I think September was stolen this year by a time thief… I remember groggily waking up at 5:30am on September 1st and hearing for the first time this year a Blue Jay’s fall call. I thought to myself, “Wow! September first and they change to the fall call just like that, I better write a blog post about this…” And here we are…

Tomorrow in spite of the predicted rainy weather, I will be a vendor at my first big fair. The New England Blacksmith, Arts and Music Festival will be held September 29th from 10am – 9pm at Riverside Park in Fitchburg Ma. The director of Membership from the Fitchburg Art Musem had seen my work at a fair last November and contacted me this summer about being a vendor at this fair. I have been knitting like a mad woman because, I have no idea what to expect at a big fair. Up to this point have I sold at local church fairs, community fairs, and farmers markets. I’m trying to get an Etsy site up an running but my progress has been slow, to say the least. I have what seems, to me, an enormous number of little creatures and piles of accessories ready to go.

I’m both nervous and very excited. Not only for myself and my work. But, I can’t wait to see the blacksmithing. I have been interested in iron work since elementary school. One of my 5th grade teachers was also a smith and made the stair railings in the house I currently live in. The forging of iron seems magical and, of course, there is all that lovely fire. I’m bringing my camera and I hope to get some pictures.But for now, it’s time to get back to finishing duck bodies. I hope the weather clears some.

On a more cheerful note, nectarines, red and white, are here and delicious. And peaches…I was talking to a friend at farmers market who grows peaches and he told me that this weather which has been such a challenge for people, cats, and vegetable crops, is just perfect fro peaches. He must be right as we have been eating wonderful peaches for the past three weeks and they’re still coming in. Peach cobbler may be next on the menu.

And then there are stitch guides. I have always liked the Harmony guide series. Most recently I have been working with Lace & Eyelets: 250 stitches to knit edited by Erika Knight, published by Interweave Press.  I like the size and feel of the book, the way it opens flat so you can read the stitch instructions while you’re knitting and the sturdy spine construction and corner construction for heavy use.  I also like the way the stitch swatches are photographed in different colors helping me to think about how a particular stitch may look in a dark or light color.  Finally I like the way the stitch swatches are photographed against a white background so you can see how shadow, which always plays a part in designing with lace, may appear on a particular stitch.  I’m not a big collector of stitch compendiums.  Beyond Barbra Walker’s Treasuries and an old, dog eared, paperback, 1970′s stitch guide from Mon Tricot, I borrow new stitch guides form the library, enjoy them and return them.  But I have borrowed Lace & Eyelets five times in the last three months and I think I will now put it on my wish list of books to add to my home library.  If you like to knit lace, check this book out.

I love to knit while listening to music and at an outdoor concert I can knit as much as I like without disturbing other listeners. Generally, during a band concert, I can knit three Flower Fairy bodies. Last night I was little slow and number three is still minus a head.

Which brings me to a  a current philosophical struggle I’m having as a blogger.  Do I want to post in progress pictures of the fairies and animals I make.  I haven’t posted any so far.  On the one hand, as a person who makes things, I love seeing step by step pictures of a fellow makers process.  On the other hand when I have taken pictures of the animals and fairies in progress, I find the pictures somewhat disturbing.  Perhaps this is the lasting influence of a Doll teacher from my past who said that  if you are making a doll or repairing one, you should be careful to do it when  a child isn’t present because it is a violent thing for them to see a needle poking through an animal or figure that to them seems real.  For everything I currently make, in the animal or figure line, there is a point at which the pieces stop being pieces and start to take on what to me feels like a personality.  Perhaps I could photograph up to that point and then jump to a more finished step?  I’ve been mulling this over for sometime now but haven’t reached a conclusion.  With knitted hats, gloves, scarves, dish cloths, anything that isn’t an animal or a figure, I have no problem with in process photos.  But animals and figures…  I don’t know.  What do you think?

And so  I have no picture today, and I shall continue to ponder…

After almost a full week of really hot, humid, without a drop of rain weather; two nights of crazy thunder storms brought a lovely cooler day yesterday. Helen and Andre were actually able to use the playground instead of staring at it apathetically. The cats were grateful and wandered around the house on their usual routes instead of lying stretched full length on the studio floor panting. I felt like cooking and had a big bowl of potato salad made and in the refrigerator by 8:30 am.

