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So it turned out to have nothing to do with math trauma. I really did mess up in the cutting--apparently I used the wrong line on the specialty ruler. Clearly points to how scattered I was during the month of October with a bunch of travel and nights out, doing the block "catch-as-catch-can" in the rare occasions I was home.
Why does it make me somehow feel better to know I made a stupid mistake rather than experiencing a more deep-seeded geometry issue? Yep, still ended up tossing out the original pieces since there really would've been no salvaging them (not being a miniature scrap saver, anyway). Started again with two new fabrics since I had none left of the originals. And these pinwheels, although still tricky to get points together and keep everything aligned, are going beautifully.
But at least I know I wasn't being a blockhead. I was just being an idiot. I can live with that.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Well...Doh. Math Trauma Strikes Again.
I was just on another quilting retreat last weekend--this time with members of my guild. A few of us are taking the same class together at our LQS--a year-long, once-a-month class on Jodi Barrows' square-in-a-square technique. We were swapping stories about our successes and not-so-successes finishing each month's homework. I told them that I'd been doing great until I ran aground on pinwheels last month--the points in the center of the block were nowhere close to meeting. Assuming I'd made some major cutting error or something, I was afraid I was going to have to toss out the pinwheels and start again.
One woman said, "Well, maybe you should try turning the pieces around--sew different edges together instead."
My math-traumatized brain had never thought about the geometry of the block, and that perhaps just a simple turn of each piece would solve my problem. So last night I sat and ripped a bunch of seams out, and laid out the pieces on my cutting table with different edges coming together. Sure as tootin', it's looking a whole lot more workable now.
I still can't completely understand the geometry of it. Just like I can't figure out the math of my stack-n-slash quilts. You're supposed to stack like-sized pieces, make one cut, move the bottom piece of one side of the cut to the top, sew the pieces together, make a second cut, move the bottom of the same side to the top, and do it again--repeat as desired, each time moving the bottom piece to the top so you end up with randomly pieced blocks. But for some reason, by the third slash, and sometimes even the second, I'm getting repeat fabrics in the same block. I number pieces, keep close track of where they are, and it still happens. So by cut three or so, I'm going to the bottom piece and then grabbing the next one as well, or two, so I'm moving a stack of two, three, or four pieces from bottom to top to get them to randomize again. Why should such a simple concept be so hard?!
Not that the stack-n-slash really bothers me in the long run. I've now made two really fun quilts with a "layer cake" pack (40 10" squares) of batiks, and I have a set of flannel fat quarters I can't wait to tackle with the same technique. It's a great way to get a fun quilt fast. But the fact that it didn't strike me to turn those stupid pinwheel pieces in a slightly different direction bugs me. Why didn't I think of that?
I pinpoint my math trauma back to a difficult teacher in second grade, who liked to hold individual students up to collective ridicule. I didn't get my homework done one night because I didn't get the concept--the next day she told the class that because I didn't get my homework done, the whole class was going to lose out on a special activity she'd planned for the end of class. Who ever thought that was effective teaching methodology? A whole year of her in our Math Lab was a brutal experience for me. To this day, crunching numbers gives me a stomach ache, although I have to do it all the time. My husband always comments that he doesn't understand why I hate math so much--my very logical, very systematic brain should take to math like a fish to water. Enter Second Grade Teacher Trauma. I can do math when I decide I have to, but usually I avoid it like the plague. I was thrilled when my kids both turned out to be great at math because I could ask them my math-related-quilting questions. "Help me figure out how many pieces at X size I can get out of this X sized piece of fabric?" Since they're close to moving out of the house, though, I bought myself a Quilt-Calc and let electronics do the work for me.
So, it was a "doh" moment with the pinwheels. But now at least maybe next time points don't match I'll look for a simple solution rather than chastising myself for being a screw-up. That being said, I haven't actually sewn the pinwheel pieces back together yet. That's tonight's job. But I'm hopeful. And you know what? Quilting has taught me that yes, sometimes math can actually be fun.
One woman said, "Well, maybe you should try turning the pieces around--sew different edges together instead."
My math-traumatized brain had never thought about the geometry of the block, and that perhaps just a simple turn of each piece would solve my problem. So last night I sat and ripped a bunch of seams out, and laid out the pieces on my cutting table with different edges coming together. Sure as tootin', it's looking a whole lot more workable now.
I still can't completely understand the geometry of it. Just like I can't figure out the math of my stack-n-slash quilts. You're supposed to stack like-sized pieces, make one cut, move the bottom piece of one side of the cut to the top, sew the pieces together, make a second cut, move the bottom of the same side to the top, and do it again--repeat as desired, each time moving the bottom piece to the top so you end up with randomly pieced blocks. But for some reason, by the third slash, and sometimes even the second, I'm getting repeat fabrics in the same block. I number pieces, keep close track of where they are, and it still happens. So by cut three or so, I'm going to the bottom piece and then grabbing the next one as well, or two, so I'm moving a stack of two, three, or four pieces from bottom to top to get them to randomize again. Why should such a simple concept be so hard?!
Not that the stack-n-slash really bothers me in the long run. I've now made two really fun quilts with a "layer cake" pack (40 10" squares) of batiks, and I have a set of flannel fat quarters I can't wait to tackle with the same technique. It's a great way to get a fun quilt fast. But the fact that it didn't strike me to turn those stupid pinwheel pieces in a slightly different direction bugs me. Why didn't I think of that?
I pinpoint my math trauma back to a difficult teacher in second grade, who liked to hold individual students up to collective ridicule. I didn't get my homework done one night because I didn't get the concept--the next day she told the class that because I didn't get my homework done, the whole class was going to lose out on a special activity she'd planned for the end of class. Who ever thought that was effective teaching methodology? A whole year of her in our Math Lab was a brutal experience for me. To this day, crunching numbers gives me a stomach ache, although I have to do it all the time. My husband always comments that he doesn't understand why I hate math so much--my very logical, very systematic brain should take to math like a fish to water. Enter Second Grade Teacher Trauma. I can do math when I decide I have to, but usually I avoid it like the plague. I was thrilled when my kids both turned out to be great at math because I could ask them my math-related-quilting questions. "Help me figure out how many pieces at X size I can get out of this X sized piece of fabric?" Since they're close to moving out of the house, though, I bought myself a Quilt-Calc and let electronics do the work for me.
So, it was a "doh" moment with the pinwheels. But now at least maybe next time points don't match I'll look for a simple solution rather than chastising myself for being a screw-up. That being said, I haven't actually sewn the pinwheel pieces back together yet. That's tonight's job. But I'm hopeful. And you know what? Quilting has taught me that yes, sometimes math can actually be fun.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Doing What Mom Says
I finally finished Month 3's homework from my year-long Square-in-a-Square class tonight. I'm actually on Month 4 but Month 3 gave me fits because I ran out of background fabric before completing all four blocks we were supposed to do, so it ended up languishing on my cutting table before I had the time and energy to deal with it.
Finally tonight, acting under my prime directive to Avoid Reverse Sewing At All Costs, I made the pieces for a fourth block using a different background fabric, and then scattered the pieces through all four blocks. So now I've got four blocks, all with mostly the same background fabric and two pieces with different background. Kind of nifty, as long as I ignore my "must be orderly and make sense" side.
But that wasn't What Mom Said. You see, Month 2's homework blocks turned out very pretty from a fabric point of view, and I like the block itself, but due to plentiful bias edges, the blocks were whonked. Bowing, uneven edges abounded. I believe these were the blocks that were the subject of a previous post, named something like "When you can see it coming". I've debated for some time whether to pull the outside strips back off and redo them, but see my prime directive above.
Finally, tonight, after I finished the other blocks and was putting everything up on my design wall to check my progress to date, I heard my mother's voice in my head. "Block them," she was saying. "Pin them down and steam the h*ll out of them." Well, Mom doesn't typically use the h-e-double-hockey-sticks word, although I'm sure if I'd paid more attention while she was in her sewing room while I was growing up I probably would've heard them. I think every quilter has her potty-mouth side when dealing with bias edges. In any case, Mom has taught me every trick in the book to cover some mistakes and make other ones look intentional. This time, her words about the usefulness of a good, hot shot of steam to bring blocks into line were ringing in my head.
So I did. I pinned every one of those blocks down on my marked pressing pad until it began to look like a medieval torture device for heretic fabric, doused them with coats of spray starch, and then went after them with as much steam as my iron (handily named "SteamXpress") could punch out.
My dog went into hiding. She's not keen on my iron (it's fallen on her head a few times so she's understandably concerned), and she's even less keen when it's a fire-breathing dragon iron. But now the iron has been put to rest and I've stacked every heavy book I could find on my shelves on top of the tortured blocks in hopes that they'll straighten up and fly right by tomorrow morning, returned to orthodoxy. Medieval practices over, my dog has slunk back to her bed next to my computer desk, still eyeing the iron warily in case it should lunge at her from its perch in another unwarranted attack.
Let's see if Mom was right. I certainly hope so, since throughout my efforts tonight I was using this as an object lesson to my almost-18-year-old son who was sitting in the same room playing a computer game. "See? Even at 43 I'm following my mother's advice. Always do what your Mom says, son, and you'll never go wrong." If the blocks don't turn out nicely square tomorrow morning, guess what? I won't be telling him!
Finally tonight, acting under my prime directive to Avoid Reverse Sewing At All Costs, I made the pieces for a fourth block using a different background fabric, and then scattered the pieces through all four blocks. So now I've got four blocks, all with mostly the same background fabric and two pieces with different background. Kind of nifty, as long as I ignore my "must be orderly and make sense" side.
But that wasn't What Mom Said. You see, Month 2's homework blocks turned out very pretty from a fabric point of view, and I like the block itself, but due to plentiful bias edges, the blocks were whonked. Bowing, uneven edges abounded. I believe these were the blocks that were the subject of a previous post, named something like "When you can see it coming". I've debated for some time whether to pull the outside strips back off and redo them, but see my prime directive above.
Finally, tonight, after I finished the other blocks and was putting everything up on my design wall to check my progress to date, I heard my mother's voice in my head. "Block them," she was saying. "Pin them down and steam the h*ll out of them." Well, Mom doesn't typically use the h-e-double-hockey-sticks word, although I'm sure if I'd paid more attention while she was in her sewing room while I was growing up I probably would've heard them. I think every quilter has her potty-mouth side when dealing with bias edges. In any case, Mom has taught me every trick in the book to cover some mistakes and make other ones look intentional. This time, her words about the usefulness of a good, hot shot of steam to bring blocks into line were ringing in my head.
So I did. I pinned every one of those blocks down on my marked pressing pad until it began to look like a medieval torture device for heretic fabric, doused them with coats of spray starch, and then went after them with as much steam as my iron (handily named "SteamXpress") could punch out.
My dog went into hiding. She's not keen on my iron (it's fallen on her head a few times so she's understandably concerned), and she's even less keen when it's a fire-breathing dragon iron. But now the iron has been put to rest and I've stacked every heavy book I could find on my shelves on top of the tortured blocks in hopes that they'll straighten up and fly right by tomorrow morning, returned to orthodoxy. Medieval practices over, my dog has slunk back to her bed next to my computer desk, still eyeing the iron warily in case it should lunge at her from its perch in another unwarranted attack.
Let's see if Mom was right. I certainly hope so, since throughout my efforts tonight I was using this as an object lesson to my almost-18-year-old son who was sitting in the same room playing a computer game. "See? Even at 43 I'm following my mother's advice. Always do what your Mom says, son, and you'll never go wrong." If the blocks don't turn out nicely square tomorrow morning, guess what? I won't be telling him!
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Allowing for Randomness
In my continued "cleaning house mode", I guess it must be, I decided to tackle my scrap bins today. Not entirely sure why the mood struck, but hey, I'll ride it as long as it lasts.
I believe I've mentioned before my desire to keep my stash under control...at least until my kids move out of the house and I have access to a couple of new closets! But even so, I'm not much of a collector; I tend to be pretty good about sorting and getting rid of stuff in general. I hate useless accumulation--it slows me down and annoys me. So although my stash is definitely growing, it's doing so quite slowly and it still fits onto the two shelves I have designated for it (even if I have to occasionally use a little judicious stuffing here and there). I am actually pretty proud of myself for not letting my stash get out of hand.
