Friday 29 June 2012

Tutorial: Ordering PDF Patterns From Knit Picks From Overseas

One of the reasons I wanted to start this blog up again was to write a tutorial. I recently ordered a pattern from the knit picks website () and OMG it was a convoluted experience!! I had to take information from various places on the internet, and combine them with my own making stuff up. Eventually I got the pattern, but I wanted to post how I did it, so that other people can follow the steps.

The problem is that Knit Picks does not allow shipping to other countries. But I just wanted to buy a pdf download, which does not involve shipping. You still have to put in a shipping address though, in the order form.

Now, the information used in this tutorial apparantly came from a Knit Picks employee and was then posted on ravelry. I found the information here, but apparantly there's an earlier thread that I can't find.

To illustrate how to order a pattern from "overseas" (not the U.S. in other words), I'll be using the order page for the Cabled Summer Top by Lee Gant, because it's a pretty top and I want the pattern ;)

So, first you go to the pattern page on knitpicks.com


Click on "get the pattern" in the right hand corner. It'll take you down the page to the "kit builder" where you could buy the yarn if you lived in the U.S. But you don't, or you wouldn't be using this tutorial, so ignore this and just click "add to cart".


It'll take you to the top of the page again, just click on the checkout button in the top right now, which will take you to this page.


Click "checkout" at the bottom.

Now,this is the complicated bit. Fill in your proper billing information, your name, address, email etc. Put "not applicable" for the state, and whatever your country is in the drop down box.

BUT!

Your phone number may not have the correct number of digits (this is the bit that threw me for ages!) American phone numbers have 10 digits plus the 1 at the beginning for the country code (for example 1-800-123-1234) You'll see on the first picture that knitpicks have their own phone number laid out on the top of the screen. You need to put in that many digits (minus the country code). My UK landline has 11 digits. What I had to do was drop the 0 at the beginning of my phone number, and just put in the rest of the digits, as in this example (this is NOT my real phone number by the way - I don't think it's any real phone number. It's just an example. Don't try and phone it!)


For the shipping address, put in knitpicks own address. This is the advice that was given to the ravelry member from their own staff, so I'm assuming it's OK. It works anyway.

Fill in the shipping address as shown in this picture. Then fill in your first and last names, and the phone number you used before.


If this works, you'll be taken to the credit card details page. I have deleted my personal details from this photo - you'll have your billing and shipping addresses shown on the left.


Scroll down and fill in your credit card details and click submit order, and away you go!

You'll see an order received page now.


And in your email, you'll soon get a link to download your pattern.

But wait, that might not be it!! You might get your pattern downloaded as a cfm file - for example "downloadpattern.cfm" Confusing, huh? Don't worry, just go to the folder where the file has downloaded, and rename the file to "downloadpattern.pdf" It will now open in adobe acrobat reader, and you can print out your shiny new pattern!

I hope this tutorial makes sense and helps you. This is my first time writing a real internet tutorial, I hope I've added enough pictures and made it sound easy, which it is really. All you're changing is the shipping address, the phone number and renaming a file. Let me know if it helps, or if you have any other questions. The information is out there on ravelry etc, but I thought it would be helpful to have it all grouped into one page :)

Tuesday 26 June 2012

I Aten't Dead....

I've just been on hiatus, I guess ;)

It's been over 6 months since I last posted - I'm sure no-one's still subscribed, but here I am anyway lol!

I totally lost my knitting mojo over Christmas and winter. I just couldn't think of anything I wanted to knit. And whenever I did try something, it went wrong - like it would be too big, or too small, or too... something. My stash was totally hanging over my head - I would stare at the bookshelves of yarn, and wonder just what on earth I could do with all of that yarn! And some things, I had plans for, like pullovers and clothing items, but I was having (mental) issues with my body too, and just felt like nothing would fit or look nice, or if it fit now, what would happen if I ever managed to lose weight? Or what if I put on weight? What was the point?

So I dropped out of knitting for a while. I sewed a little bit - made some fabric flowers and bettered some of my hand-sewing skills. I didn't go anywhere near blogs or even ravelry - there were just all these pretty, amazing objects taunting me with their makeability. So I spent months reading books, playing video games, or just sat on facebook. Which is full of all my bellydancing buddies and that's fantastic, but I still missed knitting.

Slowly, I seem to have come out of my knitting slump. I started with some small objects - fingerless mitts mostly. You can't go far wrong with them :) And now I'm back to knitting sweaters! I've crept back onto ravelry and my queue has started expanding again - it appears that so many amazing patterns have come out while I've been away! And now I'm going to slowly get back to blogging and reading other people's blogs. :)

I rearranged my blog reading layout - I used to use blogger to keep track of all the blogs I read, but it wasn't really a good layout at all. And then they changed it while I've been away and it's even more convoluted! So I've dragged all my fave blogs to a toolbar folder on firefox, and I can just scroll through that instead of having to open another program, or go to a specific page, which I was just forgetting to do. Soon I'll be back to commenting on them all, but I'm taking it slow this time - I don't want to burn myself out again by jumping back in too soon. This social networking stuff takes a lot of energy, and my levels are just starting to rise again! :)

I've also decided to stop beating myself about photographing all my knits. I kind of felt that they should all be photographed in lovely natural light, with fnacy bokeh effects and everything. This kind of hung over my head too, because in Scotland in the winter - this isn't really possible without big fancy photography rigs and tons of spare time to take 100 photos of every object from every angle. So I was beginning to feel like there was no point in taking photos if they weren't totally professional quality. I know, totally dumb, right? And I had this big thing against using the flash on my camera, when sometimes it's just the right thing that needs to be used... I'm so strange. From now on, I'll just try for the best picture I can get. With flash or without, indoors or outdoors depending on the weather and light, it doesn't really matter. A crappy photo with flash in front of a mirror is better than no photo at all, right?

I've been thinking a lot about my expectations for myself, and what I do. For this whole blogging thing - they were far too high. I'm not sure what I wanted my blog to be - a big professional looking site full of gorgeous pictures, and a tiny thin version of me in beautiful handknits posed on an Icelandic beach or something. Um, that's not my life?! So I'm going to endeavour - not to lower my standards or expectations for myself, but to make them reasonable, and realistic.

This is a good plan, I think, and I'm going to slowly work on it. And maybe I should apply the same thinking to other areas of my life... Actually, seeing that last sentence on the last paragraph written out - it makes so much sense. Why have I not been thinking like that already??? So, to repeat:

I'm going to endeavour - not to lower my standards or expectations for myself, but to make them reasonable, and realistic.

Gosh, this post has been all therapeutic and stuff! I'm really excited about getting back to my online knitting life now! :D