January Blues

No, this is not a post about post-festive-season depression.  It's a post about being in a colour rut. (Though a rut is a depression of a sort...)

You see, I've been doing a studio tidy this past week.  I really haven't touched things since getting home from the Tucson/Sedalia trip, aside from shoving piles back and forth to make a tiny space to work in.  I hadn't even unpacked some of the things I had purchased on that trip!  But now that things have slowed down, I was beginning to find the climbing over boxes and shoving of piles annoying, so it was time to tidy.

The job is not quite done--there are still all the circular needles to sort and put away, and a pile of UFOs to frog and store, and one more bin of odd balls that have no home--but the studio is a viable work space again.  But now, as I sit in my comfy spinning chair, I look around and can't help but notice an alarming trend.

I've got the blues.

The blues are waiting to be spun...

...in a variety of painted tops and rovings.

The blues are spun and awaiting knitting...

...in the form of 780 yards of Merino/yak/silk 3-ply, about 1600 ypp/20 wpi.

The blues are freshly dyed...

...in the form of the Paco-vicuna I posted last week, dyed rather spontaneously with a random (and, therefore, unrepeatable-d'oh!) mix of Ciba cobalt and Telana turquoise dyes.

More blues await knitting...

...in the form of handpainted yarns lined up for commission pieces.

The blues are even lurking in other yarns...

...like this 110 yards of bulky corespun made from a batt named "Calistoga" blended by Sayra at Atomic Blue.  Sure, it's mostly greens, but that blue is there.  Mocking me.

The blues are even evident in the UFO pile...

So, am I in a rut?  Or am I, like Picasso, just going through a Blue Period?

In any event, it's January, and I have the blues.  Lots and lots of blues!

Optimism. Or Not.

I'm sitting here this morning feeling all mellow and relaxed and really not caring that I have Important Real Life Things to do.  Things like going to the store to buy soy sauce and baking powder.  Things like getting my glasses repaired.  Things like folding those two loads of towels on the couch.

Instead, I'm sitting here, knitting away on a sweater for Steve and pondering.  Pondering what to do with this...

...340 yards of Paco-Vicuna (28 g), about an 18s/52 wpi.  It is going to be something lacy, of course.  Possibly an Emily Shawl (Rav link).  But the real question is to dye or not to dye.  The natural colour is a lovely, rich, warm beige that I hate to cover up, but beige and I decided to part ways a few years back when my hair turned white.  Blue would be better, but the natural is so pretty.  So I knit and stare and ponder.

And very now and then I get up and check on this...

...Big Pile o' Mo.  Because checking it every five minutes will make it dry faster.  I spent part of yesterday washing marvellous kid mohair locks in natural colours with the vision of a fabulous monochromatic tail-spun yarn that will become the most glorious scarf in the history of the Universe.  But mohair dries in January at about the same rate molasses flows in January.  So I check and I ponder the marvellous yarn yet to come.

All this knitting and checking and pondering has led my mind down a few stray paths, too.  Which brings me to the topic of today's sermon.  Optimism, or the lack thereof.

I am an optimistic person.  Not like Pollyana optimistic, where everything is wonderful all the time.  I do have a little to much skepticism for that, and 50 years of living in the Real World had taught me a lesson or two on tempering optimism with caution.  But I'm essentially a glass-half-full kind of person.  (See the above hopeful delusion that mohair will dry quickly in January.)

This does not mean that I don't notice the bad things.  Or that I don't complain.  I do both.  Lots.  But I get over it, or find a way to turn it around.  I make a joke and move on and embrace the joy in life.

But lately, it has struck me that I am in a minority.  (I may not actually be, but it just seems that everybody is so full of gloom and doom.)  My Facebook and Twitter is full of complaint and misery.  Some seem to delight in reposting news stories of death and mayhem and tragedy of operatic proportions.  Others are sharing the suffering of their New Years resolution diets or the dark days of January (for which I actually do feel some sympathy).   A few are trying to pick political fights-Albertan and American (Neither contest is looking like it's going to be pretty, even to us optimists). There are even a couple who have made disparaging comments on the positive posts of others.  (It may be getting close to time for a Friend Purge...)