Since the beginning of my quilting days a few years ago, I could hear generations of quilters' voices in my head sighing, shaking their heads in disbelief, or gasping in astonishment at my wastrel ways every time I started to toss out scraps from my projects. Yes, I know: to be a true quilter, shouldn't I save even the tiniest corner of fabric in case it should come in useful? How dare I toss out that 3" square! Someday that might be exactly the 3" square I need!
Problem is, I do extremely little applique and I'm not a big fan of true scrappy quilts. (Nicely color-coordinated scraps are one thing. But true scrappy is just too much mayhem for my orderly little mind.) So scraps were accumulating and not being used. I relegated my smallest scraps to my "tails" bin--the scraps you use to start a chain-stitching row. But I replace them almost as fast as I get through them so there's not a tremendous sense of accomplishment--no piles getting noticeably smaller, no sense of making headway. Just a constancy of fabric presence in the bin on the side of my sewing table.
I have recently gotten into the whole "jelly roll" thing, though--2 1/2" strips. I've gained new appreciation for scrappy using jelly rolls, but the jelly rolls are usually pretty coordinated so my orderly self can still be happy. Today, I thought, "Why don't I just start slicing up some strips out of the scraps? At least they'll be in some shape to use more quickly that way."
So I pulled a book by one of my fave designers off the shelf (M'Liss Rae Hawley) to see what size she based most of her scrap quilts on, and started going to town. 2 1/2" strips, 1 1/2" strips, 7" long with varying width strips for a particular pattern in her scrap quilt book that I decided I liked, all starting to accumulate in newly neatly labeled bins.
OK, so I only got through about 6 or so folds of fabric in the time I had--some of them were much larger than I thought they were. But it's a start. Not sure what to do with the fabrics I no longer love--so I'm cutting them into strips and hoping that they'll be "ooh--just the perfect touch!" when I get into some future project. But perhaps now that they're cut into standard sizes I could also pass them onto other quilters at silent auctions or guild give-aways more quickly. A small handful have been set aside untouched because they're in colors that might work for an applique Christmas project I have on my to-do list. But the rest? Hopefully within a couple of weeks, if I stay diligent, my current scraps will all be chopped neatly into easy-to-use sizes and ready for projects in the future.
Somehow scrappy seems less intimidating when it's neat and tidy and ready to go. I can allow for randomness in my life...as long as it's organized.
I believe I've mentioned before my desire to keep my stash under control...at least until my kids move out of the house and I have access to a couple of new closets! But even so, I'm not much of a collector; I tend to be pretty good about sorting and getting rid of stuff in general. I hate useless accumulation--it slows me down and annoys me. So although my stash is definitely growing, it's doing so quite slowly and it still fits onto the two shelves I have designated for it (even if I have to occasionally use a little judicious stuffing here and there). I am actually pretty proud of myself for not letting my stash get out of hand.
Since the beginning of my quilting days a few years ago, I could hear generations of quilters' voices in my head sighing, shaking their heads in disbelief, or gasping in astonishment at my wastrel ways every time I started to toss out scraps from my projects. Yes, I know: to be a true quilter, shouldn't I save even the tiniest corner of fabric in case it should come in useful? How dare I toss out that 3" square! Someday that might be exactly the 3" square I need!
Problem is, I do extremely little applique and I'm not a big fan of true scrappy quilts. (Nicely color-coordinated scraps are one thing. But true scrappy is just too much mayhem for my orderly little mind.) So scraps were accumulating and not being used. I relegated my smallest scraps to my "tails" bin--the scraps you use to start a chain-stitching row. But I replace them almost as fast as I get through them so there's not a tremendous sense of accomplishment--no piles getting noticeably smaller, no sense of making headway. Just a constancy of fabric presence in the bin on the side of my sewing table.
I have recently gotten into the whole "jelly roll" thing, though--2 1/2" strips. I've gained new appreciation for scrappy using jelly rolls, but the jelly rolls are usually pretty coordinated so my orderly self can still be happy. Today, I thought, "Why don't I just start slicing up some strips out of the scraps? At least they'll be in some shape to use more quickly that way."
So I pulled a book by one of my fave designers off the shelf (M'Liss Rae Hawley) to see what size she based most of her scrap quilts on, and started going to town. 2 1/2" strips, 1 1/2" strips, 7" long with varying width strips for a particular pattern in her scrap quilt book that I decided I liked, all starting to accumulate in newly neatly labeled bins.
OK, so I only got through about 6 or so folds of fabric in the time I had--some of them were much larger than I thought they were. But it's a start. Not sure what to do with the fabrics I no longer love--so I'm cutting them into strips and hoping that they'll be "ooh--just the perfect touch!" when I get into some future project. But perhaps now that they're cut into standard sizes I could also pass them onto other quilters at silent auctions or guild give-aways more quickly. A small handful have been set aside untouched because they're in colors that might work for an applique Christmas project I have on my to-do list. But the rest? Hopefully within a couple of weeks, if I stay diligent, my current scraps will all be chopped neatly into easy-to-use sizes and ready for projects in the future.
Somehow scrappy seems less intimidating when it's neat and tidy and ready to go. I can allow for randomness in my life...as long as it's organized.
Friday, September 26, 2008
Ahhh...clean...
I haven't been able to touch my machine in some time. I've been traveling for work, or out of the house for meetings, or working late, or taking a little yellow fuzzy thing outside every hour or so to try to avoid clean-up duty.... Progress in many areas of my life, but not in quilting.
So last night I finally had a free night. No one home, even. Just me, two dogs, a cat, and a guinea pig--one dog, cat, and guinea pig nicely left me alone. Little yellow fuzzy dog kept trying to sleep right between my feet no matter where I was sitting or standing. Cute, heart-warming, but a little inconvenient.
All day long I dreamed of an evening spent at my machine or cutting table, finally getting to fondle fabric. At the end of my work day, I shut down my work email and closed out of the many and varied software programs I'd been skipping back and forth between, stretched, took a deep cleansing breath, and then--eyes alight with excitement--looked over at my sewing area to decide just which project I would tackle.
Hmmm. What's that stack of files and folders and binders all over the ironing board? And what are those piles of CDs and cords and a random garbage can sitting on my sewing table, crowded around my sewing machine? And my cutting table? I averted my eyes.
All of my ins-and-outs over the last several weeks, hurried switching from one bag to another more appropriate to the current meeting or trip, piling no-longer-needed files next to will-be-needed-next files, had left my sewing area looking remarkably like a compost heap. (The garbage can on the sewing table is due to afore-mentioned yellow fuzzy. Easier to put it out of his reach than keep fighting him over it.) As I assessed the situation, I saw my evening of zen-sewing slipping from my grasp.
Strangely, though, as I ended up designating my sewing time as cleaning-sewing-room time, I found myself nearly as satisfied as I would've been sewing. There's something very peaceful about a house in order. I put a stack of copied patterns from magazines in their final resting place in a 3-ring binder, I finally added a few new book purchases to my spreadsheet library tracking system, and I measured, labeled, and put away new fabric that I'd either bought or been given as gifts. Each of these steps helped me remember moments of excitement over the last few months as I'd opened a new box from the book seller, or ripped birthday wrapping paper off a gift. I flipped through magazine pages to remember which projects I imagined making for which niece or nephew, and yes, fondled a whole bunch of fabric.
And now my sewing area is ready again for the next time I find myself with an unexpected free evening, or even a free 15 minutes. Next time I'm ready for it, it'll be ready for me.
The process inspired me to get other houses in order--my work "house", for example, in which I'm suddenly once again a little overwhelmed with trying to attend to a myriad of seemingly disconnected details. I have some spreadsheet tracking systems to create. I have been given permission by my supervisor to set aside a certain amount of time each week to develop my skills in certain softwares and techniques that I want to improve, so I need to enter those times in my work calendar. In my home life, I have some closets I need to attend to so that our rush-out-of-the-house can be a little less stressful; I need to adjust some family and volunteer calendar issues so we're a little more cohesive. I have some pondering to do on some forests so I can improve the individual trees. I don't mind being busy--in fact, I usually prefer it. I just want my busy-ness to be with direction and order rather than flying all over the place with a lack of clarity about what I've actually accomplished when I'm done.
So as I took a couple of hours last night to put my sewing house in order, I'm making a promise to myself that I'll take some time this weekend and in the early part of next week to get my home and work houses in order. It would be nice to have a sense of peace again!
So last night I finally had a free night. No one home, even. Just me, two dogs, a cat, and a guinea pig--one dog, cat, and guinea pig nicely left me alone. Little yellow fuzzy dog kept trying to sleep right between my feet no matter where I was sitting or standing. Cute, heart-warming, but a little inconvenient.
All day long I dreamed of an evening spent at my machine or cutting table, finally getting to fondle fabric. At the end of my work day, I shut down my work email and closed out of the many and varied software programs I'd been skipping back and forth between, stretched, took a deep cleansing breath, and then--eyes alight with excitement--looked over at my sewing area to decide just which project I would tackle.
Hmmm. What's that stack of files and folders and binders all over the ironing board? And what are those piles of CDs and cords and a random garbage can sitting on my sewing table, crowded around my sewing machine? And my cutting table? I averted my eyes.
All of my ins-and-outs over the last several weeks, hurried switching from one bag to another more appropriate to the current meeting or trip, piling no-longer-needed files next to will-be-needed-next files, had left my sewing area looking remarkably like a compost heap. (The garbage can on the sewing table is due to afore-mentioned yellow fuzzy. Easier to put it out of his reach than keep fighting him over it.) As I assessed the situation, I saw my evening of zen-sewing slipping from my grasp.
Strangely, though, as I ended up designating my sewing time as cleaning-sewing-room time, I found myself nearly as satisfied as I would've been sewing. There's something very peaceful about a house in order. I put a stack of copied patterns from magazines in their final resting place in a 3-ring binder, I finally added a few new book purchases to my spreadsheet library tracking system, and I measured, labeled, and put away new fabric that I'd either bought or been given as gifts. Each of these steps helped me remember moments of excitement over the last few months as I'd opened a new box from the book seller, or ripped birthday wrapping paper off a gift. I flipped through magazine pages to remember which projects I imagined making for which niece or nephew, and yes, fondled a whole bunch of fabric.
And now my sewing area is ready again for the next time I find myself with an unexpected free evening, or even a free 15 minutes. Next time I'm ready for it, it'll be ready for me.
The process inspired me to get other houses in order--my work "house", for example, in which I'm suddenly once again a little overwhelmed with trying to attend to a myriad of seemingly disconnected details. I have some spreadsheet tracking systems to create. I have been given permission by my supervisor to set aside a certain amount of time each week to develop my skills in certain softwares and techniques that I want to improve, so I need to enter those times in my work calendar. In my home life, I have some closets I need to attend to so that our rush-out-of-the-house can be a little less stressful; I need to adjust some family and volunteer calendar issues so we're a little more cohesive. I have some pondering to do on some forests so I can improve the individual trees. I don't mind being busy--in fact, I usually prefer it. I just want my busy-ness to be with direction and order rather than flying all over the place with a lack of clarity about what I've actually accomplished when I'm done.
So as I took a couple of hours last night to put my sewing house in order, I'm making a promise to myself that I'll take some time this weekend and in the early part of next week to get my home and work houses in order. It would be nice to have a sense of peace again!
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
The Power of Play
So if I were writing this in a newsgroup or message board I'd have to start it with "OT"--or, Off Topic. It's not really about quilting. Sorry. But it's about puppies. And who can resist a puppy?
A few days ago, we brought a new addition into our menagerie--an 8-week-old Golden Retriever puppy named Sam. He's about as fuzzy and cute as a puppy can get. Spencer, our almost-four-year-old of indeterminate ancestry, isn't sure this was such a good idea. She spent the better part of the first 48 hours completely avoiding him and giving us baleful looks. She was particularly offended when I brought him up into my home office yesterday--she has definitely viewed that as her special space with Mom. No way I can avoid it, though--I have to have him within site to be on puppy patrol when no one else is home. So Spencer and Sam are engaged in a very careful territory dance in the office, trying to figure out which corner of the room each of them will be claiming for their own. She's never nipped at him, but she did growl and bare her teeth at him a couple of times when he didn't quite figure out that "enough was enough".
