Lara’s World

I started this blog so I could show off the stuff I was going to make. And potentially the music. I find as I go along that I want to talk about miracles and purpose and spirit and experience and life. And still music. I knew at the outset to call it “Lara’s World,” rather than some cute play on handwork terms (and there are some funny ones out there), so some part of me knew to make it bigger than that. As I open to purpose and transformation and truth in my life, I find the energy flows more readily. Even if I appear (to myself) be standing still, I can still catch the flow that’s coming out of the corner of my eye. It is there and it exists. And now, what’s different in my life than in years before, is, I’m ready for it. I’ll confess that I’m crying now, as I write this. I don’t really know exactly why, it’s not sadness. Not in the least. It’s not tears of joy. It’s…release. (Drying up now, so please don’t run).

Release because my spirit knows that I’m removing some of the burdens I’ve placed on my shoulders for so long. My spirit knows I’m back in the game. On my terms. And it’s been a long time coming.

I remember over a decade ago, rolling over in bed and thinking, There Must Be Something More Than This. And my first inclination, I believe, was to buy a tarot deck. I’ve been on a path since then (even though I put that deck away for a while). I remember the next thing that happened was that I went into a store one evening after work….I’d been driving by it on Route 9 in Natick, MA for months, wondering what a place called Maya’s Dream could be like. I always seemed to miss the cross road it was on, or to decide “not today”. One day I stopped in time to turn off. It was a new age shop. The store was closing. I didn’t want to leave. A class was starting. I headed out to my car to get my wallet to pay for the class, and tripped on the doorsill on the way out, losing a shoe. Hmmm. Got the wallet, headed back in, paid. Needed to go back to my car to get something else, and on the way out, tripped again, and as I did, my keys flew out of my hand, arched into the air and landed deep in a big bush at the side of the steps. Don’t leave. The class was Transformational Breath. That night set me on the quest for more classes and books and discussion and meeting likeminded people. Who also believed in something else. Something More Than This.

And now is finally my time, of doing rather than healing. And I think tears snuck up on me not so much because it’e true, but because I recognize it. I think getting what you ask for requires a hell of a lot of faith. And the gratitude when it arrives is humbling.

Re: the title of this post, what would the next line of this song be? Come on, some one of you must know.

And per this post right here, I got in! I’m very psyched. There are names I don’t recognize on the cast list, people that must have audtioned on the second night, which means there was more competition than just the first night.

Draw your own conclusions about my fabulousness.

The play is a murder mystery farce set in a mansion in the UK. It’s called But Why Bump Off Barnaby? Apparently Barnaby, who dies melodramatically in the first scene, is the only person present without a cent to his name. Yours truly will play a wealthy 80-year-old woman who can’t hear a thing and therefore has ridiculous conversations with everyone. I am SO excited about this. The universal or cosmic irony here is that my 90-year-old grandmother is exactly this person (give or take some wealth). Clearly I am to learn humor and patience.

Dry as my sense of humor is (and it can by positively arid), I found the script hilarious, and this is the part I was hoping to get, based on my limited experience of the script (said experience still totals maybe 8 minutes of quick scene-related perusal). Here’s hoping I don’t have any nude scenes.

The director took an extra two days to come up with a cast list. Ay, the waiting. And during this time I had perused other local auditons, and was particularly interested in, say, a musical or two. How cool would that be? I got excited about other potential opportunities, wondered if they’d conflict with this one….etc. And sometime during this 48 hours I realized that with all this extra perusal I hadn’t stated that I wanted this. I mean, I did want it when I left the audition, but then started looking at other opportunities online, etc. And therefore, I believe interrupted the flow of it all. So the last time I sat down to check my email, I committed. I thought to myself, well, what if there is a better opportunity that would be nixed if I took this?? (I’m such a pisces.) It has nothing to do with the play or the cast or the director or anything, it’s just a fear of commitment. Period. So I sat down that last time with that “what if” going through my head and said Wait. You know what? I want what’s for my highest good. Universe, I want this, or something better. And I clicked Check Mail, and there was a cast list waiting for me. Incidentally, did I mention that I got in?

