There and There and Back Again.

I made it to DFW Fiber Fest last Sunday, and delivered all my donations, plus a donations form with photos of all the items (the ones left previously and the ones that I carried) on the back.  The volunteer who accepted my bag grinned hugely when he saw it, as it makes their work very much easier!  I had time on Saturday while traveling, and in the evening, to make two more blanket pieces out of scraps:

Yes, the one on the left looks a bit wonky, but it measured evenly.

The class I took was on Dragon Boat Decorations and I am fascinated and we all started making many with different designs and colours and I think if they'd let us we would have been there until the event closed.  Mine are the three in the lower lefthand corner:

I finished with a volunteer shift for closing, packing away yarnbombing items and helping vendors pack and move out of the vendor hall.

Then I flew out to San Diego and spent three days at a conference, which was small but meant for learning and networking:

Back to Dallas, since it's very difficult to get flights across the country unless you live in New York or Washington, DC, and then home the next day.  While at the conference and traveling to Dallas I knit a hat, and then I made another one:

In a sense I knit three hats, because the one on the left came out too tight on the first go, so I knit it again with an additional repeat's worth of stitches, and this is a better size.  Both are destined for sale in a holiday crafts show in November, and if they don't sell they are going to charity.

I've read two books, one finishing "The Time Machine" which was an assignment in my class on the origins of science fiction, and the other "Chasing Lincoln's Killer" which was written for young adults but I found it very interesting.  When I recorded them I saw my last books read were finished in June, so it's been a gap of time when I didn't have the mojo, it seems.  I did reading but mostly magazines, and also books on cybersecurity and the like while I participated in a drafting workshop related to the CISSP exam.

I got home just ahead of Tropical Storm/Cyclone Ophelia, which gave us a very windy and wet Friday evening and most of Saturday.  She departed just in time for my parents and me to go to the season opener for the North Carolina Symphony, which was just marvellous.

Now it's almost time for Yom Kippur, the most solemn of Jewish observances, a day of reflection and repentance.  In addition to the thoughts at the top of this post, I wish to share the following, which my best friend shared to me.  The Vidui is a recital we make several times in the next 24 hours, and the one used in services is an acknowledgement of failings, both individually and collectively.  This one is the other side, an acknowledgement of accomplishments, and a reminder of what to continute to do:

To all who observe, may you have an easy fast and be written for a healthy and happy 5784.

A Day with Tibetan Monks

About a month ago, a local church hosted a group of monks from the Drepung Gomang Monastery in India. The monks, exiled from Tibet, are on a tour to help raise funds for the monastery by sharing information about their faith and Tibetan culture and traditions. I visited when a friend's art gallery hosted the monks in the past, where they created one of their spectacular mandalas. On this tour, the monks did that at some locations, but at the church they answered questions and held workshops where we could make prayer flags, create our own mandala designs, and otherwise gain a deeper understanding of their faith. The afternoon began with a soup lunch that was very good. The same dough was used to make dumplings in the soup and rolls on the side. The monks cooked it for us as part of their ministry. Then we had opening ceremony and Q&A, while the main room was set up for projects. When we went back, we could learn how to use the tools to make sand mandalas: You scoop sand into the metal cones and rub one against another to control the flow. While some of the designs we tried were traditional, we mostly went free-form. This is the part of a mandala that I made, with people working on their designs in other areas:

These mandalas are on very non-traditional brown paper, so to make the cleanup easier when it is time to return the sand to the earth. Usually they put it into a moving body of water, but there was no stream or river near enough to the church. You'll see the ceremony further down.

We also made prayer flags that were strung around the room. The monks would help us with designs and names if we asked, but most people did free-form ones.

The lady in white was one of the organizers of the event. These are mine:

You could buy a string of preprinted prayer flags and many other items, such as bags (of course I did!) and prayer beads. If you bought beads, the head monk would bless them and you:

At the end of the afternoon, we danced (something a local group does, begun in the 1960's, and not a Tibetan Buddism activity, but the monks were very nice about participating) and then the monks conducted a thank-you ceremony and the closing prayers:

They swept up the sand and we followed them outside where they prayed that the energy in the sand would help to heal the world:

I found a couple other writeups of the day, including one that has me in the background of one of his photos.