Thursday's Force of Life

 I know that I must spend more time outside when I discover things that are on the path where I walk or work or play outside. This leaf looks rather ordinary on the surface from the top from its most shown view. It even looks a tad scruffy with that hole in it and the ragged sort of edge where some little caterpillar has decided it was the days meal, no care that it was altering the whole leaf. But the real beauty is not this side .. I glimpsed this leaf because it's under side was showing. And what beauty it holds. I think maybe that is true about people sometimes. There are those that we think look a tad scruffy or maybe they are rough around the edges .. but maybe if you listen they have a story to tell .. or their underbelly .. their insides... their thoughts or words tell their beauty. I found this one to be quite striking. I found the color to be the one thing that grabbed my attention first and then examining this leaf more closely I loved the way that the purple were like visible veins of life flowing through this spectacular specimen. The patterns and the edges of the ridges were so compelling! And closer still the center leaf with all the hair protrusions and even the holes didn't distract from its underbelly beauty!! I love this leaf .. i am sure that is evident .. haha. I want to try to use this in dyeing although I do not know what kind of a leaf it is. It was attached to a vine that was dark in color and those hair protrusions feel rather prickly. But the colors of purple and green are just so wonderful .. a combination I will have to repeat .. I love it's display of life force ..

 I hope you've enjoyed these things in nature that move me .. and inspire me to emulate the beauty that I see.

Two Things Tuesday

I'm often glad to have the interruption of holidays to be gone... not that some aren't enjoyable just that most are filled with a lot of emotion. Some are really good and some are really hard. All in all though I had a wonderful dinner with a dear friend and a spectacular view of the fireworks celebrating the independence of our country... a wonderful summer , barbecue, fresh veggie, good conversation, day to say the least.

Since there has been this major shift in my mood I have found myself flooded with ideas of creation and the need to really focus on how to do what I most need to do. I really have had some very poignant moments lately. I do seem to find that nature just seems to keep me centered and I have been fascinated with taking photos of the creatures that I come across in my own yard. I am sometimes in awe and surprised at the creatures that make their presence known to me .. this was really very special. While doing an exercise outside I discovered this wonderful little red salamander with these bright red spots on his back. I have never in my life seen one of these. When I saw this little guy I was so excited to see him I asked him to stay still please, while I run into the house to get my camera. I know how quickly creatures can scurry off so I hoped he'd still be there when i return ..and as you can see he did stay.. but not for long .. I wasn't able to get a huge number of photos and add to that the light was quickly going away with the setting sun. I got two shots of his whole body and the rest were of only the parts that were exposed. He went under some leaves and I wasn't willing to move anything to make him more visible. I was just delighted to have seen any of him at all. I have been reading a bit about animal totems and symbolism and this one is pretty interesting. I guess with some of the stitching ladies that I follow many are often incorporating symbolism into the stitching which goes well with story cloths and spirit cloths like that of Jude Hill. I feel like I'm finding my own way to tell my story in photos, stitch and any area that I may create in. I'm thinking some of my images will show up in stitching .. I'm loving the idea of a red salamander with red spots in stitch!!!

 He was a delight to watch and who knows if I will see him again...I will be happy if I do but either way I'm already happy to have seen him once.

Now for those that know that I follow with stitching I have done some stitching and finally took a few photos. I have been experimenting with the mixture of drawing and stitching and have found some fun ways to use that. One is a little purse that I made for my youngest grand daughter. Her sister got one back in April and so I had to stitch one for her sisters birthday. Here are all the details to that stitching.

The first photo below here is the front of the purse. For the sake of time I machine stitched the purses body and handles but everything else is hand stitched. I did all the stitching on the front first. The little girl I did on the first purse was a little painting on an old piece of paper and that glued onto a piece of denim and then stitched onto the purse. The purse below I wanted to be more permanent and so I drew onto a little shape for a face and then stitched all the facial features and then added more stitching around. I did a small line stitch for the hair and used the needle and thread just like a pencil.. that was fun!!! Then I did a small piece for the neck and another for the body. I hadn't cut the space under the arms so I filled that in with some patterned stitching. I did thread beads on the shirt and I think a pink satin stitch for the sleeves. The flower i just made an impression of a flower because I figured if i tried to stitch all the petals i would have either made it too big or it wouldn't be noticable as a flower. I basted the skirt on and tried to do a light satin edge on the arms to reinforce the fabric because it seemed to fray as I turned it under. I used several colors but don't think its that obvious.