But outside? Outside is a different matter. Yesterday, for the first time, the two dogs actually played together. My husband got them started, wrestling with both of them together until they finally just cut out the middle-man and went off on their own. Now they pretty regularly play together when they're both outside. Sam can't quite keep up with Spencer yet--she's got a lot of energy and he's still just a sleepy little baby boy. But they have fun in short little chunks of time.
Inside? Spencer's still trying to figure out just why she has to share her people with the encroacher. But she's slowly warming up to him. She doesn't run quite so far from him when he tries to lick her chin, and she doesn't give us quite so heart-breaking a look whenever he comes near. They were even sleeping within a few inches of each other earlier this evening, although she had her back to him. Baby steps. Baby steps.
All of this has made me think about the power of play. I've often used that premise when I've been working with volunteer teams--in the same manner as the proverb states, "the family that plays together, stays together," the teams that play together tend to work better together. Seeing it in action with the Canine Kingdom in my home, however, really drives home the point. It is through play that Spencer and Sam are slowly becoming friends. It is through play that we can be closer to our family, our friends, our co-workers. Come to think of it, it's through play we become closer to ourselves--isn't that what quilting is all about, after all? Aren't we just playing with colors, patterns, techniques in an effort to allow our creative selves full reign?
Ah, I was able to bring it back to quilting in the long run. I guess I'm never that far from the topic, am I?
A few days ago, we brought a new addition into our menagerie--an 8-week-old Golden Retriever puppy named Sam. He's about as fuzzy and cute as a puppy can get. Spencer, our almost-four-year-old of indeterminate ancestry, isn't sure this was such a good idea. She spent the better part of the first 48 hours completely avoiding him and giving us baleful looks. She was particularly offended when I brought him up into my home office yesterday--she has definitely viewed that as her special space with Mom. No way I can avoid it, though--I have to have him within site to be on puppy patrol when no one else is home. So Spencer and Sam are engaged in a very careful territory dance in the office, trying to figure out which corner of the room each of them will be claiming for their own. She's never nipped at him, but she did growl and bare her teeth at him a couple of times when he didn't quite figure out that "enough was enough".
But outside? Outside is a different matter. Yesterday, for the first time, the two dogs actually played together. My husband got them started, wrestling with both of them together until they finally just cut out the middle-man and went off on their own. Now they pretty regularly play together when they're both outside. Sam can't quite keep up with Spencer yet--she's got a lot of energy and he's still just a sleepy little baby boy. But they have fun in short little chunks of time.
Inside? Spencer's still trying to figure out just why she has to share her people with the encroacher. But she's slowly warming up to him. She doesn't run quite so far from him when he tries to lick her chin, and she doesn't give us quite so heart-breaking a look whenever he comes near. They were even sleeping within a few inches of each other earlier this evening, although she had her back to him. Baby steps. Baby steps.
All of this has made me think about the power of play. I've often used that premise when I've been working with volunteer teams--in the same manner as the proverb states, "the family that plays together, stays together," the teams that play together tend to work better together. Seeing it in action with the Canine Kingdom in my home, however, really drives home the point. It is through play that Spencer and Sam are slowly becoming friends. It is through play that we can be closer to our family, our friends, our co-workers. Come to think of it, it's through play we become closer to ourselves--isn't that what quilting is all about, after all? Aren't we just playing with colors, patterns, techniques in an effort to allow our creative selves full reign?
Ah, I was able to bring it back to quilting in the long run. I guess I'm never that far from the topic, am I?
Sunday, August 31, 2008
When You Can See It Coming...
What is it about us as human beings that makes us sometimes completely unable to stop ourselves from doing something we just know is going to end badly?
I was working on some "homework" from a quilt class last night and I could tell, as I was sewing the last strips on each block, that I was going to end up with whonky blocks. There were plenty of bias edges going on and I knew the strip I was attaching to the center of the block was a little too long, and that while I could certainly stretch those bias edges a little bit to make it fit, there would be a point of no return. Yet I continued to stretch and sew, and hoped for the best. After all, I'd cut and sewn everything exactly to the instructions, hadn't I? Maybe the teacher knew something I didn't and it would all work out in the end...ahem. Blocks finished, and seeing edges wave back at me, I spray starched the heck out of them, steam pressed them, and put the heaviest books on my shelves on top of them on the ironing board and left them overnight.
They're nice and flat today, but there's a clear bow in the outside edges. I either do some reverse sewing, or consign myself to grief when I try to attach all the finished blocks together at the end of the class next spring. What could've been maybe a ten or 15 minute fix yesterday before it went so far awry is now going to probably take me at least 45 minutes to an hour, if I don't end up having to recut some strips and start further back in the process.
I could see it coming. But I didn't stop myself.
Similarly, when my son woke up this morning, I gave him all of about 5 minutes before I mentioned a speeding ticket he'd gotten a couple of days ago. I wasn't yelling at him, simply mentioning to him that the only job he was going to have from me today was to fill out the information on the ticket and get it ready to stick in the mail. All in a very reasonable voice. Even so, before I even opened my mouth, I thought, "He's always cranky in the morning. Maybe I should wait an hour or so before bringing this up." But something in me (admittedly, the part still a little ticked at him for getting the ticket in the first place) just didn't want to stop myself. Yes, there was a subtext to me not stopping myself on that one that's entirely different from the subtext in the quilting incident. But both have the same basic problem--why can't I stop myself when I know something is probably going to end badly?
Fortunately, I just got a couple of eye-rolls and a bit of a snitty voice from my son. It could've been worse. And my quilt blocks can be saved--it's only fabric and a little time, after all. But it made me think of all the times we human beings make decisions we know are unhealthy, or we know will be dangerous, or we know will probably just make situations worse...and we don't stop ourselves. Although we may get some immediate benefit from our poor choices (sure, I was glad that my son was at least momentarily as annoyed about the ticket as I was, even if for different reasons), we know in the long run we'll probably regret having made whatever the decision was and may even have really dug ourselves a hole that it'll be very difficult to get out of.
And so another life lesson from quilting. Hopefully next time I'll stop myself before I sew a piece on that I just know is going to cause me grief later, and next time I'll stop myself before I say or do something I just know is going to end badly. Meanwhile, I have to go find my seam ripper.
I was working on some "homework" from a quilt class last night and I could tell, as I was sewing the last strips on each block, that I was going to end up with whonky blocks. There were plenty of bias edges going on and I knew the strip I was attaching to the center of the block was a little too long, and that while I could certainly stretch those bias edges a little bit to make it fit, there would be a point of no return. Yet I continued to stretch and sew, and hoped for the best. After all, I'd cut and sewn everything exactly to the instructions, hadn't I? Maybe the teacher knew something I didn't and it would all work out in the end...ahem. Blocks finished, and seeing edges wave back at me, I spray starched the heck out of them, steam pressed them, and put the heaviest books on my shelves on top of them on the ironing board and left them overnight.
They're nice and flat today, but there's a clear bow in the outside edges. I either do some reverse sewing, or consign myself to grief when I try to attach all the finished blocks together at the end of the class next spring. What could've been maybe a ten or 15 minute fix yesterday before it went so far awry is now going to probably take me at least 45 minutes to an hour, if I don't end up having to recut some strips and start further back in the process.
I could see it coming. But I didn't stop myself.
Similarly, when my son woke up this morning, I gave him all of about 5 minutes before I mentioned a speeding ticket he'd gotten a couple of days ago. I wasn't yelling at him, simply mentioning to him that the only job he was going to have from me today was to fill out the information on the ticket and get it ready to stick in the mail. All in a very reasonable voice. Even so, before I even opened my mouth, I thought, "He's always cranky in the morning. Maybe I should wait an hour or so before bringing this up." But something in me (admittedly, the part still a little ticked at him for getting the ticket in the first place) just didn't want to stop myself. Yes, there was a subtext to me not stopping myself on that one that's entirely different from the subtext in the quilting incident. But both have the same basic problem--why can't I stop myself when I know something is probably going to end badly?
Fortunately, I just got a couple of eye-rolls and a bit of a snitty voice from my son. It could've been worse. And my quilt blocks can be saved--it's only fabric and a little time, after all. But it made me think of all the times we human beings make decisions we know are unhealthy, or we know will be dangerous, or we know will probably just make situations worse...and we don't stop ourselves. Although we may get some immediate benefit from our poor choices (sure, I was glad that my son was at least momentarily as annoyed about the ticket as I was, even if for different reasons), we know in the long run we'll probably regret having made whatever the decision was and may even have really dug ourselves a hole that it'll be very difficult to get out of.
And so another life lesson from quilting. Hopefully next time I'll stop myself before I sew a piece on that I just know is going to cause me grief later, and next time I'll stop myself before I say or do something I just know is going to end badly. Meanwhile, I have to go find my seam ripper.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Conversations
I just spent an enjoyable hour or so reading other people's blogs. Some are sisters, some are friends, and some are complete strangers whose blogs I'm finding through links--from other blogs, mostly, although also from quilting websites.
There are those who naysay the blogging trend--their opinion is that blogs are simply is a venue for people to feel they're important enough that others would want to hear their opinions. Which begs the question, why is the naysayer's opinion any more important than those of the masses of bloggers?
Sure, there's several blogs I visited tonight that I don't feel the need to go back to, but there are lots of TV shows I don't bother watching again and lots of radio stations I don't ever listen to and lots of books and magazines I don't read. That doesn't mean I don't feel people should produce TV shows or radio stations or books or magazines. They have every right to. And I have every right to choose how to spend my time.
What I find fascinating about blogs is the ability to have conversation. Yes, it may be mostly one-way, but if you become a follower of blogs you find that there's actually interactivity there. Not only in the "comments" option, but in the way one blogger will refer to another blog, or to a prior conversation with a comment-maker, and so forth. And with the blogs written by naturally good writers, you get insights into slices of life that you may not experience yourself. For example, tonight I visited the Berkshires, New York City, and somewhere in California, all within about 15 minutes of one another. I defy Expedia to set that trip up for me.
I don't tend to find myself heading to quilting blogs that are just a list of projects, unless I know the blogger personally or it's a quilt artist I particularly enjoy. But I did find some quilting blogs of people doing something similar to this--their blogs reflecting on their quilting within the context of their lives. One woman grabbed me right from her profile--her sense of humor and unique perspective on life jumped out in the first sentence. I learned from her almost immediately--I'm going to be following her blog partly out of enjoyment, and partly as a way to improve my own writing by analyzing what I'm liking so much about hers.
So tonight is a short, less personally reflective blog entry--one that simply extols the value of blogging as an art form and a conversation.
There are those who naysay the blogging trend--their opinion is that blogs are simply is a venue for people to feel they're important enough that others would want to hear their opinions. Which begs the question, why is the naysayer's opinion any more important than those of the masses of bloggers?
Sure, there's several blogs I visited tonight that I don't feel the need to go back to, but there are lots of TV shows I don't bother watching again and lots of radio stations I don't ever listen to and lots of books and magazines I don't read. That doesn't mean I don't feel people should produce TV shows or radio stations or books or magazines. They have every right to. And I have every right to choose how to spend my time.
What I find fascinating about blogs is the ability to have conversation. Yes, it may be mostly one-way, but if you become a follower of blogs you find that there's actually interactivity there. Not only in the "comments" option, but in the way one blogger will refer to another blog, or to a prior conversation with a comment-maker, and so forth. And with the blogs written by naturally good writers, you get insights into slices of life that you may not experience yourself. For example, tonight I visited the Berkshires, New York City, and somewhere in California, all within about 15 minutes of one another. I defy Expedia to set that trip up for me.
I don't tend to find myself heading to quilting blogs that are just a list of projects, unless I know the blogger personally or it's a quilt artist I particularly enjoy. But I did find some quilting blogs of people doing something similar to this--their blogs reflecting on their quilting within the context of their lives. One woman grabbed me right from her profile--her sense of humor and unique perspective on life jumped out in the first sentence. I learned from her almost immediately--I'm going to be following her blog partly out of enjoyment, and partly as a way to improve my own writing by analyzing what I'm liking so much about hers.
