An Unexpected Surprise!

I love a surprise! Don’t we all? This week I received a huge and totally unexpected surprise but first let me lay the groundwork and go back in time.

If you’ve been following my blog since it started in November 2012, you’ll have read my post about what got me back into knitting. To recap quickly, it was when I found Alison Howard’s book called Mug Hugs. I was instantly smitten with the beautiful photos in the book; so much so that I bought some yarn and started making some of the mug hugs. I must have made close to 50 of them!! Some I made a few of as I loved the design so much; this is one of them.

I contacted Alison and credited her with getting me back into knitting. Fast forward to about 2-3 months ago when Alison emailed me to let me know she was ready to publish her second book about knitted and crocheted slippers and she wanted to send me a copy.

Wow, I was quite excited that she’d actually remembered me. A couple of weeks ago Alison emailed to see whether the book had arrived but unfortunately it hadn’t. Not only hadn’t the book arrived but neither had four publications that I subscribe to so I had to contact the publishers to see whether they could send out more copies for me. I mean – three of these were knitting/spinning publications so I couldn’t not have them!

I replied to Alison to let her know of my Australia Post woes and we agreed to wait a couple more weeks.

Lo and behold when I got home on Tuesday afternoon from work I saw a parcel shaped like a book poking out of my letter box. Yay it was Alison’s book!

And what a beautiful book! Again, the photos are stunning which is always a huge drawcard for me. It’s what attracts me to a pattern. I instantly turned on my computer and sent off a thank you email to Alison, turned off the computer and proceeded to cook my dinner for that night.

Once I’d settled down I started flicking through the book and almost collapsed in a state of shock when I looked at the page that contains the publisher’s details and publishing date etc because at the top of the page was a dedication to me!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yes, Alison had dedicated the book to me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was so excited and honoured. This is what the dedication said in case you can’t read it in the picture below “For Melanie Jonker in Queensland, Australia (melsnattyknits), and all the other  bloggers who have said nice things about my designs. Keep on blogging!”

I had to quickly turn my computer back on and send another email to Alison to thank her.

Wow! Who’d have thought that one of my posts from my little Aussie blog would lead to a dedication in a published book.

As I am going on holidays soon, I am in the process of deciding on and packing various knitting projects. Needless to say I am also looking through Alison’s book to decide what projects to tackle first.

All I can say is that I will have the warmest feet in Australia once I start knitting some of these beautiful slippers!

Thank you Alison!! I can’t wait for your next book J

And watch out everyone as I start knitting slippers and blogging about them!

I’m taking the book to my Knit and Knatter gathering this afternoon to show my friends.

Until next time…

Melanie