A Little Stitching

I did get around to a little stitching this weekend.  Using Sassalynne's beautiful variegated perle cotton and a bit of raw silk, I embroidered a square that will eventually be a pocket.

I'm not sure if it will go on the quilt that I had in mind (which, of course, I haven't begun yet), so there may be another pocket in the works tonight.  The next one will be a quilted pocket with batting to add that quilty cushion that I crave.

Last week's TAST stitch was the wheatear, and I added that to the spiral, then lots of French knots and seed stitches.  I love running my hand over it and feeling the texture.

I found the above at Kailana's blog.  A Pinterest Challenge that encourages Pinterest Addicts to Create (or DO) something they've found on Pinterest and post their accomplishments.


The origin of this Challenge can be found Here at Love, Laugh, and a Touch of Insanity .


The Details:
1. To participate you will choose your level and then make (or do) that amount of pins during May 2012. Challenge ends May 31st. (can be new pins or old pins...doesn't matter)
2. Report back on your Pin It and Do It success. Ideally this will come in the form of a blog or tumblr post. Or you can post about it on Facebook or Flickr if you don’t have a blog or tumblr. Or create a board on Pinterest for this challenge. If none of the above, report your success in the Wrap-Up Post comments.
3. Anyone is welcome to join. If you need an invite to Pinterest, let me know your email address and I’ll send an invite.

The Levels:
Timid Pinner: 1-3 Pins
Pinterested: 4-7 Pins
Pin Obsessed: 8+ Pins

Some Pinterest Etiquette and Courtesies:
--If you create a pin from a post, make sure you are pinning the true URL of the post and not the main website so folks can easily find the link again.
--When you create a pin, try to include the website in the description of the pin.
--Do not include the entire recipe or instructions in the pin description.
--If you embed a pinned picture on your own blog, make it clear that it is not your original picture--a link back to the original blog post is always appreciated.

And other little tidbits...this does not have to be a food or crafting challenge. Saw an interesting photography lesson? Click! An outfit you'd love to put together? Yup! Organizing idea for around the house? Go for it! A workout Regiment? Kick butt! Really this challenge is endless--you just need to tell us what you pinned and what you did. Make sure to note the original pin wherever you complete your wrapup (or if you do progress reports) to give the originator credit.
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What I SHOULD do is pin recipes and try them, but that might prove too much of a challenge for me, as cooking doesn't interest me much.  On the other hand, it might gain me some Brownie points with my dear husband (who accomplished several "honey do" chores this weekend).


 Or maybe...I should try some of the organizing ideas; however, every time I try to organize, I lose things.


Anyway, I think it is an interesting challenge for all of us who spend inordinate amounts of time looking and drooling to actually use the information/inspiration.  


I haven't joined, but I am thinking about it.  Maybe I could manage the Timid Pinner category.  Surely, I could manage 1-3 Pinspirations.


The formal challenge ends on May 31 (I just discovered it), but a personal challenge could extend it throughout the year.
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Whenever my brothers and I reminisce about our childhoods, our memories of events are often askew.  We remember things differently in both large and small ways.  It's funny and kind of entertaining to see the wildly different versions of the same events.


When I found the following quote at the smallest forest, I couldn't help but smile.

Maybe that’s all that family really is, a group of people who all miss the same imaginary place.

—Zach Braff, Garden State

Unleaving

As I've been working with eco dyeing and leaf printing for the last month...

my thoughts have continued to return to Gerard Manley Hopkin's poem:

Spring and Fall: To a Young Child

Márgarét, are you gríeving

Over Goldengrove unleaving?

Leáves, líke the things of man, you

With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?

Ah!  ás the heart grows older

It will come to such sights colder

By and by, nor spare a sigh

Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;

And yet you wíll weep and know why.

Now no matter, child, the name:

Sórrow's spríngs áre the same.

Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed

What heart heard of, ghost guessed:

It ís the blight man was born for,

It is Margaret you mourn for.

