Pinned
The free 14-page booklet that came out of our Urd’s Snowflake Rune Cards project has had an upgrade! Now with more recommended reading, more authors to avoid, and some other small changes. Details and download for free at the link, to help you reground your rune practice in the medieval rune poems and current scholarship.
If you prefer, it’s also available on Etsy for the listing cost (30 cents Canadian) (and please drop a review to help improve its’ visibility?):
mods are asleep post let's get married by josé olivarez
Reblog this on the first of the month for good luck all month long!
yeah, he sure is
Guys for fuck's sake he took himself out of the group chat because he is a) aware that he does not have security clearance to see what they were discussing b) aware that they will use this fact to prosecute him/go after other people at his magazine. Sometimes, someone's opinion on Zionism is not actually relevant to the specific deeply insane news story they accidentally got bundled into that in a sane world would see everyone else in the group chat fired and arrested for treason, and bringing it up as it it's a mitigating factor is just being conspiratorial about da joos. You can dislike or even hate this person without doing a pepe silvia board that makes the most consequential opsec failure of the past eighty years a, what. I'm not even sure what's going on here. Is this a Mossad plot? Is that what's being claimed?
If he valued the lives of people in general he would have revealed all the intel so Yemini civilians could take shelter ahead of the attacks. But he doesn't, probably because he thinks the lives of Arabic people aren't worth anything.
Did none of you read the article????
He states:
There is no way that an individual reporter would have been able to stop an illegal clandestine military operation by a very racist and hostile administration with two hours' notice. I know you want to be mad at him because you don't understand how real life works, but to act like this is a spiteful anti-Arab move on the part of Goldberg, who whatever you think of him is also quite often a critic of Israel, is straight up Qanon behavior. It's actually really impressive that this article came out within 10 days of this happening, because the Atlantic's lawyers must have been on every single word.
I don't know why you are blaming the whistleblower and not the very racist administration ordering these bombings (well, I do, but you're going to get mad if I say why).
This.
(yes, I know exactly what you're not saying, and why, and I sympathise)
But aside from the issue we're not addressing, there's also another issue we can hopefully address without blowing things up:
The American left is consistently and self-defeatingly going after people who try to use their positions against Trump and his administration, who uncover and highlight their wrongdoings, and who act to intervene.
There's a constant litany of "too little, too late," and accusations that they've got some secret agenda, that they're just as self-serving and corrupt as Trump and his cronies, that they can't be trusted and shouldn't be listened to.
It's as if the American left is determined to deflect focus from Trump's massive wrongdoings, and instead shift it to the perceived shortcomings of the very people who try to stand in his way.
But the only one who stands to gain from that is Trump.
Want to weave but don't have space for a loom? Have a few sticks and yarns but no DIY skills? Come, be tempted anyway. Weaving is a whole family of crafts, some of which don't require a loom at all.
Small-ish looms like box looms (as basic as yarn wrapped around a cardboard grocery tray), inkle looms, and rigid heddle looms exist, but I'm assuming every possible space for a box in your life is already filled. In this post we're going even smaller and cheaper. As far as possible, everything either is flat enough to stow behind/under furniture or rolls up safely into a bundle of just sticks and yarn.
Many of these crafts have some crossover - the same setup can be used for multiple styles of weaving. Most of them can be improvised at home depending on what you have on hand, or if you need to buy something there is not a huge gulf between homemade vs professional equipment. Alas I am not skilled in any of these and my descriptions will not be wholly accurate; corrections and additions welcome! If you need help, I'd only be able to tell you to seek out books and tutorials yourself, ask other weavers, and just try stuff out.
All photos included with permission. My thanks to the people allowing me to use their projects! I saw so many gorgeous and skillful projects when assembling this and I wish I could have included them all.
Projects by @kitteniestkitten (here) and @wefty-weaver (here)
Culture - I am aware of this as a Native American technique, I don't know its history with any more specific tribe.
Fabric - "Warp faced" cloth of any width, insofar as warp and weft have meaning for this craft as the weaving is on a diagonal. Often used for sashes or blankets.
