Not My Timeline

If you'd asked me about it last year around this time, I'd have assured you that I'd be writing copious amounts of spiritually significant insightful essays about the process of pregnancy.  That's not been the case.  As the blog clearly demonstrates. 

A year ago about this time, I was heading home from a month working at yoga school, sheparding new yoga teachers through their initial training.  It was just as transformative a month as my own original training was.  On the personal internal transformation side of things, my main take-away was the breathtaking realization that I was ready to choose to become a mom.  I naively assumed that we would immediately get pregnant.  Seven months later, someone showed up to take up residence in my womb.  Starting with that "delay," the lesson of this pregnancy has really been that "it's not my timeline."  I'm along for the ride.  Pregnancy is certainly my experience to have.  But it is not my timeline that is at stake anymore.  This little being who kicks and flutters and asks my hips to increase their circumference in the most uncomfortable ways – it is this little being's timeline now. 

There's a certain sort of stillness and peace in surrendering to that truth.  The pregnancy, the birth, the parenting : these are things that I cannot plan.  I cannot micro-manage.  I can prepare.  I can give them energy and love and intention.  But ultimately, they are a process I am undergoing, not a thing I am accomplishing.  It is a lot like yoga. It also means that I've been spending the last few months business-planning and working on house renovations.  Because those are things that I CAN control.  I can micro-manage the heck out of them.  I can plan them down to the Nth degree. 

Pregnancy is, for me, a time for connecting.  Connecting inwards with myself, connecting with this amazing shiny bright being who is cohabiting my body for this blink of time, connecting with the amazing man who walks this life path with me.  It is a time for rest: lots of sleep, lots of dreaming, lots of sitting and thinking.  It is a time for self care, the better spiritual, emotional and physical shape I am in, the better it is for this child.  So I eat good food (I do this anyway), I sleep enough (and sometimes excessively), I get regular massage and acupuncture, I meditate.  There's a cocoon-like quality to this time.  Perhaps in retrospect I'll find that I have much more to say about pregnancy, but for now this is it.  It is not my timeline and that is a beautiful thing.

Handwovens

So I was thinking of waiting for something more “official” like a business card, or a logo, to announce this; but I’m just too dang excited! I’m opening the studio of 14 Mile Farm for business.  The business license is on its way from the State, and I’ll be legit! 

I expect that at as this little one turns up earthside and grows and giggles and plays, the inventory of the shop will occasionally expand to include toys and dolls… locals may even be able to find me at the occasional bazaar or fair.  But what I’m most excited about, what is even now starting to get off the ground is a collaboration between a loom named Maggie and myself.  One thread at a time...

And so I'd like to officially introduce to you, I'd like to introduce officially to you:

14 Mile Farm handwovens!!!

I’ll be weaving (and offering for sale) artisan babywearing wraps, meditation shawls, and more!

I've got two different projects going on the loom this fall... one on Maggie, and one on my mother's loom (thanks, Ma!) – jumping in with both feet sometimes really is the best way forward! 

The first project is baby's first wrap.  Stay tuned for more details, design inspiration, and progress shots in an upcoming post.  This warp will be a long one.  It'll see a tester to make the rounds for feedback, the wrap (baby's first!) that will stay with us, and then.... if all goes well, two wraps will come off the loom for sale in time for the holidays! 

And the second exciting project is this:

I'm participating in the Fall 2015 Great Competition of Weavers!

The theme this time around is Children's Lit.  Which is such a great topic, with so many options and interpretations to choose from!  It'll be exciting to see what all books the weavers pick, and how they bring those inspirations to the wraps.  What's your favorite book from childhood?  What book would you pick?

Its an anonymous contest, so its super-secret and I can't tell you what book I'm working with or show you the project.  But I CAN tell you that I'm super stoked about it and that I just ordered the yarn!!!  I can also tell you that public voting for the winner will begin October 1st and close October 3rd. 

One wrap from the competition warp will go up for sale via draw after the close of the competition – it might even be the competition wrap itself!  So if you want to SUPER CRYPTIC updates on the progress of the competition project leading up to the grand reveal October 3, you should follow me on Instagram.  I'm hoping I can use social media as a motivational tool to get me to finish in time, despite third trimester pregnancy...  we shall see!

Meanwhile, if babywearing and/or handwovens excites you, you should totally click through to FB and 'like' 14 Mile Farm. 

And that mostly wraps up (har har) my big news.  Did I mention yet that I'm excited about it?!?  I'm pretty excited.  Because 45 yards of weaving is clearly a perfectly reasonable goal for this fall... along with home renovations, yoga teaching and oh!  right!  growing a human.  If you need to find me, I'll be playing with yarn.

Hashtag Extreme Nesting

Today I built shelves.  A few days ago I was ripping out carpeting.  It seems that my pregnancy nesting process as I enter the third trimester entails a whole lot more power tools, hammers and trips to Lowes than it does adorably tiny baby clothes.  I mean, I've got a pile or three of teensy onesies, and a handful of a few large bags full of slightly larger adorable clothing for this child that just need to be re-folded and sorted by size.  Its not like I'm immune to the charm of the tiny clothing.

But man, the siren call of shelving!  As a child I always thought the "a place for everything and everything in its place" motto was laughable.  Increasingly, I like the idea.  Especially as I embrace the lifestyle changes that I hope and expect this child to bring with it: fewer long days in town, fewer days in town at all, more time on the homestead, more homebaked bread; I find myself less and less tolerant of the general malaise of spreading stuff that two adults –packrats at that!- living in a too-large house are prone to create.

It’s all a metaphor, really.  Symbolic.  The renovation and interior design work that preoccupies my mind of late is a way of making physical the spiritual and emotional and energetic process of this pregnancy.  Of making space for baby.  Of dreaming forth the mom I want to be, the woman I want to be.  As I embrace this shift, I realize more and more just how much I've told certain dreams to wait, just how many aspects of myself I've tucked away for later.  And their time is now. The baby's time is now.  And baby deserves a space to live in that will nurture baby's growth, that will nurture baby's parents so that, as parents, we can do our best by baby.

And so my nesting process entails skill saws and screws as well as shuttles and yarn.  It means undertaking renovations both major and minor to create functioning systems in this home of ours.