Musings Amid Bubbles

So this came to me in the shower today and I couldn't stop rhyming until I wrote it down.  Imagine a beat or snapping fingers...which is more of a beatnik thing...but you get the gist.

Hey, I’m not a rapper so this might not rhyme

But all existence has a beat; you just have to keep time.

I find myself halfway through this dance

Still enchanted by rainbows and romance

All those words people say

About kindness is the better way

Through and through

Those words are true

I can live that grind

Make each day sublime

But after all this distance

It's in the temple I get resistance

In a hurry

All that worry

Can weigh me down

Make it hard to turn my frown around

I’m not a poser

Just a composer

Of my destiny

It needs to be nurtured carefully

Dreams need room to grow

Even if troubles come like an undertow

Trying to drag you down

Stand your ground

For what you believe

Don’t be deceived

When you dress

To impress

Is it the real you?

The one with true value

Or a mimic of a self

That you take off a shelf

To show the world a different mask

For each type of task

That you face in your day-to-day

But is this the only way?

Did anyone tell you, you get to choose?

What passion gets to be your muse

If things aren’t going your way

Don’t take it out on the next player in the play

You can rewind

And be kind

Make a smile

Your new lifestyle

You choose

To refuse

Or accept a way of being

That is totally freeing

From all that negativity and strife

Generate a healthier life

All that stuff I don't need, I dismiss

Instead, I choose to live my bliss.

R

Nature's Bounty

So last week I was doing a little gardening and ran into some nettles.  From that point on I did everything wrong.  I had a nettle in my finger and removed it and cleaned the area and I thought that was it.  But, I was very, very wrong.

Later, I would find nettles in my arm that were surrounded by blisters so I could not remove them with tape.  I used hot water to clean off the area instead of cold and that made the stinging pain escalate.  Then I had an allergic reaction to the whole mess.

It is so much better now.  There are only little pricks of pain because the rash burned off the top of skin on my arm; like a sunburn.  But yeah, so happy the itching is gone.  I never scratched because I didn't want infection on top of everything so I was a little crazy for the last week.  I couldn't retain info for more than a moment in some situations.  But Praise the Goddess, all that is over with.

Here is actual info if you do run into nettles.  In most cases, they will not be as bad as mine.

• Wash the area with soap and water as soon as possible to relieve the sting and remove the nettle hairs. 
• If you suspect nettle hairs; use duct tape to remove them.
• Apply a paste of baking soda and water. 
• Avoid scratching or rubbing the itchy areas. 
• Use cool, light, bedding and clothing as this will help relieve itching. (everything will feel rough)
• Avoid extreme heat – have lukewarm baths and showers. (makes it sooo much worse!)
• Apply cold compresses. (ah...heaven)
• Apple cider vinegar or aloe can also be soothing.  (used both at different times)
• Try to stick to foods that are anti-inflammatory.  (turmeric anyone?)
• Antihistamines may relieve itching and swelling.   (may)
• A cream with hydrocortisone will reduce inflammation.  (1%)
• Make sure you wash everything that came in contact with the nettles.

The thing is while all this was going on with my skin, I was creating a new shawl design with a singular focus.  This was a project I started a while ago and it was nice to dust it off and work with it again.  I had made a sample and charted it.  When I went to pull up the chart it was unreadable since the software that had supported it was no longer working.

At that point with all the itching and crazy, I just wanted to give up.

But. I  didn't.  I worked on it a bit each day and fixed the problems I had with my sample.  I reverse-engineered the sample and was able to recreate the idea I originally hoped for.

I give you Nature's Bounty.  I really enjoyed creating this little shawlette.  It can be used to teach beginning lace since it starts small and grows.  It teaches how increases and decreases are paired so that you can control the growth of the shawl.  It also demonstrates how placing yarn overs in different places can shape the motif to form a curve.  It is one of the magical things I love about lace and I am happy that I got to work with some beautiful motifs in this shawl.

Bright Blessings!

Ruinwen

:)

Dressing Your Temple

I finished the prayer shawl and I am in love with the final product...absolutely smitten.  This shawl has such good energy that I can feel it pulsating with compassion, kindness, and community.

It makes me happy to hold it in my hands.  I wanted to design a prayer shawl for a while now but nothing seemed right.  But I drew this pattern up in less than an hour.  Tested it, tweaked it and started knitting it on the same day.  That is very rare in my world.  I felt it was a nod from the PTB (Powers That Be) to go ahead.  And here it is back from its photoshoot looking fabulous!

