Oooooff

We've ground to a halt. The DSM is sitting in front of the rugby, I'm in front of the computer. A biggish chunk of yesterday and now today has been spent bringing stuff back into the newly decorated sitting room. Which means a lot of dusting, wiping over, washing of ornaments, etc.

Why do I have so much junk? Why do I have so much stuff that isn't junk?

So, I have taken the opportunity to rid ourselves of some of it. Elderly reference books that we don't need any more because we have Google. Bits of pottery, etc, that I no longer like, or that don't fit. And books. Elderly guides to. Even craft books. Even spinning books. Some of them I haven't opened in years, decades, even. Sooner or later this stuff will have to go as the years advance, so I might as well get in to practice. And do you know, it actually doesn't hurt a bit.

One bummer, we seem to have mislaid the Deborah Chandler book on weaving, which both of us like (whenever those rare moments have come when we have been near a fully completed loom, and one of those is coming, I swear!) I have a dim memory of having lent it to someone, but the person I thought it was definitely isn't, so....Oh, well, we'll just have to buy a new one (oops).

By way of cramming in some craft activity of my own, instead of reading in bed last night I knitted and listened to Weavecast. I don't listen to every episode of this, but very much like it when I do, it is one of the more professional ones (some craft podcasts are absolutely appalling, you know. I tried one a while back where the woman didn't have a script and did have a voice just like - oh, whatsername from Friends, which the, possibly, what do I know, Bronx-y type accent. Yikes. There are others....

But, I digress. I was listening to Weavecast, to an episode focussing on Sarah Swett specifically. I love Sarah's work. I once spent three ecstatic days sitting adjacent to "Three of Spinsters", listening to Sarah's tales and being guided by her in the gentle art of tapestry, using her own luscious handspun, hand dyed yarns. I also once sat opposite her at a dinner table when she got something caught in her teeth, so she pulled out her spindle and blagged some silk, and spun herself some "dental floss". I guess that sort of self-sufficiency comes from spending time living in the wilderness?

I have also been to classes with Sue Lawty
which I jolly well should have done as she lives just down the valley from me. Another tapestry weaver whose work I really admire, and another fine teacher. So, what I am trying to get around to saying is that I have done a bit of it myself in my time - not well, necessarily, but I have very much enjoyed doing it. And listening to Sarah last night, I was struck with lust to do it again. So to add to all the various things on my to-do list, I hope I am going to be able to fit in the spinning and dyeing of some Wensleydale for weft - to a plan, forsooth (which obviously means devising the plan first, right? - and slowly ....getting weaving.

Which really should be my mantra. Ha.

Next week, needle felting, the final days. In other words, the first of my destash classes at AH. It is fun to do, but not a passion, it can go. I shall sort out the mini-workshop, find fibre and samples, see if I can still do it myself (!).

Plus the usual. It's a hard life.....