Le Tissier Designs

Of Larks and Linnets and Flying Fingers

Tag: Life

  • From Traditions to New Memories: Our Unique Holiday Story

    From Traditions to New Memories: Our Unique Holiday Story

    This year was not a traditional Christmas for our family, but it was perfect nonetheless.

    Quite often our Christmas Day is culminated with Christmas Dinner that will encompass everyone, friends and family – up to 20 or so bodies at the table. And it all started as the smell of the turkey pretty much enveloped our guests as they walked in the door and up the stairs to the living room which had a center table set-up with a cheese board, and lots of baking. At the table there will be crackers, toasts, a table groaning with more food. There is always so much conversation and laughter punctuated by the occasional sip of wine!

    And the conversation. Lots of individuals catching up and sharing the happenings since their last visit or since last Christmas. And I am at the head of the table ready to refill bowls, pass the gravy and listen. I listen and just take it all in and I take so much joy in the presence of family and friends. I do not usually get much visiting in or get to share in the finer details of the evening, it is just not possible to do it all!

    This year was different. Because we have downsized and the space needs work and mostly because we need a kitchen renovation – the stove doesn’t work well enough to bake anything properly so we decided not to do the big dinner this year! I do not trust the stove! The kitchen reno will be happening soon, hopefully! That will another full story or two I am sure!

    So, as a result these things happened:

    My brother and his wife did Christmas dinner. It was just us and them. Much laughter, starting with the fact that they chose Prime Rib for dinner not turkey! Guess what we were doing for Boxing Day! Yup! Prime Rib! Another family Christmas tale was born. We laughed and visited for a few hours.

    Boxing Day lunch a good friend and her son came for lunch. We have know each other for over 38 years, we even shared a home with our children for 2 of those years. That was a two hour visit with lots of laughter and conversation.

    Boxing Day dinner, my son, daughter and grandson were there! There was laughter and conversation, memories and more conversations.

    Day of after Boxing Day my nieces and nephews and their family came for a quick visit – that turned into a couple of hours of shared laughter and memories. All of us sitting around the table, eating the nibbles and just being together.

    So – the moral of the story – sometimes the ritual forgets the point of the season! The shared time and love with family and friends. I did miss making my small Christmas gifts, the baubles and tree decorations. I really missed decorating our home. What we did was very minimal as we had to buy everything as almost everything we owned related to Christmas was in the back of the storage locker!

    Who know what next year will bring!

    Happy New Year to all!

    Lynette

  • Its been a while…

    Its been a while…

    Its been a while… But I am still knitting…

    I’ve been busy. Selling my home of 30 years, downsizing, and downsizing some more. There is still a storage locker so there will be more downsizing to come. But I am still knitting.

    Borealis Mitts for a November Class.

    It has been a tumultuous couple of years, both personally and in the world at large. Not sure where it is all going. How about you? How has your life been progressing? Life never stops. But I am still knitting.

    Did you know that I am officially retired. Not from working – though I do work less – I am retired by the definition that being retired means I get to do what I love! As I am doing what I love I am retired and still getting paid – how great is that. So I am still knitting, creating, teaching and hopefully bringing other knitters along with me.

    Ocean Legend – a fall class and a new sweater for me. I am still knitting. I hope that you are too!

    Happy Knitting

    Lynette

  • A New Year – New Resolve!? Maybe!

    A New Year – New Resolve!? Maybe!

    I Resolve that: 

    This is going to be the year of flowers. Floral motifs in my knitting – you bet! Flowers on my walls – always – courtesy of my mum! Flowers in the garden – we will see how green my thumb gets! 

    And flowers on my shelves!

    Pansies and Florals – Oh My!

    I am a collector – yarn (of course) – vintage knitting books – knitting books – yarn (did I mention yarn) and antiques.

    The antiques are mostly the small stuff. Silver things, porcelain posies, china and other small things.

    Many know about my small obsessions and every now and then I am asked if I would like some more items for my collection. Mostly my flower collection. It was their mothers or their grandmothers and really they have no use for, need of, or interest in them. And I get it, we all have our hobbies. And I on the other hand love all the things that mothers and grandmothers loved in their day. Especially the floral posies, in all my years of collecting I have not a single double, or repeat of a flower not even ones that are close. 

    Each pot is different, each flower is different. Certainly they are all the common flowers, roses, peonies, pansies, anemones, tulips or trilliums. But each one is hand made, hand coloured, and just like nature, each flower is totally unique from every other flower. Some flowers come with birds on stems, perching on a nest, or about to take flight. Some flowers come in silver vases – those are perhaps my favourites!

    I think that the fact that human hands formed each flower, placed each flower in the pot and a human mind chose the colours of glaze to finish each bloom, is what fascinates me about these china posies. Some of the older posies are true works of art, holding a moment in time as the breeze moves the flowers about.

    Posies are delicate, easily chipped along the edges of petal and leaf. Petals and leaves also break in half and are often poorly glued back together, again human hands trying to preserve something that they loved and valued. I find the love of flowers such a human thing, something that many of us share in so many ways.

    The posies I collect also go well with the many petit point bouquets that I have on my walls and shelves. All lovingly created by my Mother. She spent hours working on each piece. Somehow many of her floral pieces came my way.

    My Mothers work – she even refinished the frame to complement the work.

    I will most likely have to divest myself of some of the “things” I collect. We all usually have to “downsize” at some point in our lives. Until that time arrives, I will enjoy them, celebrate them and share that love!

    So do you collect? Have you got a stash of something special that means a lot to you? I would love to hear about it.

    Happy New Year, Happy Collecting, Happy Knitting

    Be well,

    Lynette

  • Mother’s Day Memories

    Mother’s Day Memories

    Mother’s Day is one of those holidays that brings up mixed emotions for most women. We remember and honour (or curse) our Mother if she is gone and celebrate her is she is here; we examine our own successes and failures as a mother and we look ahead to being a Grandmother, able to help (or hinder) the efforts of the mother of said grandchild, be she daughter or daughter in law!

    This is not just a female holiday – it is said that Son’s revere their Mother, or blame them for every wrong in life. I hope that my relationship with my son will have a balance of both!

    It is truly amazing how much influence a Mother, whether good or bad, has in our lives.

    Four generations of my family. I don’t have many pictures of my mother with me and this is the only one of us all together. My Grandmother passed a year later and my mother 2 years after her.

    My mother had issues. I still loved her – but never, ever, understood her. Even as she was dying, over thirty years ago, we still couldn’t communicate. Our points of reference had almost no convergence. There was one love that we shared, the love of working with our hands to create and this was important and grew more important as time passed. It allowed some avenue of communication. We loved hand work and beautiful fibres. Something that my daughter and I share as well.

    I parented by being the opposite of my mother. By asking what she would and then doing the opposite. I made different mistakes – is there ever a life without mistakes? But I did OK, so I guess we communicated better than I thought. We never had the storybook mother/daughter relationship, best friends and confidants, but I have strived to create something close to that with my daughter.

    Beth and i two years ago.

    And I have, I think. Beth and I have a solid loving relationship with boundaries and understanding and support and everything I wanted from my mother. Thank-you Mom for showing me how not to be, I am so sorry that we couldn’t have what we should have had! Perhaps next time around when the wheels of our lives converge again, things will be different.

    Have a wonderful Mothers Day!

    Lynette