2017 turned on a dime in January. I was all set to go to the Magical Fiber Fantasy Retreat (which was amazing by the way) when I got an opportunity that changed everything. One e-mail led to three phone interviews led to a week in Indiana led to me being the new editor of Creative Knitting Magazine.

This is the cover for the summer issue of 2017. My first official “all mine” issue will be Spring of 2018. Magazines take a long time! 

It’s been a total whirlwind of learning and trial by fire ever since. I had a pretty decent idea of how a magazine came together from working in publishing in the past and being a designer for these past almost 10 years. But now I really know! I know about photoshoots, and first proofs, and second proofs  – not to be confused with second breakfast – and all the people it takes to take a magazine from a squirrelly concept in someone’s head (that head now being mine!) to a glossy printed thing on the shelves of your local craft or knit store. 

How’s that for a run-on sentence? One of the neatest things about having this amazing group of people to work with is that there are editors and proofreaders to whip my nonsensical ramblings into shape! 

So things have changed around here a bit. My days have a different tempo – there are meetings and phone calls and a lot of emails. So many emails. It’s been so long since I worked for a company that I forgot about corporate e-mail.

But I still get to work from sunny Florida thank goodness. I’m not sure I could handle winter in Indiana after 13 years down here. And PicnicKnits is still very much a thing! The magazine editor gig is a part-time job, so I still get to do my designing thing, and my editing thing, and my crazy knitting empire thing. 

So here’s to figuring out how to balance all the things and knit and chew gum at the same time!