The recycling center is the best place to replace your flat tire (that you got because you hit a pothole really hard) because the people there generally want to do good in the world. That's why they're at the recycling center. And if you can present an opportunity for someone to say "I knew I've been carrying around this four-way lug wrench for a reason!" well then, you've made their day as well.
This issue includes...
updates | media spotlight | thoughts on abundance | a small booklist | a suggestion
January recap
About a year ago we had a snow day that closed the library. I was dressed up with nowhere to go at 8am, so I bought the mothlymade.com domain and got started on it. I haven't been as consistent with it as I dreamed, up I'm keeping it running. Along the way, I've learned a lot about what I want from this space. And the less I'm on Instagram, the more I like my space just the way I have it.
A screen grab from a video I haven't been able to edit and post about creative play
Also on the back-end side of mothlymade, I have two or three youtube videos 
recorded, just not posted anywhere. Canva is easy, but too slow for what I want it to do, and other software won't talk nicely with my camera. (I know what I have to do, I just have to sit down and do it. Maybe one more snow day is all I need....)
With crafting, I'm leaving my low-buy year in 2025. Keeping to my stash all of last learn taught me what I do and don't want, what I can make do without, and that I have more than plenty already. However.... my trip to Michael's last Sunday was delightful. Since I'd been using up my half-full spools of thread on my rag rug, I really Really ran out of thread. Now armed with the knowledge of colors I actually like to use (pale shades of earth tones) I could wisely choose spools from the rack. Now, it wasn't as robust as Joann's selection w as, but no w I know I can make the best of it.
I'm back in the swing of testing, with Lindsey's Check It Bag completed at the top of the year and test starting today for Cecilia with Lukrezia Crochet!
media spotlight
This month I have two videos I'd like to share. The first had been in my watch later playlist forEVER but I'm so glad I finally watched it. Marie-Noelle Wurm asks us to follow her through an art exercise where we try our best to make the Worst birds Ever. I had fun, and it was a nice reminder that I should be having fun when I'm messing with markers or playing with string.
And Kathleen Illustrated, an absolute icon, gives us a tour of low-barrier arts and crafts that can help you actually relax. For crochet and knit, the barrier is pretty high. You have to learn a lot about it before you can actually zone out and relax while making something. One new-to-me craft I'm keeping in mind is tempura paints. Henri Matisse style collage is also tempting.
thoughts on...abundance
Okay, I hear you; I just did a post on scraps and stash and I also mentioned it again in the updates section. But this one's different - it's about economics. No no yeah, but what if I also told you this is more like a book review on Robin Wall Kimmerer's The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World? Yes, much better :)
You may recognize Kimmerer's name from Braiding Sweetgrass published in 2020. In The Serviceberry, Kimmerer contrasts capitalism's scarcity-based economy with nature's gift economy, as shown through the serviceberry plant. We know that nature is cyclical, with the sun and earth growing plants, which give energy to animals, who die and feed the earth. In a transactional economy, processes are linear. Someone buys a commodity, and the relationship between people is not nurtured. The Serviceberry is a thoughtful meditation on how the earth can provide for everyone, as long as we honor that relationship. It was especially striking to read this slim book while researching government food assistance.
Through a long string of happenings, I'm researching government cheese and so-called cheese caves for a project at work. (There are a lot of articles with bad information out there, this one here gets the closest to the real story, if it is a bit dense.) In December 1981 and January 1982, when the government released 5-pound loaves of cheese from national stockpiles to families qualifying for food assistance, it was called commodity cheese. Kimmerer places "commodity" on the opposite side of the scale as "gift." The stockpiles were called "surplus" where in nature it's "abundance." For me the cheese cave myth turned from a (misleading) fun fact and into a story about manufactured scarcity in the name of protecting a failing system.
I could go on, but that's enough hippy dippy for now. On a lighter now, The Serviceberry got me thinking how other daily systems could become economies. The energy to take care of yourself, for one. It's a buy-now-pay-later system where debt is realized as exhaustion. "If I do this now, I can't do that later." That economy is self contained. I see a gift economy between my sister and her friends, where they trade sewing skills for second-hand furniture and help with chores between them.
There's also a lovely quote about libraries by Kimmerer, which I'll leave here for you.
“Public libraries seem to me a powerful example of the way that gift economies can coexist with market economies, at a larger scale. . . To me, they embody the civic-scale practice of a gift economy and the notion of common property. Libraries are models of gift economies, providing free access not only to books but also music, tools, seeds, and more. We don't each. have to own everything. The books at the library belong to everyone, serving the public with free books. . . Take the books, enjoy them, bring them back so someone else can enjoy them, with literary abundance for all. And all you need is a library card, which is a kind of agreement to respect and take care of the common good.”
a small booklist
I usually like the read horror books in the dead of winter. But this season, with the [gestures at everything] that's not right for me right now. So I'm letting books do the escapism for me. I've been lucky in finding books that fall in a pretty narrow genre.
Fairytales for the children at heart
The Undead Fox of Deadwood Forest / Aubrey Hartman
Top of the list is this charming book! I read it under the covers way past a reasonable hour of night, and I loved every page. We follow a cross fox named Clare, who ushers the souls of dead animals into one of four afterlife realms: Pleasure, Progress, Peace, or Pain. Throughout our adventure with Clare, he meets animals that make him examine his own life (or afterlife) and what he wants from it. It's properly intense at some points and so human in others. While written for children, it's never belittling or sparse on the painful aspects of self-discovery. Ten out ten, the best book I've read this year, and I read Pachinko in a week.
The Magician of Tiger Castle / Louis Sachar
We follow Anatole, an immortal magician of a castle whose name as been lost to time. The princess Tullia, who looks up to Anatole, must marry an awful prince in order to save the kingdom. But Tullia has fallen in love with a scribe. The king commands Anatole to fix up a potion that will make the two forget they had ever met. It's not so much of a forbidden love story, but about (medieval) workplace politics and how it affects those they care about. It's a thrilling adventure for fans of The Princess Bride.
The Woods and Wisp / Paola Merrill
I actually haven't read this one yet, but my library is buying a copy and I'm first in line! Here's the synopsis:
Wisp, a small white rabbit with a shy disposition, has lived in the Northern Wood her entire life. She's quite content working at her local apothecary and spending her days strolling down mossy forest paths. Her life would be just about perfect if it weren't for the curse that has befallen her friend. Zephyr, an old, grumpy squirrel, has become increasingly reclusive and bitter as a result of a mysterious illness. When Zephyr suddenly disappears, Wisp fears that her friend has gone to seek a cure in the Wild Wild, a sinister place from which most creatures never return. Soon after, a peculiar visitor arrives at the apothecary, warning Wisp that her friend is in desperate need of help. In order to save her, she must go on a quest to recover the missing pieces of Zephyr's soul.
a suggestion
Sometime soon, I want for you to use your library like it's the only way to get books, movies, and music. Check out a big stack of books you'll never finish--picture books, coffee table books, craft books, weird little novels you haven't ever seen before. Pretend you're snowed in and the internet's out. Make a big hot chocolate and have a read-in. If you are snowed in, check if your library has digital loans for e-books and streaming. At least get curious about your library, and how you can make it part of your personal economy.
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