Tag: learn with lisa workshops

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Holiday Gifting: Experiences

For the last few years, I’ve enjoyed giving experiences rather than gifts. And some of my favorite gifts to receive have been experiences too. We’ve give tickets to plays and concerts. And these gifts have included spending that time with the recipients, like a double date. One year, Bill and I did nothing but experiences: a Holiday train ride, a scavenger hunt, a visit to an orchid show and tickets to a play. It was so much fun. A family member found a food tour in our own city, here in Frederick. We learned so much about our downtown area in food and also history.

Dye up sock yarn like this!!

I’m offering an experience for you to give or receive….I have been teaching dyeing in person for many, many years. I now have my classes available as an ecourse. Courses available now are two 4-week courses: Dyeing Self Striping Sock Yarn and Dyeing Wool Roving to Spin or Felt. These classes will begin at the start of 2021.

You could make dyed roving like this!

I also have a knitting class: Knitting Socks Two at a Time. This class is 4 parts and is self paced as you work through your socks.

I’ll be offering Black Friday-Cyber Monday deals on these classes. Interested? Sign up for my special Learn with Lisa email list to be the first to find out about these great offers on fun classes. Click here!!

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Have you started something new?

As we start week 8 of the quarantine, I feel like people are starting to get antsy. There are more people out and about. There are more people in stores. More people on the street. And we still don’t know where this is going, how this is going to end.

These times have been trying. There is a new normal of telework and teleschool. And tele-yarn buying. It was just the virtual Maryland sheep and wool festival. It was a great success. Even with some glitches with websites, we all came together to see yummy yarns and fleeces and pottery and jewelry. While is wasn’t what we were used to, it was a good substitute.

For me, I’ve been starting new routines, healthy routines that I hope to continue after this. I’m spending more time outside, taking morning walks. Observing the changing seasons with beautiful trees and active birds. I’ve also carved out time to learn some new techniques through online classes and continuing to read and study color, wool, clothing construction and doing deep work. I’ve started meeting with friends on Zoom, showing our current projects and seeing the scenes on their farms. And even last week, we had a surprise retirement party on Zoom with participants from Oregon to California, Geneva to Mexico City, Colorado to Maryland. It was fun to see friends and family from around the globe.

What I’m really excited about is my new online dye class. It is a 5 week class that will lead you from blank white yarn to the self striping yarn that you’ve only dreamed of finding. This is a class for the absolute beginner. I’m nearly ready to open registration. If you want to be the first to know when you can register for it, just sign up for my special Learn with Lisa email list here.

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books I’m reading: True Colors

I don’t really know how I found this book. I bought it for myself and added it to the mastery books I plan to read this year.

This book is fun to dip into. You don’t need to read from front to back. Each “chapter” is devoted to a master dyer. There are indigo dyers and cochineal dyers. There are dyers from every continent, except Antarctica, of course. There is a loose organization by dye type, for example there are several dyers profiled who work with Indigo in various parts of the world. I’m enjoying reading about how these dyers learned their craft. The stories of family and of place.

The photographs are wonderful. It truly is a coffee table book. And it is well written and interesting.

This book has made me think about mastery. Some like those dyers in the story learned their skills and mastered them within the confines of their cultures and families. My journey to mastery has been much different. My expertise has developed through years and years of practice. Lots of great results and also heartbreaking failures as well.

As you know I’m working on some online ecourses to help you on your way to learn dyeing techniques so that you can get the yarn that you dream of. You can be first to be able to enroll if you are on the Learn with Lisa email list. Click here to sign up.

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reinventing: pivot to distancing

So we are starting week 3 of self quarantine/social distancing and it is weird. It has turned our home upside down. While I spend my time at home, working in my studio. Having DH home all the time changes my way of life. I now have to make more meals. I feel like I have to be a better listener. The dogs have also been changing. We had our rhythm. The knew when they would get to go outside. They knew when they could expect a treat and when they should just lay down and fall asleep. All that is different with both of us at home, ALL THE TIME.

And I know if you have children, your world has changed even more than mine. This week starts distance learning at the schools in Maryland. If you have grandchildren, your universe is also probably changed. Maybe you don’t get to hug them. Maybe you have to see them over FaceTime and not face to face.

A big part of my Winter and Summer months is in-person workshops here at the farm. And I think I need to pivot those as well. We had some great winter workshops dyeing yarn and roving. I have one workshop slated to go April 18th. It is a shibori-Indigo workshop. I’m not sure if it will go or not. I have limited this workshop to 3 students, so social distancing can be accomplished. And if you need to get out of the house and do something creative, click here to grab one of the 2 remaining spaces.

indigo class

I am currently working on distance eclasses for you. I will be converting my popular yarn and roving dye workshops into a series of 3-4 sessions. Are you interested in eclasses like that? If so, enroll in my Learn with Lisa email list. Members of that list will be the first to hear about the new eclasses. You can enroll here. You can also see my current array of workshop here.