Luna Boots workshop.

    I've spent the past three days in Dunedin participating in a shoemaking workshop run by Luna from Luna Boots, held in Lou's studio. I heard about the workshop last minute from a friend I met at a hostel in Te Anau just days ago, and immediately knew I had to do whatever I could to get on the roster. There are some things I've always longed to do, and most of them involve using my hands to make tons of sorts of things-- knitting/ crocheting/ embroidery, book making, leather work... I've rarely been able to find the time or advice on how to get started on new projects, so when something like this stumbles across my path I have to participate.

    I've been traveling for over a week now, and was supposed to for yet another two weeks or so, but in order to make room for the workshop in my budget I shaved down my travel and found another WWOOF host for four days from now. I'm so glad I did-- the workshop was worth the time and resources to make a custom fitted, custom designed shoe of my own.

Lou has the prettiest studio I've ever seen. It's right in the heart of downtown, with big windows overlooking sweet and busy Dunedin cafes. Bonus, it was on top of a seriously delicious Japanese restaurant.

 Luna was such a great teacher. So kind, patient, and supportive with your work. She's been teaching shoemaking for nearly forty years, having started a shoemaking co op in Wales after college.

 It took three full days to make the shoes, which seems simultaneously like a seriously short amount of time and a quite lengthy process. The days flew by but the work was constant and complex. I'm left with so much appreciation for the process.

 

 Anyway, at this point I'm so totally mesmerized by the process of shoemaking. I'd love to make more once I'm home-- I found out about another shoemaking workshop in Port Townsend near Seattle that I'm too strongly considering making a trip out for.

 

We took some glamour shots of our shoes-- you can see the imperfections but I think they're a sweet reminder to myself that they were made by me with my own hands.

Everyone in the workshop wound up with the sweetest shoes that totally matched their personalities. I'm not sure mine necessarily reflect myself in them much, but, while the red lining was a sort of fluke brought on by lack of options, I think its suited to one of my favorite quotes from one of my favorite books that I first heard when I was fourteen and has stuck with me since: "if there is no love in the world, we will make a new world, and we will give it walls, and we will furnish it with soft, red interiors, from the inside out, and give it a knocker that resonates like a diamond falling into a jeweler's felt so that we should never hear it."

    (A funny thing: the redheaded girl with glasses went to Warren Wilson, I found out on the last day! An itty bitty college outside of Asheville. She now lives in New Zealand working for Amnesty International. I love it when the world makes it apparent how small it can really be.)

    Anyway, soon I'm off to Christchurch to meet the friend I heard about the workshop from and travel around the tip of the South island before bridging over to Wellington.

new zealand.

I made it, I'm here, almost ten thousand miles from home. or anyone I know really. it feels strange but like home, too. it's hot, and I spend my days hanging laundry on lines and reading in open fields and chasing sheep, who I thought would be a little more friendly than it turns out they are. I thought I made really good friends with a horse, but then today he went and punched me in the face. I know for sure I've made good friends with a cat, though. I've been here six days, and I'll be here six more and then I move southward to Te Anau.

I've already shot four or five rolls of film, and I brought twenty-four and I thought that would be plenty. I am going crazy though: every which way you turn is something beautiful to take in, something I want to remember.

The family I'm staying with is kind and busy. homeschooled children including two two-year-old twins with the blondest hair. We're on a farm in Tapawera, surrounded by mountains and thousands of sheep farms. They all have the sweetest accents and use of language which I'm picking up quickly..

Here's some things from recently:

All the sheep sit underneath of this tree a bit sunken into the ground with rocks under it and they remind me of mermaids in a lagoon a little bit.

and by the way, I changed my url to beehaves. I'm not sure if that's what it'll stay as though-- I wanted beehives but that was obviously not available and thought this was kind of fun(ny). i could be wrong. i need to think about it for a while.