This article on ancient Artic spinning was really interesting. I really wish I had been more aware of the intersection between textiles and archaeology when I was younger.

Speaking of archaeology and totally not fiber related, I'm in love with this. Basically anything with someone in one of these t-rex costumes brings a smile to my day.
​ 
​These three videos from Bobbin Boy are on my watchlist. One, two, and three. (Flax is so fascinating!)

And last, but definitely not least. I've been sitting on some thoughts on "CRAFT," based on my readings of Folk Fashion* and Craeft**. Felicia, as always, has an insightful post here.

Today I want to share a different kind of "link love." I want to talk about our hands, and how we can take care of them. But first, a little bit about why this is so important to me:

Did you know I have a whole 'nother business? It's over here. Or, if you prefer Amazon, we sell there too. In 2016, we quit our full-time jobs to work on our business. In February of this year, my husband was asked back to his old job, and he accepted. (Health Insurance! 401(k)! Adulting!) Of course, that has meant a lot more work for me in our business. There has been all sorts of new stuff to learn that I hadn't really needed to do before. Paperwork. Emails. Navigating the different selling platforms. Figuring out the post office. The hardest part? Packing boxes.

All those products that come from Amazon or our website or even eBay? They're packed by human hands. From February to July, they were packed by my hands. I knew right away that this was no small task for me. All of the motions were small and simple. I rarely spent more than two hours packing boxes. I knew I was generating a lot of income for my business every time I packed boxes. I knew this should be easy. 

But still, my hands were sore. So sore that knitting was almost impossible. I'd hold knitting needles in my hands for about five minutes before everything froze up. At one point, the pain in my hands was so bad that all I could do was clutch a mug of hot tea, because the heat was the only thing that felt good on my hands. One night, I was in so much pain that I laid down in bed with a mug of hot tea in my hands, balanced on my belly. I woke up soaking wet and cold after having rolled over and spilling the now cold tea all over my bed. I lived in a constant state of worry that I would develop De Quervain's tenosynovitis, something that has bothered my mom's hands for years.

​Unmoored from fiber art as a refuge, I had to figure out how to keep my hands healthy so that I could work and play with my hands.

The biggest thing that helped me was to hire someone else to do the work. Seriously, if you have a task in your business that's causing you pain (mental or physical), it's so worth it to hire the work out. My employee is much faster than I am at packing boxes, and has even come up with several innovations to make it faster and easier. I can still jump in and help if I have to, but most days, he's got it covered, and I have more time to work on other bits of our business, plus write to you all!

So - I promised links, and here they are:

This video helped me a ton. And I wish I had incorporated the exercises from this video a little bit sooner. 

Esther Rodgers (aka Jazzturtle) has a great Craftsy class called Fiber Preparation for Spinning. Don't let the title of the class fool you - she shares lots of ergonomical tips and exercises for taking care of our most precious equipment - our bodies. 

We Are Knitters has this handy infographic. It moves! (Is gif-o-graphic a word?)

If you're more into the written word, Carson Demers is the expert on ergonomics for knitters. He has this fantastic book, and he's written a few great articles for Ply Magazine, too. He also has an interview on the Fruity Knitting Podcast. (Interview starts at about the 41 minute mark)

Everything we do with our bodies has a cumulative effect, which is why I love "spoga," aka Spinners' Yoga. Also great for knitters, weavers, crocheters, rug hookers...basically anyone who sits down and uses their hands to craft.

I'd love to know if there are any other resources you find really helpful for keeping your hands in tip-top shape!

xx,

Pamela

Welcome to August! Are you ready for fall yet? I know I am. We spent (at least) two or three weeks in the hottest days of July with a non-functioning swamp cooler.* Now that it's fixed, I have the air blasting just so I can put on a long-sleeve shirt every now and then and dream of fall.

In July, I managed to finish a machine-knit sweater. I tried it on to make sure it fit, but took absolutely zero photos of it. And I made a SAORI-style table runner...and tons of yarn for Tour de Fleece. But the biggest thing is what you see above! I am now selling rug hooking wool and other supplies over on FiberCrafty!

Rug Hooking/Needlepunch​

• I've dabbled in it before, but now I have a whole bunch of stuff to work with and so little time! Trying to come up with a fun project to kick it off.
• I'm listing lots and lots of wool and other tools on FiberCrafty - it's a project in itself. Be sure to check out my page!

Knitting

• Believe it or not, I finally took my stash sweater out of hibernation. (It needed to sit in a corner and think about what it had done to me!) Part of why I haven't been knitting much has to do with how much my hands can handle (more on that later), but I was also disappointed that it wasn't perfect the first time (even though it started out as an experiment, and I shouldn't have expected perfection.) Anyways, it rested for long enough, and so did my hands, and it was the perfect companion for a short road trip/long car ride at the end of July. I've got another one of those trips coming up soon, and hope to make real progress on the sweater, if not finish it, by the end of August.

Weaving

• I have a SAORI style warp on the Jano. I started out weaving a little bit on it every morning, and then it got too hot/life got in the way, and not much has happened lately. Luckily, it's easy to just go and weave a few inches now and then, so it's almost the perfect thing to have set up all the time. 
• I rescued a loom from a trip to the dumpster....it needs some TLC, starting with a little bit of rust removal. So that's on the list. 

Spinning

• I got the opportunity to try out my Guild's single treadle Schacht Matchless. I'm in love. Right now I'm spinning some CVM that has been languishing in stash. There's quite a bit of it, but I'm hoping that by putting in some good time on the Matchless, I'll be able to actually finish the project.
• A few months ago, I got a blending board. I've done a handful of things on it, but wanted to explore using it for a bigger project. All the fiber is blended, now I just have to spin it!

There are lots of other odds and ends, but I think that's most of it! What are you working on this month?

xx,

​Pamela

*​For all y'all who live somewhere humid, a swamp cooler is an air conditioner that intentionally adds humidity to your air. If you live in a dry climate like I do, it actually works pretty well to cool you off. (And if you grew up in a swampy place like I did, it's pretty alien to you to consider a swamp cooler to be a good thing.)

Prototypes in the fashion industry used to be considered essential. But with the rise of 3-D rendering of clothing designs, they're quickly becoming obsolete. 

​That's the focus of this article, which I read with great interest earlier this week. 

My immediate response was "Great. Another way for fast fashion to get even faster. And cheaper, and lower quality. Another way to destroy the planet, faster." And it's quite likely that a lot of fashion brands will use the technology exactly in this way. 

My second thought was that there's a lot of opportunity here - less cost and less waste being chief among them. Fashion brands can (and are beginning to) market using 3-D renderings that are so good, it's hard to tell they only exist on the screen. They can then decide whether there's enough consumer demand to go forward with a design, rather than spending the time, money, and resources on producing garments that just sit on shelves. 

Given the fashion industry's current trajectory, it seems like the cost and waste reduction benefits of this technology will be overshadowed by the moremoremore mentality. Fashion brands eager to revive dwindling profits will use everything in their power to get back on top. But a few brands will hopefully grasp that more and better aren't the same thing. That they can gain more profit by streamlining their processes to produce(and waste) less, while selling substantially all of their stock every season. 

Tour de Fleece is in full swing. I posted yesterday about one of my personal projects, but you should totally check out the Facebook and Ravelry groups too!

This post has been making the rounds on Facebook lately. It totally speaks to me.

I'd love a chance to see this exhibit.