Tangled Stitch

A little joy 002 , a photo by DebraAnn813 on Flickr. I didn't want to end this year without expressing just how joyful this year was. Not the whole year but so much of it. At the end of this year I'm lucky to share my love of family, love of embroidery, love of music with masses. I've had such wonderful opportunities, such wonderful times with friends and family, such wonderful time hand embroidering and I've discovered how easy it is to be happy with a needle in my hand and headphones on my ears! I'm also crocheting a wee bit too. If this wasn't your joyful year, find what makes you joyful and start doing it NOW! Blessings and Happy New Year!

First things first, Mr. Bluebird wishes you nestloads of happiness in the new year! El Camino means the path(and yes the record review will come later in the blogpost so you can read the beginning). My path to where I am today has been quite a journey. Today I am an artist with nestloads of wonderful opportunities and the peace and joy that comes with doing what you love and having other people love it enough to buy it. But my journey was hard and treacherous and some days I wanted to retreat to my bed and pull the covers up tightly. The last few blog posts have been about some of that early journey which probably had a lot more under the covers days. But I was blessed too, I had a mother who loved me unconditionally and totally and even though I lost her at a young age I know she has taken the next 20 years to shape my life and she has found living angels to kind of pick up the slack. My father was very conflicted and in the end just wanted to be happy. He might have made mis...

I have nothing to share hand embroidery wise today so I thought I would address my Black Keys obsession. No I have not had some Black Keys induced mental breakdown. They are just the most soulfully, sexy, bluesy thing missing(well not missing just not found) in music today. Their early music has been used to sell people my age all kinds of things like beer, BMW's and Victoria's Secret underwear but their marketing and yes their age worked against them for so many years. I've become a Black Keys fan because anybody or anything that can make me laugh, dance, or feel sexy during this time of year when I usually listen to Christmas music and cry has to be the best. It started with Brothers. I took the CD out of the library because they won best alternative artist at the Grammys early this year. I also liked the video for Tighten Up. It's an adorable playground video with adorable little children and it's funny(go find it on You tube). All of their videos are funn...

As I've mentioned before both of my parents were frustrated artists, the other day as I was washing my dishes and dancing to the Black Keys(they have become the soundtrack to my life)I thought about my mother. We would watch American Bandstand every single week and dance to it. Perhaps it was her way to make her soul a little less tortured or maybe it just brought her joy or maybe she just wanted to bring me joy. She would tell me about the days when she was young and she would listen to Johnny Mathis real low at night in her bed because when she was young things were quite a bit different. She liked the Rolling Stones because they were a dirtier version of the Beatles right down to their teeth(yes that is a an actual remembrance). Not many kids my age had a mother like that, but then again not every mother treated their kids like the sun rose and the moon set on them, which she did for both my brother Anthony and myself. If we had an interest she was interested. If we had so...

This is my favorite piece. It is called The World As I See It. It is now in my private collection but it proves the point of this post better than any other piece I've made. Being an artist is a real job. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing better in the world then when someone looks at piece of work and they see the intention that was in your head when you created it. At that point it doesn't really matter whether they buy it or not. I bring this piece to craft shows to show people what I am capable of, I thought of actually selling it but you just can't put a price on it. It took so many tiny little stitches and so much blood, sweat and tears(creative license I didn't literally bleed or sweat on it) I can't sell it. It was started in 2007 during my first opportunity to be a working artist. I joined an artist coop that turned out not to be a very good fit for me and rejection can be a very depressing setback for an artist. So it was stopped probably t...

Merry Christmas! OK so there is no picture. Mr. Cardinal is tired from way too much eggnog. I am working on a special piece I can't share because it is for the Reflection show at VAM and it will not open until January 12th. I would share a YouTube video but being a woman of the seventies I don't know how to do that and my son is sleeping. So first off, whatever your current atmosphere is I hope you can find some peace and tranquility and love with your family and friends. Your family and friends are really the gift you give yourself if you are able to give and receive. I guess if you read my blog you've realized I'm just a wee bit eccentric(to say the least). You probably also know that most of my adult life the holidays were a struggle(to say the least). Both my parents died in the first week of January. My mother who was the most wonderful person I will ever know, a beautiful artistic loving soul who never quite recovered from the death of my brother when I was ...

Hi All! I know it's Christmas time and everything everywhere is Christmas music, but this post is going in a different direction as Christmas music inspires me to cry and that's not such a great thing. That being said music does calm the savage beast and inspires me daily. I have really diverse musical likes. Right now I'm into the Black Keys whose Brothers CD made me go out and buy it after one listen to the one from the library. Much to my surprise I discovered they had 6 cd's before that,my wonderful son got them for me as an early Christmas gift and I'm listening to them 24 hours a day. Their bluesy, rock music makes hand embroidering abstract pieces and crocheting funky scarves and bags(I appear to have gotten my fibery mojo back)so much fun. Although I guess to be honest embroidering and crocheting are fun to begin with. Before them it was the Killers or Dave Matthews for that kind of work. I guess the inspiration gotten from them is that they make me...

Yes it's my friend the cardinal once again. I figured with Christmas next week, the cardinal's days are numbered so I thought I'd give him one more look as my Christmas icon. This has been such an incredible year! It started out great with being accepted to Valley Artisan's Market and ended with an incredible holiday shopping event at Samantha's Cafe where they are carrying my ornaments and scarves and soon my little framed pieces(not to mention the fantastic food, try the Thai chicken salad). So exciting. The Katbird Shop is celebrating it's triumphant 6th anniversary and the Albany Shaker Museum has had a great year too. I hope all this good news is a harbinger of good things to come for the arts and the artists. My family is well too. My hubby is doing great and happy in his job. My son had a great year in college and completed his first job. My dog is reasonably healthy and life is good here too. I had lots of fun driving all over the upstate region ...

Hi All! It's been a little longer break then I wished it to be. I misplaced my usb cord in with my embroidery supplies(the obvious place really) and after a few days of looking in all the places it should have been it miraculously showed up in with my embroidery supplies. It's become quite obvious that after this wonderful holiday season dies down a good organizing session(or several) will definitely be in my day planner. I'm having a tremendous holiday season as so many of my artist friends are. I think the buy local, buy handmade emphasis has made such a difference. And I'm hopeful that perhaps so many people will love their beautiful handmade gifts(and ornaments) that a tradition will be started and that there will be as many people shopping at their local gallery or gift store as there are camping outside Walmart on Black Friday. It's a pretty optimistic hope but a good one. Since this blog is supposed to be about hand embroidery and not a sales pitch, t...