My blog has moved....but you don't have to miss it.   Click HERE to read my latest post.

Then when you comment, there is a place right under the comment form, where you can sign up to get an email notification, every time I post.

Hope to see you there.

I'll keep posting here, for the next few times I post,  with a link to my latest post

HERE

To sign up for emails notifying you of my latest blog, you have to comment, and right below the comment box, there is a place to sign up.

There's a new post  HERE

And under the comment section there is a place for you to sign up for email notifications every time I post!!!!!!!!
So comment!
And sign up!

See you there.

  New post:



                                        An extra hour

New post

Until I figure this out, I will put a link here when I post, so everyone can find it.
I will also put a link on the side bar.

NEW POST

It's done!

   


My new web site is up and running.  I would like to take credit for it, but of course I can't.   The young man who did all the work, was kind enough to say that I helped, and of course, I gave him the photos and the text, but he did the heavy lifting.   I could never have built this web site by myself.

Crazy as a Loom Weaving Studio

Please look it over, and give me your feedback.  I hope you like it as well as I do.
I am especially in love with the logo, top left of the home page.  He really nailed it.

There are only 10 items for sale on it for now.   I have the big Hudson Mohawk Weaver's Guild show coming up Nov 21-24, in Latham, NY.  I will wait until that is over, and then I will seriously list everything in the shop.

He was unable to bring my whole blog over to the site, there are so many posts since 2007.  But he brought over the last 10 posts, and a link back here, if someone is of the mind to read old stuff.
I will not delete this blog, but leave it here for whoever might want to read it.  And to be honest, I am always going back myself, to find out when I went somewhere, or when something in particular happened.  It's here, in my blog, most often.

So here it is:   For future use.

Crazy as a Loom Blog

Or you can just go to www.crazyasaloom.com  and click on the blog heading on the right.

I think that this is way overdue.  I probably should have done it years ago.   It's all about investing in myself, and in what I love.   It's a web site that I can be proud of.   I realize now how amateurish my old site was, and why it didn't encourage anyone to hang around at all.
My assignment for quiet evenings is to watch You Tube videos about Woo Commerce, because I will have to get comfortable with listing products.  I am hoping to have  a hefty amount of greeting cards, a lot of dish towels, and a ton of clothes up by the end of the year, which, btw, is not all that far away.

On other fronts, I have managed to gather a good stash of vintage books, destined for paper crafting this winter.

It's a time for sweaters, and hot tea, and planning projects.........right now, the weather is holding.  But we know that won't last for long.

So check it out.......please comment......I hope you like it.

See you over there.

Hilary

And it's fall.

I am finally taking the plunge, and revamping/upgrading my web site.
I've had it for years and years, and I've always done it myself....but it's become pretty lame.
I sell a lot of stuff on FB, but when people ask if I have "more" or "different colors", I really can't refer them to my web site, because it is so lame.

Part of my reasoning is that if my web site is decent, and I can drive customers from FB and Instagram, over to my new and improved web site, where all the towels and all the clothes are available,  perhaps I won't feel so bad about letting shows GO.

Not that I won't do a show if I feel like it, but no more of this 5-8 shows a summer.   I am just too tired of all of that.

So stay tuned, I'm hoping in a couple of weeks, it will be up and running, though I won't probably be putting a lot of product on it until after the Guild Show November 21-24.   After that, I will be diligent about keeping the web site as current as possible.


The mushrooms in the last post were oyster mushrooms, and this one is "hen in the woods".

Both allegedly edible.

Here's what's for dessert.....a Swedish Apple Pie.....to die for I might add, and SO easy.

Recipe available on request.

This next minutia is for Lois, I know she wants to know.   How accurate it is?   Well, who really knows.

So the other day I was wasting time on Pinterest..... and I saw the term "chaffle".

And of course, I said WTH is a CHAFFLE???????

Which led me to tons of pins, and basically, a chaffle is a thing popular  with Keto diets.

It's a waffle, made with cheese and eggs........and there are more variations than I could imagine.

You can use any old waffle maker, but they suggest this Mini Dash.........about $10 at Target.

And the first one I made was pretty tasty, kind of like an egg muffin...but so much easier and quicker.

I'm sure I will be making more.

So, what's on the looms???


Well, the hand dyed milk warp is on the AVL, and I'm using a hand dyed cotton hemp as weft.   It is yardage.

