resurrection?

who’s for it?

what are you doing creative lately?  any ruminations?

i’m pretty excited about some knitting projects…   but i’m being a little stingy about knitting a birthday toy for a little boy i nanny.  i want to, but the one i think he (his mom?) would like best is a little more involved than i’m feeling up for.  the worst part is, i dropped a hint that he might be getting a toy of this kind soon…  nothin’ like obligation to stifle creativity, eh?  (although the “creativity” of knitting from someone else’s pattern could be argued in and of itself.)

Christmas bags

Waste bugs me. a lot. Its not even so much that wrapping paper (or other things) will go trash up a landfill. I just hate seeing things get wasted! I love wrapping presents elaborately. It has always been slightly frustrating that it all goes in the trash in the end anyway (well, not the ribbon of course!). So I got the idea of making re-usable wrapping bags. Even though I’m sure this isn’t an original idea, I’ve still never heard of it. I got some (not tons, I’ll stock up AFTER the holidays when its cheap) nice tasteful Christmas fabric to make re-usable drawstring bags. You just make a simple bag, with a casing for the ribbon on top. Put the box (or item) in, pull it closed over the bottom, and on top fold the edges over and tie it down with the ribbon in a bow on top. Things like DVD’s and CD’s are a standard size (and a fairly standard present) so they work well too. You just have to have enough extra material to fold it over so the gathers are on the back. The ribbon gets permanently matched up with the bag. Now I just need to figure out how to add pictures.

time online

i just want to say that getting time at a computer is a big challenge for me, so i don’t spend nearly the time i want connecting here. my sweet husband knows this and for christmas he reformatted our old laptop so it actually runs well enough to, say, check my email (which it couldn’t muster up the energy for previously). and now i have it set up unconventionally just above counter height on the top of a little bookshelf in the dining room. i’m so excited because it will be more or less out of the kids’ line of vision (thus diverting some of their interest in it) and it is in a major area of the house which basically means it will be accessible to me even when i’m in the middle of everything else (cooking, doing dishes, taking care of the kids, etc.) so what if i’ll be standing up? i’ll even manage to be less sedentary than most when using the computer. i’m very excited. i hope you see why this fits in so well with my effort to live deliberately and cultivate creativity, and even health. 🙂

more christmas traditions

i have a lot of fantasies about christmas too. well, i’m fond of holidays in general and have a lot of traditions i want to develop for other holidays too, but since we’re here and it’s coming up, i’ll limit myself to christmas at the moment.

in no particular order:

• have knitted stockings, all personalized (in my family they will all be pretty different from each other, they’ve been picking patterns this year…. i’m hoping to finish them for next year)
• wear christmas pajamas (i’m also very fond of pajamas)
• i love the idea of making a wreath! that hasn’t been on my list but your picture and forrest’s family’s tradition appeals to me
• read christmas stories throughout the month (i have been gradually accumulating kids books, and hope that as the kids grow the collection will mature with them, though i hate some “christmas” stories and their thrift store emotional triggers. i mostly like traditional stories (the fun silly ones like rudolf etc., and Christ-centered ones, meaning the story of his birth and life…)
• i REALLY want to see the nutcracker as well
• i’ve never been to a messiah sing-in, though i’ve seen them advertised a lot…i know i like listening…
• christmas caroling followed by hot cocoa

you know what’s funny? as this list goes on, and i’m not that close to finished,  i’m feeling increasingly overwhelmed rather than excited by it. i guess it’s because there are many things i know i won’t do this year and possibly not even the next or the one after that….

the first thing (the stockings) is really the only one i want to work on immediately (even though i’m planning ahead by a year).

if i could just buy tickets to the ballet that would be next on my list…but that being an absolute financial extra right now, it’s impossible this year.

at some point i like the idea of getting a live tree and planting it after christmas. i’ve thought of this and talked about it almost every year for many years, but this is the first time i actually looked at some. with my tree budget of $20, i was saddened that live ones (at home depot anyway, i had to go to the closest place with kids in tow and a time limit) are either only a foot tall or quite expensive. i’ll just keep looking into it oh so slowly (as is my way) and some day i will do it. and then do it that way every year.

