Happy November!

Today, November 1, is the last day to get your signing bonus when you join my Pins & Lace Club! Sign-ups will be open until December 15, but sign up by today and get some extra holiday cheer!

Sterling balls of yarn earrings are back in stock!

Woot!

In other news, the wonderful Sharon, aka Skylark, is hosting a Queen Wil knit-along in my Ravelry Group starting today!


Come on over and join us! :D

My new shawl is progressing really well!

Yesterday, at the swim meet, I got a ton of knitting done while waiting for the boys' events. The lace pattern is super easy to memorize, so it make superb travel knitting. Can I just add that I am so thrilled to be home today?! This was the third swim meet in four weeks, and we were so hoping that #1 Son would choose not to go today. I was all in favor of putting my parental foot down, but DH wanted it to be #1 Son's decision. The Bear didn't want to go back today, so it would have been a split of kids, one parent per kid. Thankfully, though, we didn't have to get to the parental foot since #1 Son was just so tired that he wanted to stay home. So we all went out trick or treating last night in the neighborhood, and ended up at the local firehouse where our Kiwanis Club (DH is a member) puts on an annual costume party with apple bobbing and pinatas. It was so much fun watching the kids! The best part was putting on #1 Son's vampire make-up. When #1 Son went downstairs after his make-up session, DH said he was unrecognizable. The Bear dressed up as a soldier, so we were joking that his only make-up was a piece of charcoal (which it was). It was a wonderful night. :)

Hope you all enjoyed Halloween! Happy November!

Shiny!

The other day, I got the greatest tip in my issue of Beading Daily. I couldn't wait to try it and now I have to share. It is a totally non toxic way of removing tarnish from silver. And here to demonstrate it is my pair of very tarnished silver ball of yarn earrings. Behold.

Ick. Here's how to get rid of it.

You'll need:
baking soda
a plastic or glass dish
hot, almost boiling, water
a plastic utensil
aluminum foil
the tarnished item

1. Spread a piece of aluminum foil on the bottom of the dish.

2. Pour hot water into the dish: enough to cover the tarnished item.

3. Add two tablespoons of baking soda and stir with plastic utensil to dissolve.

4. Drop in tarnished item.

5. Watch the bubbles;

smell the sulphury smell.

It's working!

6. Remove from water and rinse. Dry.

And it's tarnish free! Woooooo!!!

The process took about 7 minutes from start to finish and was totally non toxic and environmentally friendly! How cool is that?

Friday Eye Candy + Coupons!!!

Look! It's more newness! :)

First of all, inspired by our rabbits, especially the mischievous Ms. Diva, we have the bunny pin. I made one of these for Karen, and people keep asking about it! So here we have it. In da flesh copper.

And you know I cannot resist the siren call of the sterling silver yarn balls. I had to come up with another earring design so I wouldn't be wearing the same thing all the time. ;) And I love them! You can't have these, but I can make you your own pair!

They have a plain wire back and they look so elegant on! Here you can see the back:

btw, I am now shipping my earrings (the ones without the hooks) with clear plastic earring keeps.

And to celebrate the new offerings and Mother's Day, through May 11 I have coupons for Designs by Romi!! $5 off purchases of $15 and above (enter DBR05 at check-out), and 15% off purchases of $50 and above (enter DBR15 at check-out). If you are ordering earrings or pendants, put the coupon number in the comment section and I will refund the proper amount. I know this is weird, mixing the percentage and the fixed dollar amount, but I can't get anything else to work in the database and I am absolutely determined to have a little Mother's Day sale. So there you have it!

In other news, I was tagged by Margaridaa for a meme:

"The rules of the game get posted at the beginning. Each player answers the questions about themselves. At the end of the post, the player then tags 5-6 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they’ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog.

Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer."

1) What was I doing 10 years ago?
Living in San Francisco and planning to have my first child

2) What are 5 things on my to-do list for today (not in any particular order):
Update my website, make jewelry, take packages to the Post Office, homeschool my elder son, knit

3) Snacks I enjoy:
Chips and salsa, hummus and pita, sushi, chocolate, popcorn

4) Things I would do if I were a billionaire:
I can't say; I think I'd need to be one to decide. If anyone out there wants to give me a billion dollars, I'll let you know for sure. ;)

5) Places I have lived:
California: Corte Madera, Healdsburg, Terra Linda, Tiburon, San Francisco (currently Geyserville)
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Rochester, New York

7) 6 peeps I wanna know more about:
Yarnhog
Dr. Steph
Gudrun
Joanne
Lorraine
Lisa

Have fun! :)

Purple Ice

Breaking news on the pendants and earrings front: 2 pendants and 5 pairs of earrings left (order here - scroll down to the bottom)! Thanks to everyone who has ordered! :)

And yes, I think the Black Currant kidsilk haze Ice Queen was the winner! Although my friend was quite drawn to the Candy Girl. I may end up knitting her both...just because she would look amazing in them!

Here's my start (the color is off!):

I am using my provisional cast-on (which I love with a burning passion) although others have been using a beaded picot cast on with great success. There's a thread on Ravelry about it, if you are interested! I am knitting the stockinette version, but with the bead chart for the garter stitch version.

One thing I wanted to note about Ice Queen: it is very very important to block it; completely submerge it in water and stretch it out. When you finish it, it will look too short. But lace blocks out quite a bit. You needn't use pins or wires, but make sure to stretch it lengthwise and don't worry about the width, as it will snug to your face a bit if you block it long and narrow. Ok, maybe two things to note; you will get different blocking results with different yarns, so be sure to swatch!

And some answers:

Lorraine and Rachel asked where I get my beads. A better question would be where *don't* I get my beads?! ;) The ones shown in my last post were from a couple of local bead stores: Legendary Beads and Ubeadquitous, neither of which have online ordering. But I've ordered seed beads from Out on a Whim, Fire Mountain Gems and Earthfaire. They all have a nice selection. A word of caution about beads: not all of them are color fast in water! In particular, red beads have issues, and I have used beads (thankfully only for swatches!) that lost all of their color during felting. I don't have a problem using them in Ice Queen because I probably won't be washing it a lot, but it's definitely something to remember: test your beads first!

And Rhonda asked when you use the US 5 needles. It is only for the top edging after you have finished the charts, and the picot bind off on both top and bottom.

I am so excited to see all of your Ice Queens! You all make my day. :)

And thank you all for playing along with my meme!

Ice Queen!

It's here! Ice Queen, my new pattern in the Winter 2007 issue of Knitty, and on the cover! Woooohooooo! Enjoy! :)

In Designs by Romi jewelry news, I've just replenished materials for my hand made yarn ball earrings

featured in Vogue Knitting this season, and I have 15 more pairs to sell here (scroll down to bottom). Yay!!!