bee creative

on the table

Mostly it's been a stormy  weekend.  Early Saturday morning there was a gust of wind measured at 63 MPH. 

During this week's On Being interview with Christiana Figueres, Krista Tippett says,

"When I was growing up, when you were growing up, the weather was a matter of small talk. The weather and the seasons had a predictability that was a rhythm of our lives, and how quickly that has shifted, and we just kind of — It’s so interesting to me and a little bit terrifying how we so quickly move into accepting that there’s fire season."

I was stitching the edges of a cloud patch while I listened to this. 

It is the wind season, the season of power outages and floods.

The cloud patch is now attached to my blanket that I call "Peace and Plenty." It's the name of the quilt square that is on the upper right hand side. 

(There was another cloud close to this spot, it has been temporarily been removed.)

Somewhere on the blog I know I have shared about this blanket (it's mostly 2 layers so not a quilt) but I want to share again.

It started as a memory blanket for my grandfather.  The chambray fabric in the Peace and Plenty squares are from my grandfather's work shirts, the ones he wore gardening. 

Originally the plan was to have a whole quilt of the squares but I needed a blanket and started stitching everything that was handy together and they just seemed to fit. 

I've been adding patches to it for awhile now and suspect that eventually it will be more patches than not.

It is becoming a story quilt, every patch and mend making the story more clear to me. 

I am thinking about choice, and trust, and love...and other things too. 

 

 

greener

I woke up this morning and thought, "everything is even more green..."

While there are still blossoms on the cherry, it's as much leaf as flower now.

I was home for the day and it mostly rained so it was a house cleaning, puttering around kind of day.

A thinking about possibilities kind of day.

There was also a bit of mending on peace and plenty...

add a cloud

Cloud added to the Peace and Plenty blanket.

I suspect that I will be adding things to this blanket for a long time, it has become a kind of journal.

The more I add to it, the more I love it.

funny little (well relatively) cloud

On yesterday's walk I noticed the funniest cloud.  I am stitching one sort of like it on my Peace and Plenty quilt. 

I think it's a cumulus.

This week's On Being podcast of choice, Ann Hamilton, titled "Making and the Spaces that we Share."

"And that we grow up or we’re educated in a world that ascribes a lot of value to those things that we can say or name. But they’re all these hundreds of ways that we know things, through our skin, which is the largest organ of our body. And, so, you know, my first hand is that textile hand, and text and textiles are woven always, experientially for me. And then, I think that when I first started making things out of cloth, it was like it was another skin. So I was thinking about it as an animate surface, and thinking about it as something that both covers and reveals."

I am finding a lot of value in daily posts right now.  Following a thought, research, noticing, making, gratitude...

 

15 + 60

An hours worth of stitching this morning on the Peace and Plenty blanket:

As I stitched I listened to a new podcast I've discovered:  Seamside.  I've listened to four of the five conversations so far and have found them all interesting. 

Fifteen minutes of collecting yesterday added to my collection of plant materials for projects:

Dandelion stems for cord making, daffodils and Camellia sinensis (the Camellia used for making tea) for dye.

Dandelions will continue the process of developing seeds even if picked.  Something to consider.

That's for tomorrow.

getting back to 15 minutes of making

Today's 15 minutes, the product of a lot more time experimenting.

 

I can see a row of these on  my Peace and Plenty quilt.

hope

A day in the garden does wonders...clearing, organizing, preparing, planning, a bit of planning. 

There will be rhubarb soon.

I was lectured by a hummingbird, given the stink eye by an opossum and an eagle circled above my head.  The little birds flew in and out of the garden chatting as they passed by.

It's their world too.

I also did some stitching.  Nancy made me think of trains...

So I started a train for the Peace and Plenty blanket.

And at the end of the day there was the comfort of dinner with friends (Hazel!).

Before going in to the restaurant (the first time in 7 months), I sat in the sunshine on a bench watching people play.  There is a green space in this area, surrounded by stores, restaurants and apartments.

After coming home, I thought about everything happening in the world and the conversation on On Being with Colette Pichon Battle.  It is an important one, about climate change, full of many things to consider. 

"I think I’ve learned that even people who are — who see the world differently from you, they love something. And if we take the time to share what we love with one another, we can see each other’s humanity, and we can feel each other’s value. And if we can connect in a real way, that’s what we need to accompany each other, because some of what is going to be asked is that you just let me be."

I love that she uses the term "care economy," it's one to hold on to. 

On climate change, there is also this:  "These Climate Scientists Are Fed Up."

I am going back out to the garden again today.

There are things we can do.

 

 

I've learned a lot from this...

I've done more since this stage and am liking it better (switched to color pencils and markers).

And yet... I am not really sure.

A large part of me wants to sand it down, paint it over, try again.

I suspect I'd like it better if there was more repetition.

And yet... there is this.

I like this.

A universe of possibilities.

This is also a revision, another layer.

I had tried adding trim with stitching but didn't really like it so...

I made a patch.

Much better.

Out in the garden I found the Pulmonaria (lungwort) had started blooming.

Spring says, "Let's try again."

Started to add a house to the Peace and Plenty blanket.

It's crooked of course.

I don't think it ever got over freezing yesterday.

I came home to find my spring fever garden wilted and sad, even with some burlap over them. 

Everything has revived nicely overnight except for the indigo I was babying along. 

Seeds for this year arrived in the mail yesterday though.

There was a little bit of thread on my needle this morning so I decided to make tracks...

Some mysterious creature of the cold...