Giving Away a Salvaged Star

My first blog post was January 26, 2008 so I guess some sort of commemoration is in order. I can't tell you how many posts I've written because every year I go through and delete ones that no longer suit me. Maybe I shouldn't do that. There are 318 left, which doesn't seem like very many for a five year period of time.

SALVAGED STAR - FRONT AND BACK

To commemorate my five year mark, I will be giving away my little quilt which I call Salvaged Star. It was a vintage quilt block languishing at the bottom of a box of old textiles a friend had given to me. It was the kind of thing I love ... old, soft, a star, and in a favorite color coupling of blue and brown. I picked it up to take a closer look. It needed to be rescued, to be stitched. So that's what I did. I added some layers of cloth, the backing being a vintage piece from an old quilt, then I quilted it all with hand stitching and also hand stitched a nice brown linen border. I hope you find the result pleasing.

It is a wee bit more than 7" square. There is some staining that is due to age but that doesn't detract from its look ... at least not for me. If you like it and you would like to own it, then please leave a comment here. In about a week, I will choose a name at random and that person will receive this little quilt.

HAPPY BLOGAVERSARY TO ME

2/6/2014 - COMMENTS ARE NOW CLOSED - I'll pick the winner later today.

Thanks for participating. :-)

A Little Bit of This and a Little Bit of That

Tiny Endodontic Tools

It has been a fairly productive week! I had the third and final session of treatment for two root canals - and it was all painless. I love my endodontist - Evan Christensen, with offices in Ridgefield and Fairfield (CT), in case you're interested. He is so gentle and kind; a fun conversationalist, too. And, when he is done working on my mouth, he actually massages my Temporal Mandibular joints, ever so gently, to help assuage that horrible ache one gets after sitting with one's jaw wide open for an extended period of time! He even sent me home with a collection of tiny tools of the trade, because I was admiring them so much. I wonder what I will make with them. I have an idea, but we'll see what happens as I start playing with them.

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Sweet Baby Dreams

I am very nearly done with this latest in my Pieces of Dreams series. I really, really love it. I kind of want to save it, just in case I have a grandchild someday. Wouldn't it be just absolutely perfect, hanging on the wall in a baby's room?  I have a friend who bought one of my Sweet Baby Stars at a craft show one year, saying "I'll just tuck this away for my first grandchild."  I think that is such a great idea. However, my daughter insists she "lacks the gene" that finds children to be cute, so maybe I shouldn't start a Grandchild Hope Chest just yet!

Sweet Baby Stars


In a somewhat related vein, I'm not sure if I've already told you (i.e. bragged) that one of my little felted wool quilts was selected to be in a book! It is called 500 Felt Objects, published by Lark Books, and it will be coming out in the fall. More about this as we get closer to the date.

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I'm just starting on a little sewing project. It is a vintage quilt square - my favorite kind of pieced star, in beautiful blue and brown. I will be adding a thin filler layer, backing, and lots of stitching.

Vintage Pieced Star

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I've also been having a ball making wrap bracelets using leather cord and various beads. I love how they look and I am very excited to be able to feature some of my special antique buttons as clasps.

Double Wrap Bracelet
with Antique Dyed Mother of Pearl and Cut Steel Button
 

 Triple Wrap Bracelet
with Brass Beads and Antique Brass Police Uniform Button

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Finally, I want to share a little video with you. It is quite strange, but I hope you'll stick with it - it is wonderful. It made me think about how I feel when I am sewing a doll. I often feel very uncomfortable about sticking the needle into the doll, especially as she becomes more and more real. The closer she gets to her finished state, the more I feel like I am injuring an actual being. Anyone else ever think about that? Or am I just too weird?



New Year, New Outlook

Happy New Year to you all.  I have truly enjoyed our past year together. Your comments mean so much to me. I apologize for being such a sloth when it comes to responding to those comments. 

I have a total redesign of

my website

to greet the new year. There are still many areas for improvement, I'm sure, but I think it is much better than it was.  

I'm hoping to post many new items to my website this year. I am right now working on a wonderful fiber project which I  should be able to post about before the end of the month - and I'll be posting the items for sale in

my Etsy fiber shop

. Santa left a

Dremel 4000

for me, so I'll be doing more silversmithing at my jewelry table, and listing those items in

my Etsy jewelry shop

.

In the spirit of the fresh slate of the new year, I plan to reinvigorate my efforts to clear out the clutter. That means I'll be listing more items at

my Etsy vintage shop

and

my Ebay site

.

CRYSTAL CLEAR COACHING

I'd like to make some meaningful To Do lists for 2011, I'd also like to actually cross off items from the gargantuan 2010 To Do list.  It seems I am psychologically programmed to believe I have accomplished something, merely because I have added it as a bullet item to my list.

I'd like to enjoy life more in 2011. Eat, drink and be merry. And hopefully not die; at least not yet. Am I tempting the fates, by putting that in writing? I hope not.

I'd like to be more mindful of how I am living. I'd like to carry within me more of an awareness that we do not get "do overs," that what's done is done and therefore it matters to take care with our words and actions. It's important to remember that every day we are creating our lives, and we are creating our memories. And we don't get to rewrite history, so better make that history what you want it to be.

I would like to take better care of my body in the new year - and every year thereafter.  I hope I go to yoga class instead of just talking about it, that I get the juicer out of the closet and start using it again, that I get out of the house for at least a little while most days.

I want to do a better job of feeding my soul. Clean the cobwebs from the corners of my mind. Get the studio in better order so that I can easily go in there and create something, instead of being stymied by the seemingly endless clutter of things that I find so hard to let go. Making things with my hands - that's important.

I'd like to do more exploring, even if only by car and not too far from home. I spend so much time exploring wwwland, discovering many wonderful things and places; it's time to go see some of those things and places for real. Maybe even interact more with people in the flesh, too. Which is not to say that I do not love you, my cyber friends. I do, I do. You have seen me through all sorts of weirdness and wonder these last few years. I trust we will always be friends.

If I keep writing, I'll have to call this post a list of New Year's Resolutions - and I don't do those.

TTFN, my friends. Here is a parting thought:

One summer night, out on a flat headland, all but surrounded by the waters of the bay, the horizons were remote and distant rims on the edge of space. Millions of stars blazed in darkness, and on the far shore a few lights burned in cottages. Otherwise there was no reminder of human life. My companion and I were alone with the stars: the misty river of the Milky Way flowing across the sky, the patterns of the constellations standing out bright and clear, a blazing planet low on the horizon. It occurred to me that if this were a sight that could be seen only once in a century, this little headland would be thronged with spectators. But it can be seen many scores of nights in any year, and so the lights burned in the cottages and the inhabitants probably gave not a thought to the beauty overhead; and because they could see it almost any night, perhaps they never will. ~Rachel Carson

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