This time of year, I think about intention a lot. In the busy last few weeks of throwing this thing together, I spend a lot of time thinking about the people who are coming; where they come from, why they come, what we can do to make this thing as special as we can. My gorgeous women and I spend a fair bit of time together, doing the bits and pieces that need to get done, to make it happen. And there is real intention in that. There is quite a lot of hand making that goes into putting this together. We hand sew the programs, we hand make your gifts, we forage for the flowers. We do most of it ourselves. We could outsource it but we choose not to, because the beautiful thing about it is that we get to do it together. The five of us, sitting around, chattering, making and sorting out the detail. It's like my community sits in the intention around the intentional bringing together of our larger community. And to me this makes it really special.
A big part of the joy of putting this together for me, is the fact that we get to sit together making. And that I can feel everyone else remotely making, whether you are pinging me on instagram about your preparations (which I love!), or watching from afar, I can feel the excitement around the fact that we are coming together to share. I treasure those nights with my girlfriends in the leadup to the event.
I also spend a fair bit of time thinking about mistakes and imperfection. And how intention is way more important than those two gems. In the leadup to the retreat I miss the odd email, the odd seam on a gift is a little wonky, this blog post is a day late, and there is a typo in the program (don't tell Anna!!). Because there is a temptation to get stuck thinking about that stuff. About the fact that what we are making isn't perfect.
But then I come back again to intention. We could style the shit out of this event. We could spend time making it perfect down to every minute detail - but then the event would have never got off the ground. Our focus would have been in the wrong place and we would have been stressed, and anxious, and got stuck. The joy would be lost. Instead I remind myself that the intention of this event is to "bring together people who craft for joy and foster a love of hand making". That is all. Not to create the most perfectly styled event ever seen. Perfection would destroy the spirit of the event. A spirit where we celebrate community and learning, rather than doing things perfectly.
Anyway - coherant post this is possibly not, but I wanted to share where my head is. Outside of worrying about whether I can find all the power boards for the sewing machines that is. They are in the shed somewhere....
See you Friday either in person or online. And if you are only able to join us online then we have an ace giveaway to make up for it. Details will be in Friday's post.
Felicia xx
