on working and looking for opportunities

Before we went on holidays and before we moved to Melbourne, I had found myself working in a great job. I started at Express Media Group working as a technical project editor for patchwork magazines in March and was thrilled to have found work based on my hobby. EMG is a media group that publishes a number of craft magazines including Australian Patchwork & Quilting, Patchwork & Stitching, Handmade and Country Threads. They also publish a number of caravan magazines which I regularly read too.

When the opportunity came up to move to Melbourne with Craig's work, giving up my job was the hardest decision we faced. Both Craig and I worried what I'd do when I got here, but we quickly realized that Melbourne is a very creative city. We hope an opportunity will spring up for me quickly in film, games, design or patchwork. I also hope to make things happen with my Quilt Design a Day patterns and a few other projects up my sleeve. I'm all about making things happen these days.

Because I hadn't explained it here yet, I thought I'd talk about my role at Express Media Group and the work I had been doing for primarily for Patchwork & Stitching, but also a bit with the other publications. Creating a craft magazine is an all-hands-on-deck sort of scenario where many hands lead to a better product. My contribution was as a technical editor or project editor for the magazine. Three times a week, I made the hour slog commute to the office to work in a role I was well-suited for. It's very un-Australian to claim you are well-suited for something, but in this case it isn't much of a stretch. 

As a project editor, my role was to review the submitted patterns for technical accuracy after the editor selected them, rounded them up and got everything in-house - I worked on math rather than content. 

A good technical editor does all the basics like converting patterns into the magazine format, verifying fabric requirements and reading the pattern for accuracy, as well as optimizing the pattern construction side of things. For example, if a quilt had 40 flying geese in it, a technical editor might alter the pattern to use the no-waste method of geese instead of the slower square and rectangle method. The task requires a good attention-to-detail, a lot of math, an understanding of project construction methods and strong spatial abilities. My role was editing patchwork and embroidery for quilts, bags, pouches, soft toys - anything stitched or sewn. 

I was just one link in the chain though. After I did my technical review, the projects were passed along to the editor and sub-editor to check the grammar, phrasing and review everything for continuity. Being an American, I'll admit that I was thankful to have editors there to look after my s's, z's, and a million other words that I often spelled in the wrong flavor of English.  Who knew that 'per cent' was accurate here?  From there it was handed over to art design and layout.

Some times the work was tedious like checking DMC embroidery floss numbers against a project or verifying pattern piece sizes for the pattern sheet, but all-in-all it was very rewarding and I'll miss it.  

Along with project editing work, I was able to contribute my own projects and write articles as well. In the current issue of Patchwork&Stitching 15-9, you'll find my article on interfacing. The editor rounded up sample pictures and projects from past issues to go with it. Many of the readers live in rural areas where they don't have easy access to pop into a fabric shop and ask what interfacing to use. I wrote this guide with them in mind. I'll let you know about other articles as they come out.

I was also lucky to have a few of my own projects picked up for publication. One of my favorite is Cordial on Sunday which is due out next issue. It's a Quilt Design A Day design that I'll also have a PDF pattern of (and possibly template sets, if there's interest).

There was a time when I questioned if my work was good enough for print. I wondered what qualified me as an expert in the area. I certainly respect that there are many quilters who have decades of experience on me. I think we all feel that way at times - nervous about our skills. I enjoyed my job. I enjoyed the people that I worked with. It was a brief experience, but a good one. I'm thankful that they've added me to their contributor list for future issues.

In the mean time, I'm looking for work again. Hello Melbourne, what doors do you have open for me?