Even the Real World seems to be in a bad mood.  On two separate occasions this past week, strangers in check-out lines started conversations with me.  Normally, this would delight me, but these conversations were just openings for them to vent their spleens to a stranger.  (And, as a side note, to the man who believes that photoradar is just a cash grab by the Municipality because they nailed you 3 times on the same stretch of road:  STOP SPEEDING and the Municipality will stop grabbing your cash.  Just sayin'.)  Cashiers and servers grumble about the winter weather, which, in my opinion, has been exceptionally mild this year.  Well, okay, they reply, then say "but just wait, we're gonna get nailed."

You know, when you dwell on the negative, pretty soon it's all you see.  I'm pretty sure that there are a lot of people out there who are missing some pretty awesome adventures because all they can see are the roadblocks.  There is a silver lining to every cloud, but there seem to be a lot of people noticing the cloud to every silver lining these days.

So is it just the January Blues?  Or is everybody depressed because the Mayans are going to end the world this year. (Or because the Family Radio Network failed to do so last year?)  Or is this because there is too much bisphenol-A in our drinking water? Or do this many people just see the glass as half empty?

Well, you know what the optimist in me says to that?

"Glass half-full. Glass half-empty. Who cares?  We've still got wine either way!"

Hibernation

There has been a whole lot of this going on around here lately...

Yes, we are in the deep, dark days of winter.  The holidays are over.  The feasting is finished.  Twinkling decorations are stowed for another 11 months.  It's January, and nothing is going on.

Oh, stuff is happening.  Just not that hectic running about that seems to go on during the rest of the year.  No travel.  No teaching.  Not even a lot of emails rolling into the inbox.  In fact, it was beginning to feel downright dull around here.  Just a whole bunch of spinning and knitting and reading, with the occasional tasty meal thrown in for variety.  Fighting a lingering sniffle.  Really, nothing much to speak of.  I was beginning to get bored.

So, this morning, I decided to start getting things organised for the coming year.  I knew I had a few upcoming workshops that would need supplies, so I started sifting through contracts and emails.  I came up with 13 different classes, in 7 different venues in the next 6 months.  Four, count 'em, four Master Spinner classes alone!  And this doesn't count August-November, where I have at least a class a month booked already.

The list-making, the budgeting, the travel-arranging has begun.  Along with my work on curriculum review, article writing, and my annual foray into set design.  Suddenly, time spent spinning seems very precious, and reading is a luxury.  The last couple of weeks have not been a boring waste of time, but a precious island of calm before the next wave of chaos.  Now those empty squares on the calendar are a respite, a couple of days to rest and recharge.  Because I have been reminded that when I flip the calendar page over to February, there are no empty squares.  Until mid-August.

So, like a bear, I will continue to stay curled up in my little den, living off the fat stores built up by the excess of the last few weeks, resting and recharging.  And when the spring comes (apparently on February 15th!), I will be ready to charge out and face the world.

But for now, I'm gonna curl up and take a nap.

Merry Christmas!

I'm ready for Christmas.  Or, at least, the stuff is all done.

In the last two weeks, my quiet little Christmas has exploded into a full-bown gathering of the clan, complete with big family dinners and convoluted travel arrangements from all points of the compass. I have baked and knitted and shopped and wrapped and DONE ALL THE THINGS.  All that remains is to await the arrivals of our travellers.

The world around me is shutting down for the holidays.  The usual morning traffic jam outside my living room window is absent.  There are short lines in all of the local stores.  My inbox is devoid of actual emails.

So, now, I am going to shut down for a few days, too.  I am going to eat rich food, and drink good wine, and cuddle up with the ones I love most...

...while thinking of good friends, old and new, and, of course, knit and spin. 

So, whoever you are and however you celebrate, I hope that you find time to do the things that bring you joy during this quiet time when the world actually slows down for a few days.  I wish you peace and joy on these dark winter days.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

(PS: For those of you who follow my Twitter feed along the side bar, I apologise in advance for any off-colour or obtuse tweets.  These things happen when Boyds gather.)

'Tis the Season

Yep, it's that time of year again.  The commercials have been running since mid-October.  Retailers are promising us the best prices of the year THIS WEEK ONLY for weeks on end.  And the bloggers are choosing up sides and pronouncing their pro-Christmas/anti-Christmas stance to the world.

