caffaknitted

Divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived!

So here they are!  Finally complete!  Kind of funny seeing them all together.  They'll soon be on their way to Gallery Hanahou in NYC for the Luvable Hugable show this December.  If you're in the NY area, come out for the opening on Dec. 4.  There are a lot of amazing plush artists participating.  Now I'm off to design some "Henry VIII 'n' Friends" postcards!

The Widow

Catherine Parr was Henry VIII's 6th and final wife.  Catherine Parr was twice widowed when she came to work in the household of Henry's first daughter, Mary.  Around this time, she fell in love with Thomas Seymour, Jane Seymour's brother, but King Henry also pursued her, and she was obligated to accept his proposal instead.  Catherine is credited with bringing humanity back  into Henry's court.  She reconciled him with his daughters, Mary and Elizabeth.  She brought Elizabeth into the court to be educated along with her half brother Edward.  Catherine was also given more responsibility than the previous wives.  She was named Queen Regent by Henry, and went on his last campaign to France.  Her reign with dignity and strength is said to have influenced Elizabeth I later in life.

Henry died in 1547.  At this point Catherine was free to marry Thomas Seymour. She soon gave birth to her first child, a daughter Mary, but died shortly after of puerperal fever. Soon after, Thomas was accused of taking sexual liberties with the then 15 yr.-old Elizabeth, who was living in their home.  He was arrested and beheaded for treason less than a year after Catherine's death.

Wow, I can't believe I finished all the wives!  Pictures of the whole group coming up soon!

Staying focused

My husband thinks I suffer from attention deficit disorder. He has even nicknamed me Kay-D-D.  I'm beginning to think he's right.  Here I am one week from my self-imposed deadline for the show in NYC, and I practically have to handcuff myself to my needles in order keep working.  I'm not really worried about finishing the last of Henry's wives.  After completing the first six dolls, I think I could possibly make one in my sleep.  I have the entire pattern memorized.  It's just that I have so much going on in my brain right now.  I'm pretty sure I'm going to forget something really important.  For example, I haven't haven't mailed the ninja to Australia, even though he's been finished for 2 weeks!  I also forgot to have my price tags printed.  I was going to design some awesome little moo cards specifically for that purpose, but forgot, and now it's too late.  That's ok, card stock and a hole punch will suffice.

I'm really excited to be nearly finished with the wives.  Once they're finished, I'm going to get some great images of the whole series and print up some postcards.  Then I'm going to take a break from art just long enough to paint and move into my new studio at the nth gallery.  Hopefully, it'll look beautiful just in time for our next opening on Oct.3.  I'd love to have the dolls all on display together here for a night before I ship them to NY.

Fortunately, I haven't been too busy to remember Sophia's birthday coming up in a couple of weeks.  We had to travel his weekend for Drew's soccer game, and it gave me a chance to do some birthday shopping.  I found some super cute things.  Sophia is the girliest girl imaginable. Like mother like daughter, I guess.

Beheadable Catherine Howard

Imagine being courted by someone who is not only far older than you, but also incredibly fat, smelly, and has previously disposed of four previous wives.  Not only that, but imagine if you had to marry the man.

Poor young Catherine Howard, became the 5th wife of Henry VIII when she was somewhere between the ages of 15 and 19.  Her birth date is not known for certain.  Catherine was actually the first cousin of Henry's 2nd wife, the beheaded Anne Boleyn.  Catherine was serving as a lady in waiting for Anne of Cleves, when Henry became infatuated with her. They were married nearly as soon as his annulment from Anne of Cleves became final. Henry called her his "rose without a thorn".  Catherine was understandably less than happy with her marital circumstances. Considering the pressure that would have been placed upon her by her family, seeking to improve their wealth and relation with the throne, Catherine would have had no choice but to seek out or at least succumb to Henry's advances.  Despite her lack of attraction to him, and expected fears over marrying someone with such a volatile marital past, she would have had no choice but to become queen.  They were married less than two years before she was discovered to have been unfaithful to Henry.  To cover her indiscretions, Catherine attempted to buy the silence of knowing parties by hiring them into her household.  Eventually though, Henry was convinced of her adultery, and Catherine was arrested for treason.  According to legend, Catherine briefly escaped the guards in the Tower, and ran to the chapel where Henry was taking mass.  She banged on the doors and screamed his name, but she was recaptured by the guards. Catherine never confessed her extramarital affairs, even within the final hours of her life.   Catherine was beheaded on February 13, 1542.  The two men accused of being her lovers were executed on an earlier date, and their heads were displayed on the London Bridge.

Occupational hazards

In my desperate attempts to meet my many deadlines coming up, I've been knitting like a mad woman.  As a result, I'm starting to feel a lot of irritation in my right wrist.  I struggled with carpal tunnel syndrome in my wrist back when I was studying stone carving in art school.  I'm terrified of going through that whole ordeal again.  I'm not even sure where my old splint is, and I have no desire to seek it out.  To be honest, I've often been surprised that I haven't previously had any wrist problems associated with my knitting.  I spend so many hours every day doing it.  I've decided that this problem needs to be nipped-in-the-bud, so to speak.  I have to many wonderful, exciting (and top-secret!) opportunities coming up.  I can't afford not to be in top knitting shape.  I think I'm going to learn a new method of knitting.  I've been working on the "lever style" method, which I've heard is not only faster, but easier on your wrists.  My current method is embarrassingly slow.  You wouldn't even believe it.  If anyone has any suggestions, or experience with wrist fatigue, I would love to hear about it!

