Such a pleasant weekend …

I spent a pleasant weekend with friends hanging around, relaxing. It was lovely. I’m pretty sure winter is over, because the last few weekends have been really nice - it’s in the seventies, with clear skies. Beautiful weather.

Yesterday a couple of friends and I visited our local gourmet liquor store, Grapevine Market, which was having a big Valentine’s event benefiting the SPCA. Raffle, silent auction, wine tasting, puppies out front needing homes … The store itself was doing the tasting event, and it’s not every day when you happen upon a tasting that huge - 5 kinds of champagne, strawberry cocktails, several wines, port, sherry, madeira, chocolate, cheese … a great way to get tipsy for free. Then again, “free” is relative as they were quite successful in selling me stuff I didn’t need. My friend and I bid on a winery tour in the silent auction. I hope we won, that would be fun!

Today was more hanging out … went to Hill Country Weavers and Jo’s Coffee. Hill Country is the undisputed grandaddy of yarn shops around these parts. I’ve never been there before. I rarely go to small, independent yarn shops. The yarn is beautiful, yes. Lots of expertise, awesome. Great pattern books, nice. Good classes, absolutely. And yeah, I’ll go to one every once in a while for special projects.

Mostly though, I’m afraid of what I’ll walk out with and how much of my pocketbook I’ll be parting with. I don’t feel the need to build a huge stash. It would really weigh on me to know I’d spent a lot on yarn I didn’t use. I just want what I need for immediate projects, stuff I know I’ll like and use. Plus, I caught myself musing on about a $49 skein of yarn. Ow.

Also, I kind of hate explaining my yarn quirks. I’m unintentionally in a small camp in that I (1) don’t knit at all or even want to knit and (2) am allergic to wool, all wool, yes even alpaca and mohair, and blends don’t help solve the problem. I do not want hives. The yarn world is full of wool-knitters, and I am not in that group.

Nevertheless, I can tell right now that I will be walking out with some linen yarn before too long, as soon as I find a pattern I can agree with. I’m not quite sure what kind of crochet pattern would work for linen’s particular drape and texture. I’d like a drapey kind of wrap. I found some great linen yarn that’s new, it still has the sort of rough-ish texture of linen, but is softer than other types I’ve seen.

Meanwhile, I’ve been hard at work on my blanket. I have all the flower centers done, plus 6.5 brown squares and 10 flowered squares. My husband and I have also been hard at work on another Crafter-by-Night project as well, which should be done quite soon. Whee!

2008 and counting

I’ve been contemplating 2007 via pictures, and thinking about what to write in my “it’s a new year” post. Shall I make resolutions? Shall I consider them a lost cause? Shall I stick to hoping I can get our holiday decorations down in time for spring? Hmmm …

I’m leaning toward making resolutions. I am going to endeavor to not make this into an opportunity to overachieve, but that’s such an integral part of my personality I am already okay with failing that part of it. Instead of specific things, though, I’m going to look at areas of my life I think need enhancement or improvement - things that would make me less frustrated and more happy.

Technological barriers: I think of technology as sets of tools, and although I’ve picked up some and use them frequently, I’m at the point where I need to either put some decent time and energy into what I’m doing or accept my limitations. I don’t really accept limitations well, so I’ll be giving myself some lessons in things, specifically Illustrator and PHP. I need to stop being an “expert dabbler” in complicated things because that’s just ridiculous and in the end, defeating when you can’t quite do what you want to on your own.  I think doing this will give me a huge sense of relief and eliminate a lot of my frustrations.

Sense of accomplishment or completion: I really need more of this to feel better about my crafting in particular.  I get fidgety and move between projects a lot, but I think that’s not a great approach. I need to put my energy into finishing the projects that have been languishing. I think this will make me worry less about things I’m not doing that I think I “should” be doing (I hate the word “should”). I also think it will allow for more creativity eventually when I can move the “stale creativity” (old projects) out of my head space. For example, the granny square blanket I began in 2005. So, no more new projects until I’ve completed the old ones. Applies to all things, but particularly my crocheting and sewing.

Spend time on things that are important to me: I get caught up pretty easily in minutiae & pointless activities (or sometimes endless reruns of Law and Order - you know how they start the next episode before the first is really done? So annoying.) and end up not doing the things that are really important to me, which leaves me feeling like the days are passing swiftly in an endless sea of repetitive nothingness. This is depressing.  I should stop doing this.

Use more paper: No no, just kidding. This is an odd one, but it really means I want to write and draw more.   It means I want more sort of “raw” self-expression.  This is the antithesis to the finishing projects one above, and is all about not perfecting things, but just sort of sketching or doodling or playing with ideas and colors and techniques without needing to feel as though I have to finish something, or perfect it, or even see it through to some illogical end.  I need to change up what I’m thinking about, and get my ideas out and into some kind of life, even if I look back at my 3-headed monster and shake my head in bewilderment later.

Be more thoughtful and intentional:  Relatedly, I think the big projects I undertake this year should be few and very carefully chosen and most importantly - achievable.  If I want a project, I think I ought to consider taking on small projects instead that have short life spans.  It is part of the Crafter by Night (and weekends) problem that I must consider what I do and how I do it more carefully, and put my time to better use lest I feel as though I can’t accomplish anything and am just trying to get by.  I have a lot of ideas, lots of energy, but … I can’t not sleep.

I hope with these resolutions that I will find that I can achieve my aim:  to foster my  creativity, cut down on being overwhelmed, and do things that give me joy.  You know what?  I really hope too that I don’t sound like a new-age self-help book, but I fear that I do.  I guess we’ll see!!

Holy cow, it’s NaBloPoMo

I know, I know, what? That would be National Blog Posting Month, and that would also be November. I was lurking about on Ravelry and found it. Now when Melissa says she’s trying to write herself to death on Twitter, I know what the *** she’s talking about. She must be participating in Na … well, it’s the writing version with some other cute little acronym.

Fortunately, I had a blog post ready. Tomorrow and Sunday? Not so much.

So how do you come up with something to write every day? For me, this is generally a half-problem. Coming up with a new idea doesn’t happen every day. I’m lucky that I (a) like crafting so very much - apparently a surprise to the people I know, who keep commenting about it and (b) I am just that long-winded. Still, facing down a month of daily blog posts, I am sort of blinking my eyes thinking about what to post.

The suggestion I like is from Nicole over at Saving Nine via on Ravelry. She actually asked her readers what they’d like her to write about. *gasp* Seriously, though, I think that’s a great idea.

So, fair readers, shall I have a November theme? What shall it be? Any other small blog post suggestions?

My one concern about going this route is the lurkers. I know, for example, that there are over 50 people who read my blog almost every day. Do they comment? Rarely. Do I hear from them? Sometimes. So, if you’re out there, please, I invite you to say hello, even if you also say you have no idea what I should write about, you’re participating in NaBlo…thingie too and oh, gosh, you don’t even have enough topics! We’ll see if this works…

… 5 minute later …

OK, I’ve signed up. Now I’m committed … or should be committed. I am here on my little page.