Salad… I love the food at this time of year. I bought local peaches, apricots, nectarines, tomatoes and summer squash yesterday.  I like most food seasonally, but the prodigality of food, especially plant food, that is starting and will continue through September, if we have a slow fall through October, makes me grateful to live in North Worcester County. Going to a Farmers Market, local small town market, or roadside stand is an epic treat for the senses. Even our little garden, which got started late, is getting ready to churn out peppers, tomatoes, beans, cukes for the belly; sunflowers, marigolds and zinnias for the heart.

I’ve been setting up a table at the Ashburnham Farmers Market this summer and doing pretty well. This year, the Farmers Market is right outside of the North Country Sustainability Center where I have a year round vendor space. This picture was taken yesterday by my friend Diana Dyke. She is a free lance photographer whose beautiful work is often seen in our local newspapers. Helen and I are a little red because we are under a red canopy tent. I am, of course, knitting, geese feet in this photo; and Helen is looking over a book she just checked out from the library. My table was full when we started and this picture was taken about an hour and a half later. I will be a knitting fool for the rest of this week to get ready for next Monday’s market.

Today is August 1st and the deep summer Flower Fairies and Blue Berry Fairies are here. Black Eyed Susans, Zinnias, Marigolds, Daylilies, Phlox, Nasturtiums, Inpatients, which my grand mother always called Patient Lucys, Queen Anne’s Lace, Chicory and so many more. The little Fairies can hardly keep up. Time for a relaxing walk among the grass and clover.

This time of year when the nights are so full of the sounds of crickets and katydids, when full moons look extra full, when heavy morning dews leave sparkling water drops and there are fairy table cloths of dew on undisturbed grassy places, the flow of life seems so strong, so dancy and so magical I spend as much time outside as possible. With yarn of course.

In Ashby, the town next to us, my brother plays the bass in the Ashby town band at evening band concerts on Wednesday evenings. Hot dogs, homemade donuts with ice cream happy people listening to the music as the sun leaves the sky. In early July it’s still light as you drive home. By late August you need to remember to bring a sweater and it will be dark before you leave. We’ll be there tonight with Flower Fairies, Blue Berry Fairies and a few knitted geese that still need their feet.

So here I am at the end, almost, of January 2012.  Here I am with three pairs of manly socks.  The past two months have been especially crazy.  We did some great things like taking Helen to NYC for the first time.  We spent lots of time with family over the holidays, wonderful.  We also buried a beloved cat who had been part of our family for 16 years.  I miss her deeply.  Justin rearranged the fire pit and wood storage so we can have outside winter fires.  The lack of snow has allowed me to keep the compost pile going longer than I usually do.  I’ve re arranged my schedule to allow me to home school my nephew two days a week.  It’s good to be teaching again.

Big news, the North Country Sustainability Center found a temporary winter home in an empty school building in town and has boomed.  We have up and running classes, lectures, music programs, retail space, and we’re improving the building. So far, I am proudest of the retail space which sells local eggs, baked goods, meat, and the work of local artisans (like me) Tuesday through Saturday; and the open mic which provides a place for young performers, like Helen, to stretch their wings and fly.  On February 25th, the School House Art Gallery will open its first show at the Center.  Justin and others have been working like crazy to renovate the gallery space, develop the membership rules, create a website and, of course, hang work.

But what about the knitting…I produced a tremendous amount of  work in the past three months and sold most of it.  The experience had its ups and downs and I have a lot to think through about where to go from here.  I  finished all of my custom orders on time, the green and orange pairs of socks are the end of my list.  And so I sit here with three manly pairs of socks.  Stay tuned for snow babies and sweetheart fairies.

