Cultivar Designs Archives - Tinking Turtle

New Website!

May 29, 2015 by Jennifer Raymond

New Welcome on the Landing Page

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve been working on a new website with Cultivar Designs, and it’s finally done. If you haven’t already, I’d encourage you to click through and take a good look. It represents a much needed change – while the old design served it’s purpose, I was growing out of the tools I had at hand, and it was time to make a change.

So, what has the new layout got going for it? Let me count the ways:

The layout now scales to any size screen, be it mobile, tablet, computer, or big-screen TV. It should be easier to pull it up on your phone to show your friends, if you want to share the wonderfulness that’s Tinking Turtle.
I’ve got an easier way to contact me, if you want to ask questions or drop me a note.
Some of you found the old way of commenting on my site very difficult. I’ve moved over to another comment system that allows you to login in a variety of ways, as well as commenting the “normal way.”
If you’re interested in having Finishing done, the new form is a little more responsive, and allows me, on the back end, to get in touch with you faster.
The site reflects the way Tinking Turtle is now – a little older, a little wiser, but still full of fun energy and silly humor.

Much of the credit for the great website is due to Cultivar, and I’ll be talking a little bit more about the experience of working with them next week.

On another note, tomorrow I’ll be heading off to TNNA. This year will be my second year, and it’s quite a start to realize how much more relaxed I am this year than last one. For one, I’m packing this evening instead of say, three days ago. For another, this time around I’m much more willing to let things flow as they will. I’m looking forward to the event – it’s wonderful to be around people who “speak your language.”

And when I come back, I’ll have lots of pictures to share – both from my travels last week, and my travels this weekend! I might even have some stitching things to share – so stay tuned!

As a last note, if you haven’t already, now’s a great time to signup for my newsletter, to keep up-to-date with everything. You see the new button to the right? You should click on it.

Finishing and Beginning

May 21, 2015 by Jennifer Raymond

Tech edits on Trains

Right now I’m on the Acela heading from Washington, DC to Boston. As per Mr. Turtle’s dream, we’re riding first class, and living the life for a long weekend. We’re on vacation, and I couldn’t be happier. It’s been much needed.

This has been the week of finishing, and I mean that in more than one way.

It’s been the week of finishing the last tasks for my new website: set to launch next Wednesday, right before TNNA. I’ve been getting the Cultivar team the last of the copy, figuring out where testimonials will go, sorting through pictures, and making sure all the i’s are dotted and the t’s crossed (which, by the way, has become a saying that makes no sense to my brother, who grew-up in the land of typing but no cursive).

It’s been the week of wrapping up finishing and repair projects too: a pair of mittens with the thumbs worn out, a black sweater that needed the seams redone, a sweater & bootie combo that were adorable and needed to be seamed and blocked. I wanted to get them all off, as my guest bedroom is being taken over by finishing projects. Now, I just have three afghans in need of repair – which will be fun, as they are all quite of a size. And then there’s one small and delicate christmas stocking, which is more holes than solid fabric, but much loved.

I’ve been finishing up tidying the house: there’s so many things that aren’t in their proper places. Yarn’s everywhere the cat’s can’t get to. I’ve got “body parts” everywhere: my father gave me a whole bunch of display pieces and they were immediately conscripted into work.

I’ve finished with 14 patterns since the beginning of the year – that’s just about the same number of patterns I published last year, total. We’re wrapping up on tech edits now on most of the patterns… thank goodness! I’ve got the pleasure of working with some amazing minds to make patterns the best they can be, but it’s still hard bopping between one pattern and the next to make sure everything is as perfect as it can be.

After TNNA (next weekend, and I’m so excited!) I’ll be gearing up for the summer season: which means getting ready for the camps and for the fall. If you have or know a kid in the DC area looking for some really great craft based camps, you should check out the listing of camps here.

Follow-ups and a few other details, including a new LYS I’ll be teaching at!

May 5, 2015 by Jennifer Raymond

Wow, I’ve gotten a lot of responses to my previous post – I appreciate the support, emails, and congrats!

I wanted to talk a little bit more about the process of filming with Interweave, since I’ve gotten a fair amount of questions about it.

One of the biggest questions I got was: how did you manage to film four classes in two days?

First, Interweave’s got a great team that make the filming process smooth and intuitive. They were a huge help in making sure everything went smoothly. Having worked backstage more than once, I have a little bit of an idea of what goes on to prepare for a shoot. The second biggest thing that makes a difference when filming the classes is the preparation I did before we even began filming.

When I began packing for CO, all of my clothes went into my checked luggage. The luggage I carried with me, and refused to surrender? Was filled with something called “step-outs.”

What are step-outs, you might ask? Think of nearly any cooking show you’ve ever seen. That moment, when the host puts an uncooked cake in the oven, and the next moment pulls out the finished product? I bet you wouldn’t be surprised to find out that the entire filming crew isn’t waiting around for the cake to bake. The host, team, or someone has baked a cake beforehand, to enable the host to go onto the next step.

When preparing for the filming, I did something similar.

The last two weeks have been a flurry of working the same project over and over, each time working one “step” further. When we’re filming, I simply grab the project that’s on the next step, allowing me to skip ahead. Each of these unfinished projects is called a step-out, and they’re an important part of making a film class run smoothly.

Different people manage their step outs different ways. Each of mine went into a separate plastic bag, labeled with it’s order, and with a few different “hints” to remind me why I created the step out, and what it was supposed to be used for. They then all went on a tray, where I could grab them in between takes.

These were the ones for the barber pole cowl, along with my notes.

Using step-outs for class isn’t anything new: I often create similar things for my workshops. Still, having to have all the step outs for for classes has consumed most of my time for the last two weeks. And I have to admit it wasn’t even very absorbing work: basically, I did the same project over and over, each time going onto the next step.

Even if I love a design, the process became boring.

Still, it meant on filming day, I could grab and go, use the step-out, and move onto the next step. It also means that now that I’m back, I’m having to sort through everything that I tossed into my luggage at the end of the day.

Which kind of is a metaphor for how I’ve been conducting my life for the last two months.

I’m taking some time now to step back. In a month I leave for TNNA, and there’s some larger-picture goals I have for the show this year. Meanwhile, I have two guest bedrooms, and office, and other spaces around the house that have become a disaster. I’ve went two steps beyond “I can’t find anything,” and have launched myself into “I must leap over the piles to get to anything.”

As Mr. Turtle has reminded me, the floor should not be used for a shelf.

So the next two weeks are going to be devoted unpacking, organizing and getting back into the normal Tinking Turtle grove. If you haven’t heard from me, chances are your email is lurking in the bottom of my inbox – please be patient.

In other news, I’m adding a LYS to my teaching roster: Untangled Purls, in Fredericksburg, VA. I’ve added the class offerings to my calendar – take a look.

Finally, I’ve been working the last few months with the Cultivar Design team to create a new Tinking Turtle website. It was time, and I’ve been saving up for this endeavor for a while. In the next couple of weeks you’ll be hearing and seeing some changes – and hopefully the result being a website where you can find out what you need a little bit faster.

One of the things I’m looking forward to is an updated calendar, which I’m absolutely excited and thrilled to have… since the google calendar I use now does the job, but not elegantly, and it’s really hard to add pictures. You should, with the new calendar, be able to be able to see where classes are located a little bit better.

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