Ruth Garcia-Alcantud was gracious enough to agree to mentor me as I set out on this path towards knitterly enlightenment.  Not only does she have gorgeous designs to ogle, Ruth also gives excellent advice. She was able to identify my style, and I didn’t even know I had one!

We talked over Skype IM, it’s been a while since I’ve had an IM chat, but boy, I rocked those smileys. Quite a lot of the conversation ultimately came back to time management – if I can discipline myself to get my work done within the time I have available, that’ll be a flying start.

This is how long I have left to finish this post (from 45 mins).

Submissions I’ve been sending off are too lengthy. Huh. I forgot to ask if the ideas were sound, but I guess they are or I’m sure Ruth would have said – best not to pull the punches in these situations! So, do you have any tips for me on layout? I have a lot of information (graphical and written) that I need to fit onto one page (max 2). What tricks do you use to condense information? Thanks for any comments you can make.

We also talked a lot about blogging, my local knitting group (The Harrow Knitters (who totally rock!)), patterns with tricky bits, a little about cameras and accountants, and yes, poking myself in the eye. We covered a fair bit of ground in that first session.

This was the best bit for me though:

Me: even if i don’t have a style yet?

Ruth: if I can see it, cant you??

Me: erm???

Ruth: You are Miss Trick in the bag, I’ll teach you how to graft ribbing to make it look superb, I’ll teach you knitting backwards so your friends can gasp in admiration

Ruth: I’ll teach you to match welts at the back of a neck

Me: oh right. no pressure

Ruth: and put intarsia AND beads

Ruth: it’s your style

Ruth: I can see it

Ruth: you need to polish it by working on it

Me: ok, cool, thanks

Ruth: seriously now, I think you CAN do this

Ruth: I cannot tell you how many people don’t work half as hard in their submissions

Ruth: you’re putting in some serious elbow and brain into this and you can do this

Me: ta, ta for the confidence boost

Ruth: hey sometimes it’s all about that

I have a style! Rock on! Hope you like it ‘cos you’ll be seeing more of it!

Hugs

Xxxx e

P.s. I went two mins over.