This is an important lesson for me actually with regard to everything I want to create in my life. Especially with my music. Ultimately, I (pisces. In case you missed it) want to feel safe (wow that’s hard to write). You might be thinking, odd career choice then; have you thought about something in civil service? However I’m an ace marketer which comes in handy. Or would with a bit of focus. However, I do trip myself up by not being specific in just the way mentioned…wanting to try and do EVERYTHING! “What would I miss out on if I did this?? Gasp!” Ideally I would like to be working with a group of creative and talented musicians to make music and perform to loyal fans all over the world. To be completely fired up by the creative talent of the people working with me. To channel love through my voice that is received by and healing to all who listen.

I’ve always been appreciative of a great ensemble. Creative interplay adds so much to art. But I feel like I’m a solo artist, ultimately. At least that’s what I think I see. I’m open to the possibilities I haven’t thought of, and welcome being pleasantly surprised by the universe. Creation! Magnificent.

I auditioned for a play last night. If you knew me, you’d roll your eyes and wonder why I wasn’t doing this on a regulary basis. For many years I’ve been focusing on singing, but acting is a big part of my training as a performer. I always wanted to sing but instruction was sparse around me, and yet it always seemed I could take an acting class anywhere I looked. So I did. And I’m funny and I have a good time.

This past summer I rediscovered the bug when I auditioned for a dinner theatre gig in Boston. At the time I thought, why not? I arrived a little early and sat in South Station reading the audition materials and I thought wow, I could get into this life….traipsing around the city, with time between audtions for funky cafes and cool shops and people watching. At the audition I felt something reawakened that had been sleeping for a long time. I did my thing, and of course they asked me to sing too, since they knew I could.

I performed a monologue I had written, since I couldn’t find anything I liked online. In fact I need to find it and record it somewhere more permanent than the blue lined pad it’s written on right now. ‘Cause I like it! And I get to use a southern accent with it. And it went over well.

When I left that audition I felt so connected to the universe and full of life. Was that, perhaps, a sign, you ask? Indeed, perhaps it was! It was like the Great Flow was connected through me, I was part of it all. I guess I’d been disconnected for some time.

By the way, I was cast. As an occasional player in the role of Mumbo Jumbles, a singing charlatan voodoo priestess who goes around the boat making up songs on the spot and singing them to people, and doing readings and performing fake rituals. (Everyone that knows me thought this was hilarious. I actually can do readings, and do make up songs constantly that I sing, largely to my dog. Who is very appreciative, thank you very much.) The best part is the show and dinner took place on a boat, during a three hour cruise of Boston Harbor. How cool is that? And I got paid to do it, so that makes me a professional actress. It’s official.

So when talking to a spiritual friend recently, she said that she felt like i should join a theatre group, and that that would lead to work in that realm. I thought to myself, I don’t want to join a theatre group. Yuck. Don’t know why I felt that way, really.

But shortly thereafter on a trip to Border’s with my mom, she came back from the ladies’ room saying “hey, there’s a flyer up in the hallway about auditions for a play coming up [in our town]. And I don’t know if its obvious to you, but I knew it was a nudge from the Higher Ups. So last night I went.

We spent a little over an hour doing really fun theatre-y exercises on stage. And I was surprised how much my body remembers. I cheated out naturally, every time. And when 5 of us were doing the same thing at once, I naturally moved downstage to be seen, not upstaging others, but claiming my own space. And we had great chances to be very physical. It comes back to me now, what is it, those 4 levels of height an actor uses? Someone? Anyway, I used them all quite naturally. It’s wonderful to audition and play when you have nothing to lose. In fact we never do and should audition this way always. It was a great night! It fired me up!

The director is a new theatre grad, fresh off the press and still wet. She said “If you’re interested in knowing your chances of getting cast, well, so far there are 9 auditioners and 10 roles.”

And it was an eclectic group of lovely people. I went in with the intention to be centered in love, and to see with loving eyes. And it worked; I could see the beauty of all these people, these gentle creative spirits. I’d read a message from a book that afternoon called Angel Blessings about spiritual family and how they are the ones that you really vibe with, unlike (so frequently) your blood family, or to coin a phrase, your Teaching Family. This was true here; I felt instant affection for most of them.

So, I find out Friday if I got cast (there are more auditions tonight). I’ll tell you how it turns out when I hear.

