Ordinary Time

As you might imagine, January and often February are extremely slow when it comes to doing anything equine related in terms of my business. I'm happy to work in the cold (I'm out in it anyway), but it seems other people are not as excited to join me.  This explains why a post someone shared on FB caught my eye. The post that was shared said, "Parents of children who want a horse... This week only, for $100 you can drop them off at the barn for two hours and I will change their mind." [Original poster is Kate Montgomery, whom I don't know.] My first thought was finally a way to bring in income in winter, quickly followed by missing a prime opportunity with our recent frigid weather.  Of course, while this might work for some children, I know first hand that for those of us well and truly bitten by the horse bug, that this wouldn't work. I used to ride in the summer in Arizona. In an uncovered arena. I can remember getting off the horse after a lesson and downin...

I had dinner with two very good friends last night which was lovely and just what I needed. One of them asked me how I was doing... as in really doing given our current political crisis which directly affects my family in a myriad of ways. My answer? So far this year I've read 12 books and finished one knitting project and started many other projects. The need to keep the chaos out of my head is huge. I can keep up with current events for only short periods of time and then I need to dive back into my books or projects or head out to the barn. It is a perpetual balancing act of keeping informed and keeping sane.  How about all of you my dear readers, how are you all faring?  What are you doing to walk the tightrope of informed and actively resisting versus keeping sane?

If you enjoy reading about history, I have a great book recommendation for you. I'm just a few pages away from finishing Follow the Flock: how sheep shaped human civilization by Sally Coulthard. It is an extremely engaging book. I would say it is an extremely engaging book even if you aren't vaguely sheep obsessed. I have read this book faster than I typically read non-fiction books because I'm finding it so interesting. Probably one of the biggest takeaways that students leave my Sheep and Fiber classes with, other than to be thankful for automated spinning and weaving machines, is a greater awareness of the importance of sheep and wool. At this point I'm time I know quite a bit about the role of sheep in civilization. But one of the things that kept me reading was the new information regarding the intersection between sheep and history.  If you are looking for an entertaining and informative read, I highly recommend this book. I don't think you have to particularl...

In a rare moment, I decided to go with the more SEO friendly title. I could also have called this post Becoming an Autodidactic. My third choice was Grown-ups Homeschooling Themselves and Not Realizing It. So many options.  But I should back up. This morning I was searching for a podcast to listen to while I cleaned the barn to take my mind off of the continued extremely cold weather. The podcast I had been listening to had volume issues, so turned out not to be a good fit for the barn. On a whim I searched, "psychology of crafting" to see if I could find something that would hold my interest in eleven degree weather. The first option was for The Modern Mrs. Darcy's podcast, What Should I Read Next? I do wonder at algorithms sometimes because at first glance this had nothing to do with my search, and then I noticed the first word of the episode title. It was crafting. A very tenuous connection to my way of thinking. The whole title was Crafting Your Personal Curriculum. ...

I realize that I seem to have a penchant for choosing things that are somewhat labor intensive. You have probably already figured this out. Why buy something at the store when you can spend a million hours making it yourself? Which is why my newest craft to learn is English paper piecing. Here was my first trial run to see if I enjoyed the process.  I chose the colors pretty much at random from the bags of scraps I have. This will probably become nothing because I'm not overly fond of it design-wise, but I love the possibilities. It also didn't as long as I thought it might.  For those unfamiliar with the process, you begin with little paper hexagons such as you see in the top of the photo. Fabric is them wrapped around them and basted in place. The hexagon pieces are then sewn together.  When the project is sewn together, the papers are then removed and can be used again. This whole process was made a lot simpler because of the cool template I had. W. and MC have a 3D pr...