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Three life lessons from the loom

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I'm going to write about weaving two days in a row, but I have some thoughts that go beyond fiber-y things. First a picture.  This is the back of my loom. (I know any weavers out there look at this picture and immediately feel great sympathy.) Do you see those hanging pill bottles? Those are warp ends that needed to be added or repaired for various reasons. Pretty much everything in weaving is fixable, but in general, no one wants to have to do this. I'll show you one of the reasons in a moment, but I think an uncooperative warp has several things to teach all of us.  1. A distracted brain is never as competent as you think it is. I really and truly thought I was focusing on dressing this loom while I was doing it, but I also know I was pretty concerned about getting it done in order to have everything finished in time. Truthfully my focus was on finishing and not the process. Multiple errors in tyeing up the treadles and in threading could have been averted had I spent a litt...
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Fiber Monday - Works in progress

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As the days go flying by, I'm becoming increasingly worried that I won't get done everything I need to get done. Here's where I am. This is the stack of guest towels that still need to be hemmed. These are the towels that are done.  Hand hemming takes a while, but the results are miles better than a machine hem. I'm starting to weave the dinner napkins. But this warp has been a bit of a bear. It might have its own story later.  And then on top of holiday market items, I'm still in my pattern drafting class. These are all the pieces for my final muslin for my personal sloper. It's a front and back bodice, sleeves, and front and back skirt. I finished tracing them into the fabric today and tomorrow and need to sew them all together for the final fitting in class on Wednesday. After that we begin drafting pattern blocks from these that can be used to create wearable patterns.  These are the hand crafted paper patterns I traced to create the muslin. The process is f...
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A happy pony story

For the past month Buddy has been battling laminitis. (Yes, this is what Vienna was dealing with that very bad winter a couple of years ago.) I watched him get more and more uncomfortable and I was 99% sure that I would need to make the hard call to the vet. We made one last ditch effort to see if it would make a difference... and it did! Buddy is now back to his old self and is completely off all pain killers. I think he will be around a while longer.  You needed that introduction for my story from this evening to make sense. All while Buddy was struggling, Vienna was extremely solicitous. She would check in on him, she would always be sure he went first while she slowly brought up the lead, you could tell she was concerned and was caring for him. It was so sweet, but I couldn't even begin to ponder how lost she would be without her Buddy.  From the incident tonight, I know Buddy is out of the woods and doing well. The ponies spend their day in the dry lot and come into the b...
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Chicken stories

A couple of weeks ago we moved the baby chicks into the coop with the other chickens. Try weren't really babies anymore and they had stopped peeping. Moving chickens happens at night after all the birds have gone to bed. Chickens are not great in the dark, as if their brains are solar powered and don't work when the sun goes down. You can just pick them up and carry them to their new lodgings. Then when all the birds wake up it's as if the newcomers were always there having arrived while the chickens were sleeping.  Putting the young chickens in the coop meant that no birds could be let out for a couple of weeks as the babies learned that this was home. Tonight, while J. and L. we're switching the waterer to a heated one in anticipation of the hard frost that's predicted, they decided to let the birds out. It was good practice because there was just a half hour or so of daylight giving the new ones very little time to get into trouble.  They all came out of the pen ...
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Not exactly a book recommendation

Yesterday I felt rather under the weather, so after doing some weaving (an endeavor which is not optional at the moment), I spent the rest of the day drinking nettle tea and binge reading Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguru. (He won the Booker Prize for his book, The Remains of the Day.)  Has anyone read this book? I really need to debrief with someone about it. I can't even really discuss it here as the whole point of the book is the slow build as to what is really going on. It definitely falls into the category of book that I need to finish in one go because I can't have it lingering. The Handmaid's Tale is another book that fits into this category for me. I also can't even tell you if I liked the book or not. So, if you've read it, I'd love to hear your thoughts. 
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Fiber Monday - the return of the sweatshop

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I have finished two-thirds of the first fifteen yards warp and I hope to finish the last third this week. I think I'm still on target for having everything I want to make ready for the holiday market. There is something.... motivating about receiving an email with details and due dates. Due dates that are now less than two months away. Because along with the weaving, I'm also planning on selling handspun yarn, so when I'm not at the loom, I've been working on that. But up until now I've been kind of relaxed about the whole thing. I work a little bit here and a little bit there. Today I came to the realization that to be ready with everything I want to be able to sell, I'm going to have to be a bit more diligent. This is the only good thing I can see about having a very light schedule in terms of people coming to do horse stuff.  But don't feel too badly for me because in truth, I love weaving and spinning, so it's not really a hardship. The whole process...
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Happy 23rd birthday, H.!

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We celebrated H.'s birthday tonight. Her actual birthday was earlier in the week, but this was when most everyone could get together. H. asked for sweet and sour chicken and jiaozi (Chinese dumplings) for dinner with cheesecake for dessert. G. made the cheesecake and also went on to make a peach pie for those who can't eat dairy.  As always there was a lot of laughter as we celebrated together.  H. got a rabbit pin on the card from Grammy which she loved,  as well as two books from her favorite graphic novel series. She also received snacks, a shirt, a new spirograph set, and some other books. It was a very good birthday.  And earlier today, R. had her own ongoing party as she continued to enjoy her protest swag and spent a lot of time recounting everything she saw the previous day. R. is now very enamoured of protests... there were lots of friendly people, she was given things (including a cookie), fun costumes, and lots of honking cars. I'm her world, things don't ...
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