There's been a bad case of start-itis going on around here, but finally some pieces were finished.
Trees, moons, ships, and a still life in pink. Stories of celebration, wonder, connection, and being there for yourself- the tales I tell myself over and over to carry me through.
If you're in search of a story too, they're in the shop here, thanks for taking a peek.
Moon had a really good day yesterday (even without a hug from his girlfriend or a car). Blue joined us via Facetime in singing Happy Birthday over candle lit donuts. We even did a family selfie with Blue on a phone screen. A sign of the times.
The three of us stayed up until midnight eating donuts and watching Moon's choice of a Harry Potter movie (which made me happy to know that he's still just a big kid, in spite of telling us all day long that he's an adult now.)
I've been absent a lot here and on the internet in general. Between things that have happened for us, and the nothing of most days, my lack of oomph won out. Really, we are ok enough, and better off than so many.
I'm still feeling storyless, actually, that's not true- yesterday triggered bad memories from my 18th birthday, but I don't want to write about that.
There has been stitching. These patchwork pieces keep coming. They surprise me and I like them. Onward...
That storm is still on my mind, looking at the images from it, trying to capture the fractured brilliance of the lightning.
Today started dark and rainy...dreary.
K. goes for a walk most mornings. Lately he's been having encounters with crows. Along one block they yell and swoop at him, close enough to feel the wind off their wings. He wrote the crow guy from the newspaper. A reply came with possible reasons, such as a nearby nest. He said that they won't attack if you look at them.
This morning there were three crows cawing in a repeated cacophony outside our house. Over and over. Something was wrong. K. left for his walk with his hood on. He returned a minute later. There was a dying crow in the parking strip. I called animal control to see what to do. She thought it was probably a fledgling with parents guarding it, and it would be fine. "I don't think it's fine." Fledglings can look pretty bad, she said. I sent a photo. She called back saying it wasn't fine at all, and could we get it into a box and bring it in?
When I went back out to get it, it was face first in the grass, dead. The other crows were silent (I'm hoping they were friends, not foes). A few minutes later, returning with a shovel to carry it to the woods behind our house, it was on its back, face up in the rain. (I wonder what happened?) I put it in the woods and thanked it for its spirit.
A search for "What does a dead crow mean?" led to this, "While many believe that seeing a crow is a harbinger of death, others say the presence of a dead crow means the end of bad things and the beginning of all things new and good. ... There are also websites claiming crows symbolize change, intelligence, prophecy or strength."
Oh, I hope so.
"Struck & Still Standing in Starlight"
Yesterday brought news for us, not unexpected, but still, it has tilted things.
At the same moment a beautiful email came, from a soul who does such good in the world, creating space for healing. It was a reminder that in the big view of things we are ok.
The rest of the day was spent stitching, finishing up pieces, thinking about the many possibilities for how things might go.
There was a new start, too, and a recognition of that moment at the very beginning of a cloth, when I don't know what will happen, and of how much I love the wide openness of that.
Gratefulness for Jude's moons, star and scraps, Deb's cloths and threads, Tina's cloth, and so much for the centering circle of this community, oxo.
It was finished on Saturday.
Most of yesterday was spent curled up in it- reading, knitting, petting the cat, napping, and finally sleeping under it.
I know it's not a complicated or fancy blanket, but I made it for me, from my stories and those I love, and it makes me so happy.
There are lots and lots of places where the stitches run into, cross, or weave to and away from each other in odd inconsistent ways. Unplanned.
I don't mind. I kind of like the meeting places of selves from different days and moments.
My crazy wonky stitches make me happy. Sometimes they were lines of getting through, carrying on or finding purpose, and other times- like a laugh of "I'm here! Having a good time, making marks of myself!"
It was started in October 2018, because someone told me to make myself a quilt. I rolled my eyes at her, but a week later stitched the first few squares. In a blog post I wrote, "Maybe a very slow quilt, a square here and there, of cloths that are gifts, memories, and loved. A way to hold them, and eventually they might hold me back. We'll see."
It's a good blanket. (And there are a few stories about this old bed to tell on another day.)
Not wanting to cover up the edges of the squares on the "Story" blanket with binding, I quilted up to about an inch or so all around it. When that was done, the three layers (squares, flannel and backing) were trimmed even with each other.
Four inch wide strips were folded in half and slid between the squares and flannel layer.
A row of stitching through all the layers.
Followed by more rows, filling in that unquilted inch or so.