Lois is weaving an 8 harness draft, making towels, on the Baby Wolf, in 8/2 cotton.

I love the pattern.

and the color combination.

I usually love October, but this year, the abundance of ticks has me pretty disheartened.   I hadn't seen any ticks all summer, and this week alone, I've taken at least 20 off the dogs, and a couple off myself.
They are supposedly more active at this time of year.   They are hateful little creatures, and I am nostalgic for those days when I was growing up, and my kids were growing up, when we had never even heard of them, didn't worry about them, and being outside was a lot more enjoyable without them.
The world is going to hell, in a hand basket.

Just say no.

Rough night, waking up every hour with such a headache.......troublesome dreams in between, because I was so tired.

This morning, after I let the dogs out and fed them, and the cats, I settled on the couch in my favorite (ok my only) bathrobe, and wondered WTH I was going to be able to do today.  Then I actually admitted to myself, that I didn't really give a damn.  Pain takes over at some point, and the mind just throws in the towel.  Enough already.

Then I picked up my laptop, to look to see if the time of year was what was making my headache rock.  The ragweed mostly.   I checked my blog 2018, but no mention in September or October of this kind of distress.
So I tried 2017, and I came across this post:   Sept 12, 2017

Then I read your comments.  All of them. It made me teary, and I realized, that "this too shall pass".

Hold on.  Hold on tight, and try not to worry.  This is exactly where you are supposed to be, no matter how much it hurts.

All those years in Al Anon, (not one minute wasted), bring me back to the most important lesson I have ever learned:  One day at a time.  One hour.......ok, one minute at a time.

DO WHAT IS RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU.


I found the herbal heat packs I ordered from Bed, Bath and Beyond, and heated them up.
The one went on my neck and shoulders.

The one across my face did the trick......I could instantly feel my sinuses start to drain.  Wowza.

 Here's what it looks like, and when heated, it smells wonderful.
Who knew?

Then I ate half a bagel, took some Claritin, and some Alleve, took a shower, and got myself ready for the day.
I made a decision to love this day, no matter what.

When Lois arrived, set to finish threading a loom, I told her I wanted to take a drive, to look for an old cemetery I had found years ago, and wasn't entirely sure if I could find it.
She said, "Let's go."

So we piled the kids (Naya and Willie) in the car, and set out for Crown Point, NY.

And it's true, 30 years ago, I was touring the back roads and came across this old cemetery, there just happened to be a little wooden sign by the road.  I was amazed to find, that my great, great, great grandfather, his wife and a son were buried there.  I had all the family tree mapped out, I had done all that back in the 70's.  And here they were.  Serendipity.

We amazingly found the path into the woods, and the cemetery, with very little trouble.  The sign by the road was gone, but there was a rusty chain from two old cedar poles, and it looked promising.

 The sign was in the woods, where you entered the actual space.

I wanted to take photos of the gravestones, because I knew that eventually the information would be lost, and probably no one else will go there.
It wasn't far off the road at all, and there were a lot more graves there than I remember.
It was, sadly, abandoned and uncared for.

My great, great, great grandfather was there, Zebedee Cooper, Jr., his wife Melinda Cooper, (also referred to as Linda) and their son, Curtis Cooper, who died at age 16.

I wish I owned the land,  and it was closer, I would keep the cemetery in better shape.
But I'm glad we went, and I will make notes of exactly where it is.

We left there, and took the kids for a walk in the woods, which they thoroughly enjoyed.

Saw some funky fungi.   Have no idea what kind they are.

Brought two tired pups home to continue their afternoon snooze.

While I finish my new book.

The headache???  Oh, it's still with me, but it can't have this day, not entirely.  

I just said NO.

All things considered......

Before I start, I wanted to tell my readers about another blog post.  In 2012, Twylla Alexander came to my studio, but she came for the labyrinth.  She was writing a book about them, which I highly recommend.  Yesterday, she emailed me, to tell me about a blog post that she wrote, inspired by my blog.  It is HERE.

If you read it first, maybe all this will make more sense.

I've been having more of a headache for the last few weeks, which I have attributed to the high ragweed pollen count, plus other allergens.  Add that to my already compromised head, and it puts my headache right over the top.
This morning, on top of my worse than usual headache, I got the jagged light in my eye, promising a migraine to really be the "frosting on the cake", so to speak.

