Speed

You know, it's all Slow Cloth. Even a three-day weekend like this one, pretty much dedicated to fiber in among the chores and errands, doesn't really let me accomplish that much.

I dyed eleven skeins of handspun into five colors for a woven bag. Weaving this will have to wait till I finish the red rag rug, which make take a while - see below.

I spun 4 ounces of Spunky Eclectic wool into 110 yards of uneven bulky three-ply. I suppose this could be a hat or part of a sweater someday; for now, it's stash.

I finished the bobbin of Corriedale/Border Leicester fine singles; I think I started this bobbin a week ago. There's another half-bobbin or so to go of the roving; then I can start plying. When the yarn's finished, I can dye it. When the dyeing's done, I can weave it. When the weaving's done, I can sew myself a jacket. (Don't wait up.)

I wound a warp for a red rag rug. Putting this warp on the loom has to wait till I decide once and for all what to do with the Paternayan krokbragd sample on the loom right now. I found more, a lot more, Paternayan needlepoint yarn yesterday when I was looking for that cross-stitch sampler of mine, so now I think I could do something cool with graduated colors in krokbragd. Plus, I need to cut a lot more 2-inch strips of red fabric for weft for the rag rug before I can start weaving that, anyway.

I dug out of the stash four skeins of Merino superwash in Woolbearers' Chocolate-covered Cherries colorway and wound them into balls; I still haven't decided which scarf pattern to knit with these. I wanted some not-gray, not-blue knitting and this yarn was the first to come to hand. Citron might actually be a good pattern for this, but I think this strongly variegated yarn might overwhelm any pattern but the simplest; I might just knit a feather-and-fan lace scarf out of it.

I've done a little of everything this weekend.

And yet, nothing's finished. All of these are worthwhile, to some extent, although none of them are likely to be earth-shattering projects when they're done. Even if I had spent all weekend working on one project, that one project would likely not be finished either. Plus, my knees would be sore from too much spinning, or my hands from too much knitting, or my back from too much loom warping.

It's patience I need to cultivate. An appreciation for the process, or processes, in my case. I suppose I'm going to have to think, really think, about why I knit/spin/weave, about what I really want to make, and about how to get there from here. It's been very easy to just acquire more yarn/fiber/wheels/looms/books/whatever over the past four or five years in particular - but now I don't really want to buy more just for the sake of acquisition.

Now I want to make stuff. I typed I want to create first, but then I got scared by the pretentiousness of that, so I scaled it back.

I suppose what I want is to understand why I am compelled to make stuff, to create; I suppose I need to create so as to look at what I create and find out who I am.

And finding out who I am is the scary part.