The broom-making workshop was, for lack of a extra restrained phrase, a revelation. I’ve by no means cared about or seen brooms earlier than — I imply, how a lot thought have you ever given to broom lore, except for tales of witchy hijinks? — however now I can’t cease eager about them. The turkey-tail whisk was troublesome however not unattainable to make and is beneficial in addition. It’s lovely, made with a number of completely different colours of broom-corn (aka sorghum) and woven along with colourful and sturdy string in an attention-grabbing stair-step sample. I truthfully can’t consider I made it myself in simply two hours.
I got here dwelling and began researching brooms on-line (whisks, standing brooms, fireplace brooms, hand brooms and sure, even witch and wizard brooms, for you Harry Potter followers) and I’ve found it’s an actual artwork. If you turn out to be expert sufficient at broom-making, you’re known as a broom-squire. That’s so cheerfully quaint I need to squeal. I need to be a broom-squire, too! In reality, I’m becoming a member of a gaggle known as “Broom Club” the place anybody can drop in and, nicely, make brooms.
One of the best a part of the workshop wasn’t the broom, after all. It was merely being a part of a gaggle of girls — some youthful, some middle-aged like myself — who have been welcoming, sociable and completely centered on crafting probably the most wonderful whisks attainable. Some have been making brooms for the primary time and others had made many. It jogged my memory of Craft-O-Rama, an grownup craft group I attended on the Camas Library for a decade, till the pandemic shut it down and the organizer retired. I liked making the crafts however much more I liked being in a room stuffed with actually attention-grabbing and proficient girls. I get a daily dose of that at my e-book membership, however I want extra. I’m satisfied, because the Brits would say, to hitch the traditional custom of girls gathering collectively to make issues like quilts, baskets, bread, yarn or one million different lovely and vital objects.
In the meantime, in my solitary kitchen, I’ve by some means made sufficient meals to feed a quilting bee. We haven’t had pasta for fairly some time however the transient burst of spring climate throughout February’s last days made me lengthy for one thing lighter and extra vegetal than mac-and-cheese or linguini Alfredo. I used to be impressed to make a winter pasta salad that includes seasonal greens (butternut squash, Brussels sprouts and kale), tossed with shell pasta, dried cranberries, crisp apples and a crumbling of goat cheese. A lemony, calmly creamy mustard-and-brown-sugar dressing brings all of it collectively.