monkey hands

Morphing Beast; Teaching: Third H.S. Quilt Finished

This little beastie started out with an odd kind of menacing face that never seemed right (see the before face here). A small scrap of fabric and a new face later, this little beast now seems more friendly, even a bit curious. With an ode to Jude Hill's "Beasts" class, and now the Spirit Diaries Course, online, more info here at Spirit Cloth. Check out "Classes".

Tomorrow, after living and working in Beijing for two years, I return to teaching--part time, not full time anymore-- at Keene State College. With temperatures in the teens during the day and the single or negative numbers at night, it's going to be a rude start for an 8am course. Nevertheless, it will be good to be back on campus with colleagues and students, and I'll still have time for fiber and textile work/play.

These generous folks:  

made most the blocks or longarm quilted this great quilt, now on its way to a happy recipient!

Here's to the generous world-wide community of quilters, including longarmer Phyllis Dewey of Quilter's Pantry! Three quilts are totally finished, two more are quilted and waiting to be bound, one more is pieced to send off for quilting, and the blocks pressed for the seventh and final quilt, soon to be squared, cut, and stitched together.  

Flying Turtles, Rainbow Quilt, Leaving Soon

flying across the moon

Stitching continues on my Diary Cloth  (one of  Jude Hill's inspiring online course at Spirit Cloth). It's a relaxing way to begin to process change and transition. 

part of the diary cloth

I think flying turtle is leading the way home!

rainbow quilt for, and designed by, a very special niece

The top is finished, and just in time to pack and thento pass along to Phyllis Dewey, longarm quilter at Quilter's Pantry, when I get back.

stuff accumulated over the past two years

workers from Roundabout picking up donations for migrant workers and their families

Roundabout Organization is an NGO in Beijing. They run a store similar to Salvation Army or Goodwill in the U.S., and also donate goods to people in need, which includes the 14 million migrant workers living and working in Beijing.  

The so-called "migrant workers" are Chinese, but don't have a hukou (offical government papers allowing them to live in a city other than their rural hometown).

Migrant workers have few rights and often little access to public schools, healthcare, or other social services. These guys were great sports who pick up our air filters, my post-surgery-for-the-broken-foot gear, household goods, and so on. 

Shibori Covered Buttons, Rainbow Quilt, Beijing Smog

made using small shibori scraps from another project

the coins are about the size of a U.S. dime and a penny

when I was in Tucson, my niece picked out fabric for a birthday quilt, which she designed

no comment needed

More and Less

 

Taking a break on a hot day in Beijing

I'm reading and traveling more just now, and writing and sewing less; such is the rhythm of (my) life. More of one means less of the other and vice versa.  Like a seesaw, up and then down. Sometimes balanced, oft times not. 

Now that I'm off the crutches and able-bodied once again, I'm working, teaching, seeing and doing more outward, physical activities these days and I'm sewing less, but just for now!  The two year China gig is finished at the end of this calendar year, so I'm trying to squeeze in all that I can. 

I'll post more pics from Bangkok (great beast statues!), my teaching in Kunming, and doll-making with the women's sewing collective in Mongolia (this week) in the near future.

I'm still reading your blogs as often as possible--I need a daily or at least several times weekly dose of your creativity, insights, musings, and inspirations.

 

Beijing Floods

 

It's still raining here in our usually arid area, and new flood warnings were once again issued this morning.  

Thank you to all who have emailed and/or called to check on things. 77 people died in the city last week after the worst flooding in 60 years. There have been landslides and more deaths outside the city area as well.  Here's a link to pictures posted by the BBC:  pictures 

I was marginally affected as it took me two days to get on a flight to Kunming in the south (about 3 and 1/2 hours flight from Beijing) where I was going to teach for a week. Once I boarded after multiple delays, it took another eight hours or so until landing around 5:30am Monday morning. Nothing, really, compared to the loss of lives, the millions of people who lost homes and everything in them (including their life savings), and the 80,000 people still stranded at Beijing International Airport, many for days, sleeping on the floor and making do with few resources (money, food, options).