So tonight is a short, less personally reflective blog entry--one that simply extols the value of blogging as an art form and a conversation.
Sunday, August 24, 2008
Playing Catch-Up
It's been about a month since my last post but since I was out of town on business for two of those four weeks it doesn't quite count, does it? I took last week as vacation and intended to use it as a personal little quilt retreat at home but it didn't quite work out that way. Life tends to get in the way. My son had wisdom teeth removed, I had meetings related to my volunteer work with the Karen and Chin communities, I took my daughter and some of her friends to a local amusement park, and I had a bunch of friends over one afternoon, so I only ended up with one sewing day. But as I reminded myself, soon enough I'll be empty nesting and have all sorts of time to spend at my sewing machine so I only slightly feel bad about my lack of quilting productivity.
I did manage to finally catch up with my guild's block of the month challenge (woohoo!) and I put together the backing for a quilt that I'll be giving a niece for her bday later this week--one of those "open your present, and then hand it back to me so I can finish it!"
But today was probably the most productive--I finally managed to get my new cutting table put together! OK, so I bought it a year ago, and the box has been leaning against a wall in my sewing room, providing a convenient shelf for works in project. Now I need to find a new limbo location for my UFOs, but at least I'm no longer negotiating a warped cutting surface. The old warped cutting table is being relagated to the basement where it will find redemption as a "gift-wrapping center".
I don't have much worthy of pondering at the moment, other than the sense of satisfaction one gets when one finally finishes something that one has been tripping over for a year. I'll work on getting back in my Tessellations Game and be profound again soon enough. Time to flex my furniture-putting-together-mojo again building a desk and bookshelf for my son's room...
I did manage to finally catch up with my guild's block of the month challenge (woohoo!) and I put together the backing for a quilt that I'll be giving a niece for her bday later this week--one of those "open your present, and then hand it back to me so I can finish it!"
But today was probably the most productive--I finally managed to get my new cutting table put together! OK, so I bought it a year ago, and the box has been leaning against a wall in my sewing room, providing a convenient shelf for works in project. Now I need to find a new limbo location for my UFOs, but at least I'm no longer negotiating a warped cutting surface. The old warped cutting table is being relagated to the basement where it will find redemption as a "gift-wrapping center".
I don't have much worthy of pondering at the moment, other than the sense of satisfaction one gets when one finally finishes something that one has been tripping over for a year. I'll work on getting back in my Tessellations Game and be profound again soon enough. Time to flex my furniture-putting-together-mojo again building a desk and bookshelf for my son's room...
Monday, July 21, 2008
Some very random thoughts
I've added a slideshow of pics of my projects at the bottom of the blog, which necessitated changing how many posts show on the page when you visit. So now you'll only see the most recent post and will have to dig through archives to find older ones.
To be very honest, part of the reason I haven't been writing lately is because I'm trying to take the concept of "summer" very seriously this year, and that means actually walking away from my computer when I'm done with work for the day and doing other things like sitting in our rope-swing hammock chair with a mindless book, hanging out in the pool, or--yes--even quilting. My quilting is a little less exciting these days as I'm playing catch-up at the moment. Trying to catch up with my guild's block of the month activity (I think I'm finally up to April!), catching up with finishing up several UFOs that have been languishing as I've been in a flurry of new creativity, and catching up with sorting and neatening up my quilting area after said flurry. I'm trying to knock off a lot of unfinished business now--I'm traveling for business for a couple of weeks in August and am taking that immediately following week as vacation. No one else in my family has the week off so I'm planning on spending it as a quilt-retreat-at-home; I want to get all the old stuff done now so I can have fun with something new that week.
I did attend my first-ever quilt retreat last month and although my first day was a test of endurance, I pretty quickly got into a rhythm and accomplished quite a bit. And I've already signed up for my guild's quilt retreat in the fall. I'm hooked! A couple of the photos in the slide show are quilt retreat projects--one of which I completed beginning-to-end during the retreat itself, the second one I started on the last day and finished at home a couple of weeks later. (Look for the triple-rail on point in reds and greens, and the stack-n-slash in batiks, if you know what those are!)
I will say that one thing I've learned about myself in the last year is that the quilting techniques I love most are the ones that pull me completely out of my super-organized, pre-planned mode that tends to be the rest of my life. In "normal life", I prefer to more or less know what's happening next, I live by to-do lists and spreadsheets and my surroundings are pretty well organized. But the things I enjoy doing most in quilting are almost always the free-form, the random, the "just run with it and see what happens next" techniques. Very releasing! I suppose that's a left-brain-right-brain thing although I can never remember which side of my brain is supposed to be responsible for what. But there's something to be said for the fact that if I have to spend my day attending to my organized self, I will relax most attending to my "bag the organization and just have fun" self!
So, speaking of summer, it's time for me to walk away from my computer and go do something completely unproductive--be a beach bunny in my own back yard. Catch ya on the rebound, hang ten, don't worry, be happy, n' all that. Dude.
To be very honest, part of the reason I haven't been writing lately is because I'm trying to take the concept of "summer" very seriously this year, and that means actually walking away from my computer when I'm done with work for the day and doing other things like sitting in our rope-swing hammock chair with a mindless book, hanging out in the pool, or--yes--even quilting. My quilting is a little less exciting these days as I'm playing catch-up at the moment. Trying to catch up with my guild's block of the month activity (I think I'm finally up to April!), catching up with finishing up several UFOs that have been languishing as I've been in a flurry of new creativity, and catching up with sorting and neatening up my quilting area after said flurry. I'm trying to knock off a lot of unfinished business now--I'm traveling for business for a couple of weeks in August and am taking that immediately following week as vacation. No one else in my family has the week off so I'm planning on spending it as a quilt-retreat-at-home; I want to get all the old stuff done now so I can have fun with something new that week.
I did attend my first-ever quilt retreat last month and although my first day was a test of endurance, I pretty quickly got into a rhythm and accomplished quite a bit. And I've already signed up for my guild's quilt retreat in the fall. I'm hooked! A couple of the photos in the slide show are quilt retreat projects--one of which I completed beginning-to-end during the retreat itself, the second one I started on the last day and finished at home a couple of weeks later. (Look for the triple-rail on point in reds and greens, and the stack-n-slash in batiks, if you know what those are!)
I will say that one thing I've learned about myself in the last year is that the quilting techniques I love most are the ones that pull me completely out of my super-organized, pre-planned mode that tends to be the rest of my life. In "normal life", I prefer to more or less know what's happening next, I live by to-do lists and spreadsheets and my surroundings are pretty well organized. But the things I enjoy doing most in quilting are almost always the free-form, the random, the "just run with it and see what happens next" techniques. Very releasing! I suppose that's a left-brain-right-brain thing although I can never remember which side of my brain is supposed to be responsible for what. But there's something to be said for the fact that if I have to spend my day attending to my organized self, I will relax most attending to my "bag the organization and just have fun" self!
So, speaking of summer, it's time for me to walk away from my computer and go do something completely unproductive--be a beach bunny in my own back yard. Catch ya on the rebound, hang ten, don't worry, be happy, n' all that. Dude.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
The Lectionary of Quilting
OK, so for those of you who don't know, it's time to 'fess up to the fact that in my other life, I'm a preacher. Well, part of the time. I used to do more preaching when I was serving in a church. In my current denominational role I preach on occasion. But as I was getting ready for my next quilt project tonight I found myself reflecting on a long-term debate that moves through the circles of the ordained.
There are those who are "lectionary preachers" and those who are not. The lectionary is a three-year cycle of Scriptures assigned to each week of the year. The basic idea is that if you preach through the lectionary, in three years the congregation would have heard most of the Bible. It ties in closely with the seasons of church life, and there are Christian education curricula also based on the lectionary so that there's the possibility of the entire congregaton, "cradle to grave", learning about the same Bible passages on any given Sunday thus hopefully producing feisty and educated conversation at home following church.
Well, that's the ideal, anyway.
Those who aren't lectionary preachers prefer to choose their own sermon series, perhaps walking through a particular book of the Bible over a period of time, or exploring a topic, and so forth. Non-lectionary preachers tend to look at the lectionary as restrictive, not connected enough to the life of the congregation; they also feel that it leads to pastoral laziness as the Scripture is handed to you each week. While I was in my seminary training, I actually spent a bit of time in each of these schools of thought--for awhile, pro-lectionary, for awhile anti-lectionary, back and forth as I continued to explore who I was as a clergy-person in training.
Post seminary when I was preaching consistently, although I did sometimes do my own sermon series and chose Scriptures and sermon topics due to events happening in the life of the congregation at a certain time, I more frequently tended to be a lectionary preacher. Preaching from the lectionary forced me to work with Scripture passages I might not otherwise choose. You know, the tough ones. The confusing ones. The ones we sort of wish weren't in the Bible in the first place. If I were to just always choose my own passages every week, I'd probably lean towards my favorite books of the Bible, or at very least those passages with which I was comfortable, that I felt like I knew what I was talking about, and so forth. And eventually, my congregation would probably get pretty bored and my own preaching skills would lose their edge.
Switch gears.
Tonight I was pressing fabrics getting ready for a class I'm taking in a couple of nights. It's a "strip club" class (and yes, I catch the irony talking about being in a strip club in the same blog entry I've addressed my preaching life). In other words, it's a class that uses 2 1/2" strips to create a quilt. I had tried to find fabrics myself but had very limited time to search so I ended up taking the easy way out. The quilt store where I'm taking the class had prepared some jelly rolls (collections of 2 1/2" strips wound into a roll) specifically for the class. It has the exact number we need, and they're all Asian fabrics as the pattern we're using is entitled "Orient Express". It felt so much like cheating, and I was concerned about having a quilt that looked like everyone else's in the class, so I'd tried not to take that route. But in the long run, the time crunch won out and I ran down to the quilt store a few days ago, nabbed the required jelly roll, chose a couple of accent fabrics, and was good to go.
I'm pressing the strips tonight, thinking, "how in the world are these going to work together?" You see, the jelly roll is true scrappy. The only common thread is that they're Asian or can pass as such. There's no rhyme or reason to the colors or patterns. I kept catching myself glancing over at my stash in hopes that somehow a nice coordinated set of Asian fabrics, just the right amount for this project, would miraculously appear.
Nope, it's going to be scrappy. And immediately the difficulty of this class struck me. The pattern is easy, the technique is easy, and buying someone else's pre-made jelly roll is easy. But I'm going to have to deal with fabrics I'm not comfortable with; I'm going to have to struggle through making a block look good given that nothing seems to relate to anything else. I'm going to have to work through the seeming disconnectedness and figure out how to make it all hang together.
That's not the way I usually function. I like to make things coordinate. I like colors to play nicely together and I like to see a natural progression from one part to another. I even like how well the "suprise fabric" plays into and lifts up everything else. But for this class I can only deal with what I've been handed and see what happens. Much like the lectionary. And just like I found myself finding depths in Scripture that I'd not really understood before as I had to work my way through it using the lectionary, I imagine I'll learn that scrappy really is beautiful--that I can really do it myself. I'm starting to look at my stash a little differently, thinking "if I cut a strip off of that one, and that other one there, and there's that gorgeous one over there that I've never known what to do with..." and imagining what my next scrap quilt might look like.
So learning and growing involves challenging ourselves with stuff we normally don't like. Things we typically avoid. The hard things. The confusing things. The things we wish weren't in there in the first place. And finding the beauty within.
(Maybe I'll post a picture of the completed quilt top from this class later on and we'll see if I did find the beauty within!)
There are those who are "lectionary preachers" and those who are not. The lectionary is a three-year cycle of Scriptures assigned to each week of the year. The basic idea is that if you preach through the lectionary, in three years the congregation would have heard most of the Bible. It ties in closely with the seasons of church life, and there are Christian education curricula also based on the lectionary so that there's the possibility of the entire congregaton, "cradle to grave", learning about the same Bible passages on any given Sunday thus hopefully producing feisty and educated conversation at home following church.
Well, that's the ideal, anyway.
