Spinning Yarn

I've been thinking about listing some of the handspun yarn I've made. I'm not sure what else to do with it. I loved the roving and love the yarn once it was spun, but I have so much yarn right now that I can't possibly use it all. If I list it, then at least someone else has a chance to create with it.

Holiday Time

Take time to think about friends and family this holiday season. Those who are here and those who are not. This is the first Christmas without Gram Margaret, my Hubby's maternal grandmother. I am missing her this season for several reasons, one being that I miss the stories of my Hubby's childhood that she shared whenever we visited her.  Gram Margaret was one of those ladies who always wore a dress and had her hair done at a beauty shop. And feisty, oh yes, feisty and despite being adopted into the family when I married her oldest grandchild (my Hubby) and becoming her only granddaughter, she loved me as one of her own.

I know this Christmas that either she is finally able to bake her special sugar cookies again or that she's found an even better way to celebrate the Season, with it's Author.

My Sister will be Home in 16 Days

My shop, Spindles and More is having its first-ever sale:
And I'm selling my items for 20% off! In honor of my sister's temporary return to the US, I'm offering all items at 20% off their listed price from Dec. 1 through Dec. 16 (the day she arrives). Regular shipping costs apply. Proceeds from this sale will go to support her work at Talita Cumi Children's Home in Santa Cruz, Bolivia (www.Talita Cumi.org).

Spindles and More is found at www.spindlesandmore.etsy.com

Giving Thanks

Someday soon my sister is coming home. She has not been in the US for at least a year and a half. She's been away, working with MCC in another country. She's actually doing what the rest us us mean when we say "So and so is a Missionary in some-far-away-place."

And while my family and especially our Dad have missed her, we know that she is answering a call to serve. I know some of us are jealous, in a way, that we aren't the ones going, as scary as leaving the "civilized world" seems (until you realize that there are places more truly civilized than where we live). We are staying here, not having the "adventure" (nor the struggles) she is having.

She's learned a different language and dialect (there isn't a place on Earth that actually speaks the Spanish they teach us in school) and a different culture. She's worked with adults and children, some easy to get along with, some not. She hasn't "shoved God" on anyone, true missionaries work with and alongside the people, not over them. And she gets frustrated with her own limitations just like anyone else, but she doesn't have the luxury of sitting back and deciding to let "someone else" do it, she can't because she is that "someone else."

And so she struggles in a far-away-place. And she makes new friends with children at a home for abandoned children. And she experiences sadness when children we've never met get sent home to a bad situation. And she experiences triumph when a plan comes together and children get sponsors. And she experiences joy when some of those same children experience reconciliation with their families.

And still, she is far from home, except that through technology, we can at least see and talk to each other. We cannot touch or hug, hold or comfort.


I want her to know I love her and miss her. And I'm thankful for the women God has made her into, for her willingness to serve and for her beauty that is so much more than skin deep.

Slow going

Confession time: I have not worked on the shawl at all this week. I wanted to. I wanted to see it finished and listed but job stress got to me and I had some paperwork I had to get done too. No fun time for me, though one evening I did work on a pair of socks I'm making for myself for two hours.

Generally, this week, I would come home from work, lay down for a nap, then do dinner, then do some more work and then go to bed (anyone who tells you that teachers "only work from 8-3" has never been a teacher, would never survive as a teacher, and deserves to be the substitute teacher in a rowdy room of middle schoolers, for a week, without lesson plans... IMHO).

So, no time to work on the shawl and let off steam. There it sits, waiting for me to pay attention to it again. I may have some time this weekend, I've already prepped for the all-day conference Monday and the meetings Tuesday...

Anyway, I am a little down about my shawl progress (and the lack thereof).

If you have anything positive to say about spinning, weaving or crocheting or crafts you do, make a comment, I could use the encouragement.

Featured: One Wool Hat

Well, for everyone out there clamoring for a hand spun, hand crocheted, wool hat, there is only ONE in my etsy shop. I have not made any since this one as I am in the middle of a project for my family (see "Other Projects" post).

The wool hat pictured in this posting is made from the yarn I had left from my sheep to shirt project. I started with raw wool (right off the sheep), washed it, dyed it (with kool-aid, aren't the colors awesome and they are wash and color fast) and began to card it.

Hand carding all that wool was a pain in several regions so I sent it away to be made into roving. When I got it back, I spun both the blue and purple into singles and then spun them into yarn before crocheting them into my first sweater.

From the extra yarn, I crocheted this hat. I am only making one hat like this. I may decide to make a matching scarf later, but haven't done so yet. When this particular wool yarn is gone, I won't be able to make more exactly like it.

Click on the picture to enlarge it so you can see the varying thicks and thins of the yarn and its poppin' texture.

Other projects

I know I said this blog is for the work that I list on the Spindles and More etsy site, but I have to digress long enough to say that the reason I haven't been listing more items is that my sister (serving with MCC in Bolivia) asked me to make winter hats for the children living at the children's home where she works. And when family needs something, my own projects get put on hold to take care of that need.

Anyway, the children's home is called Talita Cumi (I usually refer to it as TC). My current project right now is to make 50 winter hats for the kids at TC. I've got 24 done so far and I have until she comes home at Christmas time to get the rest finished. She'll take them back down with her.

Last fall's project was to make crocheted wash cloths (using cotton yarn) for the kids to use. I think the total ended up being 64 (in 3 months). The saddest part of that project is I haven't made a single wash cloth since, even though we need a few here at the house. I just can't make myself make another, maybe next year...

Having spent a month in Bolivia, with my sister at TC, I have to say that I was sadly surprised by the things we take for granted here in the US. Simple things, like having our own toothbrush with toothpaste to put on it. Or how about more than 2 pairs of underwear to wear under our skirts... The people living and working at TC are doing the best they can with limited resources. We figured out that it costs $2 a day per child to live, eat and go to school at TC. The government only pays $.50 per child, per day. Now multiply that times 7 days in a week, times 4.5 weeks in a month, times 12 months in a year, times the roughly 40 children that live at TC...

And somehow TC is supposed to make up the rest of that missing $1.50 per child, per day on its own. It is almost impossible when you consider that once the children are old enough to get jobs (and therefore help support TC) they are old enough to leave TC's care and live on their own. The rest of the children are too young to work. They have come up with a few creative ways to help TC. The children participate in painting scarves that are then offered for sale (they can be ordered from the website). For a period of time they were also making pizzas to sell to the North American schools.

Incidentally, if you want to make a difference in children's lives, Talita Cumi has a website: www.talitacumi.org