With the quilting finished on the squares side, it was flipped over.
The binding folded over and whip stitched into place.
A finial whip stitched row on the front (just to be secure, or because it meant being able to keep going on it for longer).
This shows the finished edges from both sides. Three sides are done. Probably another day or two for the last one, or maybe I'll stitch another few rows into the binding on the back to keep it going?
No stories today, but I have been working on writing down a long ago travel misadventure, told a friend on the phone the other night. We had such a good laugh from it, she made me promise to write it down. It's so much longer on paper, and I'm not sure it's as funny without my dramatic presentation. We'll see.
I'm noticing that more stories are being shared these days. There's not a lot to share with nothing much going on in most of our lives, the same people, activities, walls... day after day... so the past is coming out to entertain us more and more. Moon has been shocked to find out how many times teenage K. and I broke up before finally settling down, a friend wanted to hear all about my Camp Fire girl days, and my mom shared (for the first time!) Dad's strange proposal.
I've always said stories can carry us through...
Eighty-nine squares to go. I paused on this one for a while. Indigo, walnut and tea, I think.
A couple of squares begun. This one with one of Jude's stars, it had floated to the top of the basket.
This strange thing happened yesterday in response to Jude's post about wrinkles. Not quite sure what's happening. It felt like birthing something, maybe myself, but looks like a rock garden, too. Maybe my mind is a rock garden? Now I'm remembering childhood stops at a rock garden and museum- an attraction the family would stop at on the way to visit cousins.
The book of loved things continues, but at a slower pace. Some pages take longer, like this one of a retired favorite mug. It was the perfect mug- size, image, handle...sadly, the glaze has worn off on the inside making it unsafe to drink from.
Just a bit of Rosee...
"Every night after work, Stew and all the girls in the beauty shop and I went riding before bed time. It got so hot that summer that the whole bunch of us took a blanket and went out and slept in the pines. It was a lot of fun. The summer of 36 came along..."
Last night, I went to bed thinking about art, process, and my place with it all right now. Somehow this led to remembering days at summer camp at the Oregon Coast...
Every year, on Friday, the whole camp would go over the dunes to the beach, working together to carry a long thick rope. I couldn't tell you how long, or how many of us there were. A hundred children? Fifty feet? We would march down the sand, parallel to sea. Once we arrived at the designated spot, the counselors would spread themselves along the rope and carry it out into the ocean until they were waist deep, creating a barrier between us and danger. When the signal came, we would all run in as hard and fast as we could!
I remembered that feeling of jumping into the waves, and the occasional momentary drowning panicking feeling when overwhelmed by a surprise surge, and then being upright, breathing air again, excited it might all happen again, and the anticipation and elation of jumping just right, so that the swell carried you almost to shore... It was a joyous kind of baptism.
(You should know that it's hay fever season, and I'm in those first loopy days of meds...)
Yesterday had some parenting moments...
Blue has been offered a job upon graduation this spring, and it's across the country. Whether he'll accept it, or not, is still up in the air. Either way, it was a realization that he may never live here again, which is good, how it should be, and... sigh.
Last night, I yelled something at Moon out of exhaustion and exasperation. It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't kind. I said I was sorry, and again this morning, and I am. He's seventeen and thinks he's ready to be on his own, which is normal, how it should be, and... sigh.
In trying to think of something to write here, I drew a moon mind-map, writing down moony thoughts- a page of golden round words and moonlit memories of childhood- both mine and the boys'...
Traveling to the moon and stars with my brother in our imaginations and rocket ships (lawn chairs), growing up with a woman named Mooney across the street, and being told (and believing) I could live on the moon when I grew up.
How Blue chose Moon's middle name because there was often a full moon on the evenings of our midwife appointments. "Look at the moon, Mama!"
Standing outside, huge-as-moon pregnant, days overdue, trying to convince Moon to come out and see the moon for himself, and finally, on the porch a couple of days later, showing him the moon on the night he was born.
Writing a little Zoom to the Moon book for four year old Blue to read. Putting together that wonderful "Over the Moon" play with his second grade class, which included bits of the songs "Blue Moon", "Moon River" and more.
And that night sky song that I hummed to my baby boys, while slowly twirling around the front room, trying to dance them to sleep (click here for a lovely listen).
Well, this turned into an unexpectedly long lingering...
"A Golden Making" and a few more starlit story cloths will be in the shop tomorrow morning.