Those who aren't lectionary preachers prefer to choose their own sermon series, perhaps walking through a particular book of the Bible over a period of time, or exploring a topic, and so forth. Non-lectionary preachers tend to look at the lectionary as restrictive, not connected enough to the life of the congregation; they also feel that it leads to pastoral laziness as the Scripture is handed to you each week. While I was in my seminary training, I actually spent a bit of time in each of these schools of thought--for awhile, pro-lectionary, for awhile anti-lectionary, back and forth as I continued to explore who I was as a clergy-person in training.
Post seminary when I was preaching consistently, although I did sometimes do my own sermon series and chose Scriptures and sermon topics due to events happening in the life of the congregation at a certain time, I more frequently tended to be a lectionary preacher. Preaching from the lectionary forced me to work with Scripture passages I might not otherwise choose. You know, the tough ones. The confusing ones. The ones we sort of wish weren't in the Bible in the first place. If I were to just always choose my own passages every week, I'd probably lean towards my favorite books of the Bible, or at very least those passages with which I was comfortable, that I felt like I knew what I was talking about, and so forth. And eventually, my congregation would probably get pretty bored and my own preaching skills would lose their edge.
Switch gears.
Tonight I was pressing fabrics getting ready for a class I'm taking in a couple of nights. It's a "strip club" class (and yes, I catch the irony talking about being in a strip club in the same blog entry I've addressed my preaching life). In other words, it's a class that uses 2 1/2" strips to create a quilt. I had tried to find fabrics myself but had very limited time to search so I ended up taking the easy way out. The quilt store where I'm taking the class had prepared some jelly rolls (collections of 2 1/2" strips wound into a roll) specifically for the class. It has the exact number we need, and they're all Asian fabrics as the pattern we're using is entitled "Orient Express". It felt so much like cheating, and I was concerned about having a quilt that looked like everyone else's in the class, so I'd tried not to take that route. But in the long run, the time crunch won out and I ran down to the quilt store a few days ago, nabbed the required jelly roll, chose a couple of accent fabrics, and was good to go.
I'm pressing the strips tonight, thinking, "how in the world are these going to work together?" You see, the jelly roll is true scrappy. The only common thread is that they're Asian or can pass as such. There's no rhyme or reason to the colors or patterns. I kept catching myself glancing over at my stash in hopes that somehow a nice coordinated set of Asian fabrics, just the right amount for this project, would miraculously appear.
Nope, it's going to be scrappy. And immediately the difficulty of this class struck me. The pattern is easy, the technique is easy, and buying someone else's pre-made jelly roll is easy. But I'm going to have to deal with fabrics I'm not comfortable with; I'm going to have to struggle through making a block look good given that nothing seems to relate to anything else. I'm going to have to work through the seeming disconnectedness and figure out how to make it all hang together.
That's not the way I usually function. I like to make things coordinate. I like colors to play nicely together and I like to see a natural progression from one part to another. I even like how well the "suprise fabric" plays into and lifts up everything else. But for this class I can only deal with what I've been handed and see what happens. Much like the lectionary. And just like I found myself finding depths in Scripture that I'd not really understood before as I had to work my way through it using the lectionary, I imagine I'll learn that scrappy really is beautiful--that I can really do it myself. I'm starting to look at my stash a little differently, thinking "if I cut a strip off of that one, and that other one there, and there's that gorgeous one over there that I've never known what to do with..." and imagining what my next scrap quilt might look like.
So learning and growing involves challenging ourselves with stuff we normally don't like. Things we typically avoid. The hard things. The confusing things. The things we wish weren't in there in the first place. And finding the beauty within.
(Maybe I'll post a picture of the completed quilt top from this class later on and we'll see if I did find the beauty within!)
Monday, June 2, 2008
Let's Start at the Very Beginning...
I'm sending myself back to school. The last couple of quilt projects I've worked on have ended up a little hinky here and there, and I'm not entirely sure where I'm going wrong. I'm doing my 1/4" seams correctly, and I feel like I'm cutting accurately. Pressing may be an issue--I have a suspicion that I'm a bit too assertive with my iron. But altogether, I figure it's probably not such a bad thing to stop what I'm doing and go back to basics for a bit.
I've ordered a DVD for beginning quiltmakers that got rated very highly. I'm looking forward to when it comes--should be in another couple of days thanks to Amazon Prime. I am more of a visual learner--although I can, and do, certainly rely on books quite regularly, it's always helpful to be able to watch someone actually doing something and with DVD, I can back them up and make them repeat themselves as many times as I want without them getting annoyed at me. My mom taught me how to quilt that first summer--she walked me through many of the basics, and I still occasionally call her up with the "What do I do now??" whining or the quick check on "how do you handle..." questions. But I don't live close enough to her to have regular in-person training sessions and I can only occasionally take classes at my local quilt store. An academic at heart, I figured that it was probably time to take myself back to school and walk step-by-step through some of the beginning skills to pick up those little niceties that I've forgotten or missed along the way.
It's not that I want to become an award-winning quilter. I have a friend that has entered her (excellent, fantastic) work in shows a few times and hearing her talk about trying to get something done on time or re-reading the regulations about size and sleeves and all that just makes my stomach hurt. I don't need the stress. But I have come to the point that for me to be able to push my own artistic envelope forward I need to be able to rely on my own skills. I want to get into art quilts, and doing more with photo transfer, and funky things with wedge rulers and fusible webbing and Angelina fibers. I've dabbled, but have always ended up running head-long into the wall of my own inabilities. What I can picture in my head and what I have the technical skills to actually create don't quite meet yet, and I find that frustrating. I'm holding myself back from really being able to allow my creative self to explode.
So how does that relate to life? Well, I suppose, in that there are times when perhaps we need to take ourselves back to basics. We still have new landscaping that we're slowly filling in--and I'm finding myself having to relearn much of what I thought I already knew about planting and growing because the soil and water levels are so much different here than in our old yard just a few miles away. I'm in the process of watching dog training videos (see the last post about Cesar Millan!) to take myself back to the beginning with our current dog to see if we can get rid of a couple of bad habits, and hopefully pick up tips for when we get a second dog which we're hoping will happen sometime this summer. I'm in a slightly slower period at work so I've been spending time in some of my layout and photoediting software programs trying to fill in the gaps of my technical knowledge there too. So I suppose there are several areas in my life at the moment where I'm taking advantage of the opportunity to go back to basics, review what I already know, fill in gaps, pick up new tricks, and get myself on a more solid foundation to be able to expand from there.
I remember in college registering for a music theory "101" class. In addition to being in band and chorus throughout my elementary and high school career, I had taken private lessons in violin, piano, flute, and a smattering of other instruments through the years--flute being my primary instrument and the one that carried on into adulthood. But I'd never learned formal music theory--I only knew what I had picked up by playing. So I decided in my freshman year in college that I should really learn music theory and registered for the class. I went to the first session, read through the syllabus that was distributed, and realized I knew 3/4s of what was going to be taught. It felt like it would be a waste of time waiting for the last couple of weeks of the semester when they'd finally get to the parts I wasn't as clear on, so I dropped the class that afternoon. To this day, I carry a vague regret that I didn't tough it out. For one thing, it probably would've been an easy A! But more to the point, to this day, I still only know about 3/4s of the beginning music theory level knowledge--probably less by now through the natural attrition that occurs when one doesn't use it. To this day, strangely enough, I still occasionally find myself in conversations with practicing musical colleagues and once in a great while I still have to nod my head and smile and pretend I know what they're talking about. Because heaven forbid they find out that I don't. After all, I was an accomplished flutist for many years. I should know these things despite the fact that my flute has been gathering dust in my closet for about five years now.
I suspect most of us are in a similar position. Because of our busy-ness, the need to produce quickly, we learn what we need to know to accomplish whatever it is we need to accomplish, and then we move on. Which is fine--I've learned a lot that way and become fairly proficient in some things. But sometimes it behooves us to round out our knowledge, go backwards for a time to fill in gaps, or to simply dedicate ourselves to continued learning just for the sake of learning. That's what I like best about quilting, I think. There's always new things to learn. So I'm dedicating myself over the next several weeks to simply focusing on the basics to lay a good foundation for learning all the wonderful, fun techniques that are out there in front of me.
I've ordered a DVD for beginning quiltmakers that got rated very highly. I'm looking forward to when it comes--should be in another couple of days thanks to Amazon Prime. I am more of a visual learner--although I can, and do, certainly rely on books quite regularly, it's always helpful to be able to watch someone actually doing something and with DVD, I can back them up and make them repeat themselves as many times as I want without them getting annoyed at me. My mom taught me how to quilt that first summer--she walked me through many of the basics, and I still occasionally call her up with the "What do I do now??" whining or the quick check on "how do you handle..." questions. But I don't live close enough to her to have regular in-person training sessions and I can only occasionally take classes at my local quilt store. An academic at heart, I figured that it was probably time to take myself back to school and walk step-by-step through some of the beginning skills to pick up those little niceties that I've forgotten or missed along the way.
It's not that I want to become an award-winning quilter. I have a friend that has entered her (excellent, fantastic) work in shows a few times and hearing her talk about trying to get something done on time or re-reading the regulations about size and sleeves and all that just makes my stomach hurt. I don't need the stress. But I have come to the point that for me to be able to push my own artistic envelope forward I need to be able to rely on my own skills. I want to get into art quilts, and doing more with photo transfer, and funky things with wedge rulers and fusible webbing and Angelina fibers. I've dabbled, but have always ended up running head-long into the wall of my own inabilities. What I can picture in my head and what I have the technical skills to actually create don't quite meet yet, and I find that frustrating. I'm holding myself back from really being able to allow my creative self to explode.
So how does that relate to life? Well, I suppose, in that there are times when perhaps we need to take ourselves back to basics. We still have new landscaping that we're slowly filling in--and I'm finding myself having to relearn much of what I thought I already knew about planting and growing because the soil and water levels are so much different here than in our old yard just a few miles away. I'm in the process of watching dog training videos (see the last post about Cesar Millan!) to take myself back to the beginning with our current dog to see if we can get rid of a couple of bad habits, and hopefully pick up tips for when we get a second dog which we're hoping will happen sometime this summer. I'm in a slightly slower period at work so I've been spending time in some of my layout and photoediting software programs trying to fill in the gaps of my technical knowledge there too. So I suppose there are several areas in my life at the moment where I'm taking advantage of the opportunity to go back to basics, review what I already know, fill in gaps, pick up new tricks, and get myself on a more solid foundation to be able to expand from there.
I remember in college registering for a music theory "101" class. In addition to being in band and chorus throughout my elementary and high school career, I had taken private lessons in violin, piano, flute, and a smattering of other instruments through the years--flute being my primary instrument and the one that carried on into adulthood. But I'd never learned formal music theory--I only knew what I had picked up by playing. So I decided in my freshman year in college that I should really learn music theory and registered for the class. I went to the first session, read through the syllabus that was distributed, and realized I knew 3/4s of what was going to be taught. It felt like it would be a waste of time waiting for the last couple of weeks of the semester when they'd finally get to the parts I wasn't as clear on, so I dropped the class that afternoon. To this day, I carry a vague regret that I didn't tough it out. For one thing, it probably would've been an easy A! But more to the point, to this day, I still only know about 3/4s of the beginning music theory level knowledge--probably less by now through the natural attrition that occurs when one doesn't use it. To this day, strangely enough, I still occasionally find myself in conversations with practicing musical colleagues and once in a great while I still have to nod my head and smile and pretend I know what they're talking about. Because heaven forbid they find out that I don't. After all, I was an accomplished flutist for many years. I should know these things despite the fact that my flute has been gathering dust in my closet for about five years now.
I suspect most of us are in a similar position. Because of our busy-ness, the need to produce quickly, we learn what we need to know to accomplish whatever it is we need to accomplish, and then we move on. Which is fine--I've learned a lot that way and become fairly proficient in some things. But sometimes it behooves us to round out our knowledge, go backwards for a time to fill in gaps, or to simply dedicate ourselves to continued learning just for the sake of learning. That's what I like best about quilting, I think. There's always new things to learn. So I'm dedicating myself over the next several weeks to simply focusing on the basics to lay a good foundation for learning all the wonderful, fun techniques that are out there in front of me.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
The Quilt Whisperer
I've found a new fan club to join. I'm seriously into Cesar Millan as the Dog Whisperer these days. I began watching his show on the National Geographic Channel late one afternoon when I was exhausted and there was nothing else on and I'm always game for a good dog show, and I was immediately fascinated. The things this man is able to do with dogs...and the ease with which he helps his clients and by extension his viewers understand the dog psychology behind it...is just amazing. But what's most amazing is that what he's doing is actually so ordinary and so common sense once you understand what he constantly says: "A dog is a dog, not a human." There's really nothing amazing about it.