i also like having a simple homey tree and don’t want to get into having a decorator one. i loved having homemade decorations as a kid. right now we haven’t made a lot (i think that will come as the kids get older and more crafty) but the one’s i have are little wooden figures and the felt and straw ones that kaarina and i purchased and split last year. i also tied jingle bells to yarn…. the next things i want to add to the tree are led lights, rather than the cheap tiny ones that don’t always last from year to year, and wooden beaded garlands. i’ve thought of stringing popcorn or something as well… again, that’s probably something for next year or later.

it’s funny now that i’m continuing the list even though i said i was overwhelmed. i guess i still want to write about it.

other traditions:

• my in-laws started this one a few years ago: on or shortly before christmas eve they would take the family to dinner and then go to a bookstore and let everyone browse and pick something out for themselves (with a budget of about $25 each. the first year we actually went home and wrapped them up so the others could be “surprised” at what we chose. in following years i think we haven’t done that part. since we moved away they just send us money with the hopes we’ll do something similar.
• get a good family game each year. (last year we got candyland 🙂 )
• get a good christmas movie each year (james and i together are sort of media-files, our dvd collection serves as a small library to some of our friends)
• when i was little we used to dress up and act out the christmas story. i loved it when i got to be mary (and wear a lace tablecloth over my head, not accurate, but it felt princessy and somehow appropriate to me for the mother of the Savior), and i loved pretending to be an angel (wearing a sheet and a halo out of tinsel), or a shepherd (bathrobe), or the innkeeper, or a sheep. we always took pictures, it was great.
• on christmas morning we always got to get into our stockings first but couldn’t open presents until everyone was up. we held hands kneeling in a circle, sang happy birthday to jesus, prayed, and then exchanged our gifts (beginning one by one but ending in a frenzy of wrapping paper and exclamations of christmas fun)
• my mom always set up a puzzle (the kind with a bajillion pieces) and a box of chocolates on a card table sometime after thanksgiving (though sometimes before). you could only eat a chocolate if you put a piece in the puzzle. doing puzzles is one of my mom’s family’s traditions (she used to do them with her dad). i like doing it with my mom, but i don’t know if i could do one on my own…. so i haven’t ventured this tradition in my family yet, though i might as my kids get older.

anyway, i list these christmas memories largely because i want to create for my children the enjoyment i had of the season when i was growing up.

Christmas traditions

i have a lot of dreams around Christmas traditions, but haven’t been very good at bringing these to life.
here’s some ideas i want to implement.

• i really want to make an advent calendar! i hope to get to it this year… maybe not get it done, but get to it! (find a pattern, get supplies, start on it…) in each pocket there could be a treat & a small family activity/service to do that day.
• also, forrest’s family always makes wreaths together. we’ve done that together, & we really enjoy that. this year we got a bunch of holly from my sister meg, & then we drove along the nebo loop & got more evergreen to add. (this picture is last year’s wreath.)
• i want to sing a Christmas hymn & read a scripture or a Christmas story before or over dinner every night in december. (we’d have to have dinner every night!) i heard of this last year & really liked the idea, but wanted to pick out all the scriptures beforehand… & nothing every happened. last night we sang “joy to the world” together in bed. 🙂 …and i tried to remember & quote the scripture about shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night…
• another thing we did last year that i loved was go to provo’s “many lands” store & buy a bunch of fun treats like german marzipan & finnish licorice to go in our stockings.
• i also want to try to go to the nutcracker & a messiah sing-in.

what family traditions are you trying to create of preserve?

in love

i have recently fallen in love with the art of andy goldsworthy. if you have netflix, watch this. (not instantly; the picture’s bad.) if you don’t have netflix, get it!

