December? Already?!!!

I was assigned this space for the craft fair that benefits the Silver Lake VFD.  I guess you can tell we're in a firehouse.  It's not very aesthetic and I was completely upstaged by the fire hoses.  I sold enough here so that I can order a AVL electric bobbin winder which I'd like to do this week.  I'm still recovering from all the fun, family and food at Thanksgiving!

Don't you think this would be a great calendar page?

It's not unusual for us to get a snow storm right after Thanksgiving and when we used to cut Christmas trees the day after, there was snow on the ground and sometimes falling on us.  Instead this year we're getting soaking rain.  Not the typical gully washer that leaves channels in our driveway but more like the rain in Oregon.  

In spite of the mucky muddy conditions Ian decided to drive up into the Sierras yesterday and cut a tree before today's story arrived.  There's no snow up there and he had to drive through a number of puddles.

This is our tree for 2014.  It's a little wonky but all natural trees are.  The only perfect ones are plastic.  We brought it into the house just as the latest storm hit so we got a little wet.  It's rained since this morning and is supposed to rain clear through tomorrow.  It's also raining in the mountains so again, no snow.

I've been in a weaving funk lately.  I think part of the problem is that I got focused on weaving stuff to sell for Christmas.  Sales are always best this time of year and my inventory is low, so instead of weaving for me, I was weaving for a purpose.  I wasn't happy with the last iridescent scarf I wove but I did like the teal, so put that on for warp.  I studied my sample gamp and also Deb Menz's color book and chose the color on the left.  To make a long story short, I ended up making it a sampler and have come to the conclusion that I'm not wild about iridescent cloth.

Now I decided to just weave for me and pulled out a skein of yarn I had spun up last spring.  I enjoyed weaving this scarf and I'm happy with it.  I've decided against listing scarves on Etsy as they have to be felt to be appreciated.  While it doesn't look it, this scarf is soft and drapey.  This is my first item for next years Christmas market.

I also have started my first lace, a six-shaft huck scarf.  It's a draft I got from someone on the 4-Shaft group but I hadn't seen it as cloth.  I'm disappointed as I expected a more traditional appearing huck. At the same time, I'm glad I didn't do anything more complex for my first lace.  It's a different kind of weaving and it was hard to think in terms of six harnesses instead of four.  I had a half dozen threading errors which weren't easy to fix on this pale lavender Tencel on a gray day, in spite of being in front of a big window.  It's not what I wanted it to look like but at the same time I'm very pleased.  

Being at my wits end, I decided to give acupuncture a try and started on November 4th, going once a week with the blessings of my GP and also my GYN oddly enough, whom I routinely see in November.  My insurance pays for the sessions the same rate as for physical therapy.  I'm seeing Raina Ferran, who is the only acupuncturist on my insurance company's preferred provider list and I have had four sessions to date.  I still have a stiff neck but more mobility than I've had since my accident.  The down side is that for two or three days afterward, I am exhausted.  There's no information on acupuncture other than that it has not been researched or medically proven, so I don't know anything more than what I'm experiencing.  My reasoning is that if after each session I experience less swelling in my neck and a loosening of the muscles, there must be materials that are flushing out that my body has to deal with.  Who knows?  No one apparently.