#The100DayProject

Tying Up Loose Ends

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

I have finally managed to get my brain-squirrels at least running in the same direction. I think.

I had a wild and unmanageable list of exciting and interesting possibilities for #The100DayProject, lots of potential for daily dopamine sparkles, but a couple days ago as I was vacuuming the rugs (I do that occasionally), I had a brainstorm: What if this year’s 100 Day Project would be about tying up loose ends? What if I made a list of all my Unfinished Projects, and pledged to work on one of them every day for 100 days? The daily dopamine hit would be less sparkly, perhaps, but the satisfaction in the end could be immeasurable.

So here’s the plan:
1. Spend 10-15 minutes every day on an Unfinished Project. If I have an occasional crazy busy day in which I am simply running all day from thing to thing, I can give myself a short break and do five minutes.
2. I must work on a project from my project list, and not create a new project mid-stream. I can still work on things off the list, just not as a fulfillment of this project.
3. I will take a picture of my progress on whichever project every day to log on my social media for accountability’s sake.
4. I do not have to finish one project on the list before picking up another–it’s about making progress on the things I begin but haven’t finished.

Here’s the List (for now–I may tweak it in the next two couple days before the project begins on Sunday, February 22):
1. The crochet shrug
2. The Alone Together Sweater (second attempt)
3. The Granny Square Yard Sale Cardigan
4. My Tanzania 2024 Book
5. The Rosary Zines
6. The Words Collection
7. The black Granny Squares–whatever was I doing with them?
8. 100 Hearts and Flowers for Pride
9. 20 more Little Protector Dolls for Radiance
10. Nisselue–the knitted and/or crocheted Norwegian Resistance Hat
11. Mending
12. The Red Thread Embroidery
13+ I feel like there are some more that I listed in my journal the other day, so I might add a couple from there.

I have a little cheaty thing going on in my brain right now. I have been inspired by a crocheter who makes elaborate neckpieces of different yarns and stitches, mixing knitting and crochet and different sizes of hooks and needles. If I were to begin one before Sunday, then it would be an Unfinished Project. . . Hmmmm.

I chose the name Tying Up Loose Ends for the project because I am trying to free up my mind for other projects. The image I am using is a crochet circle I am making. As I cut off ends of yarn from projects, I knot those that are longer than five or six inches to a ball of loose ends, and then I crochet them onto my circle. When it’s large enough, I will use it as the top for a beret. I’ll keep adding to the Ball of Loose Ends throughout the project.

The project begins on Sunday, and lasts until June 1. Go to #The100DayProject web page, if you are intrigued and want to join. My process is to:
1. Do the Project every day
2. Photograph or video it
3. Post on Social Media

At school, we are encouraging our middle and high schoolers to join us if they want, for the sake of creativity, mindfulness, or focus.

You can be very creative about your project choice: Try a new dance every day, give a compliment every day, do a watercolor a day, a Zentangle a day, doodle a face every day, do a breathing exercise every day, write a haiku a day, research a different animal every day, sing a song a day. . .

Bōchord: The Art of Book(mak)ing

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 1 Comment

Book. Proposal—

For #The100DayProject, artists choose an artful activity and do it every day for 100 days, recording their work, and posting about it every day. The project begins on February 23, and I decided to begin my Substack life by posting my daily creations here.

What is a book?

Is it words on pages between covers?
Is it a box, a basket, a vessel of words and images?
Is it a kit for your imagination?
What makes a book a book?
And what is the line between book and not/book?
Or is there even a line?

One of my students, when I posed the question to a class, said,

Perhaps a definition isn’t so much about
what a thing is as about how it is used.”

Wise young person.

My aim for #The100DayProject is to explore the spaces between what is “book” and “not/book.” I aim to make some traditional (though whimsical) books in the form of pages between covers, and some boxes, baskets, vessels of words and images, photographs, to expand the definition of what a book is, and explore how it may be used. . .

Can I create one book a day for 100 days? Perhaps I will have some days when I record the process of making one book over several days. I cannot let this work interfere with my daily work, so I give myself permission to make quick little zines on busy days, to call anything a book, and to create junk.

I will make a bōchord (library in the old English), a BOOK HOARD, a library of sorts.

bōc as Vessel
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

The leaves of the beech
quiver in the winter wind,
rustling whispers,
so many stories to tell,

Etymology: bokiz or bece
to bōc, to book.
Bark and leaves, cover and spine,
the line of words across a page.

It is written in the trees, you see,
not just cellulose and pulp,
but in the very essence of the word:
seeds of ideas, leaves, and bark.

Not only Goths but Gauls too
saw forest as library.
Livre from librum, the tender
inner bark of the tree.

When he was a child,
my father carved his name
into the soft grey
of the household beech.
I found the letters there,
the book of his childhood,
the story of branches
shading the quiet balcony,
the pious lives, the quiet joy,
the industrious aunts,
and some words allowed to be spoken
only by the whispering leaves.

Once there was a guardian beech
watching over the river and the valley,
serpent branches
spreading shadows across the hill.
But insects burrowed her barky pages
until the book of her began to die.
We honored her story, you and I,
the best we could; we read
the book of her until the end.

Here in the pages of my palms
I cup this small wooden bowl
you turned from the branch
of the serpent-beech,
a new vessel to contain magic
much as the tree herself
held her secrets, the livre,
the living library,
still here, alive.