We are almost at 400!! Give-away time!!

Hey there-- I am busy sewing a Xmas quilt top that I started over a decade ago... yes, for some reason I got bogged down with making it PERFECT, instead of just MAKING IT! Thanksgiving was hard for me this year, so after the family trekked to Grandma and Grandpa's for the PRE-MEAL festivities I stayed in and pulled out something to work on. I got out all of the Christmas fabrics that I have been collecting and somehow the last time I worked on this quilt I packed up all the parts in a bag and set it on top. What I found on Thanksgiving, looked OK to me (not totally ugly, but I didn't have to think too much), I am adding some sashing and some borders and by the end of the week I should have a QUITE large finished top! I had already given up on this project a few times, it's a Christmas miracle!

Because I like to get others in a celebrating mood as well, I am giving away the "STITCH GIFTS 2011" magazine. Why? Because I like to give people more reasons to craft a holiday surprise or gift-- and also I love to toot my own horn! See below...
That sweet little Elf Baby was hatched in my craft room earlier this year. The folks at STITCH did a beautiful job with the project pictures and also put him in the table of contents!! So exciting!

If you would like to get one of my extra copies of "STITCH GIFTS 2011" please leave a comment about your favorite things to do for the holidays by Monday December 5 @ high noon PST. We will draw a name and I will drop the LOVELY magazine in the mail that afternoon after I get the boys from school. (I am partial to my Elf Baby, but this issue is LOADED with beautiful projects. I liked how they picked some that would take a half hour and some that would take a little longer-- a really fun bunch!)

I hope you are all getting cozy and crafty-- I have been knitting a simple lace cowl and fashioned some doll pants for Mango's bare bottomed baby. Handwork soothes and brightens!

JMB

A smug Mango, but she can see!

This little one has been going "rogue" lately... ripping clips out, running around like a feral pony. Yes, I can officially say that we have reached 2. Neither of her brothers had a large "attitude" change at two-- it was more noticeable at 3. This little lovely has decided that she has an opinion about EVERYTHING and that it is going to be KNOWN! OH DIOS MIO!
She did sit still enough for me to give her a little eye window. So now when she is screaming at me she won't have to pick ALL of her hair out of her mouth. Little things... little things.
There also has been sewing!! I am happy to report that I am almost done with my free-pieced study. I have the best partner. She was the first one finished and then has been so understanding about my tardiness. Little things... Little things. I am gearing up to start this group in January... it is full of REALLY talented people and I know that it is going to make me reach for next handhold in my creative life. I am so happy I was invited to participate. Also Hoop-up is getting going again in January...

Mango is getting bigger and I am needing some outlets for my grief and creativity. Looking into 2012... I am going to continue to try and stretch the ol' creative muscles-- get some projects finished, new things written up. It has just got to happen, I feel like it is time. Forward motion is just a matter of suckin' up the fear and sadness and getting some stuff done... right?! Hmmm, time will tell.

:)

JMB

Caught between two seasons...

1. Bridgewater, 2. in the sewing shed, 3. In progress..., 4. Baby Ingrid v. 2, 5. 318/365 (30 days of gratitude, day 14), 6. Untitled, 7. Taste tested!, 8. Candy Cane Love Paper Pieced Pattern, 9. Radiant Orb detail, 10. Strings Attached, 11. Strings Attached, 12. Beaded Birds, 13. "Fight or Flight", 14. Fence Line-Habitat Challenge, 15. one year ago today, 16. Fans of May, 17. Felt mushrooms (2), 18. Untitled, 19. Block for Vickie QJRR, 20. Cross and flowers quilt, 21. Scissors for Amisha ~ Patchwork 318 Bee ~, 22. even rock babies need cozy quil, 23. fabric 012, 24. elk, 25. Block for Bearpawandbearpaw

I feel like it should still be summer, but here I am, firmly planted between harvest season and winter. I do like what I have been finding on Flickr. I may not be making much right now, but my eyes are happy!

--JMB

My mom was an Artist... Memorial Show 11-12-11

This is only the smallest sampling. My mom, Amira, created art seriously (the work was a serious endeavour, but the content was not always.) for over 4 decades. Her entire house was her studio-- stacks of painting, every surface was covered with sculpture, she was more prolific than I knew. My mom always wanted to show her work, but then she was always immersed in making more, so where was the time to do it all? Her wish was that her art not be thrown away-- I could never do that, but isn't that any Maker's greatest fear? Her dear friends organized this show and these pieces and more were released in to the world. People were so happy to take a piece home.

It was overwhelming to me.

I grew up and lived with all of this "art-making" my entire life, and it all seemed so pedestrian (in a way) to me -- didn't all of your moms collect everything for their projects? Didn't they paint doll heads blue? Didn't your moms save spent firework papers to be fashioned into wings for a Japanese-inspired Kachina doll? and maybe not one, but 15 creations? Your mom didn't carve EVERY mango skin from EVERY mango she ate into a face? Your mom didn't dry those faces on the dashboard of her Datsun?

Now that she is gone-- it is hitting me how unique her view of the world was and how she reacted to it-- How THAT has shaped me and how I make things. I wonder what the future will bring me. She really "dialed it up to 11" and that is why things seem so "quiet" in my life now. Things just seem beige where they used to be an electric blue pastel.

I have to say that we didn't even show the best stuff-- it is stashed away for now, waiting for some breathing space for me and my family.

Still breathing

JMB

Blurry focus...

This post started just as a way to move myself forward. Forward to where, I am not quite sure, but forward. I looked for pictures to post for today on my laptop... and realized that I have been uploading the new ones to the new mac mini. That means the pictures on this computer are all pictures of before. Before, before before...

So much has happened in the last two months. I feel like I have lived a lifetime. The sweetness, the bitterness, the laughter, and the tears-- there has been so many of each that it baffles me that I am not just lying on the floor dehydrated and rocking in a fetal curl.
Looking back, memory all seems fuzzy, but the feeling is sharp. Some days it is a sun shining in my face (there is a chill in the air) and my sister says to me "Jessi, doesn't feel like we are in Maui?!" Then we walk through the sunlight to the car and make our way to the church to set up our mom's memorial. Other days it is a labor to shower and dress and then all I want to do is climb in to the DVD world of Mango's 9/5/11 birthday. The boys talked my mom in to be the "singer" for a game of musical chairs. I missed the game because I was inside cooking, but in the movie, my mom is just outside the field of view singing the theme songs to "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and the "Emperor's March from Star Wars" as the boys laugh and skip around the chairs. I know you all are wondering... the game was a tie.

My mom was so worried that these kids would not remember her because they are so young. How could you forget someone who sings a Star Wars theme song for musical chairs? How? I just want to crawl into the screen and lay my head on her good shoulder, to pat her fuzzy hair. I want to laugh with them and feel the heat of that September evening.

Coming back to the computer today was prompted by this post. Thank you Soulemama. This was my 10 minutes today. I don't know that feel better as writing, for me, sets me in the middle of the muddle that is my self right now. But the effort is worth something and it is a move forward.

JMB