Whew, it’s been a year! Here’s some highlights from the past few months.

New Tzitzit Strings

I finally tried some at-home dyeing, and these sunny yellow strings are the result! Naturally dyed with marigold petals, they have a lovely golden hue with subtle variations throughout.

This year has been a year of new techniques for my tzitzit strings! Naturally dyed colors, 8-ply strings, linen, rambam style, and more. Next year I want to sharpen and refine my new skills, especially with the linen.

Golem Central

I’ve been making SO MANY needle-felted glamim. 16 so far this year, and six more in the works! I’m really proud of how they’ve turned out.

I’ve started giving them “shelter names” like they’re kitty cats. First of all it’s cute, and second, in a market situation, it helps people point out which one they want from the batch! Since this is my newsletter and I can talk about whatever I want, you get to hear about everyone’s names.

Little ones

first row

Bixby, classic gray & red: from bixbite, an old name for red beryl.

Dirt, sprouting a seedling: it’s dirt with a sprout in it.

Olivine, classic gray & chartreuse: from the mineral olivine.

Negi, sprouting a scallion: japanese for scallion.

second row

Quickly, geode gray & pink: has the Q from quartz, and I like adverbs as weird name choices.

Mott, glowing ghost: from מת/dead, the joke on its forehead, and the apple juice company since its eyes look like apple seeds.

River, mossy pale gray: since it looks like a river rock with algae and moss on it.

Layzer, classic gray & dark blue: from the gemstone lapis lazuli, but I was trying to avoid steven universe gems (no shade, just wanted this golem to be its own thing), so I found a nearby jewish name!

Jumbles, wearing a flower hat: recently I played bugaboo pocket, a game where you raise individual bugs as pets! The game generates a name for each bug you raise- I had a rubber ducky isopod with a little flower hat, and its (very charming) auto-generated name was Jumbles.

AC, classic gray & purple & yellow: from Amethyst & Citrine in the gemstone ametrine.

third row

Marin, classic gray & aquamarine: from the gemstone aquamarine.

Triptan, cracked gray & orange: for the class of migraine medications, because it has an incredible headache.

Dosie, gentle-eyed sparkly green: named after a mini macaw I met at a bird sanctuary, who was similarly green with blue accents and gentle, white-rimmed dark eyes.

Voix, black with glowing eyes: from g-d’s neopronouns in Inclusive Siddur.

Big ones

Effie, classic gray & purple: for the Fe+ ions that give amethyst its color.

Marble the Revenant, scarred white & red: “marble” because its body fiber has veins of dark gray and gold like marble tile, and “the revenant” because it looks like it’s been killed several times but just won’t stay dead!

I’m doing a round of custom glamim now, plus a couple more that haven’t been spoken for yet. I’ll share when they’re done!

Collabs

In September, I teamed up with Ezra Rose on a fundraiser for the Sameer Project! We ran a raffle with beautiful art and judaica made by us and 18 other artists, and we raised over $1000! The raffle is long over by now, but if you’re curious about the art, you can see all the pieces in this bluesky thread.

Other Stuff

I was at the Pushcart Judaica Hanukkah Craft Market again this year, and it was wonderful!

I had my usual offerings of my carousel of tzitzit strings, basket of secular yarn, pile of DIY tallit zines, and squad of golem felties, plus several new arrivals! This year I brought cotton kippot handmade by me and my sibling, as well as DIY tallit kits containing an atara & corners, tzitzit strings, and an instruction zine (just add beged).

All of the mini glamim got snatched up within the first hour, and Effie (big purple) went home soon after that. People really liked the kippot too!

Market Leftovers

Tzitzit strings: I have a LOT in stock, like 30 sets? If you’re thinking about running a class or workshop or something, now’s a great time to get strings! I’ll have them all up on the website soon, but there’s lots of natural and colors, wool and silk, sparkles, even 8-ply.

Tallit kits: The beautiful rainbow one sold, but there’s two left! One has a turquoise silk chiffon atarah with matching corners and silk tzitzit strings, and the other has a silver lace-pattern atarah with white satin corners and wool tzitzit strings.

Golem felties: Marble is the only golem left from the market, and honestly I’m getting a little attached to it lol. I love a scary-faced softie.

Zines: There’s four each of the DIY Tallit Katan & DIY Tallit Gadol zines! They’re always available in digital format at https://furywren.itch.io/, but let me know if you want a physical version!

It’s the last possible day for me to write a secular-year-end wrap-up, so that’s all for this newsletter! Thank you for reading, and I hope next year is a little kinder and a little brighter for us all.