You've probably seen something-the interwebz is full of the Spirit of the Season.  Christmas is too commercial.  How to have a "green" Christmas.  Don't say "Merry Christmas" because it's insensitive to those with non-Christian belief systems.  If you don't say "Merry Christmas" you are part of the "War on Christmas".  I have been reading all week about these things, and about each blogger's individual family crises that arise at this time of year for weeks now. 


And I will admit, the stress of the Season was beginning to build in me, too.  I was sulking about the fact that my family is scattered and we cannot spend significant dates together anymore.  I was fretting perfect gifts and mailing dates.  I was stewing over whether or not to decorate the dining room, for crying out loud.  Hell, I was even worrying about the lack of snow in the region!  I mean, how could I feel festive without snow?


Then the barrage began.  I started getting about 25 emails a day from retailers, some of whom I don't even shop with, offering me discounts, free shipping, or a gift card for me if I spend X dollars on gifts.  My Facebook and Twitter are littered with messages to "Keep Christ in Christmas", include non-Christians in my holiday wishes,  and Shop Local (which is grammatically incorrect--they should be exhorting me to shop locally).  I receive a dozen messages a day to boycott the same retailers who are emailing me to tell me to shop with them.  My blogroll is littered with stories of Christmas catastrophes and angst.


So I turn on the TV to escape the negativity.  Along with airings of "A Christmas Story", I find ads for seasonal air fresheners and special edition "holiday" oral care products.  I find myself confronted with news stories of Christmas sales being up, which is good news for the economy.  Or down, which is bad for the economy. I find ads telling me to give $2000 diamonds and big-screen TVs and cars for Christmas because those are the perfect gifts (financing available OAC).  I find celebrity chefs informing me that if I haven't been raising my own turkey since April, I have ruined Christmas dinner.  Or vegans telling me that if I eat turkey, I am a heathen and a monster.  And doctors telling me that eating any holiday-related foods will make me fat.


And don't get me started on the radio.  If I have to hear Justin Bieber singing that he wants to get his shorty under the mistletoe one more time, I may just go screaming fa-la-la-la-la all the way to the nearest mental health institution.


So I walk away from the media.  I meet friends for coffee.  Friends who tell me tales of family conflict over who will be hosting Christmas Eve and who gets Christmas dinner, or who are trying to figure out how they can afford to get both of their kids X-Boxes for their rooms.  I go to the Post Office to mail a non-Christmas-gift package and stand in line for half-an-hour surrounded by people who are angry because they have to stand in line for half-an-hour to mail their gifts.  I go to my local coffee dispensary for a latte and have to run a gauntlet of gifts and frantic shoppers fighting over the last mug with a reindeer on it. 


And this was only the first week of December.  I just wanted to crawl into a hole until January by last weekend.  I really did.


Now, don't get me wrong.  I really love the Festive Season.  I like the warmth and coziness of my home on long, dark winter days.  I love the reasons to see friends that I never seem to find time to visit the rest of the year.  I have an excuse to indulge in day-long knitting sessions, and to shop for things I would never otherwise even look at.  I love the lights, the music, the food, the smell of balsam and cedar.  But it's hard to remember these little joys when you are being bombarded with what you are doing wrong.  After all, what is a candle-lit evening spend sipping mulled wine compared to the "War on Christmas"?  Clearly, there are much bigger things than my simple pleasures.


In spite of my misgivings, I bravely soldiered on.  We ventured out and acquired a Christmas tree (the Boyd household is still a "real" tree establishment).  I turned off the radio and TV and played Christmas carols instead.  I planned baking, and, of course, I knit gifts.  My heart wasn't really in it, though.  I felt like I was just going through the motions.  And that made me really sad.


Then things started to happen.  With a rather deus ex machina-like development, my little quiet Christmas at home became a big family gathering.  It snowed.  I stumbled upon a favorite Christmas album on iTunes.  I finished the Christmas knitting.  I began the Christmas baking.  I remembered the joy of these early winter celebrations.

I think too many of us have bought the Madison Avenue Christmas--the one where the most expensive gift buys us the most love.  The one where we have to start decorating in October, and start shopping the day after.  The one where everyone behaves perfectly and there is peace and love and joy.  And shopping.  Or we have been burned out by the things that go wrong at Christmas.  The same things that go wrong at Easter and Mothers Day and on any given Tuesday, really.  But when there is a family spat or a burnt meal at Christmas, it is apocalyptic.  We lose perspective. Because we have been indoctrinated that this is the Biggest Day of the Year, and if you get this day wrong, you are the ultimate failure.

