Break

It used to be that when March Break came along I’d swing into high gear. (For my American friends "March Break" is our equivalent to "Spring Break" except for we don’t call it that on account of there’s a decent chance you’ll spend it shovelling snow. There’s an equal chance that you’ll be able to forgo the mittens, this time of year is ridiculously unpredictable.)  I don’t know what all kids are like, but I can tell you that my children had an agenda – or  maybe it was really just a commitment, to having the world in absolute chaos all around them.   I always found that their natural inclination towards disorder could only be met with an equal measure of order if we were going to get through the March Break together without me locking myself in the loo for a four hour bath made entirely of my tears.  Planning, structure, things to do. That was the whole way I pulled that holiday off, year after year. I was a pretty orderly mum to start with, but if you’re going to lock a load of winter weary people together for days of crap weather, then you better start with a schedule of events, a strict bedtime and a cookie cutter collection that includes a few dinosaurs and maybe a moose.  Toss in there my secondary rule, which is that only crazy people go to the ROM during the break and we all got through it smiling.

I woke up this morning and instantly reacted. It’s day one of March Break, I thought, and the part of my brain responsible for self-defence screamed "WHAT IS YOUR PLAN?"  It was a few conditioned minutes of panic before I remembered that Sam’s taking off today for five days with Yvonne, and that means… well. It means that for the very first time, I am not responsible for any part of a March Break plan.  My contribution has been dwindling for years as the girls have grown and gone, but still…  the idea shook me, and I’m still not down with it – it feels like the whole week could come unglued any minute now, because I don’t have the thing laid out like a high school science project. 

I’m going to stick with the spin-a-thon.  I plied the funky batt singles together, and I love the yarn I got. I’m enchanted by the shifting colours and the way that they play against each other.

Isn’t it a lovely thing? It’s funny to me that these batts are consistently my favourite thing to spin, and make yarn that’s my all time favourite to look at, and frankly, my least favourite thing to knit – I’m always at a loss for what they intend to become, beyond enchanting yarn. They seem finished as soon as I’m done spinning.

This batt made about 160m of a soft sport weight yarn, and as much as I love it, I have no plan for it at all. More mittens? A little hat? A tiny scarf?

What to do… what to do.  I’ll be spinning while I think it over. That’s my whole March Break plan.  For those of you who still need the focus of a ninja to get through this week, may the force be with you.