The Painted Sheep

Left – old band style label; Right – new tag style label

My new labels will make their debut at Guild.  This has been a goal of mine for ages.  I hate, hate, hate the band style labels that I was using.  They were big, bulky and fell off constantly – particularly on the yarn, as I could never find the perfect adhesive.  Since the trademark application was pending for almost a year, I wanted to wait until it was in place to make changes.  And now, ta da!  New, smaller labels that I can print myself on business card stock and tie on with some embroidery floss.  Still some refining to do (next time, going with better quality cards) but what a difference!  Much better!

Time to distract you with the pretty again.  No pictures this time, however, rest assured that the pretty is on its way.  I just placed an order from Knitspot – there’s 14 different patterns coming, about half of which are new.  Some of my favorite new ones?  Carcia, Maple Wing and the Spiralucious Mitts.  Mmmm, pretty!

And thank you to everyone who has offered words of encouragement and support.  Though I may not be able to respond to each of you personally, know that I deeply appreciate it.

I don’t know where to begin this post.  Its the blog post that I have been waiting to write and at times, writing in my head, for close to 21 months.  Today is a big day here at The Painted Sheep.  I suppose I should start by sharing the news:

“The Painted Sheep” and the sheep logo are now the registered trademarks of The Painted Sheep, LLC.

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Perhaps I should backtrack a bit.  Some time ago, there were some behind the scenes goings on here that were extremely stressful.  So stressful in fact, that I considered just shutting down and giving up my little dream of having a fiber business.  I’m not going to go into great detail or name names.  All I will say about what happened is that the name of my business was threatened by someone.  I fought her and won when she changed her name.  What kept me going all along was the knowledge that I had first use of the name The Painted Sheep and that it is my intellectual property.  I was lucky enough to have an amazing group of people providing me with legal assistance and for them I am incredibly thankful.  After I successfully won that battle, I applied for trademarks for the name The Painted Sheep and for my sheep logo.

Today, l learned that my trademarks (holy shit, I love to say that!) were registered by the USPTO on Tuesday.  It has been a long road to today, sometimes horribly stressful.  I applied for my trademarks last April, though all of this started in June 2007, shortly after I started.  Its the little thing I’ve been hinting at periodically, the big news that might be coming about The Painted Sheep.  In reality, I know that all you’ll ever notice is that now, instead of a TM next to my sheep and the words The Painted Sheep, there’s an R symbol (but please, notice it!  seriously, changing them all over was just so amazing).  It means that I have protection against another so and so, should anyone be so foolish.  And for me, this is a huge victory.  I stood up for myself in a way that I haven’t before and I won.

The fact that I got this news today, of all days, was huge.  My personal life has been extremely stressful lately and this morning, I went through one of the worst experiences of my life.  And then this news came and gave me a little glimmer of hope, a sign that things are going to get better, that I can fight and win.

There’s one more thing – I’ve mentioned a few times that I’m planning a new tattoo, to celebrate something momentus.  Its going to be this:

My little victory dance, permanently engraved on my shoulder.

Finished this afternoon!  Of all the things I’ve knitted, this is definitely my favorite.  Its the first sweater ever created with yarn from The Painted Sheep – that alone is significant.  Its been an amazing creative process for me, from choosing the button to the yarn selection to creating the colorway to dyeing the yarn to knitting and finishing.  I’m thrilled with how it came out!  Can’t tell you how GREAT it feels to be wearing a sweater made from my yarns!

So the particulars:

• Yarn: The Painted Sheep’s Alpaca Handpaint, about 5 skeins in Woodrose
• Pattern: Mr. Greenjeans
• Needles: US 7 and 5 Circulars, 16 inch, 32″ and 48″
• Button: hand made from Birch Mountain Pottery
• Started: December 21, 2008, finished March 1, 2009

More details on my Ravelry project page.

Mr. Greenjeans and I are off – time for a latte!