I had an OMT appointment at 12:15pm, so in spite of the fact that I really wanted to crawl in a hole somewhere, I managed to get myself over there....it's a half hour drive.

During it, I had a disconcerting experience....you might say that my mind wandered off, trying to get away from this head and neck that felt like someone had poured concrete there, and then dropped me off the roof of a building.

I clearly saw this room, as if I were standing in the doorway, looking in.  There were no windows in the room, so the light came from the open door.  There was a large table, long,  to seat at least 12 people, and on the table there was an "oil cloth".....no kidding......  There was a door to the right, and I could see a stairway out there, and there was a room behind this room I stepped into, and it was open straight through, but I couldn't say what it was.  For a few moments, it was so real, and I felt that any minute, all these people were about to sit down to a meal.

Then I heard this voice, that said, "This is your head, and YOU alone have the answers to this pain.  You can access those answers if you try."

No, I am not drinking.  It was all very real, and at the end of the OMT session, I felt just as awful as I did when I got on the table.

On the way home, I started thinking about it, and about the "tiny life" concept, and also about the concept of "enough', and still about "if not now, when?"

And I asked myself, "if you could do anything that you wanted,  what would it be?"

Travel?  Adventure?  Novelty?  Excitement?

That's when the tears came.  Because I realized that none of that matters, not one whit.
I only want a life without this headache.
That's all.

I don't need to see other countries, climb mountains, see Broadway plays, sky dive, learn new things.

Not one thing appeals to me, makes me want to plan my getaway.


I just want this "tiny life" and I want it without a headache.

Oh, I know that is probably not going to happen.  I know that 8 years into it, there is probably no light at the end of this tunnel.
I can only hope for better days, less headache, the chance to do the things right in front of me,


So for today, it's heat on the neck, more Advil, rest, and not much else.

And hopefully, by tomorrow, I will have kicked this old body square in the behind, and told myself to "get the hell over it".  By then, maybe I will have counted all my blessings, and put it all in perspective.

But sometimes it's good to call it what it is.   Because it's hard. So I curse it out, cry a little.

Then I'll let it go. 

I finally got the towel warp off the AVL, just in time for a show in Vermont.

It was a nice day, and a nice show, but the whole day I found myself wondering what the heck I was doing.

Loading the truck the day before is a huge job,  but necessary so we can leave at the crack of dawn the next day.

Then we have to unload the truck in a designated amount of time, so we don't hold up the line of traffic behind us.

Then it's set up time, making a 10' x 10' tent look like a place to shop.

Then it's time to load the truck up, and now, we have even LESS time.   By the time we drive away, we are whipped.   An hour or better on the road, and it feels much longer.

12 hours after we left, we arrive home, and then we have to UNLOAD the truck.
We barely get it in the barn, and product in the house.  The actual putting everything where it belongs doesn't happen until the next day.

In short, I think I am getting over shows.  Like REALLY getting over shows.

I have some thinking to do.  Just the guild show left in November, which does not require me to be there for four days.
But before shows start next spring, I have to try to figure out another way to market my wares.  I definitely felt like it was just too much work.  Or maybe I'm just getting too old to really enjoy it.
Or does anyone really.


On the studio front, I have a "milk" warp that I dyed, on the loom and just about ready to go.

My friend from Georgia was here all last week, and we did some crafting together.

I had planned a couple of things, and made sure I had all the stuff we needed.

Feathers from old books was one of them.

They really turned out better than I expected.  We dipped them in glitter, some silver, some god.

And now I have them hanging all over my house.

Friday, my grands came, and we did more crafting.    Apparently painting a unicorn is pretty hysterical.

And yes, the dinosaur is blue.

On the dog front, I can't believe that I was worried about two dogs.   Willie is good for Naya, and she is good for him.

I love what Denise called this game:  "Bitey Face".

Yes, and they do it every day.  Several times, so it must really be fun.

They are busy all day, and they crash at night.  And it's true, a dog loves nothing more than another dog.

My friend kind of rolls her eyes, I know she wonders what on earth anyone would want two dogs for.

But I can't imagine my house without them.

So after a pretty exhausting week, I'm now spending a pretty quiet weekend.


Despite the occasional bumps in the road, I am blessed.


My six grands.

My three beautiful daughters.

''
Life is good.