The Heathen Housewife

Whew! I just got through airport security, and am waiting for my flight
out of Bend. I have two carryon bags and a giant suitcase with me. There
was a teensy bit of fiber acquisition during the trip, plus a wool wash
door prize and a little something for my girls, so all the bags are
stuffed to the max.

I even had to step aside and take some things out of the big suitcase to
get it under the 50 pound limit. So I shoved a few heavy items into my
carryon bags, and lugged them over to the x-ray machine. Of course, they
couldn't tell for sure that my spinning wheel wasn't a threat, which
meant that I had to watch the nice gentleman unpack the whole big
backpack, which is stuffed with fiber and tools of all kinds and lots of
it. It was like a clown car at a circus.

"That's a bobbin. That's a spindle….that's a spinning wheel flyer."
You get the idea. After the all-clear, I managed to repack the bag (just
barely) and was grateful that the TSA guy hadn't commented on my "Fiber
Bomb" from Velma. It's just a metaphorical explosion of color and wool,
I promise!

I'm including a picture of the two new bags, both of which I made myself
in the last month. I'll tell you more about them later, but they have
been very popular so far, especially the one made from pop tabs.

In the mean time, I am exhausted and glad to be heading home. I miss my
family.

Not that I ever went to band camp, or any other kind of summer camp for
that matter. But from what I gather, the energy must surely be somewhat
the same.

We're a bunch of people who are really interested in and excited about
an activity that most of the rest of the world either just doesn't
understand, or considers extremely boring. And then we come together for
a brief time, find that we are amongst our people, and run high on
endorphins, having conversation after conversation in which we can
easily participate and enjoy.

It's quite late, and I have to get up early for class tomorrow, but I
just got back to my room after a "wild" party, so it's going to take me
a bit to wind down. Which gives me a chance to show you one last photo
for the day.

Meet my new friend Velma. She's into making awesome, funky art yarns,
and also is introducing a new product here at SOAR called the
SmorgasBomb, which is a grab bag of assorted wool fibers in all
different colors. She has a warm and a cool colorway, and I knew from
the moment I heard about them that I needed one of each.

So I pestered her mercilessly until she allowed me to be the first proud
owner and spinner of 8 ounces of funky spinning glory. I spent my time
at the wild party on the couch with this fiber and a spindle, and I
could not have been happier. I'm afraid Velma may have been a bit
horrified by what I was doing with her lovely fiber, but she was polite
enough not to say so.

These aren't available online yet, but you can go check out Velma's web
site at www.colorbombcreations.com. Oh, and I did pay for the fiber. I'm
raving about it for reals with no other motivation than sheer band-camp
style enthusiasm.

I'm still having the time of my life. I've been super-busy, so much so
that I needed a nap between my class (Janel Laidman's lace spinning and
knitting) and dinner. I sat down after dinner for a beer and a spin-in
and met a nice blog reader named Heidi. Everyone here is super nice,
friendly, and almost as enthusiastic as me.

It is overwhelmingly awesome. Beyond my wildest hopes or dreams. More
later. I've got to go spin now.