent company still employing them (or reemploying them). Who were the rest of the staff, my dream dealt with each person as an individual, fleshing out their hopes, dreams, desires and back story and I can't remember any of it.
Oh well. That's what a sleep-in will do to you :)
I was working in a small hand-made chocolate factory. I was the HR person, I was involved with hiring and firing, employee motivation etc etc.
The company made small individual hand-made chocolates - like you see at high-end chocolatiers. No blocks or bars, just dainty little well petit-fours in chocolate. I did have to let go three staff during my time there. One worked contract and felt that as long as he turned up he didn't need to do any actual work, so I didn't renew his contract when it ended. Another was so odious that he could not work with anyone else. Hated the job and everyone there, so I helped him apply for jobs in other areas of the company that he felt he would be happier in. I can't remember why the third one was laid off. Inappropriate sexual advances I think.
Of the people who I worked closely with, there was the manager, lovely fabulous person and manager but the only definite thing I can remember is she felt a failure because she was managed projects instead of having children - and this turns her into a cliche. Wish I remembered more than just feelings. THere was an old guy in his 90s who should have been retired years ago, but he had a nose that couldn't be beaten, and was still our chief tester for new products. His grandson was one of our newest chocolatiers and there was a whole raft of others that I can't remember now.
Head office (which was probably some big multinational) decided we weren't profitable and shut us down. The newest member, the grandson suggested we change our format, and produce ice cream in the taste of our chocolates. Not big tub of litres of one flavour, but finger length creations. One of our best sellers was a cherry and chocolate (kinda like a cherry ripe but in individual form - not bar form). When we turned this into ice-cream we put three small scoops about the size of ferrero rochers, into a a little tray made of the same ice cream. It ended up being a finger length long and maybe 1.5 finger widths wide and was eaten in two bites. We planned on selling our ice creams like trays of chocolates, each was just a taste, a morsel of decadence at the end of meal. Very quality over quantity. THe manager scouted a new location. An island with an abandoned factory - we cleared out the inside but left the crumbling exterior to hide our activities. The manager also got us all excited about this new idea and way of working.
We worked long weeks discussing and shaping various delicacies that were reminiscent of the chocolates we used to make. I remember at one point she praised the grandson for his innovative way of putting two different flavours together - flavours she wouldn't have dreamt were compatible. THe old grandfather gets a new lease on life, absolutely captivated by the new line of products and eagerly looking forward to coming to work again. Its not just an excuse to be out of the house anymore!
Then,a few weeks before we were ready to unveil our new company to the world, the odious guy I helped get a job in another area, started following us and discovered what we were doing. He reported us to head office who thundered down that we had no right to go off on our own initiative. SHe set up a new arm of the company run by these three people I had laid off (ie those who had an axe to grind) to investigate selling innovative new forms of beer! Using the full backing of the parent company they were to crush us.
Now I get a bit hazy here, whether the company laid us off and we formed our own company, this there would be a charge of intellectual theft seeing as our previous chocolate creations would be the intellectual property of the company and we many not have had a legal right to use the same flavour recipes for our ice creams. Or it could just be that dreams are weird. I mean how can they destroy ice-cream makers by setting up a beer company? Surely the two were aimed at different sectors of the market and could co-exist and even cross-fertilise ideas quite comfortably.
Anyway, my colleagues are getting increasingly nervous so I talk with each of them about their fears (as HR person I seem to do a lot of emotional hand-holding as well as process documentation) and then the big day arrives.
We unveil our company, it is a huge success. We obtain huge orders and adulation on our opening day. Everyone is ecstatic, even the manager who was rather keen to point out that the birth of a new company is longer and just as stressful as having a real baby.
I think about my future and the future of the company and decide that I'm not needed anymore. They are a cohesive working family, there are no disruptive elements, there are no external pressures pulling them apart. They re working as a family of friends.
I write them a letter stating my reasons for leaving (far more eloquently than I am doing here) and I mention each one of them by name and thank them for a service or kindness they had done over and above to get the new company off the ground.
It galls me now that I can't remember that letter, because inside it contains all the hooks I need to remember all the other parts of the story. All the bits I've forgotten. Why did the guys I lay off hate us so much, why was the parent company still employing them (or reemploying them). Who were the rest of the staff, my dream dealt with each person as an individual, fleshing out their hopes, dreams, desires and back story and I can't remember any of it.
