Catch up time...

My guild meeting in September hosted a FANTASTIC quilter...Janet Fogg. I have seen her work in magazines and thought "oh, that is beautiful" but then seeing her pieces up close is enough to make you pass right out. I am not sure if she can make a small quilt each of the portions of quilts that you can see are draped over a table with a 6 foot diameter, some of them dragged on the floor all around.
She uses a wide color range, the technical difficulty of the piecing, not to mention the PHENOMENAL quilting...it was all so awe-inspiring.
While she spoke and shared her pieces I was drawn in by her desire to inspire people to create their own masterpieces. She said that she has not yet made her best quilt and that while she has a plan when she starts the quilt, where she ends up is where it needs to be, but that is not necessarily where she thought she would end.
What I found most resonated with me as a quilter, I think that it is something that we all need to accept when designing our own quilts, she said, "Develop a belief in yourself that each decision will be a good one, not the perfect one, but a good one." She went on to say that, each choice you make along the way will open up the next choice. I have always believed this, but maybe not so succinctly. What a nice affirmation to my inability to follow a pattern...right?
I really enjoyed hearing her speak, very down to earth. She just started doing some workshops in her studio in Portland...I don't know when, but I think that I will be attending one in the futureI also made my first e-fabric shopping trip this September. I really like to touch the fabric as I shop so I have been holding off on web purchases....WELL, I think that getting a package that is so cute and filled with BEAUTIFUL things compensates me for the tactile shopping experience. I didn't read the return address when I first got the mail, so I thought that one of my swap partners had sent me a doll quilt with lead weights...but it was all of my beauties...hooray!
I am such a sucker for Halloween prints and this grouping also had the always needed dots!
I haven't been able to find anyone in town that stocks these mermaids (Heather Ross)I had to get them, they had orange, aqua, and the mustard yellow?? To be honest, I worked really hard to not buy more fabric. It is an illness, but I started to dream about the chasing mermaids (I think that they are kind of spooky) and after that I had to buy them. I am so glad that I did. I want to give a shout out to Fabricworm, whose etsy shop I perused...she got me with the packs of 1/2 yards, priced to sell...toot, toot (they also shipped really fast!)
Farewell to the well-tended garden...Late September and early October bring all kinds of crazy, yet I tend to forget (or forget to tend) EVERY YEAR! I am happy to report that, as of this week, our Chickadees have returned as well as some of our Oregon Juncos. I spied the Chickadees flitting from the destroyed sunflower heads (our squirrels, Nutty and Wacky have been working hard on their acrobatics). The Juncos surprised me this morning and are out hopping around in all the lush garden greenness. By surprised, I mean that I was surprised how happy I was to see them again. I guess it is almost time to find places for the feeders, now that the death-trap arbor has been torn down...
Look for birds and make something!
JMB

Cluck, cluck, cluck...

hi there...yeah I'm over here...a little bit dizzy from the height, but what blogger desires to do with my pictures, blogger gets.
It was a busy and fun filled weekend. My husband had the misfortune of missing the show...it was opening weekend of hunting season...so he and his compadres had to go to the woods to grow some stubble. The quilt will still be finished when he returns (tomorrow!!!!). On Thursday I am headed to Portland with a dear Meatball friend for some much needed GROWN-UP play time and R&R.

I am at a loss for words as I was up most of the night with a feverish little boy. Just so the husband gets some props...usually, the middle of the night wake-ups are his territory, because I am just delirious unless it is after 5am. Sweetie, you were dearly missed and we can't wait for your return, tag filled or not.
JMB
P.S.
My friend Tonya is having a quilt together that looks to be A LOT of fun. Join us if you would like!

Love and kindness, my cup runs over...

Wow, I guess when you really need some kindness you need only to hold out your hand. I really appreciate all of your kind and gentle words. My heart is full.

I finished hand stitching the binding on two quilts today and was able to take a step back from the work, the tired fingers, and the myopic monotony and see their beauty. My chickens are finished and I look at them and think "Did I really make that?" "How far you have come friend...". They will get hung tomorrow at the show and I will be sure to get a picture of them, with them to share with you all.