The child Margaret is sad about the autumn leaves dropping from the trees (unleaving), and the poet appreciates her innocent sorrow, but knows that other sorrows  will eventually cause her to weep.  Death and loss are part of the cycle of nature, and in the end, with each loss it is ourselves for whom we mourn.  

As I outlined the leaves on the eco prints, I kept thinking about the term "unleaving," and decided to make an Alzheimer's Art Quilt using leaf prints and the word "unleaving."

Memories fall away from our loved ones as the colorful leaves fall away from trees in autumn. Our loved ones recede from us gradually...

  Unleaving.

As their memories ebb, the singular, distinctive persona also fades because experiences, memories make us all who we are.  The unique individual, the person we remember even if they no longer remember us, begins to disappear, to retreat, to unleave while the body remains.   And, yes, it is ourselves for whom we grieve as we contemplate the loss of a parent or loved one.  

The habotai silk on which the leaves are printed was dyed in a leaf dye pot, a variety of leaves went into it.  The muslin was dyed with rosemary (just long enough to knock down the white a bit) and so was the cheesecloth which covers portions of the quilt like a web.  The beads represent the brightness, the uniqueness of the memories that are being lost.

I think I'll make another quilt or two before registering this one, and oh, I have one left over from September that I hadn't quite finished when I mailed in the others.
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I've been reading again, after a month or more of a pretty dry spell in the reading category.  I've ordered a few more bargain kindle books from Amazon and have an order of real books that should be delivered soon, but I need to get to the library!


What's on your agenda today?  Any good book suggestions?

Rosemary and Agnes

Rosemary in progress.

Agnes is in progress, too.  I continue to refine the pattern.  The first one I drew has changes already and will have many more as I continue to decide what I like and don't like.  Rosemary and Agnes patterns will be different in future incarnations.

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This is a Note from the Universe that I saved because I like it so much:


Of course there are exceptions, but all-in-all it seems to me that those who are religious, cling, whereas those who are spiritual, seek.

But to be really honest, Jen, it's the happy folks who know how to live.

Grins,
    The Universe

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I've completed my 70 minutes of yoga, pranayama, and meditation.  I skipped Friday and Saturday, but got back on schedule yesterday.  Boy, does it make a difference in the way my body feels.


Now, on to cleaning and laundry before going upstairs to play.

Reflecting

Things I love: books, sewing/quilting/embroidery, gardens, fresh flowers. Early morning fog.

"Making progress doesn't always mean continuing forward on the same path...
It may mean retracing your steps, taking an unexpected turn, or even stopping to rest and renew your spirit."

from Simple Truths for Women

This and That

Shoot, I intended to delete the first draft of this post and deleted the post I had finished instead. Now, I'm reconstructing.

The binding went on last night.
All stitched down now.

Finished? No, I was dissatisfied with the back - too bland.

So I added some fused raw-edge stars that need some blanket stitching.
Then will it be finished?

Yes.

Unless... I decide to add some text, a quote, a nursery rhyme. That, however, will depend on whether or not I'm tired of it by the time I get all the stars done.

All these little scrap pieces are working on me. I'm thinking of a way to turn the tables and work on them instead. There are lots of scraps left from the front as well.
Before Prozac, there was quilting. (via A Prairie Home Quilts)

Since yesterday's trip to the post office was a no go --and I did know it was Veteran's Day, I just had the post office and the bank on yesterday's list of errands without thinking. Actually, I don't think another couple of stops were in the works yesterday anyway because I was pretty tired.

Today, however, saw the book off to Amy and the beads on their way to ACey. What I want to do tomorrow is...not leave the house. At all. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I know there is something I have to do, but I haven't checked my calendar yet so whatever it is just kind of teases me.

