This morning, I’m sitting on the patio with a cup of hot tea, Oli nearby, thinking about the Shenandoah Valley Fiber Festival. Yesterday I was surrounded by wool, people, conversations, color and all the noise and movement of a fiber festival. Today I’m home. I’m tired. There are bins to unpack, inventory to count and things to put away. But mostly, I keep thinking about the friendly, curious and kind faces that stopped at our booth.
People noticed the colors. They picked up batts and rolags and talked about the combinations we had created. Someone described the variegated orange yarn as something that “just glows.” People were drawn to some of the very colorways I had quietly worried might be too bright or too bold. They are a choice, in the best possible way. One woman even thanked me for making them.
Those conversations stayed with me because underneath all the festival preparation, the labels and the seemingly endless piles of wool was a question I’ve been asking for much longer than the past few weeks: Am I heading in the right direction?
It has been just over a year since I opened The Forager’s Fleece. There wasn’t a ribbon cutting or some grand moment when I suddenly became a small business owner. I opened an Etsy shop and then told my family what I had done.
I had ideas, of course, but I didn’t really know what The Forager’s Fleece would become. I knew I wanted to work with wool and color. I wanted the things I made to feel connected to landscapes, gardens, memories and the little moments that inspired them. The rest I would have to figure out as I went.
“Maybe trusting myself doesn’t mean being certain. Maybe it means knowing I can find my way back when I’m not.”
A year later, I’m sitting here thinking about someone thanking me for making something I had worried might be too much. It humbles me just thinking about it.
Over the past year, I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out what this little business looks like. Some of that has been practical, but much of it has simply come from trying things and paying attention to what feels right. Some ideas worked. Some didn’t. And others began with little more than I wonder what happens if...
Somewhere in all of those decisions, I started learning to trust my gut again. Not confidence exactly, because I still question myself plenty. But I’ve gotten better at recognizing when something feels right, when it doesn’t and when I already know the answer even if it takes me a little while to listen to myself.
Saturday morning is proof of that. While we were finishing the booth, I became overwhelmed. There was so much happening around me, so much left to do, and my anxiety caught up with me. I told Jonathon what was happening, and he handed me my tea. That was it. It was such a simple act, but it brought me back.
Saturday night, the alarms started going off in my head again. I worried whether people would buy anything. I worried about all the things I couldn’t control. And once again, Jonathon was there to help bring me back when my thoughts started running away from me.
And then Sunday came. People came back through the doors. They stopped. They talked. They touched the fiber and held colors next to one another. They asked questions. They bought things. They told us what caught their eye. The weekend didn’t magically make uncertainty disappear. I’m pretty sure running a small creative business is never going to offer that particular luxury. But maybe trusting myself doesn’t mean being certain. Maybe it means knowing I can find my way back when I’m not.
“I don’t think one year means I made it. I think it means I kept making it.”
Perhaps that’s why those conversations at the booth meant so much to me. They weren’t proof that I’ve finally figured out exactly what people want. I’m not sure that’s even something I want to chase. They were something quieter. They helped confirm that I’m landing in the right direction.
They also gave me new questions. Several people wanted to know what particular colorways looked like knitted up, which means I apparently need more finished samples. There is one slight problem with this brilliant plan: I am a slow knitter and knitting swatches makes me want to crawl out of my skin. So now I’m thinking about small projects instead. Because apparently even while celebrating how far I’ve come, I’m incapable of not wondering what I should make next. Maybe that’s part of this, too.
A year ago, The Forager’s Fleece was something I had decided to try. Now there are customers who come back, people who recognize the work, festivals where I get to talk fiber with strangers, and other makers and farmers who have become part of my world. Somewhere along the way, it became ours a little bit, too.
Let me tell you, Jonathon did an amazing job this weekend. He welcomed people into the booth, answered questions and happily shared what he knows about fiber arts. He even got to sell his own art batt creations. I loved watching him do it, and one of my favorite realizations from this weekend was a very simple one: we make a great team.
Although The Forager’s Fleece began with me opening an Etsy shop, this first year hasn’t happened in isolation. Jonathon has become part of the making, too. We blend batts and rolags together, bounce ideas off one another, and increasingly this little business carries pieces of both of us.
My family has hauled bins, filmed the occasional bit of studio chaos, fixed things when they broke and listened to more conversations about wool than any reasonable family should probably be expected to endure. Customers have trusted me with their ideas and taken my work home. Other makers, farmers and shepherds have shared their knowledge and welcomed me further into the fiber community. All of those relationships have shaped what The Forager’s Fleece is becoming.
And I use becoming deliberately, because I absolutely do not have this figured out. Far from it. This is a business, after all, and one of these days I would, in fact, like it to pay me. And my medical insurance.
There is still so much I want to explore, and there are parts of the business that need time to grow and change. I have ideas about where I might go next, but this year has taught me that I don’t need to know exactly where all of them will lead.
There will be ideas that work and ideas that don’t. I’m sure I’ll make more mistakes. I’ll change my mind. I’ll probably wander down a few completely unnecessary rabbit holes. But sitting here the morning after SVFF, I don’t feel like I’ve reached a finish line. I can simply see the path behind me a little more clearly.
And it isn’t particularly straight. There are experiments and detours all over it. There are things I would do differently now and things I’m incredibly glad I tried before I knew enough to be nervous about trying them. There are people walking alongside me who weren’t there when I started. And there is a version of The Forager’s Fleece here now that I couldn’t have completely imagined a year ago because I hadn’t lived it yet.
Oh, and apparently somewhere along that winding path I became someone who gets asked to judge the drop spindle competition at a fiber festival. I’m still wrapping my head around that one.
A year ago, I couldn’t have known any of this was waiting for me. I could only begin. And then, on all those ordinary days in between, I kept going. I kept dyeing. I kept experimenting. I kept showing up. I kept changing things when they didn’t work and following ideas when something in my gut told me they might.
I kept making things, but somewhere along the way, I was also making this.
So I don’t think one year means I made it. I think it means I kept making it.
And now I get to see what we make next.