I, again, can't help but liken my struggles with depression to my struggles with finishing my quilts....the minutiae at the end blurs the picture of the whole. Usually near the end of a project, I am so sick of looking at the it that I just put it in the corner and start on something new. Seeing it to the end is where the glory is. Wow, what a feeling, to put the finished quilt on the couch or the quilt rack instead of back in the craft room out of sight. To take stock of all the things I have learned with the project, things that initially seemed too hard and very daunting, that now seem second nature. It is good to have that chance of reflection and appreciation of a job well done.

Yesterday, my note to myself and to share, was a chance at reflection. I am heartened that it struck a chord. I feel a bit shy about being so open, but now I can go back and read it tomorrow, or next year. I can think about the growth that I have experienced or just feel buoyed by the kind words that I recorded for myself and the cheers of encouragement that you all were so kind to give.
Thank you
JMB

Thinking about this...a note to the future me.

I am thinking that I just need to get something down on pretend paper, something that I can read again next year or next month, because I know that this is all going to happen again.

The creep of depression.

It has been washing over me, slowly for the last month. Every few days I would check in with myself and say "Yeah, I feel kind of bad today. Why are the kids driving me so nuts? Why is every answer murky and hard to figure? and why can't I remember anything?"

To Future JMB: This time it is both a seasonal light trigger and lots of change, good change, but your brain has a hard time dealing with change, in all of its forms.

To Present JMB: You are the mom of a school age boy now, he is moving out in to the world in larger and larger circles and that feels scary. He is making wonderful new friends and learning about the world in new ways. People like him and also want to include him in their lives and this feels scary too. He still needs to have his place at home, to be grounded and know that there is a safe and quiet place in his growing world.

You are moving outside in to the world too. Learning new things, trying things that you might actually really enjoy, this is scary too. What if you discover what you "want to be when you grow-up?" What if you had to choose to pursue a dream in ADDITION to being a mom? How is it all going to balance? What is going to have to give? Sometimes, the status quo is too warm and comfortable. Staying the same doesn't allow room for new things to come in, for growth.

I think that this last bit is what I am really having a hard time with. I like routine, I like to know what is going to happen...I can't help but think of the wake-up call of having a baby. Boy, did that really throw a wrench in to my desire for order-- because just when I thought that I had something figured out, he went changed on me. A baby learns to sit, to move, to speak, to run away, incrementally.....and I was just trying to anticipate the dangers and how I could protect against whatever COULD hurt my child. I had a hard time with that, but eventually I could see the other part... the beautiful part, where I saw the first smile and heard the first laugh. The part where I picked my son up after he had fallen from standing and he just tried again and again until he found success and stood alone.

I can see the balance here when I think of being a mom and helping my kids grow. Trying to translate it to myself is quite another story. I deny my fear and it buries itself inside of me and forms this nasty boil, eventually it makes me depressed. It festers and makes me uncomfortable....but I am unwilling to look at it and call it by name. I know it is there logically, but emotionally I keep it covered and hidden, because then it isn't "real".

My logical self has been doing things to grow, I am only seeing this now, because I feel right in the middle of it. Over the past few months I have, before I thought of how scary it was to that emotional self, entered a quilt in a juried show, entered 4 quilts in my guild's show, and signed myself up for a Pattern making class. Written out like this my logical self scoffs and makes light of the four years that I have been "dreaming" of taking this class. Showing my quilts is public??? who cares? Right?! Apparently the little queasy emotional self does....these are all scary things to her.

Right now, I am trying to look at this, to really SEE it, and make peace with myself.

I want to "High-5" my logical self for being so brave and also to hug my emotional self who is feeling so anxious about changing. I am trying to catch "us" up, to make my logical self and emotional self "get- along" better. The whole of us, of me, doesn't like to be depressed. I would like to embrace my fear in order to get on to the other "good stuff" that is out there for me.

I know that I am not the only person struggling with depression, or even the only person struggling with "what I am going to be when I grow up?"-- I know that I will be here again, because I haven't yet decided and the world is going to keep on changing.

So, here it is Future self, proof that you have been here before and you have made it through again...

with hope.

JMB

Findings...

