Mute Monday... easing back in to it...

JMB

Resting, working, thinking...a lot...

Hi,

I have missed you.  I have missed me.  I have been thinking a lot.  Big picture ideas, little picture notions.  What is going on, what will be, what I have control over, what I don't.  Then....what to make of that.

My friend Beth made it out of surgery well, but not as expected.  They opened her up to take out the large tumor and found several small tumors in the connective tissue.  It did not go according to the original plan, a new one has to be made...  What will be now?  This is the scary part to me, the unknown, the uncontrollable.  I felt really numb and sad for a while.  I still feel sad.   BUT, she is still here with us.  This is cause for joy, despite the unknown.  

We all are here just for as long as we are.  There are no contracts on that.  We have the time that we have and during that time we need to LIVE.  We need to appreciate each other and the work of our bodies, to do what we can to leave the earth better because of our lives LIVED here.

In a round about way all of this thinking and dealing has really made my word this year fit.  My word is Welcome.  For me it is about me being inviting in my heart to all the things I am going to learn this year, all the things that I am going to experience this year, all of the change that inevitably will happen.  I did not know when I picked my word that it was going to effect me so profoundly, but it is really helping me to see the journey that I am on.  I don't know if I really have ever thought that a life as a journey, as silly as that may seem.  For some reason I have always thought that it was more a series of discrete chapters.  I have always thought of things ending and beginning.  It does not seem so black and white to me now.  I am seeing that there is a flow to things, one event running in to another, and flowing back to a happening in the past that suddenly makes sense. Going on and on...  the lives of your children carrying you further and then back to your own parents.

Yes, it has been a week of much thinking.

The thing that strikes me as totally absurd and also totally obvious, is that while I have been having these Jack Handey-esque "Deep Thoughts", my boys have been marching on in their own growth.  In the past week my youngest has decided to be potty trained and my oldest is venturing ever forward in his pursuit of language and reading.  I think that all moms must go through this from time to time....as you, yourself seem to be growing and expanding, the little ones around you are showing you how it is done with far more grace and acceptance than you can muster yourself.  Wow.... and wow.

I have a bunch of exciting quilting, sewing ideas (you are going to sew your own clothes you say?), and I want to share about a sabbatical I am going to be taking this summer... but I think that has to brew for a few more days.

Thank you all so much for your kind words and heart felt prayers, I feel blessed by them and Beth will too.

JMB

Comfort and Strength...

Hello,

This is a heavy post for me.  Heavy in terms of emotion and seeing a long road ahead for a dear friend.  When I made this quilt top, I was working on one for John too.  Mine just kept growing and growing and this is how big it wanted to be.  I wasn't sure what I was going to do with it, I was definitely putting it in the "tops to be quilted pile" which, somehow keeps getting larger... but that is a good thing right?  It means I am having a good time.  Sometimes, that is all it is, me having a good time.  I loved piecing this quilt, I felt such a satisfaction with how the design and colors came together with serendipity and meaning.

About a week and a half ago I was speaking to my sister on the phone and she relayed to me that a dear friend, the mom of her best friend from elementary school, had a fist size tumor in her liver.  It was cancer.  My sister was so upset that it took her 2 weeks to be able to tell me and try and process this news.  Our friend, Beth, is scheduled to have surgery tomorrow, March 5 @ 10:00 PST,  to remove the tumor, her gall bladder, and half of her liver.  She will be in the hospital for maybe a week?  But then the recovery time at home is going to be long and will require a grace and a strength from her and her family.  I believe the kind that we all have within us to get us through tough times

It really has been too much for me to think of.  All I could think of is how I have been so exhausted lately and that I had nothing to offer this woman and family that has been close to my family for the past 20 years.  Then, I only could think of a quilt.  I thought of how it feels when I am sick and snuggled under one of my quilts.  I just really like them for that.  I thought that could be healing, that I could, with what I have, give that... Comfort and Strength.

So, the past few days I have been pinning and quilting and sewing and sewing some more.  I sewed hope in to this quilt, prayers for healing, and most simply love.  This is what I could do, this is how I could process how scared I feel about her journey and about how much I love the "Auntie" that she has been to me.  To answer questions, throw a baby shower for my oldest son, share jokes and a delicious margarita, she is a fixture in my life, a corner post, and I believe that she is due a healthy long life.  She is a wonderful mother and teaches elementary school.  Parties at her house are always fun and inviting.  Her style is classy and snappy all at the same time.  I am so thankful to know her. 

I would like to invite, with her welcome and request as well, any one who feels able to send her prayers, positive thoughts, healing, how ever you feel led, tomorrow during her surgery.  It is scheduled for March 5 @ 10:00am PST.  If you read this post later, feel free to still participate.  I believe in the power of prayer.  Beth told me this morning that she just keeps thinking of Thursday night after the surgery and working on the healing that will come in the weeks after the surgery.  She also said that she believes that prayer, good thoughts, healing energy will all help her move through this time.

I feel blessed to be able to share my friend with you.

JMB