Empowerment Project: Knitting the Heliotaxis Pi Shawl for Inner Strength

It has been hard to put into words the complicated emotions that have been swirling through and around me lately. The entire world is hurting and finding joy feels like theft. Everything feels devoid of meaning when there is so so much suffering. Watching human beings being destroyed for resources so I can type on this platform, on a device that was made with exploitation, warm in my home with my happy and healthy children; I wonder if a person can drown in the guilt they feel. I wonder if we deserve to drown in our own guilt.

So that’s where I am at.

I know that I am not alone. The genocides ::gestures globally:: has made our demons known, brought them out, and has made us acknowledge at least a little of our complacency. People deserve life, Palestinians deserve life, Congolese deserve life, Fur deserve life. Children deserve a safe place to grow into who they’re supposed to be. This shouldn’t be a difficult concept. But here we are holding onto absolute grief, because what the fuck else can we do? We’ve donated to aid groups, called our representatives, witnessed protest after protest, and nothing changes. Its an endless nightmare, and we aren’t the people suffering.

If you’re like me and you feel like your drowning in the hopelessness of it all, I invite you to take a break for a minute and knit with me. It can be anything you want. If knitting is too much, that’s okay too. Just sitting is also fine.

I am making the Heliotaxis Pi Shawl, by Renata Brenner. I love the circular shawls. They’re beautiful and meditative.

The point of this project is: Rediscovering our Self. I am making this in a beautiful yellow color, so that when it is complete by the Summer Solstice, I will have this beautiful sun made of love.

Yellow is also the color of the Solar Plexus chakra. This chakra is the center of our self esteem. So each post will come with meditations meant to enhance your self esteem. Think on these as you are knitting, put these intentions into the yarn as you knit each loop. It will hold onto that energy and be a comfort for you when life feels extra hard.

Why am I not starting with something like the root charka? That’s simple, this is where I feel the most anxious in my body. When I have anxiety, I feel like my diaphragm forgets to move, not like I have a weight on my lungs, but the muscles that support the lungs forget how to work. IYKYK. If we want to affect change, we need to fix our own issues too. We need to be healthy on the inside.

I will never be perfect, but I can work on myself. I can’t save the world by myself, but I can do good in it.

Every human deserves to live a happy and healthy life. Mothers deserve to see their babies grow up. Children deserve a good future.

Go out and knit some good.

For more information about the issues and ways to help, I heavily encourage you to go to Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch

Summer Time and Life Updates

I feel like I start every post with “I know that I haven’t been here for a while,” it’s that guilt that eats at me when I neglect anything in my life. However, this silence has been mostly peaceful. I feel like I am finding my place in the world, finally. Or at least, I am allowing myself the grace to grow slowly. Our world is so fast paced, and I am always feeling left behind.

The thing is, I like going slowly. Once I allow myself to be slow, anyways. I like taking my time and listening to the birds, watching the sun shine through the trees; taking my time one word, one stitch, one step at a time.

So for Spruce Knits, this means that I am allowing myself to be slow. I am going to take my time to learn how to write patterns effectively.

This summer I am going to be rewriting my first three patterns. The Colorado Cowls. I will be editing them for better understanding.

I am also going to be relearning how to dye and find the colorways that sing to my soul. Spruce Fiber Co will be back in October.

I am also going back into the real world.

This year, I have been working on getting my teaching license. While, as of right now (Monday June 13 at 10:30 am) I don’t have a full time job. I am working as a long term sub at a middle school and I LOOOVE IT. This is what I was supposed to do. I can’t believe how fulfilling this job is for me. The kids, they’re kids, but they’re amazing. This is absolutely the right thing for me to do. I can’t wait to tell you more, and I am yearning for the opportunity to be a “real life teacher”

That’s it for the update. I hope that you are all doing well.

Here I Am

Well, it’s been a fun pandemic eh?

Freaking oof.

I want to apologize to everyone for straight up disappearing. Sometimes life gets too heavy to carry the all of the extra weight. Some things fall apart without you even knowing, until you’re in a room unpacking all of your things and just sobbing. Forever.

Depression is awesome.

But I am here, I never meant to let go of Spruce Knits, but it was too heavy to hold onto. I never meant to stop writing, but it felt like tooooo much. The weight of unfinished projects, the feeling that I am disappointing everyone around me. The barely hanging on and not being able to do everything while taking care of my children.

So instead of taking a break, I just quit.

Sometimes you need to just drop all the extra ish and take care of yourself. And that’s what I did, with the help of my amazing and understanding family.

I feel stronger now. Able to slowly come back into my own. Slowly bring myself back to Spruce Knits and all good that Spruce Knits can do.

Thanks for hanging around. Thanks for being here all along.