It is less than two weeks until we leave, and I have just spent a week with visiting friends, up to see our new location and to say good bye before we sail off into the sunset…
While doing a little local sight seeing with friends, I visited several amazing places over the past week. First the Chester Fair! Wow! This is a real old-fashioned country fair with oxen pulling contests; cow, sheep, and goat judgings; best vegetable and fruit contests. There was a sheep herding demonstration. There were judgings for best fruit pie, best whoopie pie, best vegetable decorations…just to name a few. This has been taking place since 1877, and it’s just down the road from me. Who knew?
Two other highlights of the week occurred yesterday when my friend June and I visited a weaving school in an historic octogon-shaped house in Carolina, Rhoda Island, run by Jan Doyle who also teaches at URI. She is doing an amazing program with local weavers, and she has lots of looms and quite a large weaving reference library. On the way home my friend and I stopped in Stonington at the Velvet Mill to see the Fiber Arts Studio. What an amazing space! Just walking in the door I felt the weaving zen come over me. I could live here…..
Now that I’m home, doing laundry from the week of visitors, all I want to do is weave. I have two weeks to get organized and packed for a 9 month trip, but all I want to do is put on a fine linen warp for napkins….wouldn’t that be relaxing? I really must snap out of this…
….which leads me to what I can realistically do today. In the laundry this morning are 13 handwoven linen dinner napkins (not all woven by me), a dozen linen cocktail napkins, and several small handwoven towels from the powder room. They are all air drying right now, and shortly I will have the pleasure of ironing them. I know…..it’s a bit eccentric….maybe even quite ’round the bend’…..but I love to iron linens. That’s a pleasurable activity I can’t wait to do in a short while when the linens are barely damp.
A spray bottle of water for the stubborn wrinkles, a really hot iron, steam that will waft up at me and the sweet smell of ironing. I can’t wait!
