The hero draws inspiration from the virtue of his ancestors.
[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe]

Mama was, among many other things, a hand weaver. In the early 1950s, Daddy built her a large, 8-harness floor loom out of birch. It was as pretty as a piece of furniture and sat in our dining room. She wove on it until the late 1990s then gave it to my daughter Ellen. When Ellen crated her belongings to move to Wales, the loom went along even though she didn’t know how to use it.

Ellen learned to knit, then she learned to spin and joined a guild near her home in Wales. Her hand-weaving friends helped her put the birch loom together and she has been weaving. Recently, she has been building the structure for a small fiber arts business—business plan, web presence, etc. All the while, she has been spinning, knitting and weaving wares to sell.

Ellen’s mama (me) earns her keep with graphic design and web development. I’ve been helping her long distance with the art and web side of things. We want to launch her web store for the UK on February 4th and have an introductory page online until then. Her site is www.shepherdsmoon.co.uk.

Today we were discussing a variety of exciting developments and I sat here with the phone to my ear and my heart so warmed I could have exploded. It is a mother thing. Then I thought about how happy my parents would be if they knew their granddaughter was earning her living on that 50+ year old loom.

We never know how far our actions and influence will extend into the future.