Needlefelting an Advent Spiral

I have long been enchanted with Waldorf-inspired handcrafts and have made my share of gnomes, gnome huts, fairies and other assorted fiber goodness.

Our homeschooling and household journey was definitely charged with a great deal of Rudolf Steiner's thinking and the approach to the spiritual through celebrating and observing nature, as well as  the Christian festivals of the year.   I don't find this incompatible with my Pagan observances of the Wheel of the Year.  It all  brings me closer to peace and light and Spirit.

When we brought the traditions of Advent into our lives, this whole season came alive for me and filled with meaning.  From my perspective, it's all about Light. And warmth. I remember thinking that I could continue to observe Advent in these ways even after my children were grown and living far away. And that turned out to be true.

But now my granddaughter shares these rituals with me - the building up of the nativity scene, adding elements week by week; the lighting of a new candle each week; the songs, verses & stories shared.

It fills my heart with joy and my granddaughter loves the familiar rituals - unwrapping the same stones & crystals that her father did, singing carols & ringing our special Advent bell.

She doesn't like change much, but I hope she will like this addition to our celebration: a needlefelted Advent spiral with twenty-four stars to travel to its center.  I found the inspiration for it here.

I was very excited that I am such a craft packrat that I already had a lovely piece of thick blue wool felt, and roving in the perfect colors, so I could just start it right away and have it ready for the first week of Advent. 

In the blog to which I linked, she uses a little felted apple to move along the stars.  I think I am going to try to make one of Anna Branford's sweet pregnant Marys for our guide.   (When you click on that link, browse around her blog - if you love this kind of handwork as much as I do, you will feel like you just found a treasure chest!)

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Editing to add: I did make a Mary Great with Child!  A smaller, simpler one than on Anna Branford's site. Just perfect to take us on the journey through the stars to Christmas Day!

Surf the Change - Thanksgiving 2014

For the last 10 years, except for once at my friend Martha's, we have not had any sort of traditional Thanksgiving meal.

On this holiday in 2004, we sat for our 5th day in an Indianapolis hospital cafeteria, sad and exhausted, after Patrick's awful car accident, grateful so grateful he was alive, but fearful in the foreshadowing of what was to happen to him 16 months later.

I have not been able to plan festivities for this day ever since.

Oh, I have other, lovely Thanksgiving memories. It's rarely the food I remember (though the sweet potato pies from our friend Myobi in Miami will not be forgotten), it's the company, the camaraderie of family and friends, that I hold dear.

 And the best of those were the Miami years more than two decades ago. Years when we had so many people over we had to move the long table from our study into the living room. Years when my mother and brother were alive. Mama would cook the turkey and I, a vegetarian,  did the rest and my husband washed all the dishes. 

Our move to Indiana changed our traditions. Deaths changed them, too.

But rather than be sad about this, I think I want to celebrate all those joyful days and also celebrate how traditions can evolve with our shifting circumstances.

Everything changes. Everything. One of the wise things we can learn as we age is how to ride those changes like great waves. If we're lucky we might be able to do it with the same exuberance and exhilaration as a sunkissed  surfer.

I feel on top of this wave.

I have lentil soup simmering on the stove this morning. I have made lentil soup as our Thanksgiving meal for years now. Last night I made my chunky gingered applesauce. My husband made cranberry sauce and a boxed stuffing. 

He just got back from playing saxophone at our friend's bakery, where they are hosting a free meal for anyone who wants to come. He's going to band practice later. I'll be writing and knitting and planning Advent crafts for my granddaughter.

We'll eat when we're hungry. We are grateful for many things.

We're hanging ten and we're good.

Off the Needles Little Noro Sweater

Finished!
This is important. I so rarely finish things like this. So....yay me!
It was an easy knit.
I didn't do the waist shaping as I wanted a more swing-y shape.
I also made the sleeves slightly shorter and wider.

Unfortunately, I am not so thrilled with how it looks on me...maybe it's the horizontal stripes, maybe I should have done the waist shaping.  Maybe it's just that I don't like pullovers that much.