Latest addition to the onesie sets. I will probably make a burp cloth to go with this one, too.
I've also made a little progress on the letters for the Winter Class. The invocation by Dame Julian of Norwich posted a month ago has stayed with me; the repetition, rhythm, and simplicity of the quote are calming. I had planned to use pieced letters for "All shall be well" and then move to embroidered letters for the rest of the quote. Unfortunately, relying on my faulty memory, I thought it was will (no, it is shall) and made a w and an i and will now have to make the appropriate s, h, and a and discard my i. All I had done was the first two words and one of those was wrong, nevertheless:

All shall
be well,
and all shall
be well,
and all manner
of thing
shall be well.

dame julian of norwich - 14th century - mystic

Or I may decide on something else entirely. The pieced letters appear to be more challenging for me than for some of the other participants, but if there is ever an hour straight to work on them, maybe I'll get in the flow. "All shall be well" as Dame Julian said. Whether I stick with this plan or move in another direction with-- maybe-- only one word. And a short one at that.

The refrigerator is clean, left overs disposed of, sheets changed, living room picked up, sewing room re-arranged again, laundry almost done, supper planned. Life is good.

Moodling...

Over at Me & My Quilts, I found this quote, “so you see, imagination needs moodling – long inefficient, happy idling, dawdling and puttering”… that she had copied from a book written in the 1930's by Brenda Ueland: If You Want to Write: A book about Art, Independence & Spirit. I can see why Julie wanted to remember that phrase; I love it, too. Julie, however, took the next step and began a series called Mindful Moodling-- what a great idea.

Yesterday was "get the new crowns" day. But they assistant left in a cord, and I have to go back. Not good...I hate going to the dentist and having to go back really annoys me.

Laddie has a doctor's appointment (stress test) at 7:30 this morning. So...Marty will pick me up at 6:45 in order for us to get to the Cottage, get Laddie, and get to the doctor's in time. This will be, as always, a minimum of four hours. Possibly longer, if things go as usual, and we spend as long in the waiting room as we did on our last visit to the cardiologist.

Yesterday, Fee and I went to Bass Pro, and I got a new pair of boots. Love 'em. Then we went to Copeland's Cheesecake Bistro. We made a meal of appetizers (fried eggplant for me and a crawfish dish for Fee), then we passed on the cheesecake for dessert and went for the white chocolate and almond bread pudding. Now, that is heaven on a fork.

Found it!

Thanks for all of the good wishes I've received this week for my birthday, for feeling better, and for finding my book! Yesterday, on the way to take Laddie to his last appointment this week, it dawned on me. The scanner! I'd scanned the cover the day I wrote the post about Tender at the Bone. Yesterday, after searching every nook and cranny, the possibility of split personalities or aliens crossed my mind; however, my sanity was saved because the book was still in the scanner.

I never got around to sewing, working on projects yesterday, but today...surely!

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, martini in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO HOO !! what a ride!"
Hijacked from Hell's Geriatrics who have an entertaining Bill of Rights.

Quote

While looking for something else, I found this quote that I've had for years, but re-discover regularly:

You are what your deep, driving desire is.
As your desire is, so is your will.
As your will is, so is your deed.
As your deed is, so is your destiny.
--Brihadaranyaka Upanishad IV.4.5

Although there are certain circumstances beyond our control, we are still responsible for our choices. We can blame someone else or events for our failures, but ultimately our success is our own responsibility. The failure to achieve what I want is, usually, because (one way or another) I didn't desire it enough to shape my will, which shapes my deed, etc. Also important for me to remember is to be realistic in my desires; I am never going to a professional basketball player and wouldn't have been if I'd started at five and practiced every day. My goals (desires) need to be within my reach, and I need to desire to be the best I can be, not the best. And choices, don't they reveal what you really want? Inspite of what I think I want, my choices are saying something else. Oh, and last but not least, achieving desires can't always be accomplished in a month, a year, or 10 years...it can be an infinite process.

And another favorite quote:

A book is like a garden carried in the pocket.
--Chinese Proverb