 Then just some whimsical idea that sprang into my head to just put these circles of cloth that seemed to be asking to be places on the belt loop that was already on the piece of denim I chose for the girl. Each loop i stitched something on .. like happy birthday ( i think i ran out of room for the last letter haha) and I Love You on the bottom one and nothing on the middle one. And finally a crudely done "stitched with love, Grandma" on the bottom.  I still haven't given it to her yet so I'm still needing to stitch the rest of Grandma and somewhere I will write my grand daughters name.. perhaps that middle ring. Either way .. I was pleased with how this turned out and i know that it is infused my love for her .. to commemorate her second birthday! Now I will have to make other equally fun gifts for my grandsons! So much to do and so little time !!! Thanks for stopping by. !!

Life at a Snails Pace

Sometimes life does seem to go at a snails pace and it has felt that way for some time. Interesting how the spiral on a snails home is going up ~ a great reminder that I don't need to continue on the previous months downward spiral.. lost to negativity. That direction doesn't seem to work however there is one positive aspect to being in the dulldrums of life .. when it shifts it has a significant positive impact.

I have to say that I am so extremely grateful to have a love of nature and even the most ordinary or slow creatures can give me so much. I spent over an hour just taking photo after photo of this beautiful creature
this past week. I was fascinated with the texture of his  very long slender body. I watched in amazement as it's eye looking attennae would protrude out to search the expanse of the universe that lay before it. And at other times it would completely hide them inside .. so as not to be certain which end was the front. There was the added satisfaction of finding it on a plastic sheeting that I used to rust some large fabrics.. the rust had stained the plastic making it a rich colorful background for the snail.  How I delight in the patterns that mother nature provides ... so many are simply exquisitely beautiful.

The shift from my downward spiral has taken me to complete gratitude. I have a list that is so long for why I am so grateful at this time. I think for the first time in my life I understand why it is important to ask for the things that you want. Oddly enough many of those things are just there for the asking. I think being clear about what you want is very important. I was reading on Jude Hill's blog about her questions regarding want and need of dyed cloth. It is good to question these things. I believe that needs sustain us and wants give us more of the joy. Certainly we don't always get what we want but often I have not asked for something that I wanted because I already felt that I didnt deserve it... for a variety of reasons. But this past week or so I have been so blessed in so many ways that it just seems to be blazed in my brain .. that I must ask for what I want..... in a literal sense and a prayerful spiritual sense. It makes me think about how empty my life could be if I never asked. There are still so many things for me to learn from these recent revelations about asking. About wants and needs. Nature has a way of giving me so many of these lessons. I am almost urged to remind anyone that may read this .. to slow down to snails pace and see what is right there making itself present in your life. They come and they go and sometimes if we are still enough to look and watch there is something wonderful to see or experience .. I am grateful for time, silence, and gifts by man and nature. Thank you from my heart .. from the deepest parts of me. .... thank you.

Always a dreamer

In my idealistic view of the world I do really believe that all will be ok... only the fear of what might not or may happen just seems to take over my mind and thoughts. It's never fun following fear. I looked back over alot of my blog posts and think that I am always lamenting. Perhaps just focusing on the positive is a better position. I have been stuck in my head and my thinking. Its funny how you can get caught in the trap of negativity .. Generally however I am finding that no matter what the emotion I can always use this for creativity. No matter the feeling. Sometimes in strange ways the harder emotions create better work .. perhaps it's just the passion of the moment of feeling that does it. I think this is true for the more pleasant emotions as well. In spite of everything I am going to hold out that something will shift into a more tolerable circumstance. No matter what the outcome. I am going to believe that it will be good even if it's not what I want.. because I can always make something out of next to nothing. I finished the piece of cloth for my girlfriends birthday and will give it to her tomorrow. That is the photo above.

A week ago I babysat my grand daughters and I had taken my new stitched ragged purse that I glued one of my little girl illustrations on to. My grand daughter Mariah really loved it! I was so tickled that I told her that I would make one for her. I said ok what color do you want? She said Purple!!!  YEAH!!!! .. i Love that she wanted it purple. So .. I started to make one for her. Then the next week I unexpectedly babysat again the following week .. a few days ago... and wondered if she would remember that she wanted the purse. I had started it but it wasn't finished. I brought everything with me and if she'd remembered I planned to attempt to stitch it all up for her by hand while we were together. So ... i get there . .. and am so happy to greet them and they are happy to see me .. A few minutes after I got there.. Mariah asks me if I had her purse. She just turned three a few months ago. I was surprised really that she would remember. I don't know why. But I said yes I started it but I have to finish it still. So .. between fixing breakfast and lunch and baths and playing silly and loving on them.. i managed to stitch her purse. I'd still like to add more things to it.. .. like her name.. some flowers maybe .. but I can't tell you how simply divine it was to see her face when I gave it to her mostly finished. She loved it better than anyone could .. she smiled proudly and put it on her shoulder .. she held it close .. she was so pleased. If anything can melt a heart it is her loving me in the perfect way that she does. On the left is a photo that I tried to take of her holding it .. she was tired and decided to cover up on the couch just before I left her.. when I remembered I wanted to capture a photo of it. It's not as clear as I'd like but .. it is here. It's a velor purple shirt that I cut up that had some flowers stamped into the cloth .. and I did a discharged denim handle and the girl is glued onto a piece of discharged denim. This is really an experiment to see if the modge podged girl will last on the cloth .. i machine stitched the illustration to the purple and then stitched everything by hand. It seems sturdy enough to last a while but certainly a child can give it a good test. If it doesn't last I will just make more. It was fun to make though. ANd thats all i have to share today .. thanks for stopping by .. it's means the world to me. :)

