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Q: How do I search for So-and-So's Article in "Fill-In-The-Blank" Magazine?
A: Unfortunately, my webmistress skills do not extend yet to making the website searchable. BUT there is a way to cheat on that, using either the Notepad or Word "Find" function. Go to the magazine bibliography page that you are interested in searching, right-click your mouse, choose "Select All", right-click your mouse again, and choose "Copy"(do not do any of this with the mouse sitting over the top of a picture, or you won't get the correct right-click menu). Open a blank page in Notepad or Word and "Paste" what you copied into the document. Now use the software's "Find" function under "Edit"(in the menu fields at the top of the document) to search for what you are hunting for. Yes, it's cheesy, but it works. Stick with 1 word in your search field, and if you are looking for a name, try only the first or the last name. Authors change how they attribute their work(women get married), and I'm not immune to mispellings, so try parts of a name as well. I ask that you do not save the file when you are done searching, but dispose of it. The bibliography is proprietary information that took 1,000's of hours and dollars to collect, collate and enter. Please respect that. :)
Q: Can I use this same trick to find specific types of projects in the book section?
A: Unfortunately, except for the catalog of books that only lists very basic information(alphabetized by author), you won't be able to find specific projects without opening each book review page, so no, there is no easy way to use this trick for books.
Q: Will you do a search for me?
A: Any time I spend hunting down information for you is time taken out of that 30 hours a week I could have used adding new information to the bib! So with that said, it will be $10 up front paid into my Paypal account. If it is a project you need researched that is going to take more than an hour(for example, you want to know where every crochet elephant pattern was published), there will be a $10 charge for each succeeding hour - and that's whether I turn up all the information you want or not. I do not guarantee my work. I can't because Murphy makes certain the information you want is going to be in the one issue I'm missing of a run of magazines! While I have amassed a great amount of material, it is by no means comprehensive. Those magazines that I have complete runs of will be stated in the review. What you are paying for is the time it takes me to hunt for the information in the material I currently have entered, not the information itself.
Q: Do you think you're going to get rich charging for searches?
A: Nope. I doubt I'll make enough money in a year to pay the website fees(that's less than $100). But I also know if I don't charge, I'll quickly get bogged down in searches that eat up the 30 hours a week I can devote to this project - that means more information isn't getting entered while I generate search files for people. By charging, I weed out the looky-loos.
Q: Will you buy my materials?
A: Maybe. It depends on whether I already have it, whether it fits my fields of interest, and if I can afford it. I have a limited budget that I can spend on acquiring new materials. Send me a list of what you have and what you would expect to get paid for it.
Q: Will you accept donations?
A: Delightedly! I've had many contributors over the last seven years, and keep a contributor's list. Those contributors that wish to remain anonymous may remain so. You still get my undying gratitude - nothing I can do about that. I do not publish contributor names without permission. Contributors also get exempted from the $1/page rule for photocopying out-of-copyright materials(within reason!).
Q: Can I take donations off my taxes?
A: Alas, no. I am not set up as a charity - and would feel a little queasy claiming to be one. When I die, I intend for the collection and bibliography to go to a textile museum. I have a great many materials already that deserve conservation, and a museum would be the best chance of their surviving and remaining accessible to the public. But until then, I will continue to add and document the published work on crafts that I'm interested in, and share what I find out with others through this website.
Q: May I make a donation to help keep this website going?
A: You're a saint. Yes, any help would be gratefully accepted. I'm always thrilled to find out that someone else has gotten excited about what I'm trying to accomplish! Just e-mail me through the contact page. Even a couple of dollars helps. With enough people contributing a buck or two, my paycheck can go back to little things like groceries and car maintenance.
Q: How do you protect your materials?
A: For the most part, I mylar bag and store the materials in acid-free cardboard boxes. While I buy bound materials, I do not do binding myself. All boxes are labeled, so I can find various runs of magazines when I need to pull an issue for reference. The boxes are stored in a storage unit, so pulling reference materials for you may take more than 24 hours and up to a week. It's not optimal, but the best I can do without this project taking over my entire home!
Q: Where's Igor9 and the funny monsters - excuse me - "excess specimens"?
A: Igor9 and Dr. Moraih's excess specimens are on hold for now, until I can find the room to resume production. It turns out that both pattern design and toy production takes good lighting and a clear table - none of which I have right now. The only table I have right now has the computer and my sewing machine set up on it, and moving them to lay out fabric really isn't an option. I hope to eventually have a home where I have dedicated space for Igor9 and his menagerie.
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