Aw heck, the bottom line is I feel fat in it.  I think I look fat in it. I am a bit fat, in the middle of what I hope is my last weight loss journey. I've lost 20 pounds and have 20 to go. And I don't feel like I've lost 20 pounds when I put this on.

 It will probably look better with a skirt, rather than pants and it may look better when I've lost more weight, so I am not ready to give it away just yet!

On the positive side, I was really pleased with how soft it is - and how nice it feels next-to-skin. And just the fact that I finished it!

I think I will probably knit this pattern again - in a different yarn.  One thing that is very nice about the pattern is that it is digital and includes full, separate instructions written for each size.
Pattern available on Craftsy, $1.99, from Juliet Romeo Juliet designs: Simplest Sweater

poem: relief

 

relief

at how, when we become so still
things peel away, 

a dirty cloak slides off,

an ugly veneer strips itself.

and the truth of the world dazzles
in sudden werelight.

relief at how there is magic at the core,
everything’s numinous.

at how, there are eyes
in the wood

and they are kind.

                           --Zann Carter [2014]

-----------------------------------------------

Since my brother's death, I haven't been able to write a poem. Until this week. This is the second of two.  I am very happy to welcome poetry back.
The picture is by me. I have become fascinated with the wood planks of my porch and fence. The patterns in the weathered wood! Angels, sorrowful beings, eyes, keyholes, whirling amulets. It's quite odd how something looks very distinctly like something one day, then only a sort of interesting wabi-sabi surface, just a knot in old wood...

In any case, I believe magic is definitely riding under the surface of everything. We have only to be still for a bit, to make an inner movement just a fraction to one side,  for its revelation.

I never knit pullover sweaters

...and yet, I seem to be knitting one:

.

Pattern: Simplest Sweater 

Yarn: Noro Silk Garden 203

2014 International FreeForm Challenge

This year's challenge was to limit ourselves to one color.  If you know my work (and Noro addiction), you will understand that this was very difficult for me. Here is what I wrote for the exhibit:

I struggled with this Challenge, as my work is usually a riot of color.
Inspiration finally struck with a skein of white. The many-layered tale of The
Snow Queen has appeared in my work before, with other pieces of the Snow
Queen’s wardrobe. Imagery from the story also appears in some of my poems.
The central piece is an angora/wool blend, edged with white ribbon yarn, yarncovered
pipe cleaners and sparkly white novelty yarn for icicles. Final
embellishment: a poem.

The Snow Queen’s Fascinator

She likes pretty things,
the swarming of her snow bees,
the miraculous flowers inscribed by her frosts,
the silvery glint of sun on her never-thawing ice.
She likes, too, a good party,
and dresses herself in wintry splendor:
pale ermine robes, white silk shoes, a fascinator
of satiny ribbon, softest angora & fine ivory wool.
Icicles chime as she bends to greet guests
with her infamous kisses, leaving lipstick stains.
Her shade? Frostbitten.

 

See other years' challenges at the  International Free Form Fiberarts Guild (formerly Int'l Free Form Crochet Guild). 

For technical reasons, a complete online gallery (including artists' statements and links to their websites) is not available for this year's work at the INTFF site. However, you can see all the images here.

You can see the preview for the Blurb book online, which makes all pages available and includes artists' text: One Colour.
The book is stunning, I think, especially because the exhibit is arranged by color.

you can always start over

"...Full, with everything
possible and intransient,
the slow pale oracle
of my longing
revealed something at last,
saying,
you can always
start over, levitating
from the edge
of a shadow,
as pure and whole
as this."
 - from Moon, a poem by Zann Carter [1987]






That is how I feel, after bearing witness to my brother's last breath, after journeying back to the Smoky Mountains to scatter his ashes.
I feel like I am in a new land, starting over.
I have little idea of where I might be going in this new place, so I'm just sitting here awhile.

Breathing in
and out.

Being.