monkey hands

wings from a broken heart

I just noticed, while playing with scraps and shapes, that a broken heart can become wings to fly

some kantha stitching for ground under their feet, and to help hold the cloth together

both with a nod to Jude Hill at Spirit Cloth 

Friends

 

big beast meets little winged turtle

 

 

three year old Nellie (lab) and 14 year old Peanut are good buddies

 

 

Sandy Relief Quilts #4 and 5, back from Phyllis at Quilter's Pantry and ready for me to bind them

 

 

Longarm quilting (and this photo) by Phyllis Dewey at Quilter's Pantry

 

Hand Work for Mongolia

As the storm rages along the U.S. east coast, I am leaving for the airport to head to Ulaanbaatar. My thoughts are with my family, and yours, and everyone affected. I'm glad I have a serious distraction to keep me busy now, though of course my children and other family members will be in my constant thoughts.

After cutting boiled wool birds to take to Ulaanbaatar for the workshop this week, I noticed the scraps were fish-shaped.

and perfect for the over-the-ocean-back-to-China phase of the diary cloth I'm making as part of Jude Hill's Spirit Diary Cloth online course at Spirit Cloth. Jude's an inspiring teacher, and her classes and the communities that develop are nurturing as well as challenging. I'n not sure if big fish will make it onto the cloth--looks more like a whale to me, but maybe that's okay. Once I get stitching, the needle seems to take over and guide the way. The moon in the corner is a "Glennis moon," indigo dyed by the famous Shibori Girl herself. 

I've been adding some kantha style stitching to the cacti and wings--it was hard to leave family and that incredible sunny big Southwest sky.

Plodding Toward China

I've slowly been making minor progress. Turtle now has claws to cling more firmly to the freshly seeded (stitched) ground, and also newly embellished wings for soaring.

my view from a Tucson coffee shop

Meanwhile, I've been working my way back to Beijing via some family time in Oakland, Ca, Tucson, and now San Francisco for a night before taking off for China tomorrow morning.

cacti in post office parking lot

Next steps may be a cactus behind Turtle, and an ocean in front...ongoing work as part of Jude Hill's inspiring Spirit Cloth Diaries class at Spirit Cloth.

 

Covered Buttons and Flying Turtles

My friend Terri Lipman gave me this great fabric she'd dyed. I was inspired to use it for a couple things (in process) and to cover these buttons:

And then, 

Just before my hand surgery, I pulled together some scraps from this big scrap box (origins, unknown/remembered) for possible stitching. 

Most the scraps were 1.5 inch to 2 inch strips, and I picked a few that felt turtle-ish to me.

My first post-surgery sewing, inspired by a class I'm taking online with Jude Hill at  Spirit Cloth.

Nellie (three-year-old Lab/St. Bernard) and Maddie (14 year-old Shepard/Beagle) in the yard, waiting for me to come out and play. 

I took the dogs for a walk. This is the road leading back to the house. Can you see the big mushroom on the right side of the road?

These are my favorite colors--browns, tans, greys (or is it grays?), greens, a bit of yellow, terracotta, too.

Here's the mushroom top with my foot in the picture for size perspective.

Nells loves her walks, even if we have to stop and examine a mushroom.

Not much stitching going on these days; carpal tunnel - - surgery scheduled for this Wednesday. Bad timing given the need to travel back to Asia and the beginning of Spirit Cloth Diaries, another amazing class from Jude Hill (see Spirit Cloth ).  It is what it is.  I have trees on my mind. Fresh air, autumn scents and colors, too.

 

A Few More

a little community on the hill--folks stay here through late September or early October, then it gets so cold they move a few kilometers to a larger village where the gers (what we call yurts) and small houses are closer together to survive the winter.  Ulaanbaatar is the coldest capital city in the world. Here is a site with more info and pictures: Gers

Even in mid-August, the day was fairly cool and rain threatened, hence the greyer than usual skies in "Blue Sky" country (taking photos with my phone didn't add to the image quality).

I am fond of horses. At one point we had five in our little New Hampshire barn, but now we have none.

Basically the same image as above, but I was creeping closer, trying to get a better shot without spooking the horses.

Patchwork Beast

Inspired by Jude Hill's great "Beasts" course, this is in process--made with scraps from yesterday's beast(s) and a pair of shibori pants I took apart to use for an apron in my online boro class with Jude Hill of Spirit Cloth.

Seeing (and Sewing) Beasts

When I first glanced this poorly dyed (lots of bleeding and smudging) linen batik in Muxiyuan, the large wholesale fabric area in the south side of Beijing, I saw beasts.  I didn't see shapes that could be made into beasts, I saw beasts. My vision or imagination was so strong and clear that I actually thought it was screened with Jude-like (of Spirit Cloth) wild, soulful, imaginative beasts. 

Maybe I just have beasts on the brain these days. I've been dreaming in beasts since beginning Jude's Sprit Cloth Contemporary Boro 2 online course, and it was about this time last year that I was creating a Chinese folklore inspired tigercat project for an enrichment program for migrant workers' children (see more in this post TigerCats at Human Capital Unleashed). Here's an example: 

So, with beasts on my mind, I was delighted that this was a "remnant" of four or so meters, and thus I could purchase the coarsely woven, dyed cloth. Cloth in the market is usually sold only by the entire roll or bolt--typically 100 to 6000 meters--but remnants, sometimes beginnings or ends of rolls that have flaws, are often available.  I washed and dryed the cloth and put it aside. Last night I picked it up and put a 12" square on my hoop. 

This is my first creature (or creatures--is it a three-headed beast, or three beasts, connected?) from this cloth.  More are sure to follow!

Stones and Critters

While I was home, I made a few little stones and sent them off to Jude for her heartwarming  Magic Feather project. 

Maddie, 13 

Peanut, 15

Nellie, 3

Thomasina, 2

The family pets, and some of the family, were together during these few days home. Now everyone is scattered again, including the animals, who live in three different homes while we're in China. Fortuantely, they're all loved and well-cared for, with new people and pet buddies to enjoy.