Around and around and around.  The first creches I made, I made by dressing my dolls in scraps of fabric and scarves to be the major players with a bread basket as a manger for Jesus.  I have made creches in paper, clay, with pine cones, with rocks, with fabric, embroidered, crocheted, and of course knitted.  Only  two of these have lasted through time; the pottery set I sculpted, glazed, and had fired when I was 9 or 10, and the Waldorf style creche I made for Helen when she was 4.  So I was very excited when Donna Slocum of Creative Connections http://www.ccgiftgallery.com/, a lovely gift store in town; asked me to knit some creches for her store.

I  would not describe myself deeply devoted to a particular denomination, but I find as I grow older that I am deeply religious.  I am most at home with the Unitiarian/ Universalist viewpoint plus a strong dash Pantheism, and a reverence for the mystical aspects of Catholicism.  I find working on a creche, especially at this time of year, to be an inward journey.  Deep, frustrating as my technical limitations stand in the way of expressing my vision fully, joyful when I work through the limitations, or sometimes finally accepting when I acknowledge that my wool and needles can only bring me so close to my ideal.

I feel such awe and respect for Mary strong in her sense of herself and her willingness to give.  I feel such tenderness when I finish Jesus and cradle him in her arms.  He is for me, then, a baby, not so much a God/Savior as a little baby containing the potential for everything which is divinity enough for me.  And Joseph…I like Joseph.  He often gets short shrift from  theological perspective, or is shown as a feeble old man or an accessory to the main event.  Not for me.  I like Joseph.  Hardworking,  plying his trade, suspending his disbelief in favor of the miraculous, taking care of his family, a straight up guy.  He is worthy of my respect and admiration.  Together they are the Holy Family, they are and represent the best of what we can be to each other, the adults willing to shelter the promise of a new child, the child reaching toward them into the future.

And so I finished the first figures in this new set of creches.  I wonder what sort of feelings will get stirred up by the knitting of the kings.

It has been a crazy six months or so. Craft Fairs and Farmers’ Markets have kept my knitting needles moving at lightening speed. I’m rapidly wearing through the points of my second new set, new since March, of Susan Bates dp#1s. I really like Susan Bates double pointed needles. I have been using them off and on, mostly on, for all of my knitting years. I have also used Inox, Quick Silver, Aero, Bamboo,and several different kinds of wooden needles. But I keep coming back to Susan Bates for small gauge double pointed needles. The needles have points that are sharp but not so sharp that they split the two ply yarn I work with most often, or prick my fingers. They allow the yarn to slide easily and feel good in my hands. But their real charm lies, for me, in their colors. I love their metalic colors. The pair I am currently wearing out is a lovely warm peachy copper. The pair before that was a pale silvery green. And don’t even get me started on the wonderful colors they used to come in pinky purple, greeny yellow, deep blue, cranberry red… Needless to say, I paw through piles of second hand knitting equipment trying to find these old beauties in good enough condition to work with. Last year, the passing of my sister-in -law’s beloved grandmother lead to the gift of a much cherished stash of old knitting needles. Every time I pick up the purple #1s or the dark green #2s, I think of this creative woman and my sister-in-law’s generous gift to me. Thank you Kate.

My other project has been working with some very creative, far sighted, incredibly hard working people to develop a Sustainability Center for our region in Ashburnham. Ashburnham, like many New England towns. has a surfeit of old abandoned mill buildings and few economic opportunities that don’t require intensive commuting. The idea of a Sustainability Center grew out of a desire to re-educate people about doing for themselves, promote a better understanding of local farming and the food it produces, make people more aware of the goods and services produced in our area, provide a space for local artisans to display and sell their work and to teach their crafts. To be able to do these things in ways that are sustainable. That nourish our community and the communities around us. As with any project of this size, the amount of time and work involved in starting up is enormous.

About two weeks ago, we signed a lease for a temporary home in an old school building owned by the town that would otherwise have been vacant this winter. We’re still working on issues with the heating system, so I really appreciate the spell of warm weather we’re having. But we’re moving forward. You can check us out at http://www.northcountrysustain.org/ We will be having our official grand opening December 10th from 10am – 4pm with a fair, farmer’s market, food, information about classes and membership.

I’ll be selling the items in the picture (Photo courtesy of Diana Dyke) and what ever other things my fevered brain dreams up between now and then. If you can, stop by, check us out, and shop small.