To go off on a tangent here…most people have decorated their homes with memories, colors, and themes that make them happy or have a special personal meaning.  But with our temples, our bodies, sometimes we get into ruts and just wear the same things over and over in the name of comfort or lack of time.

I am so guilty of the comfort style look.  I get up early and work in a place with no one but a dog and an occasional visitor.  I would rather be comfy then spiffy but there gets to be a point where comfy becomes complacent and turns into more of nightwear then day wear…you know what I mean right?

I used to dress with energy in mind and pay attention to my daily colors; I believe color can change or enhance your mood.  One reason I love spring and fall so much is the colors.  After a long winter, those pops of color are a healing balm for the soul.  As the cooler days of fall come in and the trees start to turn it is like nature is pulling up a blanket and telling us to slow down Winter is Coming…lol

By implementing Daily Color you use your day of birth to calculate how you are going to dress your temple that day. 

For instance, if red is your color of the day it would mean it is an auspicious time to begin something or try something new.  Red for me is also the color of Aries so it has a more intense meaning.

You can try it out here if your interest has been peaked.  On special days I try to dress to my strengths and harmonize my colors with the Universe.  Also, I have a set of scarves that have all the colors in them for tucking into my purse on days when I can’t find a thing to wear in the right color.

Back to the shawl...it is full of high vibration energy, connection with the divine through the crown chakra and the quiet energy of prayers and healing that come with the violet spectrum of color.  I hope that this shawl adorns the intended with good, holy, healing energy.

May your days be full of color and unexpected blessings!

Ruinwen

Things Forgotten

Do not trust your memory; it is a net full of holes; the most beautiful prizes slip through it.
Georges Duhamel

I made this hooded caplet and I used it a lot last winter.  It is perfect for keeping the wind out and adding a layer of warmth.

This winter I found this.  Something had broken quite a few yarn strands and there was even a hole...I think a cat tried to eat it...not sure why.

I tried to fix it and ended up with this since the yarns kept on breaking.  While no one will probably even notice that the rows no longer line up; I do.  This means I need to undo everything I did to fix it and rip back a row in each direction to clean out the broken ends that I duplicate stitched.

Unfortunately, the damage was more extensive, the ends kept on breaking and I had to rip it out.  There was no saving the cowl.  I was able to save most of the yarn.  So when I knit something new with the yarn will it remember being a cowl?  Will it hold the spirit of all the warmth it gave me?  Will it mean more to me since the yarn is full of happy memories tinged with the loss of the cowl?

This got me thinking about memories and how we perceive them.  Often it is our point of view that determines how a memory is experienced by us.  A small child will remember an event differently than an adult.  If you were happy during the course of the memory you might remember the favorable parts of the event and forget any unpleasant ones.

I was often surprised when my parents told me of an event I remembered so clearly in a different way then I thought it happened.  Yet, they could have been the ones who had changed the story of the event in their minds.  The truth is really just your point of view at times even if everyone sees that differently.

One of the Reiki symbols can be used to change how you perceive an event.  You cannot change the past but you can change how you react to it.  You can take a painful memory and like the hole in my caplet, slowly rebuild it layer by layer.

People have strong beliefs that are challenged by others or new ideas and they change how they perceive things based on new information.  Changing a memory is really no different.

Another thing you can do it is to take away an emotional attachment to a certain memory or trigger.  Say you hate rain and every time it rains you get mad.  This anger serves no real purpose.  Maybe it is rooted in the fact that you slipped and fell on the championship game and let your team down.  You've let that one moment in time warp rain into a negative being almost.  Because you have this attachment to rain every time it starts to drizzle things will go bad for you.  This will only add fuel to a long-standing fire and cement the anger that begins to build when it rains.

If you could go back into that memory of falling at the big game and change it to something more positive then rain would just be rain again.  Not good or bad, just rain.  There would be no emotional attachment to it anymore.

Instead of focusing on failing everyone maybe you could remember how hard you did try.  You could remember that everyone slipped in the mud a bit that day and it had been a challenging time but you had done your best.  You could remember your coach telling you that it was okay because you had really grown over the year as a player.  The other team members chimed in about various plays you were a part of and how important you were to their team.

It might take a while to start to believe in your new story but as you do you will release those negative feelings towards rainy days and that you failed your team.  Maybe the following year you helped win the championship game and that fact had been lost in all that negativity that you had been wallowing in.  Now when you look at the trophy on your wall you will remember the friends and teammates, the fun and the hard work but you won’t be focused on the game you lost anymore.

So, no one will ever know the story of my cowl or whatever the yarn turns into this time and how it had a death experience from looking at it.  But I know...does that knowing change how I feel about it?  In truth, the hole, the mending, will all be forgotten as it continues on as a new project a new item with new stories to tell.