So, thanks to Ragazza Just Doing Some Sharing recently, I went and got myself the best avatar in recent history. Read what she has to say and maybe you can too. Look real close and you’ll see I’m listening to my ipod. Grazie, Ragazza, per la informazione!

Here it is!
I’m now part of the knitting craze for calorimetry. What can I say? I get a kick out of pop culture. Sometimes. I also get a kick out of the fact that I knitted something. And almost followed a pattern. Or should I say, I’m just thrilled that my novice pattern editing worked, thanks in part to various online boards that are knitting this together. Most seemed to do it in about 3 hours. It took me more like 5. But I have now knitted something, and a useable, wearable object!! I’ve knit a wearable; who knew? I think this counts as clothing. It’s not a rectangle, that’s fer sure.

In fact, isn’t it cool? The variegation here really worked funkily. It looks like a big pink and brown eye. Here, come closer:

I should note for you that what looks like a cream color on my screen is actually a tan, or cafe au lait. I used Paton’s Classic Merino yarn in Rosewood, left over from my Sis-in-law’s Christmas gift. I had another skein and I’d been coveting it. And after one calorimetry, there’s still enough for about 4 more calorimetries. Or a neck warmer.

When I was done, I sewed a bright turquoise abalone button on to one end. At least if I go to a CaloFestival, mine won’t get confused with anyone else’s. Now, finally, of course you have to see it on:
Now if you’re curious, I threw my hair up into a (very casual) twist, and allowed the ends to do as they pleased, which, in my case, is to curl like crazy. Voila’! I am now dressed to walk dogs with the best of them. I will confess to being so proud that I wore it around my house the first day. And the second. And possibly still do on occasion although this is unconfirmed.

Listening to: Dixie Chicks Taking the Long Way

Early in January 2007, I went to Fiberswap 2006 (yes, a smidge late) hosted in Holland, MA by the fabulous Meg, knitting and spinning teacher extraordinaire. I found out about it and got confirmed to go the night before, thanks to Greta of the Wayland Knitting Circle via the SnB mailing list, and only had time to identify 7 skeins of LaGran mohair that could be released to find a new home. As it was, I could only find 6 skeins that morning. So off we (me and my mohair) went to Western MA.

Now, I went looking for Noro. Preferably Kureyon. And I knew, as I made plans to go, that I would come home with Noro. Probably Kureyon. It just popped into my head, like. And I’ve learned to pay attention to this type of…popping. So I get to Holland, squeeze my tiny car into a tiny wooded space, and head into the event. We start by laying out our goods. And this is no joke, because these women are serious fiberists. Meaning, 60% of the gathering or more owns sheep.

After we got a finished basement room loaded with yarn sorted by fiber, we headed up to a pot-luck lunch in Meg’s recently redone first floor (to which I’d brought a rotisserie chicken). And can I just add that Greta brought some fabulous vegetarian chili. In all honesty, I’m not anti-vegetarian, and even like to entertain the thought of going down that road, at least occasionally. But my family has a chili recipe that contains meat, and that’s the way I like it. Whenever I’ve tried V-chili in the past, it was a disappointment, more like thick vegetabley soup.
So I’m ever so pleased to report that there was no mistaking that Greta’s chili was chili, and it was good. In fact everybody brought great stuff, and I left the table considerably fuller than when I sat down. Thank god I was still able to run for the yarn.

And when we were set loose on the yarn, here’s where I headed first:

And while the majority of it is this funky Noro that I quite like, I’ll have you know that the hot pink/orangey ball at the top is Kureyon. So ha.

From General

Next came the fabulous wools, mostly handspun and dyed, and also Lamb’s Pride, Galway, and a Russian wool/alpaca blend called Alpafina. (Soda can for scale. Please note, soda cans in MA are 2cm tall).

And cottons, so I can make dishcloths and really, truly learn to knit:

From General

And acrylics/wool blends, posed artfully with the tshirt, embroidered one for each participant, by Meg at her former place of work.

Food, yarn and a tshirt for $10. I mean, shut up already! This was too great! When I got home, I was heady with it all. Here’s what it looked like all together, not including the big bag of wool and lllama/wool roving, which may have still been in the car when I took this pic for you all:

It was great, and I have great stores of wools and natural fibers now for the bags I want to make for spring craft fairs. However, as I snap snap snapped away with my trusty digital camera, I got another *pop,* if you know what I mean (much like for the Noro). With that pop I knew that I had to “see” my stash. I had to get it allllllllllll out of the various places it was hiding, get it all together, and see it. Good god amighty, I was *not* prepared, I’ll tell you what. I’ll show and tell all in a future post.

