windthread

wish You were here

so many just seemingly small things,   .............  if You were here, i could show you

the piece across the top:           this, from Deb Lacativa.  it is so beautyFull that i can't photograph it's full beauty.   as i am nearing finishing the stitching on the circle,  i find myself eyeing this piece of cloth.    how will i stitch it to retain it's integrity as is but also meld it into the cloth as a whole???

that place from 4 to 6 oclock....all it wanted was a piece of the Glow from the top...perfect.

 and late in the evening is the good time for the Kantha stitching around the edges.  to strengthen it for the many fingers that will touch. 

 
 

momentum

the stitching has taken over.  

and there needs to be something more between 4 and 6 oclock.  i'm waiting to know.   but, i found out that there will be many small birds.

 

 

crazy love again

can you see where the left tip of the dark night scrap has taken the bottom tip of the dawn sky into it's mouth??????          and then, over on the far right,  there is just that oh so small piece of orange  fringing out from under the sliver of the universe????

and then,  see the small piece, smaller than a postage stamp, of the violet...just an accidental scrap that got placed there because i didn't want to lose it,  but with no intention at all that it would "go" there,  then, seeing it there this morning,      causing crazy love again.......  how perfect and how  design designs itsSelf sometimes?????

so....this is a 7 inch span of the West Rim of the circle on this latest Wendy cloth.  it is a whole world to me in the moment.  

 

 
 

 

 

re~considering everything and changing stuff

i'm not sure exactly what caused the crack in the This Is How It Is,  but there's a crack and a bright light shining through.    suddenly, i am re~considering a lot of things.    one of the biggest is my     Stuff. 

today i gave my fiber optic Our Lady of Guadalupe to my neighbor Margie.   that was a biggie.

then, i vacuumed the futon couch and went out to the Albatros (huge shed) and brought in 4  six foot quarter rounds and put them across the length of the futon couch.   i put the nice  large dog cushion in a central place and also the two big end pillows from the couch.   plenty of lounging space for one normal and 3 midget dogs.  nice.  as nice as the couch.  tomorrow i'll bring in the denim cover i made from the clothesline and place it UNDER the 6 ft. quarter rounds until the dogs get the drift,  which might mean maybe forever....but oh well to that part. 

and then,  i began looking at all the books.   actually, there are only some out of the original many.  but i'm looking at them.  thinking library book sale. 

and what i am about to show you might end up being what we might consider as the heirlooms of this life, after all is said and done,  with the exception of one more book which will be Jude's.

Second Skin  arrived today.   it is so much more than i had even imagined it might be.       so,  these two and then Judes  when it  manifests itself.   3 books.  the heirlooms.  otherwise,  however it goes.  but these three for sure. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

here we are..............

i took a zillion and this is as good as it's gonna get.  sometimes i have the patience for it, sometimes i don't

and then, today is my mom's birthday,   her first since she died.   i usually call her.   so, next best i thought was getting out her sewing machine.

 
 

what's there at the end

i thought it might be important for some reason to document what's at the bottom of the pots when all is said and done.

the caste iron pot.  things tend to kind of rot in this pot....become gooey.  but i wish you could see the almost crystalized almost metalic glint.  so curious of what that is.............

the most beautiful, this is the copper pot.  they are so dry, like parchment, really, but retain their shape and also this beautiful intertwined circle 

the aluminum pot.  i like this shape.  kind of a bird 

 

thrift shop and one woman's pleasure

thrift shop lately has been a little predictable.  natural linen.  some silk.  actually a very beautiful man's silk shirt.....BUT,  this week we have these:

this shirt/jacket is corderoy.  i have not owned anything corderoy in YEARS and i don't love the color, BUT, the double yoke is just so great and unusual....am wondering how i can change the color????????  and then        this so totally great very used denim skirt...with these gussets!!! i think that's what we call them?...i sewed a thread through and wounding it on the beam so you can see.... but...hmmm...it's for a tall woman, which would not be me....i could wear it as a dress, really, if i sewed on spagetti straps...and it has a waistband and a zipper, so...how do i shorten it???  if i cut it shorter at the bottom, i will lose the beautiful effect of the gussets???????????         and then:

an amazing wool blanket.  amazing for a couple reasons, the first being that it is two colors.  and it appears that the two seperate colors of wool were "felted" together?  i've never seen a blanket like this.   and then, look at the binding...it is SO worn....but, when removed, it's just this totally wonderful fragment...worn, but not weak.  what on earth could have worn those edges like this?  and then

what is one woman's pale is an other's Perfection.      These from Deb Lacativa arrived today.  i sit and stare at them, holding them, looking back and front and see so so so much in them.   And already one piece is perfect for the cloth for Wendy's kids...for that horizontal piece across the top.   Perfect.  

so it's a very good day and on the horizon a storm makes its presence known and the Mocking Birds are pretending to be the little finches that are coming for the sunflower seeds.  Life is Good. 
 

 

 

for Michelle in NYC

up this morning early in the still dark to have some good chunk of time without the whirring sound of the fan and cooler.      and in this dark with the only light being this screen i am in New York City at a reading of Lydia Davis.  and then i go on to an email (!) interview~  she and The Believer.   and i realize how firmly i had shut that door to the part of me that "wrote" and loved looking at how others place and arrange      words.    and this was good to know.

but the best was next.   the coffee ready, i sat down in the "morning chair", turned on the sewing light which is nicely dim at this time of day and began the ritual of sorting through thoughts and feelings of this day in August, 2011  and there                  whipping around under the lamplight were two           FLIES              and at first i was incensed......   i am so sick of flies, they just won't QUIT

but because, i am sure, because of having gone to New York already and attended this poetry reading,  and thought about translating Proust or whoever,   it suddenly occurred to me that those two flies were just                        having fun          that they were doing really very funny things      flying in amazingly acrobatic forms     disappearing and reappearing  in the envelopes there   jumping on eachother from behind the highlighter pen               they were FUNNY!

so...thanks, Michelle.  who'dve guessed. 

 

 

 

 

 

the circling back of August

amazing.  i looked back to last year,   this month of August,  to see what it looked like outside then.   but what i found instead was that this time last year i was working on the cloths for Wendy's kids.  and here i am again.......     .~.

 

i don't know if this will be "right".   there was no specific conversation.  just that it would be a cloth about            Leaving               a cloth about        Finishing                    so, in my mind, it's a cloth about Continuing,   like everything seems to be these days about Continuing.   about just going.  about what's next.   and  as it seems to be for me, there  really was no fore thought,  just one day i picked up the large piece of linen from the thrift shop.   spread it out.   ripped it  and had 3 pieces.    there was an urge to tea dye but it just kept NOT happening and for some reason,   this cloth needs to be white.  well, not white white,  it's a little off white, like maybe i will refer to this white as       bone.   and then i went out to the giant albatross shed thing and found the lid to the big kettle for the   Circle,  penciled it on  and as i posted the other day while Waiting,   just began setting scraps, fragments on.   then a whole lot of just         looking.    it was still flat on the doortable.  scraps came and went, returned,  moved from here to there and some of the pieces still cause me second thoughts but truth is, none want to be taken away at this point.   so this morning they are basted in place.   the  words post and lentil come to mind.  across the top, the horizontal piece which is blank.  this is doubled so that a stick can be placed through to hold it up.  the  cloth itself is in two panels.  so a child can               walk through the Circle.   

it's up on the wall now.  so....we'll see.

 

 

elderberry

 

Mexican Elderberry leaves....the summer after the hard winter.  and all is well

these pics are particularly for Helen Lee/Buzz and Drucilla who might use their Elderberry for their Diaries cloths?

the light here has such a mind of it's own...

all cloths are the same original larger piece, torn.  muslin.  just wetted and pushed into pots of Elderberry leaves,  local water to the top.   steeped in the desert sun one week, some evaporation.

on the left a green that doesn't jump out here, but is green nonetheless, and always consistent from a copper pot.

middle, in the aluminum pot.

right from the rusted cast iron pot  ........  which in the first few days was a dusky pale violet color.  maybe i'll take it out at that point with the next batch that i'll start tomorrow?