It's Been a Turtle Week

Well it's Saturday evening and breeze is cool enough as long as I sit in front of the fan. Amazingly I feel like I have gone from one extreme (freezing cold) to the other (hot as hell). Either are just as disconcerting. Both leave me wanting to lie still either under a cover or in front of a fan.... too hot now to exert much energy .. sheesh. So I try to get up early while the weather is tolerable and do what ever needs doin outside. 

I have been struggling due to financial hardships from being unemployed. That is not a fun situation and finding work is harder when your mood is not so good. So inspite of the difficulties I have had some nice experiences lately. The first one was early in the week ... I was really feeling bad ... and went outside to get a change of scenery when I looked over at my dog Misty and saw her sitting in the flower bed in front of the porch .. she just seemed to have this look about her that made me say " what are you up to?" and as I approached I saw what I was sure was a toad .. and I questioned her .. "Did you get a toad?? " which usually means one thing .. that nasty poison in the mouth .. that leaves the dog frothing and wondering why the toad didnt want to play too? So I was getting ready to wipe her mouth out with a rag when I looked a bit closer at the toad and saw that it was a Turtle laying upside down .. I was surprised .. I hadn't looked that closely before and picked it up right away and started to inspect it to see if there were any puncture wounds or bleeding and I saw none of that.. just a muddy shell .. so .. i took it in and washed it off .. and as we were headed back out the door I saw it's eyes open .. i was so excited. After giving it some thought I decided perhaps he needed a rest so I would keep it in a bucket till I was sure he could walk and was ok .. in the mean time .. i had to get the camera.. cause he was a baby alligator turtle .. very interesting to look at and I wanted to get some pictures .. So here are a few of him ..

 His eyes were pretty spaced out. I can't imagine how

frightening it must have been being attacked by a dog and then this human is just staring at me .. after a while I realized that it wasn't injured and that it really just wanted to be back in some body of water. Where they usually live. So I walked it down to the creek and sat him on the shore and then .. after a few minutes of watching it there it took off into the water .. amazing and every few seconds it would poke his head out to get a breath of air. Amazing to watch. I really enjoyed the whole experience.   Then today I went off to run an errand and as my car was driving down the road I thought that what I'd seen was another turtle so I stopped and sure enough here was another turtle upside down in the middle of the road. This was a box turtle and who knows how it got turned upside down but there it was. I decided I needed to get pictures of it as well so he went along with me in the car. I left him in there while I ran a quick errand that didnt require me to leave the car. So .. after we got home I took some photos. Here he is .. it is interesting to notice the differences in the two turtles. The box turtles eyes .. were big and round .. with out the center detail in the alligator turtle. I guess they were both big one was just darker then the other .. fascinating though.

In the Wee Hours ...

I had planned on blogging about my experience outside today which involved the creek only to discover that all of the photos that I took and thought I'd saved in a folder ... didn't happen... i just kept saving every new photo as the same thing I guess ... either way it was an hour of work in edits that are lost .. atleast i still have the photos so I just have to take the time to re-edit them .. sheeeeeeshhhh.... I sure don't want to make that mistake again .. So I will post the bug that I photographed at the end of my creek experience. I found this piece of wood lying on the ground with all this wonderfully textural lichen/moss/fungus growing on it .. decomposing... with this kewl looking centiped and since it was the last photo that I edited it got saved on my desktop .. so I thought i'd share it with you .. and I have a few shots of my purse. But isnt he a kewl looking peachy beige shaded bug?? I love looking at all his legs!!!



And here is that hippiesh purse I mentioned. After taking photos of it it doesnt seem to hold the pizazz that I thought it did so .. it sorta looks like a mess ... I still have lots more stitching to do on this but I couldnt wait to carry it around with me. maybe just reliving my teen years... when i loved to carry funky purses .. Let me know what you think!!! all recycled fabrics here .. :)