But to end on a happier note (scary forboding music beginning to fade), I went to Greta’s Wayland circle a Weds. night or two later and met the crew who are very very nice and low maintenance….Her-Ka-Lees! Only a town or two from me, but we met way out in Holland. I’m planning to go again this week. And the freaky coincidence I romised you at the beginning of the post? Something told me to mention my mohair, so I did, since I had another skein looking for a new home (allergies!). Don’t you know it turned out that Greta’s friend was the one who got my mohair at the swap? I can’t remember her name right now, but she said she’d let me know if she needed skein #7. But wait, it gets better.

I went on to mention that I had gone to the swap hoping for Noro, and that I had been successful. Greta gave me a funny look, and as her friend chuckled, told me that the Noro had been hers. Now I don’t believe in coincidence, I believe in synchronicity. And this was very fun and very cool. Next time the three of us want to trade yarn, we can just do it locally.

I hope you’ll consider taking advantage of your local fiber swaps, though I’d recommend looking at your stash before you go. And chant the mantra “It’s safe to let go” as you root through your storage containers looking for what to take.

I went out to the Worcester MA AC Moore today to check out the “big yarn sale” and more importantly, to crochet or knit a square for Warm Up America. Since I am a more experienced crocheter than a knitter, I chose to crochet my 7″X9″ square in a thick and hearty basketweave stitch. I’d been dying to try this stitch for a while, so I was pleased as punch. The yarn, Phoenix, one of several provided by the store, was a delicious deep violet. If you are looking for a warm fabric, this is the stitch to go for, y’all.

The blankets will be stitched up next week, and will be distributed to local folks in need, which is kinda cool.

I did score some sugar’n'cream cotton in Hot Lime, Hot Blue and Grape.
A skein of Paton’s Merino in Taupe, and two of Caron Simply Soft in Iris. Some stitch markers, a fabric shaver, a small tote with palm trees on it ($2!)…. In short, I upgraded my yarn trinket collection, while contributing to peace in the world.

I’m going back to get the grommet pliers for 50% off next week. Usually when I felt a bag and add grommets, you’ll find me out on my porch, with various tools to poke a hole through the bag, my grommet stud and anchor, and a hammer. It’s a pain in the butt, and it’s a little cold for that right now. And I expect to be felting up a storm for the spring craft fairs, at which I expect to be selling!

Check this out:
I was gonna make my mom a cute roll brim hat for Christmas. I had some mystery lopi wool (I mean NO ONE has heard of it. It has one mention on the web, and that is by someone who came across some and had never seen it before. That’s it, in English anyway.)

Now long after the fact, I spoke to Meg at her 2006 Fiber Swap, and came to understand that what I had been crocheting this hat with was unspun lopi wool, specifically pencil roving. Look at me, throwing the lingo around…you can’t touch this.

Anyway, the pattern, one of the caps for cancer at leisurearts.com, called for two bulky strands held together throughout. My rookie mistake happened when I tried to translate 6 strands of pencil roving into two strands of bulky yarn. I then took something like an 11.5 mm hook and whipped it up, intending to felt it. What is it with me and felting? I’ve done some cool stuff by felting, but it isn’t like I’ve had one felting experience yet that went off without some major kind of snafu. So 3 days before xmas, family lolling around the house, I decide to start this hat for Mom. Yeah.

What went so horribly awry you ask? It’s adorable in its pre-felted state above, right? Well, take a gander at this picture of my creation positioned artfully next to my laptop, for scale:

This was before felting. Now,stop laughing and I’ll tell you the rest. Much like Dorothy repeated the refrain “There’s no place like home” in an effort to keep the faith, so I kept telling myself all through the crochet process that this Lopi wool would “felt like crazy” so I didn’t really need to heed the sick little twist in my stomach every time it danced and jumped and basically told me, in not so many words, that the hat was too damn big.