I feel this lesson that this cowl has taught me is an important one.  I've been asked to write up the pattern by a bunch of people.  I take notes for everything I make so I can create them again.  It is going into my enormous queue...but it will not be forgotten  :)

Speaking of forgetting things.  Memorizing lists has been shown in many cases to reconnect brain function.  So, working on a pattern with a bunch of repeats that you memorize is actually helping your brain get a good work out and keeping those pathways flowing.  Yet another benefit to knitting!

Happy crafting,

Ruinwen

:)

Growing Strong

I have been working on a prayer shawl for someone who just had some surgery and is having a rough time.  I also need to bring healing to our connection because of a misunderstanding which brought in a bit of a rift between us.  I am not making this shawl to gain any sort of ground in the personal matter because that would be wrong.  I just can’t stand to see anyone that I have been connected to in pain.

But with all knitting, this shawl has provided me with a feeling of new peace and I have enjoyed working on it.  I am about ½ done here.

I wanted to make something that echoed all the prayers and positive thinking and shaped them into a traveling vine that made its way across the shawl.  Each leaf helps the other and that strength builds to shape the vine into something truly wondrous.

I used three vines with leaves for the Trinity.  For me, that is the three faces of the Goddess: the Maiden, Mother, and Crone.  For you that might be Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Three is a holy number in most religions and everyone knows good things come in threes.

I like cables for stability.  They are like a winding staircase that holds everything together and lets the prayers climb higher along the shawl.

And finally, there is a slipped stitch because the motifs need some delineation between them in order to grow and not become lost in one another.

I used Knit Picks Mighty Stitch because I really like the vibrant colors and the softness of the yarn.  I chose the eggplant, mulberry, fairytale, wisteria and blush colors for the higher end of the spectrum which focuses on the third eye and crown chakra energy; also she likes purple.

The pattern is easy to follow and the repeats become easy to memorize.  The cables mix things up a bit so that it isn’t quite a mindless knit either.  

I've decided to call it my growing strong prayer shawl.

I hope to get this all worked up and tested and do a photoshoot before the end of summer.  But I need to focus on knitting it first.  lol

Happy Knitting,

Ruinwen

Hi World...

Hi.  I know that I’ve been gone for forever.

When Mom and Dad died I lost my voice.  I just couldn’t front all the time.

I wanted to be my happy little rainbows and unicorns self but it was just too hard to keep up the act when my heart was breaking.

That doesn’t mean that I curled up in a ball and kept out the world.  I kept working, knitting, gaming and enjoying my time with my friends and family.  But my special spark was gone.

I know that this is perfectly normal but I missed me; the real me that really meant all that happiness and stardust stuff she said.

Then, two weeks ago I went down to grab something for my knitting class and found out that a mouse had nestled down, chewed and nested in all the knitting that I have ever done for me and I think I broke through that void that had surrounded me for so long.

I finally found my voice though it was small at first; and it was very, very sad.

This blog is a record to most of those treasures which I still, have to get the courage to throw away.

The one that hurt the most is the blanket I made as Mom lay in the hospital recovering from her first cancer surgery.  It was Jared Flood’s Hemlock blanket and I loved that project.  I had so much trouble starting it because my hands were shaking worrying about Mom.  When I got it finished I bound off too tightly and I always vowed to fix it, but I never got there.  Now I will have to just toss it because it is the worst of all of them.  I know that it kept that mouse warm and it was so soft too; can I find comfort in that?

I made twin scarves for me and my sister to wear in Hawaii and mine is trashed and that makes me sad.  We buried Mom at sea in Hawaii, it was a beautiful ceremony even though I was seasick at the time.  The Kahu had the most serene and lovely voice and his blessing is a moment I will always treasure.  I am sorry to lose the twin to my sister’s scarf.

Each piece of knitting has a story.  My life and emotions at the time I made them is woven into the fabric and it hurts to just have to get rid of them.  Even though I can remake each of them, they will not have the spirit that they once had.  So I just have to let them go.  But the memories will remain here on these virtual pages and in my heart.

I'm not sure when I will write again.  But I do know that every once and a while I miss this blog with such fierceness.  It has allowed me to share a bit of my inner self that I don't always see when I write in its pages.  This blog has helped me to see things of valve that I can dust off or nurture that I have forgotten.  

This feels so perfect to be writing again.  Almost like a loose gear has slipped into place and there is a humming of happiness that is not a facade but rather a song that is bursting from my soul.

Bright blessings,

Ruinwen