Ok, so in our house we've never treated our dogs like babies or little people. They have always been dogs. And, consequently, we've never had dogs with severe behavior problems although our Spencerpup has a couple of odd neuroses floating around the edges. And often when I'm watching the shows I can immediately pick out what the owner is doing to create the problem (the woman who had dyed her frou-frou dog's fur pink to match her entire wardrobe and home decorating scheme was an easy answer, admittedly). Watching Cesar present his trademark "Calm Assertive Pack Leader" self to the dog in question leading to almost immediate resolution to the behavior problems--apparently your average dog really does want someone to be in control. As Cesar puts it, it's a matter of creating a balanced dog.
Calm Assertive Pack Leader. Hmmm. Where do I get me some of that?
OK, so I'm pretty much a pack leader with Spencer but that's not such a big deal because she's the quintessentially submissive pack runt and basically looks to almost everyone as her pack leader, including the painters, the UPS man, the Jehovah's Witnesses.... I'd like to think I'm a pack leader with my kids. Hmph. On a good day.
I've had recent reason to be taking to heart the Dog Whisperer's lessons about energy in the room and balance. He talks with dog owners about what sort of energy they're giving off--and how the dogs pick up on that and it shows in their behavior. If you're nervous about them acting up, they'll assuredly act up. If you're panicky or excited or fearful, you have a panicky or excited or fearful dog. But if you're calm and assertive, you'll get balance in return. I know that's true with my family as well. If I'm giving off negative energy, I'll either get it back in spades or everyone will retreat to their respective hidey-holes--not in panic, so much, they are teenagers after all, but in a strong sense of self-preservation. "Mom's in a mood. Lay low." I may not really feel stressed in my own body, but I'm apparently spewing it off in my aura or energy fields or whatever other new-agey phraseology you might want to give it. And when it's bad enough that I do actually feel stressed? Watch out. Conversely, however, calmness and a sense of your own personal power brings balance.
I've not been quilting lately, and I've realized why. I need to be in more of a calm, assertive, pack leader state to quilt effectively. Otherwise my quilts fly all over the place with nervous energy. I have one project I'm working on as a gift for a friend that was reported to be "One Afternoon" in the magazine. I'm going on about 10 days now. But that's because I almost immediately messed up one thing that should've been pretty obvious had I been sufficiently paying attention, and then realized I'd never purchased one of the necessary fabrics because I hadn't been sufficiently focused in the fabric store (and don't have a solution in my stash), and then just barely managed to stop myself before I added insult to injury by trying to muddle through skipping a step or two because surely I could still manhandle this thing into submission even though my focus was still all over the place and my nervous energy was slowly but surely building higher and higher with each passing moment. One more false move and my partially-pieced project would've turned it's snarling teeth on me and drawn blood.
But oh, how I long to be the Quilt Whisperer. How I desire to take one look at a quilt-gone-bad, immediately ascertain the psychology behind why it went wrong, give it a quick mother-dog-bite-simulation with my hand and a sharp "ssshhht!" to pull it's attention on me, take a breath and reach deep inside me for the Calm Assertive Pack Leader, and have that quilt follow me in obedience until its completion.
It's not the quilt's fault. It never is. I need to recall the lessons of Cesar and draw forth the Calm Assertiveness necessary to succeed. Beyond quilting, that would hold true with most of life. I need to recall the calm assertiveness I've felt in the past, times when I've been able to achieve good things, or at very least acheive things, even when it felt like life was spinning wildly out of control.
Ssshhht. Here I am. Calm Assertive Pack Leader Sandy. That's me.
Ok, so in our house we've never treated our dogs like babies or little people. They have always been dogs. And, consequently, we've never had dogs with severe behavior problems although our Spencerpup has a couple of odd neuroses floating around the edges. And often when I'm watching the shows I can immediately pick out what the owner is doing to create the problem (the woman who had dyed her frou-frou dog's fur pink to match her entire wardrobe and home decorating scheme was an easy answer, admittedly). Watching Cesar present his trademark "Calm Assertive Pack Leader" self to the dog in question leading to almost immediate resolution to the behavior problems--apparently your average dog really does want someone to be in control. As Cesar puts it, it's a matter of creating a balanced dog.
Calm Assertive Pack Leader. Hmmm. Where do I get me some of that?
OK, so I'm pretty much a pack leader with Spencer but that's not such a big deal because she's the quintessentially submissive pack runt and basically looks to almost everyone as her pack leader, including the painters, the UPS man, the Jehovah's Witnesses.... I'd like to think I'm a pack leader with my kids. Hmph. On a good day.
I've had recent reason to be taking to heart the Dog Whisperer's lessons about energy in the room and balance. He talks with dog owners about what sort of energy they're giving off--and how the dogs pick up on that and it shows in their behavior. If you're nervous about them acting up, they'll assuredly act up. If you're panicky or excited or fearful, you have a panicky or excited or fearful dog. But if you're calm and assertive, you'll get balance in return. I know that's true with my family as well. If I'm giving off negative energy, I'll either get it back in spades or everyone will retreat to their respective hidey-holes--not in panic, so much, they are teenagers after all, but in a strong sense of self-preservation. "Mom's in a mood. Lay low." I may not really feel stressed in my own body, but I'm apparently spewing it off in my aura or energy fields or whatever other new-agey phraseology you might want to give it. And when it's bad enough that I do actually feel stressed? Watch out. Conversely, however, calmness and a sense of your own personal power brings balance.
I've not been quilting lately, and I've realized why. I need to be in more of a calm, assertive, pack leader state to quilt effectively. Otherwise my quilts fly all over the place with nervous energy. I have one project I'm working on as a gift for a friend that was reported to be "One Afternoon" in the magazine. I'm going on about 10 days now. But that's because I almost immediately messed up one thing that should've been pretty obvious had I been sufficiently paying attention, and then realized I'd never purchased one of the necessary fabrics because I hadn't been sufficiently focused in the fabric store (and don't have a solution in my stash), and then just barely managed to stop myself before I added insult to injury by trying to muddle through skipping a step or two because surely I could still manhandle this thing into submission even though my focus was still all over the place and my nervous energy was slowly but surely building higher and higher with each passing moment. One more false move and my partially-pieced project would've turned it's snarling teeth on me and drawn blood.
But oh, how I long to be the Quilt Whisperer. How I desire to take one look at a quilt-gone-bad, immediately ascertain the psychology behind why it went wrong, give it a quick mother-dog-bite-simulation with my hand and a sharp "ssshhht!" to pull it's attention on me, take a breath and reach deep inside me for the Calm Assertive Pack Leader, and have that quilt follow me in obedience until its completion.
It's not the quilt's fault. It never is. I need to recall the lessons of Cesar and draw forth the Calm Assertiveness necessary to succeed. Beyond quilting, that would hold true with most of life. I need to recall the calm assertiveness I've felt in the past, times when I've been able to achieve good things, or at very least acheive things, even when it felt like life was spinning wildly out of control.
Ssshhht. Here I am. Calm Assertive Pack Leader Sandy. That's me.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
It's all in the training.
Comments notwithstanding, I may have been in the States for over a week but I haven't been in MY state until just a couple of days ago. I got home from London, had three days to regroup, then skipped town again for business. It's nice to finally be home for awhile!
But it's a good thing for this blog that I had to spend some time in the mid-parts of this great country o' ours because "a funny thing happened on the way to the forum" and I suddenly had great content for Tessellations at hand.
I was doing a series of speaking engagements over the weekend, traveling from one event to another through two states. I had no sooner gotten off the plane than my host and chauffeur for the weekend whisked me off to the first engagement, a two hour drive away. Still high on Dramamine and my head spinning from trying to figure out where I was and what I was doing, we parked near the door of the church where the first event was being held and unloaded our technical equipment to run PowerPoint for my first presentation. We slung a variety of computers, projectors, and other bags over our shoulders and power-walked through wind and spattering rain into the church, entering via the social hall, quickly conferring about schedules and how to organize ourselves for set-up and presentation. I was no further than two steps into the social hall when my eyes immediately landed on a gorgeous quilt folded over the back of a bench on the far end of the room.
"Oooh!" I interrupted whatever I'd originally been saying, "Look at that beautiful quilt!"
My friend/host spun her head from side to side..."What quilt?"
"That one right there," I responded with a quick bob of the head in the appropriate direction, my arms too full with equipment to be able to point. She continued to look around even as I began to make my way to the quilt, equipment burdens and schedules momentarily forgotten.
"What quilt?" She asked again, her voice sounding bemused and, admittedly, maybe even a little frustrated with my distraction. She watched where I was going and finally saw it. "Oh, that quilt," she said, somewhat dismissively as she returned her concentration instead on finding the person organizing the event. Her tone of voice recalled me to what I was there to do and I turned in my tracks, heading back in the direction of the sanctuary as the leaders of the event, having spied our entrance to the building, began introducing us as the speakers.
The quilt was forgotten as my friend and I rushed to get flash drives and computers and projectors talking to one another (unsuccessfully, as it turned out). But an hour later when our presentation was finished and we returned to the social hall to pack up our equipment and say our farewells to the participants in the event, I finally had the opportunity to check out the quilt. Another woman noticed my interest and my curiosity was finally assuaged as we chatted for a few minutes about the pattern and quilting and the story behind the quilt (Log Cabin, machine quilted, done for a celebration of some sort in the church).
After we left, beginning another two hour journey to our next destination, my friend and I joked about how I'd visually locked in on that quilt the second I'd entered the room whereas she hadn't been able to see it until I had actually pointed it out to her. It wasn't until I was back on the plane for my return trip home several days later, however, that I thought about what that small incident pointed out.
We see what we're trained to see.
Because I spend so much time and energy engaged in quilting, I have essentially trained myself to notice quilts, quilt patterns, even color combinations or geometric designs that somehow relate to quilting, everywhere I go. It's no surprise, then, that the first thing I notice when I walk into a room is the presence of a quilt. Equally telling, my friend who isn't a quilter didn't notice it until it was especially pointed out to her. She may have eventually seen it, of course, but it still wouldn't stand out for her the way it did for me. Her reaction points out the opposite truth to this statement:
We don't see what we're not trained to see. Or the corollary statement, we don't see what we don't want to see.
How appropriate a realization this was to me as I was flying home from my weekend spent making a series of presentations on the topic of sex trafficking. This global scourge is something that happens in every country including the U.S., but is something that the vast majority of us don't want to think about and may even simply refuse to see. "That's something that happens over there," we might say, "or in cities," if we live in a rural area. Just a few days before I traveled to make these presentations, however, a series of newspaper articles was printed in one of their local papers about police having broken up a sex trafficking ring active in small towns through the eastern part of the state. It listed the small towns the traffickers had set up brothels in, and several women present at some of those speaking engagements lived in or near those small towns. Some of those small towns only had a few hundred residents, and the photos of the "brothels" showed that they were just regular homes on regular streets, near gas stations and sometimes even churches. Houses that any of us would walk by several times a day and not think twice about what was happening inside. People reading those articles, and those present at my speaking engagements, now had to see what they hadn't been trained to see. They had to realize that yes, trafficking even happens in Small Town America.
The moral of the story is that we see what we want to see--which means that sometimes we have to train ourselves to see certain kinds of things. I still don't want to see evidence of human trafficking, but I've had to train myself to see it. But more ever-present than the big global issues like that is the day-to-day "vision" we have. I have worked with teens for over twenty years, and the old maxim is true--you often get the behavior you expect to get. In other words, if I look at a kid and see a troublemaker, I'll have a troublemaker on my hands. But if I look at the same kid and see a basically good kid that occasionally messes up, I'll be working with a basically good kid. Or if I see a kid that has real attitude but that attitude indicates a traumatic childhood or a dysfunctional home or difficult relationship issues at school...then I can work to break through the attitude to get to the heart of the matter. And stepping the topic down even more, if I look at a rude waitress or store clerk and see only the rudeness, I may react rudely myself. But if I see a harried person who's had a difficult day or is stressed over things at home or any other number of reasons behind the rudeness, I would be more likely to react with patience and understanding and alleviate any possible difficulties with the rest of the conversation.