In my defense, even Meg said that unspun Lopi should felt in a big way. *sigh* When I get around to it, I’ll post a pic of the finished project. Since I was using a charity pattern for a gift, my intention was to make another hat for charity. I’m not sure I should inflict something like this on someone who’s already facing great struggles.

Well now! A while back I posted this, and for some reason never showed a close-up, so I figured I’d add that now. This shot better shows the cool combination of yarns in this cowl scarf.

In other news, I’ve got some pics of some Christmas gifts, made by me, including one gone horribly awry.
First of, here’s one of one fingerless mitts made by me for my good friend Beth. Yes, Beth does have two hands, however after making one, I started to waffle wondering if she’d like them. So yesterday, I broken down and showed her the one, and she loved it. So I’ll be crocheting the second one now, out of wools from a local mill, and using the same pattern, Wristables, from Crochetme.

You may notice a blue thing on Circular needles. It’s one of my early knitting projects. Seeing as I’m evening more of a novice knitter than I am a crocheter. Just so’s you know. It’s a Healing Shawl I’m doing for my grandmother. More on that later.

Oh! And I almost forgot; I’d promised you a project gone horribly awry. Click here.

Finally, here is a Finished Object. It’s a scarf done for Beth’s (see above) daughter C. I used the the Crochet Addict’s Hearts in a Row pattern. And it worked out quite well. Mind you, I had to do it in Light Blue and Pink, C.’s (age 12) favorite colors. Ew. No offense, C., but jeez. Also, I know everybody likes to go outside and drape their scarves on hapless trees, and maybe the trees even like it, but it was too danged cold out today. So instead, I found a little bit of nature indoors. A member of the animal kingdom, even. My K9 couch potato, daisy (who, in all seriousness, is glaring at me as I type this. Might just be because she’s overdue for a rawhide chew):

Did you notice how slick I was about sneaking in a pet picture, kinda indirect-like?
Thanks for stopping by, and stay tuned, cause I’ll be posting my Calorimetry, and a stash confessional, most imminently.

Well, I’ve taken pictures that I just don’t feel like loading for posting here. And I have to get over the idea that I need pictures to post. So there, I’m over it.

Not a day for crochet today. I’m making a tank with super-bulky yarn and the directions are a little funky. And I seamed 3 pieces together wrong and then redid them. By the time I redid them and had decided which way I was going to interpret the funky directions, I was disgusted with the whole thing and decided to put it away! Sheesh.

So I visited with my dog and then decided to pick up my Backyard Leaves scarf, which is advanced for me, and a fabulous too rich turquoise (so appropriate for the throat chakra) and for which I had knitted the 8 setup rows (and it took about 8 tries if I recall correctly. Probably not a day most people would recommend I pick it up again, what say?) At any rate, as I went along, there were maybe two areas where I wondered if I had corrected a flub or two…correctly. And I got to a point where I just said, you know what, this is MY scarf and MY merino wool and MY project. And as a wise new friend at a knitting group said last night, THERE ARE NO KNITTING POLICE!!

No matter how it looks it will keep my neck warm, and really I just want to be with the experience of knitting and being immersed in this intense healing color. Yes turquoise is healing. All colors are.

And finally, I’m not an uncreative chick. I will end up with something that I like no matter how I get there. I won’t end up with a tangled mess hanging from my throat. Sheesh. And maybe instead of Backyard Leaves I’ll end up with Front Yard Leaves or Park Leaves or some other leaves, which will, I’ll have you know, be just as good as any other leaves.

So I knitted 4 rows and left it at that. I’m planning to write out the chart for myself. I mean, a blank box is a K on RS and a P on WS and vice versa for a dot. How bout a blank box is a knit and a dot is a purl? Why get all stupid? *grumble*

I was just a bit on the edge today anyway. I did mile two of Runagogo with Daisy Dog by my side. And I got some singing in. Do we love our Nano? We DO. We have vocal warmups and vocal exercises and backup tracks loaded on and it’s a vocal studio in a…tiny little ipod box. I can also run tracks through my mixer from my ipod for recording or performing. This last tidbit is for you music types that might still be carting around a laptop. I’d love a live band, but this is BUTTAH in the meantime.

And it occurs to me that the only way I can truly dispel that jittery energy is through singing, whether finding a song that seems right, writing one, or just singing the energy, i.e. spirit singing.
This is because I am a singer. How do you equalize?