(i do think it’s interesting that i finally watched it on my third exposure to his work.  first was at mentor graphics, the amazing reggio emilia preschool i worked at in portland, second was this, & then yesterday at my new family’s house (that i nanny for) i picked up a beautiful book of photos of his work with an intro by the artist.  i read it cover to cover in awe, then went home & watched the documentary.)

what i’m working on

kadra & i have talked quite a bit (through the years) about how to handle Christmas.  in our talkings & in seeing what other friends of our have done, here’s some ideas for new ways to “do” Christmas.  one, which i am trying this year (maybe not going 100% though) is a handmade Christmas.  this idea is pretty big around the crafting blogosphere; the idea’s certainly not new.  another way is to give Christmas experiences that you do together as a family/with friends.  like:  everyone pitches in & you go to the symphony together.   i went tubing with my friend emily & her siblings up in park city.  this was a more expensive tubing endeavor than i would have undertaken on my own, (why pay $15 for tubing when you can find the nearest hill & go for free!?? here’s why:  tow lines!  that, & manicured runs.  SO fun!) but since it was a Christmas Experience, everyone chipped in what they could & the rest was a gift.  and the memories that result are so dear.  my last idea of a different way to do Christmas is like a sub-for-santa…  but there must be a better way to do it.  i just like the idea of having a year where you truly give your Christmas to people who need “things” a lot more than you do.  not reluctantly do it in addition to, getting the least expensive things as quickly as possible, but really having it be giving your Christmas.

so, that said, back to the original post…  (:P)

i’m working on crocheting & knitting a bunch of hats for my sister’s family.  i’m currently crocheting my sister’s hat, which will be a felted cloche.  it’s so funny because it’s HUGE!  i’m almost done with the crocheting part, & i’m toying with the idea of altering the pattern so the little “brim” part is only in the front.  i have a fairly good idea of how i’d do this…  but dare i?  and i am so excited to felt it!!!  i’ve never felted before, but loooooove the idea of it.  crossing my fingers…

i am also totally intrigued by needle felting.  that’s a someday dream.  but just look at this!!  (i really want to get the kit to make this for my niece…  but she’ll be getting a darling handmade hat instead!)

dreams

kaarina started us out on the theme of dreams. i’ve lived several imaginary lives in moments here and there… and haven’t thought of them as being a part of me before, however fleeting those dreams may be. but it’s true that they are. albeit in my head, they stay with me as solid as my bones.

now that i hear them gathering around me i’ll spit this out like a list or a free verse poem:

i moved to washington

with my truck and my dog

buzzed my hair

and lived like a dandelion gone to seed with my guitar

and my voice in the wind

then

once with little left to lose

i grew my hair long and tangled

bought a motorcyle

and crossed the country a thousand times

alone

younger

i moved into an oval silver trailer

at the mouth of sandy red foothills

stayed warm in wool socks and sweaters

bundled with my best friend

and our books

younger still

my love galloped down my suburban street

i ran to meet him in bare feet

scooped into the saddle and his arms

we rode away

through the colored sky all the way to oregon

and i named him joseph

they’re fading away and now my inner history feels more real. my bones have a voice.

bali

i think dreams are important pieces of who we are. when no one knows what secret dreams we harbor inside ourselves, they become stagnant. sharing these gives them more power to not just become reality, but shape who we are, even if they never happen. i’ve always believed the proverb (13:12) “hope deferred maketh the heart sick.”

do some of your dreams need a good airing?

circa 2001 i was new in portland still, & feeling a bit awash. i’m not sure if i was back in school again or not. i do remember feeling like i wasn’t sure what the heck i was doing with my life. this feeling was both depressing & liberating. i felt like i could do anything i wanted. i started reading books on bali. i heard it was really cheap to live there. i thought about it constantly. i imagined living in a one-room grass hut on the beach, eating nothing but rice & fish, shaving my head, & living in a bikini & sarong. i think i was planning on getting dreads before i shaved my head.

there.  see?  that’s part of me!  i’m the kind of person who dreams of escaping to bali!

birthing a new blog

we needed a space to come together.  a safe space.  nurturing.  fertile ground for growing dreams & ideas into blossoming fruition.  a womb of sorts.  a space to discover & rediscover ourselves & our creativity.  a place where even our near-forgotten dreams can have a witness.  not safe in the city, not quite in the thick of the wild wood, but in the borders of discovery.

we want to create more & consume less.  we want to live more deliberately & breathe more meaningfully.

what else?  what do you want?