Oh well. That's what a sleep-in will do to you :)
Monday, 7 February 2011
Mel's Sunday Update on Monday
I have an excuse this week - I was evacuated from a bushfire zone yesterday! It's OK for us, the fire moved off in a different direction .... phew!Anyway this fortnight I really struggled with my stitching. Going back to work and all the stress involved there-in; increase in migraine pain, wages negotiations, lack of time etc etc, my stitching slowed to a crawl.
I did however do a respectable amount on Rosanne's Big Blue Beast. Due to migraines I had so many problems with placing the motifs - some nights I just can't count to three .... but it is done and off in the mail tomorrow to Sisu. It is a gorgeous design, and I love floss colours Rosanne chose - in another head space I would have loved working on this design.
In and around the Round Robin, I also completed the second part on the Stitch Specialist's Tree of Stitches. Part 2 was smyrna stitch :) One of my favourite stitches :)
Also in the past fortnight Mystery 3 was correctly guessed as Draco the Protector by Enchanting Lair. Once he was guessed he screamed loudly, so Draco has also been started now.
So for the next fortnight? Maybe more on Draco, maybe more on Mystery 2. Either way I will start the next Round Robin as soon as I receive it from Julie, I don't want to get behind again :)
Adventures
SUMMARY: WE ARE SAFE AND BACK HOME.Yesterday afternoon I was watching cricket, stitching on Rosanne's Round Robin piece* and keeping an eye on the bushfire to the North. Every now and then I caught a whiff of smoke but only rarely. Then came the knock on the door.
The fire was still out of control and becoming very erratic. Anyone who's visited me knows we get gale force winds regularly. And these were whipping around in such different directions that the course of the fire was unpredictable. So anyone within 1km of its location was asked to fight or flight** Within 10 minutes the roads were full of horse floats as all the neighbours evacuated livestock.
I decided to be sensible about my fire-fighting abilities; I grabbed the cats, their food and bowls, a change of clothes for me, my laptop and skedaddled.*** There was a Police car at the end of my road, letting people out, but no-one was allowed in.
I drove past the larger more threatening fire at Roleystone on the way to Armadale, and spent the evening with Janine, her husband and their cats. Janine looked after us very well and I thank her so much for opening up her home at such short notice. I also thank her very much for a lovely dinner and a dessert that my diet will be rebuking me for for a while :)
Janine has five cats so we had fun after dinner watching Abby meet the new cats and the her cats meet someone new. It was fascinating watching Abby explore the house nervously, then find her comfort zone (my lap) and begin to actively defend her turf with hissing and growling. Abby is not the alpha cat at home; she is the submissive. And she never sits on my lap. But as the above photo shows, the rules change when you are in a new situation.
Trubs spent the evening in the bedroom we were given quite happy that all the other cats were locked out of her area :)
This morning I got an all clear to return home. During the night the fire had moved in a westerly, north westerly direction (I'm at the southern end of the affected area). So we are now home. It looks like all the neighbours and their pets are home, but all the livestock are still away. I presume they will return when the fire has been completely extinguished. The fire is still raging out of control, with over 1170 hectares (2900 acres been burnt out). Its just raging off in a different direction :)
Everything is fine at home, not even any spot fires, but we lost the contents of the fridge and freezer due to the loss of electricity and the extreme temperatures due to the proximity of the fire. So it was bacon for brunch and some thawed out but still cold steak for dinner tonight.
The experience was a wake up call not to be blase about fires and to prepare an emergency kit. In hindsight there were things I left behind that I should have taken, such as identity documents, phone charger etc.
As I live rurally, we haven't lost any homes to this fire, mostly outbuildings, sheds etc. The other major fire, down at Roleystone/Kelmscott has destroyed over 40 homes. So far no loss of human life.
* I now know why she called it the Big Blue beast, it's because I swore a blue streak trying to make the last motif fit in with those that had already been stitched!
** OK so I think the actual words were "be prepared to leave or actively defend your home".
*** Well I got parked in by a couple of horse floats so I went back into the house for toiletries, my roll of finished stitched pieces and a couple of works in progress. I also grabbed everything that I had borrowed from the library. No I don't know why either.