Method - There is no loom! A couple sticks hold the yarns to begin with, but then it is all freehand. Starting at one corner, you use your fingers to weave a strand through the other strands, and... that's it. Very simple beginnings work up to very complex patterns that no loom is capable of. The whole project can be rolled up when not active.
Projects by @calendae-creations (here) and @weavingforlooms (here)
Culture - I am most aware of this from the Andes but I think it is much more widespread than that.
Fabric - Warp faced or balanced fabric of any width up to your own reach, suitable for blankets and clothes and many other things.
Method - You are the loom! Several horizontal rods hold and manipulate the warp threads but your body provides the tension, with the other end hooked to some furniture or around your own feet. When not in use, you can roll up all the equipment into a small bundle of yarn and rods. You can also use a backstrap loom setup for other methods like tablet weaving.
Projects by @shadowcreepling (here) and @doctormead (here)
Culture - used by ancient Greeks among many many others.
Fabric - any kind of fabric at any size. Shadowcreepling is using a warp weighted loom for a tablet-woven band, Doctormead is probably using heddle rods to make a wider piece of cloth.
Method - the warp threads are held by a bar at the top and tensioned with weights on one end that hang down towards the floor, then the weft is woven into them with any method such as tablets, heddle rods, or by hand (if you have a lot of patience) and beaten into firm fabric at the top or bottom of the loom. Warp weighted looms can be very big, but they are simple and can also be very small and taken apart when not actively weaving.
Projects by @damage-ko (here) and @foxease (here, hardware from CellesKit on Etsy)
Culture - found as far apart as textiles (geographically and temporally) from Byzantine Egypt and the Vikings
Fabric - a warp faced fabric with patterns made by twining warp threads around each other, usually used for strong narrow bands like collars, belts, and shoelaces.
Method - the cards hold open the shed so you can pass the weft through, then rotate the cards to advance the pattern. Many people make their own with cardboard or playing cards, or you can buy some. The rest of the weaving setup can be improvised with a backstrap (or just a shower curtain hook clipped to your trousers), a cardboard box loom, or warp weights.
Projects by @pisaracraft (here) and @crookedtines (here)
Culture - small rigid heddles like the first project have been found in Roman archaeological sites across Europe. The larger rigid heddle in the second project is being used for "baltic pickup" style designs on the band.
Fabric - can be warp faced or a balanced weave, size limited by the size of your heddle.
Method - you provide tension with any setup you please such as an inkle loom, backstrap, or warp weights. The heddle creates sheds so that you can pass weft yarn through the warp easily. Infinitely many "pick-up patterns" let you weave patterns and even words into the cloth.
Projects by @pardalote (here) and @weavingmyheartout (here)
Fabric - a small square (or rectangle or triangle) of balanced weaving, which can be used alone or patched together into larger fabrics. Pin looms are finer and suitable for many knitting/crochet yarns, potholer looms are chunkier and designed for big elastics, but the method is similar.
Method - wind yarn lengthways around one set of pins and then pull yarn widthways through these strands with a hook. Or, work at 45 degrees in continuous strand weaving! Lots of room to experiment with colour and texture. You can improvise a pin loom by cutting notches in a square of sturdy cardboard.
Projects by @thaylepo (here) and @pastelispunx (here)
Fabric - weft-faced fabric and rugs of any size.
Method - thread long thin warp threads through the pegs, then wind a thick weft (eg heavier yarn, sheep fleece, or long scraps of fabric) around the pegs. Push the weft down along the pegs as they fill up, so that it slides off onto the warp. The pegs can be secured in a base to make a peg loom for large projects, or just handled freely. I believe these evolved as separate crafts and the nuances are different, but the overall method is similar.
Projects by @squeakygeeky (here) and @battlestar-gasmacktica (here)
Fabric - weft-faced or balanced fabric ideal for wall hangings and upholstery, size limited to the frame being used.
Method - (usually) thinner warp threads are wound round a frame, such as heavy cardboard with notches cut in the end, a picture frame, or a small and flat purpose-made loom. Thicker weft threads are woven in by hand using needles or just small lengths of yarn. Some people make lifelike images, others make more ordinary fabrics or geometric patterns.
