Winning Section
The winner of the Lily Chin book is Jill. I threw a dart at the computer and it landed on her. Now I have to get a new screen. I’ve emailed her, and I’ll send off Lily Chin’s Knitting Tips & Tricks as soon as I get Jill’s address.
THANK YOU to everyone who left a comment or tip. What a great idea, a TIP exchange! I loved reading them, and feel like I learned SO much.
You readers are a font of information, thank you.
Patience Section
I’m FINALLY coming in on the end of Anne Boleyn. I swear, I feel as if I’ve been working on this thing longer than she was queen. But I’m doing the bottom edge now, and I’ll have some nice photographs in my next blog post.
I’ll also have a new contest for a totally non-knitting related audio book. The book is John Irving’s Last Night In Twisted River. I like Irving, but at the same time I also don’t like some of his stuff. Which is probably as it should be.
I’ve long felt that we don’t have favorite authors, artists or designers, or fall in love with folks because the recipient of our affection is the BEST writer / person / musician / designer we know.
We fall in love because the author / musician / designer suits us, makes sense to us, in a way that no one else does.
As much as I love Gerry – and I adore him – I love him not because he’s inherently good, but because we suit each other so well. Likewise with Irving. I like him as an author because his work resonates with me, but I don’t necessarily love everything he writes.
So I’m excited to listen to this book and think up a compelling (?) question to pose that will get everyone involved and won’t limit the contest to only Irving fans. It will be a few days, but patience is a virtue.
Horoscope Section
Speaking of patience, I read my Virgo Twitta-scope again. Once again, it seems eerily on track for me. Here’s today (Friday’s) message:
Clarity is beginning to return, but it still may be too soon for you to make any big decisions. Your emotions continue to cloud your normally cool analytical style, even if you can tell where the current situation is leading.
Attempts to make changes today won’t likely be very effective, for they could get lost in the larger shifts that are coming your way. Avoid impulsive action that is motivated by frustration; patience is now your best friend.
Okay, that makes sense to me and really fits with what I’m struggling through right now in design terms. Keep plugging along. And I will.
But it was my scope for tomorrow (Saturday) that really got to me:
It’s all about communication today, but sticking with detached analytical facts will likely leave you feeling unsatisfied. You must dig a bit deeper now in order to get past your logical filter that can keep you from fully engaging with your experiences.
You may not understand the reason for everything that’s happening, but you’ll have time to put your amazing day into perspective later if you just let it unfold without resistance.
Spiritual Section
You see, tomorrow the kids and I (and Gerry for part of the day) will be attending a weekend retreat held by our temple for families of B’nai mitzvah candidates. Max’s Bar Mitzvah is scheduled for next January (2011) and Hannah’s Bat Mitzvah is … in a holding pattern.
But I’m thinking this weekend may be a very good chance to introduce both of them to the part of Judaism that I’ve been missing for quite a while. The community part.
For whatever reasons – various and non-specific – we’ve had a hard time connecting with the temple here. We attend services every now and then, the kids go to Hebrew School, but we’re not engaged in the way we’d like to be. The last time Gerry and I both felt fully engaged in a congregation was back in Brooklyn when we were members of the budding Kolot Chayeinu.
I’m not Jewish, Gerry and the kids are (we’re Reform, please hold back the comments that the kids aren’t REALLY Jewish, we’re proponents of patrilineal descent, or perhaps bilineal descent..?) and we have a casually Jewish home.
I’d like us all to take the holidays a bit more seriously, but Gerry’s initial and painful exposure to a 1960’s Hebrew School experience (sadly, not unusual) soured him a bit on the whole raising-the-kids-as-Jews thing.
I think the fact they have this descent is a gift, and should be treated as such. I don’t care what path they follow as they grow older, I just want them to learn all they can at this point so their future spiritual decisions are made from an intelligent and well informed place.
I’m hoping this weekend will awaken some questions from the kids, light a bit of a fire, and maybe even bring Hannah to a point where the idea of her Bat Mitzvah isn’t so totally foreign. We’ll see. Obviously, the most important thing is that Hannah is a good person, and I don’t think ANY religion (or philosophy) has cornered the market on that.
One doesn’t need religion to be “good”, one just has to be considerate and respectful of the needs of others. I think religion can help us put that in perspective, but we’ve also all seen examples of religion binding folks’ eye’s from the obvious truth that you should treat those around you with the same love and respect you’d like to be shown.
So I’ll hold the horoscope to this tantalizing promise,
You may not understand the reason for everything that’s happening, but you’ll have time to put your amazing day into perspective later if you just let it unfold without resistance.