Thank You For Sewing!

Dear Sewing Enthusiasts,

Thank you for your dedication and hardwork to unite or fasten by stitches a more beautiful world. You are such fine advocates that we wanted to reward you with this small prize box.  We hope you enjoy it and continue your quest to make and do and be.

We are all in this together! Baste on!

Bernina P. Singer

This mystery box arrived on our doorstep a week ago.  I don't even know how to describe the joy that errupted upon its opening.  Sadly, my photos just don't quite do the trick, but please use your imagination, pretend that you LOVE sewing and are turned on by yards of colorful fabric, buttons - buttons! -  and thread...and you will have some glimmer of the energy surrounding this bounty.

Also included was a copy of One-Yard Wonders, which Eliza used and loved in her sewing class.  I'm kinda thinking that even I could make a few of the items in there...

Eliza pounced upon a package of metal studs and knew just how to use them.  She painted a few and embellished a newly-cut pair of jeans shorts.

So the sewing madness around here continues, thanks to the juicy infusion of a beautiful mystery box!!!  

sewing a new bag

button love

THANK YOU, Bernina P. Singer! You are a sewer of magic and joy!

Gallery: painting, puppets and potions

Now that we have the "holiday" version of Gallery posted, I can share some of the regular everyday creating that's happening around here.

This, in case you aren't sure, is the back of Frodo's head. Painting by Ani. I love this painting.

Before getting to all the shirts at Christmas, we had a practice stenciling session in November with some friends who were visiting for a few days. Eliza cut this skull stencil free-hand and made it into a patch that is still looking for a home. I think this purple skull would look pretty right-on on my back-pack...

I was inspired to make my friend ET a present for her birthday - it must have been leftover Christmas crafty juice or something, as her birthday falls the day after, but wow, it hit me and it's how I spent the entire day until we went over to her house for dinner.

It's a puppet theater, which is really what every 42-year-old needs, right? 

Eliza painted the background pieces for me - there is this seaside sunset and a glittery night scene as well as a plain blue sky.  And of course there are puppets.

Brooding men and gorgeous women, and a tall, mysterious feather...what could they all be doing?

Fighting off giant swallowtail caterpillars, perhaps?

The "art room", as we are calling it, was a gift from my sister and her husband - she knew we'd been thinking of turning the play/guest room into a space where art messes could be made and left for a while, where works in progress could safely stay out without getting disturbed, and where art supplies could stay out and accessible for when the mood strikes.  One foldable table, one drop cloth and one huge set of shelving later...behold the art room.  Between making presents and the usual flow of crafting that goes on around here, this room is getting used.

 (I love how the three paintings below are starting out so differently...)

Eliza: Hey! Look how much more like the sea it looks when I use dots!

Ani's glittery butterfly

And the latest project this room was used for during a friend's visit, was the making of potions. It was a regular apothecary in there.  Bottles holding medicinals and magicks with names like Red Rizeing, Gang Green, Cast Awae currently line one of the shelves.

Wonder! Sparkle! Out! YES!

We almost stayed home...We hadn't done enough "school" for the week (I'll write more about that change in our "schedule" soon...), there was definitely laundry to be done, and I'd no idea what I was making for dinner. Plus, we only had 2 hours before we had to get to a piano lesson.  But we'd already made the mistake of missing Out for the sake of Inside Have-to's once this week and the results had been disastrous (dramatically speaking...), and I wasn't going that route again.  How many jeweled autumn days could there be left? (she writes, huddled on her bed, refusing to turn on the heat in spite of the stone-cold drizzle outside the window) I'm greedy when it comes to fall. I want all of it. So...Out.

leaf "tarantulas" skittering across the roads

milkweed

goldenrod in its last days, deep scarlet sumac

singular sparkle

no better place for some yoga

sun and water for inspiration

the woods were creaky with the wind...spoooooky

jack-in-the-pulpit berries ready for the taking...squirrels? anyone?

Ani and toadstool, size comparison

sisters

oh, sisters....

I had a hunch this would be spectacular. Boy, was I right.

Lactarius Indigo, you rock my world.*

So Much in one and a half hours. Connection, sparkle, yoga, laughter, space, breath, dreaminess, expansion (can we come here every time we want to do yoga?), silence, wind, story, kindness, wonder, awe, friendship, stride...even a trip to Meltdown and Back (a stray apple, unfinished, rolling and...plop!ing into the lake water...so funny and so not funny...).  Deep pleasure in a decision well-made.