I'm working on training my eyes to see things differently. What do you see?
But it's a good thing for this blog that I had to spend some time in the mid-parts of this great country o' ours because "a funny thing happened on the way to the forum" and I suddenly had great content for Tessellations at hand.
I was doing a series of speaking engagements over the weekend, traveling from one event to another through two states. I had no sooner gotten off the plane than my host and chauffeur for the weekend whisked me off to the first engagement, a two hour drive away. Still high on Dramamine and my head spinning from trying to figure out where I was and what I was doing, we parked near the door of the church where the first event was being held and unloaded our technical equipment to run PowerPoint for my first presentation. We slung a variety of computers, projectors, and other bags over our shoulders and power-walked through wind and spattering rain into the church, entering via the social hall, quickly conferring about schedules and how to organize ourselves for set-up and presentation. I was no further than two steps into the social hall when my eyes immediately landed on a gorgeous quilt folded over the back of a bench on the far end of the room.
"Oooh!" I interrupted whatever I'd originally been saying, "Look at that beautiful quilt!"
My friend/host spun her head from side to side..."What quilt?"
"That one right there," I responded with a quick bob of the head in the appropriate direction, my arms too full with equipment to be able to point. She continued to look around even as I began to make my way to the quilt, equipment burdens and schedules momentarily forgotten.
"What quilt?" She asked again, her voice sounding bemused and, admittedly, maybe even a little frustrated with my distraction. She watched where I was going and finally saw it. "Oh, that quilt," she said, somewhat dismissively as she returned her concentration instead on finding the person organizing the event. Her tone of voice recalled me to what I was there to do and I turned in my tracks, heading back in the direction of the sanctuary as the leaders of the event, having spied our entrance to the building, began introducing us as the speakers.
The quilt was forgotten as my friend and I rushed to get flash drives and computers and projectors talking to one another (unsuccessfully, as it turned out). But an hour later when our presentation was finished and we returned to the social hall to pack up our equipment and say our farewells to the participants in the event, I finally had the opportunity to check out the quilt. Another woman noticed my interest and my curiosity was finally assuaged as we chatted for a few minutes about the pattern and quilting and the story behind the quilt (Log Cabin, machine quilted, done for a celebration of some sort in the church).
After we left, beginning another two hour journey to our next destination, my friend and I joked about how I'd visually locked in on that quilt the second I'd entered the room whereas she hadn't been able to see it until I had actually pointed it out to her. It wasn't until I was back on the plane for my return trip home several days later, however, that I thought about what that small incident pointed out.
We see what we're trained to see.
Because I spend so much time and energy engaged in quilting, I have essentially trained myself to notice quilts, quilt patterns, even color combinations or geometric designs that somehow relate to quilting, everywhere I go. It's no surprise, then, that the first thing I notice when I walk into a room is the presence of a quilt. Equally telling, my friend who isn't a quilter didn't notice it until it was especially pointed out to her. She may have eventually seen it, of course, but it still wouldn't stand out for her the way it did for me. Her reaction points out the opposite truth to this statement:
We don't see what we're not trained to see. Or the corollary statement, we don't see what we don't want to see.
How appropriate a realization this was to me as I was flying home from my weekend spent making a series of presentations on the topic of sex trafficking. This global scourge is something that happens in every country including the U.S., but is something that the vast majority of us don't want to think about and may even simply refuse to see. "That's something that happens over there," we might say, "or in cities," if we live in a rural area. Just a few days before I traveled to make these presentations, however, a series of newspaper articles was printed in one of their local papers about police having broken up a sex trafficking ring active in small towns through the eastern part of the state. It listed the small towns the traffickers had set up brothels in, and several women present at some of those speaking engagements lived in or near those small towns. Some of those small towns only had a few hundred residents, and the photos of the "brothels" showed that they were just regular homes on regular streets, near gas stations and sometimes even churches. Houses that any of us would walk by several times a day and not think twice about what was happening inside. People reading those articles, and those present at my speaking engagements, now had to see what they hadn't been trained to see. They had to realize that yes, trafficking even happens in Small Town America.
The moral of the story is that we see what we want to see--which means that sometimes we have to train ourselves to see certain kinds of things. I still don't want to see evidence of human trafficking, but I've had to train myself to see it. But more ever-present than the big global issues like that is the day-to-day "vision" we have. I have worked with teens for over twenty years, and the old maxim is true--you often get the behavior you expect to get. In other words, if I look at a kid and see a troublemaker, I'll have a troublemaker on my hands. But if I look at the same kid and see a basically good kid that occasionally messes up, I'll be working with a basically good kid. Or if I see a kid that has real attitude but that attitude indicates a traumatic childhood or a dysfunctional home or difficult relationship issues at school...then I can work to break through the attitude to get to the heart of the matter. And stepping the topic down even more, if I look at a rude waitress or store clerk and see only the rudeness, I may react rudely myself. But if I see a harried person who's had a difficult day or is stressed over things at home or any other number of reasons behind the rudeness, I would be more likely to react with patience and understanding and alleviate any possible difficulties with the rest of the conversation.
I'm working on training my eyes to see things differently. What do you see?
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Oh...and...
We had a very pretty morning a few days ago and as I was cleaning photos off my camera in preparation for my trip I forgot I'd taken some of a young Japanese maple in our backyard in the morning sun...
On the road again...
I'm writing this just a few hours before our family is boarding a plane to London for spring break. My husband and I had always planned that we'd go to Europe for our 20th anniversary. Said 20th anniversary was this past fall--and when time came to actually plan our trip we realized that we really only probably have a couple of years left of the proverbial "family vacation"--kids n' all, as our son is a junior in high school and our daughter is a freshman. So we shifted our plans a little bit, adjusted our savings plan, and the kids are coming with us on the trip. It may not be the traditional romantic anniversary get-away but it has its own romance--after all, our kids are the product of our 20-year-long odyssey together so it only seems appropriate they be part of our anniversary celebration. Besides, we'll have plenty of time for romantic get-aways once the kids don't want to be tagging along with Mom and Dad on vacations anymore.
What does all this have to do with quilting? Admittedly, not a lot. In fact, my life has had little to do with quilting lately. I finally recovered from my illness, had a couple of productive weeks of good health and dabbling my toes in sewing here and there, and then Mom ended up in ER and having emergency surgery...and everything else fell by the wayside again.
However, I did have the foresight to use my upcoming week-long absence as an opportunity to have my machine serviced so I dropped it off for a cleaning and general tune-up a couple of days ago--first time I've had anything done to it since I bought it a few years ago so it's about time. But other than that, I've had to be OK with the fact that I wasn't getting any quilting done. It wasn't so much not having the time as it was not having the energy and, therefore, no real desire. And I'm OK with that. All things need a rest on occasion. Even things we normally see as fun. All I felt like doing after leaving work to see Mom and meet with doctors and all, was sitting on the couch with my laptop either playing mindless computer games or messing around with digital scrapbooking--my other creative hobby.
With the emergency of Mom's surgery past (she's in a rehab unit now and we have every reason to believe she'll be home again within a week), I'm now regrouping. My usual fear of flying has taken a backseat to my great anticipation of being forced to sit still for several hours and sleep! I've loaded up my iPod with all sorts of really interesting podcasts (not a few of which are quilt-related) and am planning on a nice period of limbo between the here and the there, the home and the vacation, the bustle of getting out of the house and the bustle of trying to see as much as possible in the few days available to us.
But there is a quilt connection to being in London--since the exchange rate is such that we won't be buying souvenirs I plan on taking a ton of photos as my souvenirs. I plan especially on looking for architectural details that may inform my quilting at a later date. I've seen many demonstrations of creating quilt blocks around tile patterns or using mosaics as a quilting design. I doubt my skills are up to that yet but I can always stock up on photos for the day that my skills catch up to my imagination! I'll probably end up with a wad of vacation photos that are mind-numbingly boring for anyone else to look at but I'll think they're pretty darn cool.
So I guess the "life lesson from quilting" in this blog is two-fold: 1) Sometimes we need a rest even from the fun things--a chance to regroup, to do something different, so we can return to it fresh; and 2) inspiration from quilting--or any creative expression--can come from anywhere, even the grout between tiles or the edge of a cornice on a building.
I'm off to finish packing, making sure my camera and iPod are completely charged and ready to go. Oh, yeah, and some clothes. But those are only the after-thought. My electronics always go in first!
What does all this have to do with quilting? Admittedly, not a lot. In fact, my life has had little to do with quilting lately. I finally recovered from my illness, had a couple of productive weeks of good health and dabbling my toes in sewing here and there, and then Mom ended up in ER and having emergency surgery...and everything else fell by the wayside again.
However, I did have the foresight to use my upcoming week-long absence as an opportunity to have my machine serviced so I dropped it off for a cleaning and general tune-up a couple of days ago--first time I've had anything done to it since I bought it a few years ago so it's about time. But other than that, I've had to be OK with the fact that I wasn't getting any quilting done. It wasn't so much not having the time as it was not having the energy and, therefore, no real desire. And I'm OK with that. All things need a rest on occasion. Even things we normally see as fun. All I felt like doing after leaving work to see Mom and meet with doctors and all, was sitting on the couch with my laptop either playing mindless computer games or messing around with digital scrapbooking--my other creative hobby.
With the emergency of Mom's surgery past (she's in a rehab unit now and we have every reason to believe she'll be home again within a week), I'm now regrouping. My usual fear of flying has taken a backseat to my great anticipation of being forced to sit still for several hours and sleep! I've loaded up my iPod with all sorts of really interesting podcasts (not a few of which are quilt-related) and am planning on a nice period of limbo between the here and the there, the home and the vacation, the bustle of getting out of the house and the bustle of trying to see as much as possible in the few days available to us.
But there is a quilt connection to being in London--since the exchange rate is such that we won't be buying souvenirs I plan on taking a ton of photos as my souvenirs. I plan especially on looking for architectural details that may inform my quilting at a later date. I've seen many demonstrations of creating quilt blocks around tile patterns or using mosaics as a quilting design. I doubt my skills are up to that yet but I can always stock up on photos for the day that my skills catch up to my imagination! I'll probably end up with a wad of vacation photos that are mind-numbingly boring for anyone else to look at but I'll think they're pretty darn cool.
So I guess the "life lesson from quilting" in this blog is two-fold: 1) Sometimes we need a rest even from the fun things--a chance to regroup, to do something different, so we can return to it fresh; and 2) inspiration from quilting--or any creative expression--can come from anywhere, even the grout between tiles or the edge of a cornice on a building.
I'm off to finish packing, making sure my camera and iPod are completely charged and ready to go. Oh, yeah, and some clothes. But those are only the after-thought. My electronics always go in first!
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Signs of Health
You know you're a quilter when...you decide you're on the road to health when you finally feel up to handling a rotary cutter.
I've been sick since I returned home from Thailand with bronchitis, 4 weeks ago. I had a small handful of halfway decent days the second week when I thought I might be on the way out of it...but then apparently got hit with a second cold-type bug on top of it and the two things didn't play together nicely, so I ended up in bed again most of last week. Since I work at home, it's unusual enough for me to take one sick day let alone four in a row. Yeesh.
As frustrated as I was to be missing work and to have to keep cancelling out of events and responsibilities and to have to keep relying on my husband and kids to take care of everything while I was sacked out in bed for days on end, I was probably most put out over the fact that even the thought of standing at my cutting table or sitting at the sewing machine exhausted me. Sharp edges and serious cold medicines? Not a good mix. No, the closest I got to sewing for 4 1/2 weeks was the pages of my quilt magazines and one evening messing around with my quilt design software.
