Monday, October 31, 2011

Blessed Samhain!

What a busy week this has been!

I attended a very small gathering for Small Business Peer Mentoring hosted by the creator/owner of Oasis Healing Arts. It was a very small group, but that gave us a lot more interaction than there might have been. I did learn a few things and I'm looking forward to learning more.

On the craft front, I finished a few small projects and reached 50% of a large project -





In the repair/fix-it department, I added hooks to my flyer and replaced the dryer belt. 







Tomorrow begins the Nanowrimo, which I will be participating in. I won't be writing a novel, instead I'll be writing about various memories I have of being a child. I don't have any grand dreams of being published, but it might be a nice story to share with my grandchildren someday.

For now, I will continue working on my knitting and relax for the rest of the day.

Monday, October 24, 2011

Project of the week...

The other night, the idea of a project each week was given to me and I have been thinking about it since then. I think it's a great idea and it doesn't even have to show only my crafty projects, but life projects as well. Such as seeing the whales off the coast of Maine (not my idea, but a cool one nonetheless). And the thought occurred to me about just adding this to the other blog, or keeping it separate. If I want this to show the things I've done in a year, or five, then it should be a new blog.

I think the most daunting part of this is the fear that I will have nothing to show at the end of this. But, since we never know where our roads lead, what would I gain by not trying at all.

Where to start? If I started projects from my birthday until now, I would include these:

Fiber spun into singles (spun on the wheel that Sally painted and my awesome friends made sure I received by my birthday) -


Then plied -


A scarf made for my dad -

Some fiber I dyed -



And split for fractal spinning -


Other crafty news: I finished another washcloth, am still learning how to do stranded colorwork with a little stretch to it, am working on the Evenstar shawl, and am planning to make a shawl for a crafty swap.

There are other things that have happened as well, but more challenging to actually show. Some of them are internal and who wants to see my insides, right?

One accomplishment recently was a detox. Scary word, isn't it? Well, this was a food de-tox. I went for over a week not having any type of dairy or grain. I don't have any allergies or anything like that, I just wanted to get my body cleaned out for the winter. Mainly, it was a way to help eliminate any odd cravings that I get sometimes. For example, there is nothing of nutritional value in a Whataburger. As nice as they are to enjoy, having an actual craving for one certainly doesn't point to a vitamin or mineral deficiency so, why the craving? Since there really isn't any answer, the detox was in order.

The first few days were pretty blah. I rested a lot, read books, knitted, and drank more water than I thought possible. I also enjoyed a ton of veggies. Most were raw, but some were cooked lightly. And I discovered that I won't be doing another detox once the sun starts to decline. Why? Because this is the time of year that I love hot, spicy, and filling foods. Not, cold, raw veggies. Anyway, it was a good experience, nonetheless.

I've also been doing more journaling and thinking. I have so many ideas running through my head on a regular basis and I'm really looking forward to figuring out ways to make them work. Some are pretty simple, like moving the furniture in my room. The most challenging parts of that are the fact that I don't have many outlets, nor do I have a really long data cable (my F8 key is broken on the netbook so I can no longer connect wirelessly). I'll get these things settled pretty soon and my room will be even more pleasing than it is right now.  Well, to be honest, at this moment there are things out of place since I didn't put them away when I got home yesterday.