Tangled Stitch

I though yesterday's blog post about the circle hand would be the last post of this year but I thought I would take a minute to reflect on the wonders of the internet and the blog community and inspiration. As I mentioned yesterday this year was not the best for me but I am still optimistic about the upcoming year and decade. The beginning of the new millenium was a time of great spirituality for me. It was also a time when I could scoff at all the Y2K worries. That changed for me later that year when the election of George Bush(or whatever you want to call that election) came through at the time I had the feeling that nothing would ever be the same and 10 years later that is most definitely true. I lived on Long Island and spiritually was being called to a simpler life, a country life. I had realized that being on an island of millions wasn't really where I wanted to grow old. So I found a dream house on Realtor.com in Kinderhook NY. It was a swiss chalet that I could...

Well, it seemed like the Circle hand was the perfect way to end this year. It is hand embroidered on watercolored muslin. This hand was a tortuous project as it was my craft fair piece from earlier in the year. I brought it from craft show to craft show so that my craft show anxiety wasn't visible to the public. After the craft shows it sat unfinished for months and then it sat unframed for months and then I figured out a way to change it's karma and I gave it to my friend Cheryl as a combination birthday and holiday gift. Cheryl was my partner in crime during most of my craft show angst, she was and is a wonderful artistic spirit that I am very, very, lucky to have in my life. Cheryl is a very successful artist and was exactly the right person to go through my endless angst with. She never lost faith in me nor this piece. There was never a phone call or an outing when she didn't ask about this piece. She kept prodding me to finish it and finally she succeeded. It...

Well I hope this Christmas holiday was everything you wished it to be! The three of us had a wonderful time, full of fun, food and togetherness. I'm already back on my Mediterranean lifestyle. The amazing thing about this diet is that the minute you stray you pay for it. Easier to eat healthy then to eat unhealthy. I received wonderful gifts from the hub and the son. They know me so well, some gift certificates to Borders and Michaels and a CD. To read, to craft, to listen life's wonderful pleasures. I am working on an embroidery piece for a new adventure so I can't share it at the moment, but I put it away for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day and made myself some matching mittens to match my favorite scarf and mittens. I'm gonna make a hat someday too, just not right now. Before these I hadn't made mittens in years, maybe decades. The first one took so long but the second went much faster. I knit it on 4 doublepointed needles and I cannot count how many ti...

Today was my final business outing. A lovely trek to the Katbird Shop on this positively frigid day. I dropped off a few pieces so if you are in the neighborhood drop in and take a look. I also dropped off my artist statement which is based on a blog post I did last year sometime. It's a little over the top but I needed one for the Albany Shaker Museum Christmas Craft show which is now over, and I couldn't think of words that accurately describe my love of what I do better. So now that my dropping off days are done for a short while(I have some wonderful heart ideas for Valentine's day) I can relax and recoup and revamp. I'm thinking of giving up the bags unless I can find a home for them on Etsy and I want to move in a more experimental direction. The thing about a unique bag is that it has to find a unique person who wants it and to just knit or crochet bags just to knit or crochet bags doesn't really float my boat. If I am going to experiment and grow I a...

Well it seems the year is winding down and frankly not a moment too soon. This year has been not the best year of my life, lets leave it at that. Too much too opine about anyway. But I am also thankful, very thankful, for my wonderful friends in real life, Emily, Cheryl, Sandy and the two Wendy's! For my hubby and my son who have been very supportive this year. For the wonderful shop owners I work with, Kathy, Debra, and Jeromy. For the Albany Shaker Museum and the lovely ladies there. And for finding bits and pieces of myself, strewn along the landscape. Ready to put this year behind me and spread my artistic wings and fly without a net next year. I have quite a few ideas in my head, some of them quite out of the ordinary for me but I've given the crafter part of my head a chance and now it's time to embrace totally the artist in me. As this year passes along, I feel much more like my given name DebraAnn then my everyday name Debbie. I've learned that solitu...

I know, I know it is a retread. I have been relaxing myself with several projects none of them finished so here comes passion. Hand embroidery has become a passion again for me. Perhaps because it is the holiday season and I don't do the holidays very well or perhaps because I have been having a bout of insomnia I have been giving myself the gift of hand embroidery, no framing, no sewing on the machine, no deep thought just embroidery. I put the soundscapes channel on my television(new age music) turn off the politics, turn off the family(they know enough just to avoid the new age musical) and just retreat to my embroidery. It takes so little to make me happy and I've been giving myself the gift of happy. Oddly enough reading Whiffs and Glimmers, that seems to be a trend. Finding happiness in needles. Oftentimes people think about what they would need on a desert island, myself it would be a suitcase full of embroidery thread on an island full of silk worms so I would ha...

This is just a little inkling of my handmade gifts for this holiday season. There are hand embroidered and hand knitted and hand stitched and even a couple of hands thrown in there this year. I'm still in the process of figuring out which home they will go home to. Some are no brainers and others require a bit more brain then I have at the moment. I'm a last minute Molly so I probably won't know a couple until I am ready to deliver them. There is a big push this year for handmade gifts and I personally hope it keeps going. There are always gift card years, but I don't think this is one of them. Our economy and our spirits are broken, this is the year to buy something that comes from the heart and is made with love. Be it a beautiful hand embroidered hand or a beautiful wooden train, or a lovely crocheted scarf. Crafters and artists do what they do because they love it, so every hand made gift you give means you are giving something that someone loved enough to...

Today I made a trip to the Katbird Shop where I dropped off, Lotus and Mighty Sun, both hand embroidery on watercolored muslin fabric. I took the glass off of Mighty Sun to see how it would be received, as I am thinking of the endless possibilities for embellishment. It is always a wonderful time at the Katbird seeing the lovely Kathy and today she had an artist there making a beautiful painting of a horse. There are so many talented artists and artisans represented there it is definitely worth a trip. I also took some Christmas Ornaments, which Kathy is selling like hotcakes. One woman bought a whole bunch of them and it always heartens me to see that some people admire my work that much. I am starting a new endeavor(or a revisit to an old one) at the Katbird making personalized childrens pillows and birth announcement pillows. When my son was very little I used to design them, the first one being a train which is what I brought to Kathy, and I would ask my two year old son wha...

Meditation is something that is so good for you. Only problem with that is that I cannot sit still without my hands doing something. I've always been a fidgety person who has to have my hands busy. So recently I decided to make my stitchery a meditation. Repetition, prayer and music. I think the holidays are just a stressful time, you can almost see the energy bursting out of people's eyes. Too much shopping, worrying about money, missing those who are not with you, eating too much, drinking too much,not sleeping enough and that leads to smiles, big empty vacant smiles. Happy, happy, happy. Well that being said, I sat down with a very small piece of fabric and my tangled mess of thread and started a stitching meditation. It had no rhyme or reason. It started with a pair of spirals and then I just added stitches until it felt done. Now that it's done I'm going to have to put it away for a few days, because of it's size it won't fit in a frame but it came ...