As I already hinted: it was wonderful at LonCon. That was not only my first WorldCon, but also my first convention ever, and I started full speed ahead - with a dealer's table and a one-hour presentation about medieval textile crafts (with examples from London).

I met a lot of wonderful people, and I had the joyful experience of having an hour and a half on the very first evening, giving my presentation. Thanks again to the wonderful organiser of the academic track, Emma England, who made this possible! From the feedback that I got afterwards, it was an enjoyable experience for my audience, and I had a lot of fun too. There was a bit of an "aaargh!" moment at the very beginning, when I found out that all of the six (six!) microphones on the table were live, and fretted over toppling them over with my textile tools. There were a few further "oops" moments during the presentation, when I did my tools and process demonstrations before having clicked on to the cue cards in the presentation slideshow... but all of these were very minor and more something to grin sheepishly about than to really be troubled.

Apart from that first evening of (enjoyable) work, I spent the time after 18:00 hanging out with friends in filk concerts and in the "Fan Village", or at one of the several dances. During the day, I was mostly at our table in the Dealer's Hall, and that was not any less enjoyable, thanks to lovely customers, colleagues and neighbours. Susanne, our trusty and immensely helpful sidekick, hung out with us most of the time, helping to sell and chat - it wouldn't have been possible to enjoy the Con half as much without her. In fact, we had so much fun we decided it would be nice to do this again - surely not at the next WorldCon, because that is in the US, but there are more conventions apart from that one...

I also learned (quickly, hah!) about the Thing with the ribbons. You see, for your con attendance, you get a plastic badge that you hang around your neck. And if you like, you can stick ribbons to the bottom of it, stacking them. If you are really keen on ribbons, you do that until you have a long, scarf-like tail of cloth hanging from your badge. (I just wanted a few. I ended up with eleven.) There were some official ones (such as the bright orange "Dealers" ribbon, or the light blue "Programme Participant" ribbon, or the multi-coloured "First Worldcon" ribbon) marked with the LonCon symbol. Most of them, though, were unofficial and made by fans, and with all kinds of statements on them - such as "I <3 -="" a="" advertising="" and="" back="" because="" bid="" book="" br="" bryan="" citations="" city="" convention.="" coveted="" dead="" did="" doctor="" dog="" during="" evening="" fetch="" few="" film="" for="" four="" future="" get="" go="" his="" host="" hotel="" i="" instantly="" kind="" last="" making="" manage="" me="" my="" of="" on="" one="" or="" out="" party="" really="" ribbons="" room="" s="" saw="" showing="" so="" support="" that="" the="" there="" thing="" three="" to="" totally="" very="" wanted="" was="" were="" worldcons.="">

The Con also saw the debut of the pattern for Dread Pirate Roberts' Favourite Winter Hat (ravelry pattern page link here), and it was very well received indeed!

The pattern is printed in colour, contains clear illustrated instructions for the special moves that are necessary for the lace part, and is now available via my webshop. Since I wanted to be able to sell it as a printed version, and prints do cost money, I am not planning to offer it as a download for at least a while (read: until the printing costs are, at least to a good part, regained). I know that it's nice to pay, download, and start right away if you buy an electronic pattern, but I did want very much to have the real ink-on-paper version for this one.

And as the introductory offer, you will pay no shipping costs if you order it now! The offer is valid until September 10, 2014.

Here's the more-or-lesss promised short break in the blog hiatus...

I've had a very busy few days, finishing the preparations for LonCon - writing lists, preparing goods, packing up stuff, and playing with Powerpoint - and I will start traveling into the rough direction of London tomorrow.

In case you are visiting LonCon, or plan to, or need another excuse to go there, I will be at table F16 in the Dealer's Hall together with Margit from Ancient Arts.

In addition to that, I am part of the programme and will be giving a presentation belonging to the Academic Track, a conference about Diversity in Science Fiction and Fantasy. I've been granted a special session for this - and it will include a spinning technique demonstration, among other fun things to see and learn about textile techniques. Sounds interesting? I will be in the Capital Suite 6 (Level 3), 8pm - 9:30pm, and the presentation title is Spin A Yarn, Add a Twist, Weave A Tale: Textile Crafts in Medieval London.

