An update in three parts.

Part the First

You've perhaps noticed some inconsistency in our server upage in the last few months. I've discussed it here before. The good news is that we've put our finger on the problem; the optimistic news is that we're confident we'll be able to fix it... soon. So we've set up a Twitter account, and urge you to follow us there so we can let you know about things should the server go down. (Since Twitter is its own program, it's unaffected by our server, see, so we can still communicate with you easily. Sweet.) [Thx to Whipup for the inspiration.]

Part the Second

This is the coolest recent use of the Amigurumi Dude pattern I've seen. Rock.

Have you caught wind of the Day in the Life series Robyn has sparked over on her blog? I wrote up a weekend and weekday of my own, and loads of other crocheters have joined in. Julie just posted about more days-in-the-life to come in June, too. Makes for a really cool look into the daily life of crochet people, if you're into that sort of thing.

Part the Third

I'm going on a proper holiday tomorrow. I'm not bringing my computer or my cell phone. Also, my cell phone would be useless, as I'll be in London, England. Yes. Yes. Yes. I'll be doing things like riding a ridiculously enormous Ferris wheel in an urban setting, attending some musical theatre, drinking tea and beer, visiting good friends, buying Doc Martens for it's time they make a comeback, and relaxing in the countryside. Emma Jane will be keeping her keen eye on the site while I'm away, so do send her some hugs and yummy yarn wishes, eh?

Preparing:kpwerker

Consider my Icelandic Turtleneck in a bowl after washing evidence of my impending trip to Ohio for Knitting Daily TV taping. My nails are done, my hair is coifed (which shouldn't be taken too literally—my hair: I do not coif it), and soon my bags will be packed. I'm psyched!

But now to the apology. I blogged recently about CrochetMe.com being in need of a new webhost. We've experienced a lot of downtime in the last few weeks (this afternoon, most recently), and our web host has experienced a massive technological glitch, and I thought the two were related. It turns out I wasn't asking the right questions when I was submitting my support requests—our server isn't actually affected by the web host's other problems. Our downtime has been caused by our own database problem, which is hopefully now fixed.

I apologize both to you, dear crocheters, for the inconsistency of the site of late, and to our dear web host, whom I inappropriately blamed.

Have a great weekend, and a great week. Pictures and updates later, gators!

In the last couple of months, this site was down about a handful of times. Each time it was for an understandable technology-related reason, but taking a higher-level perspective makes the inconsistency in service frustrating and unacceptable, and I can only imagine how baffling it might be to you, our dear members and visitors, to come to CrochetMe.com to find a blank screen or a confusing error message.

I've put off looking for a new web host for three reasons. First, I've really enjoyed working with our current host. They're friendly and responsive, though not quite as good with their up-time guarantee as I would like. Second, our current host's fees are relatively low, and I've been concerned that a switch would result in a fee increase we simply couldn't afford. Third, switching web hosts is a royal pain in the patootey.

However, like with most issues, there comes a point where the costs of maintaining the status quo outweigh the (potential) costs of change. We've reached that point and we need your help.

First, if you have experience renting a dedicated server, we'd love to hear your recommendations for a great host. (We've far outgrown shared hosting, so please only weigh in if you're familiar with dedicated hosting services.)

Second, we could use some of that awesome community spirit that makes this site so special. Months and months ago I thought we'd be revitalizing our languishing CafePress store, but that fell through. If you're a talented graphic artist and would be willing to donate your skills and art in any small or large way so we can raise some funds to support CrochetMe.com, please be in touch (there will be goodies in it and undying gratitude from thousands of crocheters, and hopefully your crochet and CrochetMe.com-themed work walking the streets and adorning caffeine-delivery vessels the world over). I'm also very open to suggestions for engaging our active and caring community to push this site (and crochet) as we enter this transitional technology period—there are many improvements yet to be made to the site, and the more people get involved, the better the site will be!

I'm going to trample my inclination to feel great stress over this hosting situation and rather will channel my energy into making this into opportunity to build our community even more. Won't you come along for the adventure? It won't be the same without you.

Thoughts?

I don't really use Facebook all that much, but given it's the greatest thing since sliced Myspace, I thought it would be fun to create a Crochet Me page there, so all y'all can become a fan and then—I don't know what. What do people do on fan pages on Facebook? I'm looking forward to finding out...