"The Holidays" have become synonymous with stress.  Because we have let them.  But we can take our joy back.  We can delete those emails about shopping.  We can turn off the advertising.  And the Justin Bieber.

We can celebrate on our own terms, whether that means a Solstice bonfire, or lighting a Menorah, or hosting a Norman Rockwell-esque Christmas for 40.  Or we can not celebrate at all.  We can cozy up in our homes with our loved ones, or we can travel to Grandma's house, or  to Cancun.  We can give big screen TVs, or hand-knit mittens, or no gifts at all.  We can give to the food bank, or we can wait and donate food in June when stocks are low again.  We can eat turkey, or Tofurkey, or roast beef.  We can eat cookies or not eat cookies.  We can like fruitcake.  We can laugh and cry and fight and hug.

Because when you embrace life on your own terms, taking the good with the bad, you will find joy where ever you are.  And whatever the date.

So, whatever celebration you observe at this turn of the seasons, ignore the advertisers, the spammers, the nay-sayers, and the Grinches and celebrate with all you've got!  Or not.  It's up to you.

(Personally, I'm gonna celebrate.)

Sedalia. At Last.

I know.  It's about time I got back at the blogging.  I have a long list of excuses for the most recent radio silence, most of them pretty weak.  But I'm back now.

Back from spending 4 out of the last 6 weeks on the road, sleeping in strange beds, slogging through airports, snuggling up to total strangers on airplanes.  And teaching 106 people to spin.  Dude, ONE-HUNDRED-AND-SIX people!  I've been busy.

You've read about SOAR.  You've read about Tucson.  You haven't had the Sedalia report.  Yet.

This is the second year I have taught a Level 1 class in Sedalia, MO, and it felt rather like coming home.  The accommodations in the Hotel Bothwell were fabulous, the weather (except for one very blusterous evening) was fine, and the students (as always) were amazing!  Many of the students I taught last year were back for their Level 2 class, as well, so it was rather like a homecoming for me.

The first day of classes fell on Halloween, and there were a few shenanigans...

...including a pair of rather sassy sheep from the Level 2 class. (Sheep-nanigans?)  I even made a sad attempt at cobbling up a last-minute costume...

...Ooooh, scary! 

I decided three days before I left Tucson to knit a sheepy costume and whipped up the headband, and a tail in my "free time".  There were others who got into the spirit, as well...

...and we all went out to dinner together.

We sorted fleeces, we washed, fleeces, we carded, we spun woollen and worsted yarns, and we dyed...

...It never ceases to amaze me the colours that we get.  It's like magic every time!

The week absolutely flew by.  And then it was over.  But I wasn't ready to leave.

I had been invited by some of my students from last year to visit Chillicothe, MO, so I packed up my gear and hopped into the waiting chariot and was whisked away to that very charming community...

... for some well-deserved R and R.  My hostess, Zelma, took excellent care of me.  And kept me hopping!

We visited a covered bridge that dates back to the Civil War, one of the few remaining in Missouri...

I learned about osage (aka "hedge") trees...

...and that the dye derived from them, osage orange, was used to dye the uniforms of US WW1 troops at the suggestion of local-boy-made-good General John J. Pershing...

I visited longhorn cattle...

...and llamas...

I also attended a local church service, and a concert featuring country music legend Gene Watson.  I was even the guest of honour at a brunch hosted at Nico'Z for the local Fiberistas...

Yet, as busy as the weekend was, I managed to rest and recuperate from two solid weeks of teaching.  It was a perfect little getaway.  Then back onto a plane and home.

Where a gargantuan mountain of laundry and an empty pantry were waiting, along with the final paperwork for Fibre Week 2012, another writing assignment, and a pile of requests for proposals.  And as I have been chipping away at those things, a whole pack of exciting new challenges and opportunities have been coming up. 

And, of course, there is much spinning to be done!

Postcards from the Road: Tucson

Greetings from Tucson!