*come on - CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS COLOR???? you don't even have to like mushrooms to find this unbelievably wonderful, unbelievably unlikely, incredibly Unbelievable. And yet, there it is. I'm an inarticulate, panting mess in the presence of this crazy unlikelihood.

Echoes

There are those weeks or months when everything seems to come around to the same idea or the same story...we are having one of those times, and it's not completely by accident, but it is being noticed by the wee ones and there is something so gratifying about that...resonance.

We've been reading harvest stories, of course, and I came across a wonderful Day of the Dead book a couple of weeks ago which lead to all sorts of discussion about death and celebration and life. I taught the girls a song that somehow I learned, though I can't remember when; it was whirling in my mind for a few days and I managed to find it on the internet (of course):

Hoof and Horn, Hoof and Horn
All that dies shall be reborn
Corn and Grain, Corn and Grain
All that falls shall rise again

The girls love everything about this song, which is sort of a chant and is easy to fall into and just keep going as you walk, or draw, or drive...we've sung this a lot at this point! (here is a clip, if you are the singing type and want a good harvest song - I wish I could play Eliza singing it for you; she has such a wonderful singing voice) The words have also penetrated their thoughts and they find echoes of the idea of rebirth in so many other places.

We recently read a sweet book called "Ears and the Secret Song", about a mouse and his life's cycle with the other mice in his family and field, and there again was this idea of death and rebirth. The secret song became like a little sister to Hoof and Horn, and the girls sing this one all day, out loud, together, alone, under their breath:

I am small and brown, in the earth I lie;
I spring tall and golden, waving at the sky.

I just sat down to try and write the notation of how we sing this out for you and take a picture, but I am tired enough that I can't quite figure out the key signature!!!!! Yowza. Where's Dan when ya need him? (ok, for the geeks among us, here it is in simple notation:

I am small and brown, in the earth I lie
C Eflat D Bflat C (repeat)
I spring tall and gol--den, wav-ing at the sky
G G G F G--F, Eflat C C Bflat C

Um, yeah. I should go to bed. But wait! There's more! We started moon journaling this moon cycle (maybe more on that later), and, starting with a new moon, we were talking about why we can't see the moon when it's new. Eliza thought about it, and though we've talked about the moon a lot and she could give a fairly accurate explanation of the scientific why, she knew I was fishing for more - she said the old full moon had died and a "new" moon was being born. Anika got an excited twinkle in her eye and started in, "Hoof and horn, hoof and horn, all that die shall be reborn..."

It's a little bit of magic, these echoes...

Mother's Day Magic

I was doing dishes in the kitchen yesterday afternoon while the girls were playing outside.  We were having a challenging day, as many of them have been lately, and I was working it out on my dishes.  Anyone else do that? Anyway, Eliza came rushing into the room, "Mama, there's some lady outside and I think she's selling something, and anyway, she wants to talk to you."  Grmph. Not in the mood for whatever she's selling, spiritual or material. I stalk to the front door, drying my hands on a dishtowel and ready to send her packing (in a kind way, I'm not a total bonehead).  Well, there are a handful of ladies standing outside my door, and one of them is holding something wrapped in cellophane, and she stretches it out towards me and I've got "no thank you" just waiting to dive from my lips when she says, "We're just giving these out to moms in appreciation  of Mother's Day."  Silence.  I say something clumsy like "What?" So she kindly repeats herself, with a beautiful smile, but I can see she noticed the "no" hanging around my face, so I'm hoping she feels a little relieved when my face crumbles into a disbelieving smile and a watery "For real? Are you serious? This is for me? Cause I'm a mom?"  I wanted to cry right then and there I was so touched, and then I said the most old lady thing you can imagine, "Your mothers would be so proud of you!"

The dishtowel and the gift

The magical mother's day posse

Eliza had run inside to make a sign that simply said "I love you" - I think she noticed how moved I was (her weepy old mama), and my girls followed them down the street a ways until I called them back.    As we came back inside I looked at her, and said, "Eliza, you know how you're always asking me about magic in the world? Well, if that's not magical, what those ladies are doing, I don't know what is."