Since I have been not focused on designing patterns, I decided to fully close down my Patreon page. It had been inactive (not charging anything) for well over a year, so I thought the time had come to close it for good. I left my Ko-fi open as a tipping option, but honestly, I’m not expecting payments from anyone at all. I appreciate everyone who supported me while I was actively designing.

As such, I’ve revamped the store that was here, moving it to an external site – PayHip. This has made Mercurial Knits load MUCH faster and also allowed me to add a pay-what-you-want scheme for my patterns which used to be at a fixed price. I changed the pricing to free simply because these early patterns of mine were not properly graded or tested, as I was very new to pattern writing. My newer ones are much more size inclusive and better written overall, and thus still have a baseline price.

For me, it’s been a tough few years. About a year and a half into my studies, my dad became severely ill, and the stress of it all while being 3,000+ miles away made it impossible for me to focus. I withdrew, and at this point, I have essentially forgotten most of what I learned. I want to go back to Korean and Japanese, but I am very, very slow with it. Then, another chronic illness added itself to my list, so I am managing that as best I can. Finally, early this year, my mother-in-law, who had been an absolute rock for me ever since I moved to the UK, passed away suddenly. Our whole family barely had any time to say goodbye – it was very painful. We are healing slowly but we still feel her loss deeply.

Eventually, I would like to finish my alphabet of fingerless mitts patterns. Can you believe I already got Q out of the way and then just stopped? There really aren’t that many letters left to do.

I hope everyone is doing well.

Another major change in my life the past year is that I have finally recognised, as a white and cis-passing person, that I am not only able to, but have a duty to use my privilege in life to stand up and speak out for marginalised people. I already had quite a few LGBTQ+ community friends and accounts I followed, but now I have been following more Black, Asian, and other POC designers on my Instagram page. It was easy to sympathise with queer people, many of whom look like me already, but I was unintentionally ignoring designers of colour almost completely. Of course, following, listening, learning, and appreciating are all good things to do, but I don’t think that’s enough on its own. Yu Ra from Knitboop Designs mentioned on her Instagram story how she chooses not to work with designers, dyers, etc. who don’t have an anti-racist or inclusivity statement on their social media or company webpage. Now, I understand that this message was more directed at large companies, but I felt moved to make my own statement and link to it permanently in my site’s top menu. If you’re interested, you can read what I wrote here; please do follow the links to amazing BIPOC makers that I’ve added. I have tried my whole life to not be racist despite the overwhelmingly white community I was raised in, but I now understand that it takes more to be truly, actively ANTI-racist – and I want to continue to do what I can to help dismantle white supremacy.

Lots of love and care.

I’m pleased to say that my Patreon page is growing and I’ve uploaded two fingerless mitt patterns which are only available through there: Ribbed Leaf Mitts and Swift & Simple Lace Mitts. They’re both quick to knit and easily amendable to a range of sizes.

I’d also like to say that, thanks to a kind knitter alerting me to the problem, the pattern shop is now operating as intended. Before, it asked you to accept the terms & conditions for shopping, but there was no checkbox to click – this was a bug and has now been fixed, so you can get all the patterns available in my shop with no issue.

Thank you for your continued support! <3

You can access my dear friend and sibling-in-wool Silver’s patterns on their Ko-fi page.

You can send me some support via my Ko-fi if you want to. Thank you!

Today is my 33rd birthday, so I thought I’d take a leap and launch my Patreon. 🙂 Why sign up? Well, you’ll receive sneak peeks of my patterns in progress, get access to my patterns six months before the public do, and even offer suggestions of what types of items I should knit and games I should take inspiration from – and you’d be helping me make a living doing what I love.

I have three tiers available:

• £3 a month, which gives you access to the sneak peeks
• £6 a month, which also lets you get patterns six months before the general public does (these will be paid patterns, but you’ll receive them for free!)
• £12 a month, which also lets you suggest colours, type of garment / accessory and games to take inspiration from

Any amount is appreciated, of course, and even just spreading the word to your knitting friends would be a great help to me. I’ve found I really love getting to make patterns for others to enjoy, and getting money on Patreon to do just that will help me so much. My main goal right now is to reach £150 a month, at which point I will stream my knitting progress live on Twitch.tv once a month, and also play a suggested-by-patrons game once a month.

Thank you all!

It’s been a few months since my last update and I’ve adjusted a bit better to lockdown life. I’ve got a few more fingerless mitt patterns planned out, and I’m still contemplating a shawl I’d love to make and share the pattern for.

I’ve also got some exciting news up my sleeve – but I’m waiting a week to tell you exactly what it is. So check back on my birthday, next Saturday, to see what I’m going to announce! It’ll be a way to support me and also get behind-the-scenes looks and exclusive patterns, and I hope you’ll be interested in it.

I’m glad I got to visit my family last year as it looks as though it will be impossible to see them this year. I miss them. We’d had a trip planned for May but as you might expect, that’s been cancelled. I’m not sure when we’ll see each other in person again, which is scary, but the truth nonetheless.

In February, I officially became a British citizen. I have lived here for 8 years and I want to spend the rest of my life here, and it makes me very happy that I can call England my home forever. Once I became a citizen, I applied to start studying at the University of Sheffield (and was accepted!) in Korean Studies with Japanese. I have always been interested in languages, and while visiting my family last year, my sister got me into BTS, the Korean rap / pop band. I wanted to learn Korean to sing along and understand the songs better, so I started using an app called LingoDeer – and I’ve discovered that I absolutely love speaking and reading Korean. My end goal is to work as a translator or interpreter for Korean speakers in the UK. The Japanese classes available to me in this course are just icing on the cake, as I’ve been interested in Japanese culture for many years and being able to read and speak Japanese too would be wonderful.

I find the entire pandemic situation overwhelming and terrifying, but I’m trying my best to carry on despite it all. I’m staying home and safe, and trying not to get too stir-crazy during this lockdown period. I’m wishing for the best for everyone.