Back in Beijing; Blogging Break

 

Mushrooms for a family dinner

I've been traveling and busy with family and friends, as well as New Hampshire pet and house chores, these past two and a half weeks.  Things are slowing down a bit now that I'm back in China, and I'm going to continue this blog-free time for a bit while I catch my breath and gather my jet-lagged wits. It's quite a transition. 

View from New Hampshire sewing table:

  View from Beijing sewing table: 

 

Doll prototype, Boro patching

I'm using rough unbleached muslin to make some dolls for an upcoming summer teaching project in Mongolia (provided I'm crutch-free and walking well by August). I was going  to make a Mongolian doll in traditional dress last night, but somehow I ended up with home-on-the-prairie or little miss shetl here.  The thing that matters most now is getting the doll pattern down so I can make a papper patten and PDF instructions. So I'm just having fun. The traditional Mongolian costumes will be fun to create, too. I'll take another trip to the Beijing Women's and Children's Museum to look at their great displays of traditional dress as part of the process. 

 
 Tie shoes and wacky socks under that prim dress:  

What kind of face?  I often stumble here.  I should probably make the face before I stitch the doll so I could mess-up and re-do, but it seems the doll's personality doesn't appear to me until s/he's stitched and stuffed. So...simple stitched lines for eyes and mouth?  Embroidered eyes and mouth? Drawn (this is scariest for me) face? No face?  Old dolls often had no eyes/mouth, but it seems to me that's saying something about seeing, smelling, and speaking--as in being heard or something, yes? 

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I'm still working on my boro-inspired apron, but I took a break to patch my pjs. Before taking the boro class, I might have found a black scrap and made an unobtrusive fix with black thread,* but this time I decided I want my work to be visible. It makes me smile.

* or I might well have tossed them--my favorite pj pants--into the giveaway bag.  I'm changing my ways.

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Today marks 16 weeks post-break, and 12 weeks post-op (bone graft/plate/screws) for my poor old left foot.  I'm off to see the surgeon this afternoon.  The last x-ray was six weeks ago and showed "no sign of healing" (i.e. bone graft filling in gap). I'm hoping today brings better news!

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Our air quality continues to be quite bad. The days are gray and hazy--it's like looking through a steam/dirt filled sky. The sun is not visible, and the light stays dim, as if in a heavy rain, all day.

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!

Beautiful Beijing

I'm back in Beijing, jet-lagged and loopy, but wonder of wonders, the air has cleared upon my return, with big blue skies and floating white clouds. What a welcome change from the typical smoggy gray sky and thick, dirty air I'm used to seeing and breathing here. The times, it seems, they just may be a'changing here in the capitol. 

In another reminder that progress is possible here, U-Tube is unblocked, at least for the moment. Proof is in this picture of Jude Hill's hands showing a "paperless piecing" technique. It's a terrific method for piecing, especially for  squares and rectangles. See her blog, Spirit Cloth, for inspiration and online courses.

Blogger and Wordpress are also fully accessible (at least for now), complete with pictures and the ability to comment. My virtual world in China has grown exponentially!

Meanwhile, because life is a mixed bag no matter what, construction on the block-sized mega builting continues below the apartment windows, and it's rising daily, getting closer and closer, bringing noise and dust 24/7. 

It's amazing to watch the techniques and progress, especially at night when workers toil at welding stations, fusing rusty steel rebar at welding stations, and moving back and forth in unison like a well choreographed dance. 

Photos taken at dawn during a rare quiet lull between night and day shifts.

A lone tenacious tree hangs on between newly erected construction site buildings. 

I have several projects in mind, so tomorrow, after some rest, I shall return to the sewing table with focus and renewed zest. Just putting out that positive intention in the hopes it comes to pass.

Big Moon Over Beijing

view from apartment window

How I long to be home in the country on nights like this--listening to the geese, bull frogs, and cyotes instead of cars, horns, trucks, sirens...soon! I'll be back in rural New Hampshire for a few days, from the end of this week to the end of next week. Happy, happy about that.