Well, actually, greetings from the Albuquerque airport.  I've (reluctantly) left Tucson behind to travel onward to Sedalia, MO.  I say (reluctantly) because Tucson was FABULOUS!

My visit began with a warm airport welcome from my hostesses for the week Jill and Lura and only got better and better.  Except for one day, but we'll get to that.

Little did I know that plans had been made for me upon my arrival.  The visit began with a trip to the woodshop of spindle maker extraordinaire Ken Ledbetter...

...which was literally stacked floor to ceiling with spindles-to-be. 

I was given a sneak-peak at his new Russian and Tibetan spindles, as well.  And yes, the spindle collection was enhanced!

Then we scooted over to an arts and crafts sale where Lura was selling some of her glorious weaving with her partners Mary and Barbara, who joined us for dinner before I was whisked away to the Tucson Music Hall for a performance of Shrek: The Musical.  All in all a wonderful day, and I felt most spoiled by all the treats.

That would have been enough to make any trip worthwhile, but the week went from great to indescribably fabulous the next morning when we travelled in to Crizmac Marketplace and met the Master Spinner class.  What a wonderful group of women!  It was a joy to teach such an enthusiastic, inquisitive, and daring group of students.

The facility, as most off-campus facilities do, presented a wee bit of challenge for Level One, which is a pretty wet and messy level.  The shop itself is lovely...

...and filled with charming and colorful Fair Trade goods from around the world, with a particular emphasis on Mexico.  Our classroom was a little warm on some of the hotter days, and it was a little cozy washing our fleeces...

...but we all survived.  And will live to laugh about it.  Eventually. (And Level 2  would fit in there nicely...)

Tuesday was a day of woolen and worsted, carding and working with fleeces.  The route home that day included a stop into Kiwi Knitting Company's fabulous little shop, just across from the historic Rincon Market.  Kiwi is the home to this fabulous yarn-stormed bicycle...

...which is apparently driven by this guy...

...knit by Jill Holbrook.

We did stuff Wednesday.  I know we did, but I can't really remember what.  Master Spinner stuff, I'm sure-I have a lesson plan somewhere to prove it.  But Thursday, I remember very well.  Too well.

I like to do the Level 1 dye day on the Thursday of the week.  We have covered all of the key topics by then, and everybody's brain is overfilled and leaking a little, so the change of pace is very welcome.  Usually, dye day is physically gruelling, but kind of fun.  Well, for me, it was just plain gruelling.

You see, I woke up in the night with a wee tummy-ache.  Which became a REALLY BIG tummy-ache.  By 2 a.m, I was worshipping at the great porcelain altar.  By 6 a.m., I was pretty sure all I had left to throw up was my own innards, but the fun continued until nearly noon.

Meanwhile, there were 10 people waiting to learn to dye with natural materials.  So, green about the gills as I was, I trooped in, pointed vaguely in the general direction of some dye pots and turned them loose.  Apparently, they figured it out...

...and fabulous colours were made.

I took a nap.

Then I was given the miracle cure.  There is a local food chain called Eegee's and they sell a frozen lemonade drink called, oddly enough, an Eegee.  An Eegee was what I needed.  That and 12 solid hours of sleep.  And I was up and atom again on Friday morning for a day of blending and spindle spinning with the gang.

We wrapped up the class and all (well, mostly all-some had other commitments) went out to dinner together.  Where we were joined by wonderfully supportive spouses and by another Master Spinner student, Carl, who had been in my class in North Carolina a few years ago...

...Carl is an Arizonan (Arizonanian? What do you call folks who live in Arizona?) now and dropped by for a visit with his family.  La Parilla Suiza had no idea what had hit it--15 people all talking spinning and sipping margaritas.  A great wrap-up to the week!

I had planned to spend Saturday touring around Tucson, but you know what they say about best-laid plans.  I spent Saturday napping and knitting and staring and regrouping.  And now, here I am , on the way to Sedalia.  I know Sedalia will also be fabulous, but it's gonna have to work pretty darned hard to top last week in Tucson. (I would, however, be thrilled if we could avoid the day of blech this time around, okay?)

Big hugs to my class from Tucson.  Thank you all so much for being who you are.  I hope you are resting and recouping after a pretty tough week, and that those of you who have to travel are having safe journeys. 

Now, get cracking on that homework!