Of Blizzards and Small Successes!

We knew the storm was coming. All the channels told us so. With the sun shining and a beautiful sunset last night, it was hard to believe that something so fierce was bearing down on us... but by 5 am, the winds began to howl and the snow was falling fast and furious. Since then, we have huddled in our nice cozy home and just stayed put. Almost everything around town has been canceled. Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, who are being hit even harder than us, have declared states of Emergency and all of the plows have been taken off the roads. We haven’t even seen across the street for most of the day, let alone seen any signs of plows or snowblowers. I think everyone is just waiting for it to let up before they go out to do anything about it. After all, why exert yourself with the 100 km an hour winds are going to blow it all back in. We can’t get out our side door because the snow is up to MY armpit (that would be over the heads of some of my shorter friends!) and yet the front door and steps are completely bare!

The site I mentioned in yesterday’s blog has taken down ALL of the albums where they had patterns for download and has just left up the ones that are for trade, so I think that in this case it might have just been a stitcher who didn’t know any better... but to think that there are digital files out there that could still resurface (unless they did delete them completely) is still a sobering thought.

One of the biggest dangers about getting such files “for free” is that most of the time, the quality of the scans is so poor, it would actually be very hard and not at all relaxing to stitch from the charts that those files would print out as. Yet, if a person thinks “since I got a copy for free, I don’t need to buy one”... they never pick up a copy until the time comes for them to stitch it. Then, when they want to get a clear copy at a local shop, there may be the risk that the designer or those charts are no longer available... because the designer has moved on to something else.

I am SO humbled by the many cyberhugs that filled my e-mail box today (thank you everyone!!) and it was indeed a reminder of how many HONEST stitchers there are out there. In reading over last night’s blog, I can hear the frustration in my tone and the discouragement... but I cringe at the thought that it also sounded a bit whiny. Such is the nature of capturing a moment and its feelings in time. One of the whole reasons that I wanted to start this blog was to provide a peek into the real life of a designer.. with all its joys and frustrations. Last night, I had indeed stomped up to Nick and said “You know what... I think I will just finish off my next big dragon, release it as DD-80 and just stop there! “ Yet this morning, as I woke for the second time (we got to go back to sleep once we heard the schools were canceled!) the idea for a new design was already swirling around in my brain....

I am done printing covers for my chart packs and the two English files for my Milk Maritime projects are done, so I am going to go up and stitch on a Bent Creek design for a bit tonight. It is a perfect night for stitching and I want to relax with someone else’s design in my hands for fun!