The pattern for Dread Pirate Roberts' Favourite Winter Hat has also been finished and printed in time for LonCon, and it will have its release there. I'm very, very happy with it!
The pattern is printed in colour, contains clear illustrated instructions for the special moves that are necessary for the lace part, and is exactly 13 pages long - very fitting for a pirate-y knitting pattern. After I return from LonCon, it will also be available via my webshop and Ravelry.
If you are at LonCon, please drop by and say hello - I'd love to see you there!

Sarah Goslee, together with a friend, is proposing a new study group about archaeological textiles in the Complex Weaver's group. That does sound interesting - I've read a few of the newsletters from the Medieval Textiles group, but being no proper weaver myself, I never joined or participated. The new group will have a much broader focus, and I will definitely keep an eye on its development.

It's all still in the planning stages, but you can read more about it on her blog.

Want to see the oldest bottle of wine? You find it here.

If you are rather looking for about 1.5 kg of chocolate turned into an anatomically correct replica of a human skull, look no further.

Speaking of skulls, Dread Pirate Roberts' Favourite Winter Hat is currently being test-knit by a group of lovely folks over at Ravelry. I hope to have it available as a pattern soon - and will take it to LonCon, too.

Other not so nice news regarding SFF: Marion Zimmer Bradley had a dark side, protecting her child-abusing husband as well as molesting herself. Jim C. Hines has a blog post about this, with further links.

Here is, finally, the thing I've been working on, knitting-wise. I call it "Dread Pirate Roberts' Favourite Winter Hat", because, well, you know... pirates can have cold ears too.



There you go. A pirate hat. And here's a closeup of the Jolly Roger motif:



The hat is knit from the crown downwards, so there's no need for doing a gauge test. I recommend knitting with smaller needles than recommended on the ball bands, however, to get a fairly dense structure or else the Jolly Roger won't come out so well. Wool, for its blocking malleability, is also a firm recommendation.

There are quite a few special moves involved in knitting this, including an unusual decrease, some cabling, some creative stuff with elongated stitches, and the lace (yes, technically, it's a lace-esque structure) that makes the skull. Pirate knitters are known to be fearless, though, so it should not be a problem. Right, matey?

I will be writing up the pattern tomorrow - and then, then I will be looking for someone to test-knit it. If you'd like to do that, let me know in the comments or send me an email!

Remember, a good while ago, that I was writing about a knitting project? The prototype is almost finished, and I'm planning to go and sit down with it in a few minutes and finish it up (which is mostly a bit of tweaking and darning in all the remaining ends).

As so many other things, it has taken longer than I had hoped (and planned) for it to take - other stuff happened inbetween, and the little hat got shunted to the back a few times. But now the end is nigh! Rejoice! And I promise to try really hard to get you a good photo of it tomorrow (it might be a little tricky to take a picture of it...)

We have a regular (weekly, usually) session of "get excited and make things". It's a fixed day and time of the week, and most of the time, one or several friends drop by. They bring their projects and we all sit together and work on our things - knitting, sewing, woodworking, paper-related stuff. There's been miniature painting and programming done, too, as well as the very mundane task of mending socks and darning clothes.

Last week, our meeting went on an outing - into the FabLab in Nuremberg. Just in case you have never heard about a FabLab, it's short for "fabrication laboratory". Usually, a fablab is an open workshop where you can make things, for a very small fee.

Most fablabs have a set of tools for mechanical and electronic stuff, a laser cutter, and a 3D printer. You might also find a large drill, a CNC machine, a sewing and/or embroidering machine, a few computers, and some other stuff. Plus a stash of materials you can buy for your projects.

So, last week, I sat at the FabLab, designing new whorls and a new flyer and new bobbins for my little Finnish spinning wheel. I got that wheel back in 2012, and it's been running with the roughly tweaked flyer and bobbins since. They do work, but they are a waste of space in the spinning assembly, since the flyer is huge and the bobbin is tiny. (The wheel seems to be called the Varpapuu Toika, and someone else was so nice as to post a video of it.)



As you can see, the flyer is... less than elegant. A waste of space, and energy, and I am going to replace it with a lighter one, with longer wings to accommodate a bigger bobbin. I'll space the hooks closer to each other too, and fit it with smaller whorls. Someone at the FabLab has offered me help with the metal axle, and the rest... I'll laser cut wooden parts for the bobbin ends and the flyer, probably drill holes through some leftover dowels for the bobbin cores, and the whorl bits will be 3D-printed. (3D-printing takes ages, AGES, so as I'm an impatient person and want several bobbins, I will just print the whorl disks.)

If you have a FabLab in your region - go check it out. They are fabulous!