UPDATE: The preview of the Spring 2008 Interweave Crochet is up. I hope you enjoy!

Kids, I missed CrochetMe.com's fourth birthday! It was two weeks ago. Happy birthday to us!

Also, I'm over a third-of-a-month tardy in shouting out National Crochet Month. Doing anything special to celebrate or promote crochet this month? There's a giant hoo-ha going on at the NatCroMo group on Ravelry.

It's always exciting to see crochet covered in the mainstream media. And though it's not the best writing the New York Times can offer, this article about the Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef project is awesome.

I've been surprised over the last year to read occasionally about people's confusion when beginning to make squares for the Babette Blanket. After overcoming my assumption that the squares are super simple, I did a demo on how to make them at the Knit Out & Crochet Too. I blogged about it at the magazine, and hope my drawn-on images don't do more harm than good (Skitch is so cool, I don't know when to stop).

Moving on to very-well-done images, Sister Diane recently posted a great tutorial on How to Crochet a Wire Flower Pendant [via Craft].

Finally, today is my sixth wedding anniversary. In a sea of magazine submissions, copy editing, and tech editing (with an added sea of marking, homework, and studying), the Mr and I are doing our best to carve out good time to celebrate. A wildly expensive night out is planned!

Have I ever mentioned how dark winter is in Vancouver? Beyond being a wee bit North, although far south as far as the rest of Canada is concerned, the cloudcover is brutal. I think it's out to get me. I've had a bugger of a time getting work done today.

But I did tinker a bit with the site, and think it's about time I give you a tour of how you can maximize your CrochetMe.com fun with our sidebar widgets. You have to be a logged-in registered member of the site to use most of these (it's free!).

1. Tag This
   You can label content any way you'd like! Not only will this help you categorize your own posted content so people can find it more easily, it also enables you tag any content on the site. And that makes all the content easier to find. Rad.
2. Rate This
   Since the revamped site launched, there's no editorial vetting of content. Although this is a change it's taken a little while to get used to, it doesn't have to mean that the quality of content you encounter here has changed at all. Use the Rate This feature to mark content you think should be most visible (it's the best!) and not so visible (it could use some improvement). For now, the most salient result of content ratings is on the main Patterns and Tips pages, where there's a list of the top-5 most highly-rated posts.

   A related aside: Something that's very different now is that patterns are not tech edited and nothing is copy edited before being published. Certainly one shouldn't judge the quality of a posted pattern on the coolness of the finished object alone, but also on the clarity and quality of instruction in the written pattern. Since the beginning, I've had a slew of ideas for how to implement some community-based editing on the site, and I haven't been able to figure out a way to pick and choose. Got some ideas? Wanna help out? Leave a comment or drop me a PM.

3. Blue links
   1. Add to Favorites
      Click this link to mark the page you're on as one of your favorites. On your profile page, there's a section that lists your favorites from different areas on the site (patterns, tips, forum posts, blog posts). So not only will you be able to find them easily another time, other people will find them, too.
   1. Print-Friendly
      Click the link for a printer-friendly version of the page you're on. No ads, no fancy formatting.
   1. Email This Page
      Click to bring up a page that will allow you to enter a friend's email address to send them a link to the page. Neither your own address nor the recipient's address is saved by us; it's just used to send a note saying you think they'll enjoy the page. Fun!
4. Share This Page
   This is a new box in the sidebar. Click any one of the icons to add the page you're on to that service. If you hover your mouse over an icon a tip will pop up letting you know which service it's for. In most cases, you'll need to have an account on that service to use this feature. Spread the CrochetMe.com love!
5. You Might Also Like
   This is another new box. It lists a recommendation of other content on the site you might enjoy if you like the page you're currently on. This is CrochetMe.com spreading the love just to you.

And there you have it. Are there functions you wished were there but aren't? Think something could use some improvement? Wanna help with the editing thing? Let us know.

PS You might also notice there's now (finally) a link to comments on the main blog page. Older posts are displaying just title and categories for now, but all posts from now on will show up in full on that main page. In case you were curious.

PPS (8 January) Note that around the time I posted this a few days ago, I managed to screw up the RSS feed for the blog. I've since fixed it (I think), which is why you might first be seeing this in your reader or inbox now. Oops.