Hi there, here we are back to blogger flipping pics...but let's not get over wrought about it OK? I will try. Here are all of my findings...$8 worth of buttons...whoopee!
I fell in total love with these weird egg cups. Birds and the one was aqua, white and black, I had to take them home, but they are kind of strange. I also found these odd little wooden doll heads for $0.25, of course they had to come home too.
This poodle fabric is so, so great...kind of shiny, 2 yards and it didn't do anything weird after I washed it. PLUS the poodles are HUGE and kind of ugly cool. The other is a yard of a peppy flour sack material. I do have to admit that this grabby lady snagged some very odd white material with big red dutch clogs on it right out from under my hand. I am still a little crabby about it, but I am too greedy.
A larger picture of the poodles, I think that I am going to make myself a bag with some of this. My sister "M" said "Oh that would make a great lining for a purse" LINING??!!! What are you talking about these are some crazy dogs, they need to be out and PROUD!
I have to come back to these buttons. I bought a $3 bag (I am so cheap) of buttons just for these. They are that old cheddar/mustard color that is so ugly and so beautiful in old quilts. The big holes and the odd color, they just spoke to me.

The most exciting find was 6 full size bowling pins for $12...we are going to make them in to hose guides in our garden. They will look really cool. Initially I only bought one, as I was carrying it around the antique fair I got some really odd looks and it made me really just want to walk around town with the boys and one pin. Just to see how people react, people are weird. But I guess that is OK too.

More about the desire to doze off the other day, it really wasn't because I was tired...but sometimes when I haven't made anything lately, I just get really bored of myself and my musings and YUCK, I have got to get out of my head...maybe others can relate??

Fiber Art show...yes, I got a piece in and I am so pleased. It was the wind-up bird with the wonky house...my favorite. I am a little nervous, but excited to share.

That is it for now...I have to go and watch some Battlestar Galactica, before the husband decides to pack it in for the night (I am only on season 3, right after the cylon invasion....what is the resistance going to do??? Quite thrilling.)
JMB

Hunting and the grand reveal!

I went to this great class last Saturday and on Sunday we got to go on a FIELD TRIP!! I love field trips, even if this one started at 6 a.m.! These are just a few of my treasured sights (why they are so small, I will try to forgive blogger)...later I will have to post my treasured FINDS!! Let's just say, I totally got PINNED! The bottom two pictures are of myself and my sweet friend Emily... I am trying to remember if I have mentioned her before...

And man, I can't remember, so let's pretend that she is new to you... We have been friends since 7th grade (she was in 8th, but we were in the same homeroom, were both tall, with dark hair, and a penchant for silliness.) We have ridden the ebb and flow of life and growing up and have found ourselves now as crazy, artistic, stay at home mommies...seeking the balance between art, craft, life, family, and self (not necessarily in that order.) It has been a wild trip, but I am happy that we get to meet somewhere on the continuum. She inspires me to keep trying new things and to have confidence in my own style artistically. It is just nice to have a friend like this... AND she totally introduced me to blogs, and since I am vain I started my own.

Wait, did I just call all of us who blog vain?? Yep, well, maybe not you, but I am a kind of vain, I will admit it.

Speaking of vain...
Here is my first totally HAND stitched project (it ended up being about 12X14 inches). I am so pleased with myself. Really, I am. I struggled with starting it and then when I had to give away in this swap...I just wanted to keep it. Finally, I had to seal it in it's envelope, so I wouldn't look at it anymore. All so I could take it to the post office and send it away!

I did receive a lovely quiltlet in return so no sadness here.
(Why, blogger, do you flip pictures?? You are so vile at times, and yet I need you...curses!)

I am feeling some bad vibes from blogger right now...I will be back!

JMB

WOW, has it really been 4 years???!

So, I wrote this WHOLE OTHER post...and then I fell asleep. I was SO BORING, yea, I just dozed right off. SO I am just going to say "so" a few more times...

and then I am going to say "Yahoo, I got in to my first ever JURIED fiber art show!" ...(stay tuned for more details when I don't just bore myself SO much.)

and then I will say some thing like....well, "I am going to my first ever SCRAPBOOKING class tonight, and I am kind of nervous, because it is out of my comfort zone" and I am being silly about ALL of IT...like a dork.

But that is what you have to do to get out of the funk.... I did purge 4 bags of fabric (that I NEVER was going to use.) this week and my boy started school. I am coming off of my "school starting/summer ending" anxiety trip (please let it be ending!)

It is time to end this post right quick...

take care

jmb