Covert Operations

I've recently been in need of an ally to conduct secret activities in the far-away mysterious land called Australia. It didn't take long to figure out what needed to be done.  I had to knit my own ninja...or shall we call him a ...kninja? 

Actually, kninja was created for the Plush It show at the Ruban Rat Gallery in Sydney.  There are several artists participating. I know I have some readers down-under, and if you happen to be in the Sydney vicinity, I would definitely encourage you to go check it out.  It opens November 12.  I've seen a lot of the pieces going in, and they are fantastic!  I wish I could go myself.  For the show, each artist is working from the same template, and I have to say, this was quite a challenge.  It's one thing to cut a template out of paper, and trace it onto fabric.  It's a whole other thing to knit a custom shape to a specific size.  But I think he turned out pretty well.

So kninja is off to Australia.  I'm going to miss him terribly.  Farewell, little warrior!

It's the waiting that kills me

Good news readers!  Last week, I finally managed to accomplish a long-time goal of mine...to submit a pattern to Knitty!  Of course, I can't tell you anything about it, or show you any pictures, but I'm pretty happy with this pattern.  The problem now, is the waiting.  As I understand it, I could hear back from them anytime between now and December!  The more time that passes, the better the chance that my pattern is still in the running.  Oh Knitty!  Put me out of my misery and tell me already! I tend to obsess over things...a lot.  Just to give you an idea, here is what my morning has been like so far...

7:00  wake up

7:05  check email

7:10 get ready for work

7:30 check email

8:20 drop Sophia off at school

8:30 check email

8:40 get a cup of coffee

8:45 count deposit

8:50 check email

8:55 go to bank

9:00  refill coffee

9:05 check email

You get the idea...  Part of the problem is my beloved iphone, which while magical, also gives me the opportunity to check my email every 5 minutes, or more frequently if I like.  I know how horribly desparate this probably makes me sound, but truthfully, I tend to be this way even to hear about things I don't even care about that much...like my pending health insurance policy. I check for a response from them several times a day too.  Do I care that much about my health insurance?  Most definitely not.

So here's what I'm going to do...limit my email checking to once every 3 hours.  We'll see how that goes. I should be able to accomplish a good bit more knitting this way as well.  On a more positive note...should my pattern be rejected, I'm going to post it here...for free.  So you all win either way.

The Ugly One

After the death of his third wife, Jane Seymour, King Henry VIII mourned for two years before remarrying.  When he was ready to seek out a fourth bride, he dispatched the painter, Hans Holbien to the German court to paint Anne of Cleves and her sister Amelia.  Henry was quite taken with Anne's portrait, and the match was considered politically favorable.  He met Anne's arrival at riverside, but after the first night, it is said Henry emerged from their sleeping quarters and pronounced, "I like her not".  Popular culture has it that Henry found her unattractive, calling her a "Flander's Mare".  She is thought to have been plumper than his previous wives.  But other historians suggest there are better possible reasons for the mismatch.  Anne was ill-prepared for the English court. She was raised with a concentration in domestic skills, and was uneducated in the music and literature so popular in Henry's court.  In addition, she may have herself been repulsed by Henry.  By this time he weighed over 300lbs, and had a foul-smelling wound on his leg that wouldn't heal.  It has been suggested that she made him dislike her in order to get out of the match.  It was also around this time that political tensions made the alliance with Germany less desirable.  After 6 months, Anne agreed to an annulment.  The two parted amicably, and are even said to have become friends.  Henry called her "The King's sister", and Anne later attended the coronation of his first daughter Mary.  Henry gave Anne of Cleves the estate of Hever, formerly the home of Anne Boleyn.  Anne of Cleves outlived all of Henry's other wives.

I'm taking a very short break from making the Tudor wives, in order to finish a piece for the show in Sydney, but more toys are coming soon!   

May the force be knit you

I'm suffering a major set-back today.  I lost a pattern file...a whole stinkin' pattern!  I spent all last week knitting Princess Leia for my little friend Rachel...possibly the world's youngest Star Wars fanatic.  I love the way the doll turned out, really cute, and Rachel adores her.  I had planned on releasing the pattern today...for free!   Unfortunately, the battery died last night on my Mac.  This is a frequent occurrence for me.  Normally when I turn the computer back on, all my files pop on to the screen via auto-recovery.  But for whatever reason, the Leia file has vanished into thin air!!  Now, I know what you're thinking...didn't I ever save the file??  Sadly, the answer to that would be 'no'.  I had the file open on my desktop all week, and not once did I save it.  So I probably had this coming.  

My husband thinks he may be able to find the pattern.  If so, I'll post it ASAP.  If not...I don't know if I can bring myself to type the whole thing up again.  Maybe, but I'd have to borrow the doll back from Rachel.  Ugh...this has nearly ruined my weekend.