Lent: a season of less

photo credit: Betsy Barber

In giving ourselves to a season of less, we learn that our personal comforts have little to do with the love of Christ. We, like most of God's creatures, are seasonal and should know that some seasons are harsher than others. There are different lessons to be learned, different habits to be employed in winter than in summer. This is as true in our spiritual lives as it is in our gardens or the forest.

                                  -Cate MacDonald, "Lent", Let Us Keep the Feast.




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Weekend Links: Getting things done, being blesed, and more!

Some good reading from around the Web for your weekend:

"Face It: Your Decks Will Never Be Cleared":

The reality is: Things never clear up. They don’t even reliably settle down. Your in box is always full. The decks are always crowded. There is always more going on than you want or expect. Nonetheless, you can find ways to put your writing first, and make sure that it gets done. Otherwise, everything but your writing will get done.

"Why I don’t say 'I’m so blessed.'":

. . . God loves you. But I don’t know how, just like I don’t know how or why or how much He loves me. He makes rain fall on the wicked and the just, and woe to the just who think that they deserve the rain.

"Episode 9: Slay Your Dragons Before Breakfast So They Don’t Eat Your Lunch [Podcast]":  I really enjoyed this particular episode of "This is Your Life", on productivity.

"Jennifer Orkin Lewis": I loved this interview with an artist on her habit of sketching with paints for 30 minutes every day. (Hat tip to Melissa Wiley.)

"5 Easy Indoor DIY Succulent Ideas": Maybe it's just because I live in a hot place where succulents grow REALLY well, but I loved this post.

"Four Unexpected Benefits of a Small Church":

When I was in college and attended the big college-town churches, it was very easy to take in a sermon, get the free college kid care package, and book it back to the dorm with no strings attached. This is much harder to do in a small environment. When Isaiah has his vision of the Lord, there are lots of angels around, but Isaiah is the only human witness. When the Lord says, "Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?" there aren't really any other options. I suppose Isaiah could have refused, but doing so would have highlighted his own unwillingness as the excuse—there was no one else to hide behind. Similarly, in a small-church environment, when something needs to be done, it's much harder to trust that someone else must be taking care of it. Often my response to a need must be, "Here I am. Send me." This isn't always my preference, but it is almost always for my good.

Crochet Works-in-Progress and Works-in-Hibernation

After my discovery of Ravelry, I spent a bit of time cataloging my works-in-progress with their Notebook feature. And I discovered that I am definitely not a one-project-at-a-time sort of crafter. In fact, I have started yet another project since uploading these pictures.

Here they are. First, the start of one of my daughters' Easter dresses:

I'm planning on a dress for each girl and a vest (orange, by request) for my son, for Easter.

Next, a hat for my husband, inspired by a very bad haircut that I gave him:

The haircut already looks okay and the hat isn't even done yet. I'm making it using self-striping sock yarn though, and I like how it's turning out.

Next is a hibernating project (i.e., I have no idea when or even if I will finish it; I'm not currently working on it), the beginning of an intarsia blanket. The part you see in the picture is the bottom of a crescent moon:

Next is the beginning of a rug, crocheted with a large Q hook:

It's waiting for the next stained t-shirt, since it's made out of scrap jersey fabric. I'll work on it as I have material.

This next is one of my favorites, a log-cabin scrapghan:

This is made with small balls of yarn left over from other projects. It took me awhile to figure out how to use the scraps so that they look pretty and not chaotic, but once I started thinking about patchwork quilts - those triumphs of frugality and beauty - my path became clear.

Once the balls of yarn are too small to even be used on the logcabin scrapghan, they go to this scrapghan, a simple ripple blanket:

Spacing the scraps with white seems to give them enough order that the variety of colors looks cheery instead of messy.

Any bits too small even for that go to Bess so that she can make embroidered pictures on plastic canvas. Waste not, want not.

This is a Boteh scarf, destined for a friend this Christmas. I love the geometric feel of the shapes curving towards each other:

Next is my first lace project, a starry scarf from Crochet So Fine. Crochet is really lace-making at its heart, so I wanted to try a project that embraced that:

It looks all furry and squiggly now, but it'll have sharp points and definition after it's blocked and pressed.

Finally, one more work-in-hibernation, more intarsia, this time a Celtic knot:

I hope to finish this one at some point, but I'm not working on it now. Intarsia takes so much picky concentration, and all that single-crochet, ugh! But I do like the results.

Next time, I'm posting a finished object. I really do have one! Promise! :) But, I'm curious, am I the only one that has more than one craft project going at a time? And, if you do have more than one craft project going at a time, do you also read more than one book at a time? I'm curious if there's any correlation.

Peace of Christ to you,

Jessica Snell