Projects by @crochetpiece (here) and @noxx-notions (here)
Culture - began in renaissance Italy and spread throughout Europe, often as a cottage industry.
Fabric - balanced fabric usually made of very thin threads in freeform shapes. It's not usually considered "weaving" but the basic cloth stitch is definitely a woven fabric!
Method - each thread is wound onto a bobbin (e.g. a clothespeg) and then bobbins are crossed over each other to weave threads together. The lace is pinned to a cushion to hold everything in place while the design grows.
maddening that there is a common medical condition whose symptoms consist of massive long-term loss of mental and physical functions, due to the incredibly damaging effects of prolonged stress overextending the mind and body by pushing it into survival mode beyond endurance—and that there is no medical term for it. despite the fact it's so damn common that everyone knows of someone suffering from "burnout."
At the risk of sounding anti-intellectual, I think that college should be free and also not a requirement for employment outside of highly specialized career fields
At the risk of sounding like an effete intellectual, I do actually think you should be allowed to just take college courses indefinitely
technically you can, if you don't care about degrees.
Free Harvard courses. Free Courses from Stanford. Free Courses from MIT. Free courses from Yale. Free courses from Princeton.
For paid, there's The Great Courses+/Wonderium. 20$ a month for unlimited courses.
When searching, the phrases you're looking for are Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), or you can do a general search of say, "free online college courses." Oh, and so you don't get surprised like I did, have an avoid: Hillsdale College is a conservative Christian site and not a valid MOOC place. Sign up with them and you will get things like THIS IS WHY THE LEFT IS TURNING YOUR KIDS TRANS AND GAY in your inbox.
@yourunderwaterskies I wanted to say thank you so much for adding these links, seriously, they've been life-changingly helpful to me-
And I also wanted to mention that humanitarian organisations have free courses too, like the Red Cross on international humanitarian law.
As a former librarian I'm actually required to remind you that many libraries that subscribe to Libby are opted into a program that lets you subscribe and access magazines for free with no wait
And that this is actually a really fun, low cost way to not only access news and larger cultural magazines, but also to get free patterns for many different crafts that you can screenshot if need be and that lower the financial barriers to entry for trying new things
From my experience working in both academic and public libraries, many libraries are use it or lose it funding-- I have to say this because a lot of patrons feel guilty for how much they use the library and how often they're using it funny enough, but the worst thing you can do for libraries is not try out new features and not use what's already given to you as much as possible.
The numbers that come as a result of your patronage are how most libraries justify their continued existence in times of financial hardship, which sucks but, go check out some magazines on Libby!
*slides you this chart*
*you kick me out of the butcher shop*
Live your dream.
I am leaving a mark on the world
I’m sure someones already said this but I often see Tumblr described as a hellsite. This is fundamentally incorrect.
Tumblr is the faesite. Everybody is super confused and lost, you keep running into random places. Somehow you end up stuck there forever after interacting a couple of times. The people are all strange, everybody simultaneously seems to be from the future and the past as if time is meaningless.
YES
also technology breaks at random, and sometimes you just suddenly feel a thousand years old
wore my thigh high boots on a walk today and we had to take a path through some long grass and while everyone else was rolling their pants into their socks and putting on jackets to protect themselves from ticks i was standing there smug as hell in my thigh high leather boots.
a hoe never gets lyme disease
I know millennials are getting the traditional generational luddite reputation at this point for sneering at smart devices and banging on about privacy and not needing all those fancy functions etc. but I am speaking to you right now as an experienced activist: you have to start seeing your smartphone as your big red glowing weak point. it is a repository of all the information someone could conceivably use to ruin your life, and you carry it around with you all day every day guarded by maybe a 6 digit PIN (or a photo of your face, seriously turn off face unlock right fucking now).
a couple of people I know don't use smartphones at all, because their devices were compromised years back and they spent about a decade being tracked and spied on by the police without any idea. they learned the hard way and we should all pay attention.