This week, I'm starting to feel like maybe I've turned that corner again, for the second time, but hoping it sticks this time. I'm also doing better at listening to the advice of my family and my doctor who have all told me to keep laying low this week. Do only what I need to do--don't send myself into a tail spin again.
Do only what I need to do.... I need to have my hands on fabric. So tonight I put the binding on my son's quilt; that felt fairly straight forward and like something I could feasibly handle. I got all the way through it until having to make the ends meet. Never an easy part of the binding process for me, I knew that it might particularly hitch me up tonight. And yep, I sewed them together together all twisty-like, and not in a creative way. I ripped them out and had a brief debate with myself about whether I should try again when I remembered everyone's advice to lay low and reminded myself that there was no rush; the binding could be finished just as easily tomorrow night when I was fresh.
So the last four weeks have been a long lesson in learning to listen to my body, to practice the art of self-forgiveness, and to just be patient. I have to remind myself to give my body the time and space it needs to get healthy again. Like when I was on sabbatical, I had to remind myself it was OK to have a couple of weeks of non-productiveness, although I do confess to spending much of that time watching a lecture series about the Middle Ages on DVD so that I could at least feel like the time wasn't totally wasted. Admittedly, I believe I dozed through quite a bit of the 11th century.
But I've been able to play with fabric again today even if just for a little while. And since I got a shipment of new quilt books and a surprise gift of fabric from my sister today as well, I'm going to go celebrate my stuttering return back to the quilting life with a little time in a comfy armchair petting new fabric and dreaming of future quilt projects.
I've been sick since I returned home from Thailand with bronchitis, 4 weeks ago. I had a small handful of halfway decent days the second week when I thought I might be on the way out of it...but then apparently got hit with a second cold-type bug on top of it and the two things didn't play together nicely, so I ended up in bed again most of last week. Since I work at home, it's unusual enough for me to take one sick day let alone four in a row. Yeesh.
As frustrated as I was to be missing work and to have to keep cancelling out of events and responsibilities and to have to keep relying on my husband and kids to take care of everything while I was sacked out in bed for days on end, I was probably most put out over the fact that even the thought of standing at my cutting table or sitting at the sewing machine exhausted me. Sharp edges and serious cold medicines? Not a good mix. No, the closest I got to sewing for 4 1/2 weeks was the pages of my quilt magazines and one evening messing around with my quilt design software.
This week, I'm starting to feel like maybe I've turned that corner again, for the second time, but hoping it sticks this time. I'm also doing better at listening to the advice of my family and my doctor who have all told me to keep laying low this week. Do only what I need to do--don't send myself into a tail spin again.
Do only what I need to do.... I need to have my hands on fabric. So tonight I put the binding on my son's quilt; that felt fairly straight forward and like something I could feasibly handle. I got all the way through it until having to make the ends meet. Never an easy part of the binding process for me, I knew that it might particularly hitch me up tonight. And yep, I sewed them together together all twisty-like, and not in a creative way. I ripped them out and had a brief debate with myself about whether I should try again when I remembered everyone's advice to lay low and reminded myself that there was no rush; the binding could be finished just as easily tomorrow night when I was fresh.
So the last four weeks have been a long lesson in learning to listen to my body, to practice the art of self-forgiveness, and to just be patient. I have to remind myself to give my body the time and space it needs to get healthy again. Like when I was on sabbatical, I had to remind myself it was OK to have a couple of weeks of non-productiveness, although I do confess to spending much of that time watching a lecture series about the Middle Ages on DVD so that I could at least feel like the time wasn't totally wasted. Admittedly, I believe I dozed through quite a bit of the 11th century.
But I've been able to play with fabric again today even if just for a little while. And since I got a shipment of new quilt books and a surprise gift of fabric from my sister today as well, I'm going to go celebrate my stuttering return back to the quilting life with a little time in a comfy armchair petting new fabric and dreaming of future quilt projects.
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Under the Influence...
...of jetlag, sleeping pills to combat the jetlag, and various cold meds to combat the cold made worse by the plane that caused the jetlag.... I'm home from Thailand and am still processing all I saw and did. I'm not sure how coherent I can be just yet (see sentence #1) but hopefully over the next few days and weeks I'll be able to find the right words and phrases to express some of the more significant moments. It was an amazing trip. For some background, you may want to do some reading up on the situation in Burma, especially in regards to the Karen people. Here's a recent article: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/on-the-run-with-the-karen-people-forced-to-flee-burmas-genocide-432267.html.
We met with many people and visited a wide variety of places, but to stay true to the purpose of this blog....from a fabric perspective, there were definitely some highlights. I was able to watch a Karen (pronounced, "kah-RYN") woman using a traditional back loom to weave fabric in a traditional Karen pattern. A back loom literally surrounds the weaver with a wooden brace across her back and the threads stretched in front of her, tied to a wall or other solid object in front of her. This particular weaver's body looked like it had melded itself into that position from years of weaving, her fingers moved the various shuttles through warp and 
weft quickly and assuredly, the complex pattern appearing before our eyes without us even really understanding how it was happening. (These photos don't pick up the intracacies of the actual pattern well--sorry.) Yes, she was partially there "on display", but we weren't in a tourist spot--we were at a school in a women's organization office which works to help the Karen women support themselves through traditional handicrafts. So this weaver was representative of a culture past and very much future--a people embracing their tradition to help ensure that tradition is able to continue unfettered for generations to come.
Later, in a somewhat more "touristy" spot (although still way off the beaten trail), we shopped at a store run by a Hmong woman (pronouned "mung"). The Hmong are another group who have a history of being refugees--they originated in southern China but spread south into Laos, Vietnam, Burma, and Thailand; due to their opposition to the communist regime in Laos in the late 70s, thousands of Hmong there were forced from their homes and fled to Thailand; many were later resettled in other countries around the world including the U.S. Several thousand remain in Thailand to this day.
The Hmong woman we met was selling clothing, purses, and a wide variety of clothing that she told us she had made by hand.
I'm not entirely sure I would've believed her--it always sounds like a tourist-oriented sales-pitch and she had a fair volume of goods for sale--until she sat down to very quickly fix an article a woman in our group wanted to buy but had found a problem with a seam. The Hmong woman's fingers flew with that needle and thread and she had fixed the problem in mere seconds. It was suddenly very believable that she could've made all of those items herself in a fairly limited period of time. After I finished paying for my purchases, her face broke into a wide grin and she excitedly grabbed my arm and said something in her native language that I mentally translated into great thanks for the income I'd just ploughed into her business! I had also remarked earlier to another traveling companion that I was always a little skeptical about "traditional clothing," wondering if people really ever wore those clothes anymore except in high ceremony--until we were driving through the countryside in the miles around that little store and I saw all sorts of men and women wearing clothing exactly as she had been wearing and selling--as they farmed, carried huge baskets of harvest on their heads, led obedient cattle with ropes, and carried out the tasks of their daily lives. So yes, traditional clothing sometimes truly is traditional clothing.
I guess maybe I'm a bit too skeptical. There truly is such a thing as tradition left somewhere in the world. I come from a fairly mongrel American background so I don't have much ethnic tradition left in my own family history. I've married into a smattering of it in my husband's family but there is still little we can point to that's distinctive to anything other than a general euro-Christian-American-middle-class culture. On the other hand, the Karen and Hmong women, and the Kachin, Chin, and other refugees around the world who work to support themselves in this way are, in general, barely making a living. I don't want to glorify their lives in any way--it's a hard, unimaginable life of never being sure what's going to happen tomorrow. And yet they keep their traditions alive--they hang onto them, perhaps even more so, in the face of uncertainty; the weaving and the embroidery and the ethnically-distinctive patterns remind them of who they are and where they came from when all that was familiar has been ripped from them.
And one way I can support them is through purchasing their goods and adding my own creativity to theirs by making quilts out of their fabrics. And everytime my eyes land on those fabrics on my shelves or hanging on my wall in a completed project, I will remember women the world over who struggle to put food on the table, who have been thrust from their homes and villages and chased across the countryside into strange lands, who deal with life circumstances I can't even begin to imagine, but whose fingers nimbly trip over the threads bringing beauty to life.
We met with many people and visited a wide variety of places, but to stay true to the purpose of this blog....from a fabric perspective, there were definitely some highlights. I was able to watch a Karen (pronounced, "kah-RYN") woman using a traditional back loom to weave fabric in a traditional Karen pattern. A back loom literally surrounds the weaver with a wooden brace across her back and the threads stretched in front of her, tied to a wall or other solid object in front of her. This particular weaver's body looked like it had melded itself into that position from years of weaving, her fingers moved the various shuttles through warp and 
weft quickly and assuredly, the complex pattern appearing before our eyes without us even really understanding how it was happening. (These photos don't pick up the intracacies of the actual pattern well--sorry.) Yes, she was partially there "on display", but we weren't in a tourist spot--we were at a school in a women's organization office which works to help the Karen women support themselves through traditional handicrafts. So this weaver was representative of a culture past and very much future--a people embracing their tradition to help ensure that tradition is able to continue unfettered for generations to come.Later, in a somewhat more "touristy" spot (although still way off the beaten trail), we shopped at a store run by a Hmong woman (pronouned "mung"). The Hmong are another group who have a history of being refugees--they originated in southern China but spread south into Laos, Vietnam, Burma, and Thailand; due to their opposition to the communist regime in Laos in the late 70s, thousands of Hmong there were forced from their homes and fled to Thailand; many were later resettled in other countries around the world including the U.S. Several thousand remain in Thailand to this day.
The Hmong woman we met was selling clothing, purses, and a wide variety of clothing that she told us she had made by hand.
I'm not entirely sure I would've believed her--it always sounds like a tourist-oriented sales-pitch and she had a fair volume of goods for sale--until she sat down to very quickly fix an article a woman in our group wanted to buy but had found a problem with a seam. The Hmong woman's fingers flew with that needle and thread and she had fixed the problem in mere seconds. It was suddenly very believable that she could've made all of those items herself in a fairly limited period of time. After I finished paying for my purchases, her face broke into a wide grin and she excitedly grabbed my arm and said something in her native language that I mentally translated into great thanks for the income I'd just ploughed into her business! I had also remarked earlier to another traveling companion that I was always a little skeptical about "traditional clothing," wondering if people really ever wore those clothes anymore except in high ceremony--until we were driving through the countryside in the miles around that little store and I saw all sorts of men and women wearing clothing exactly as she had been wearing and selling--as they farmed, carried huge baskets of harvest on their heads, led obedient cattle with ropes, and carried out the tasks of their daily lives. So yes, traditional clothing sometimes truly is traditional clothing.I guess maybe I'm a bit too skeptical. There truly is such a thing as tradition left somewhere in the world. I come from a fairly mongrel American background so I don't have much ethnic tradition left in my own family history. I've married into a smattering of it in my husband's family but there is still little we can point to that's distinctive to anything other than a general euro-Christian-American-middle-class culture. On the other hand, the Karen and Hmong women, and the Kachin, Chin, and other refugees around the world who work to support themselves in this way are, in general, barely making a living. I don't want to glorify their lives in any way--it's a hard, unimaginable life of never being sure what's going to happen tomorrow. And yet they keep their traditions alive--they hang onto them, perhaps even more so, in the face of uncertainty; the weaving and the embroidery and the ethnically-distinctive patterns remind them of who they are and where they came from when all that was familiar has been ripped from them.
And one way I can support them is through purchasing their goods and adding my own creativity to theirs by making quilts out of their fabrics. And everytime my eyes land on those fabrics on my shelves or hanging on my wall in a completed project, I will remember women the world over who struggle to put food on the table, who have been thrust from their homes and villages and chased across the countryside into strange lands, who deal with life circumstances I can't even begin to imagine, but whose fingers nimbly trip over the threads bringing beauty to life.
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Departing soon...
In a couple of days, I leave for a two-week trip to Thailand. It's funny (funny-ironic, not funny-ha-ha) how much time I've spent preparing for this trip when you put it side-by-side with how long I'll actually be there. But shopping, doctor's visits, and pharmaceutical supplies aside, I think I'm now ready.
I couldn't resist--I spent a little time today googling "Thailand fabric". I've seen some of the traditional tribal weaving, but I wasn't as sure about what other fabrics may be considered specialties in Thailand. And of course, it's silk. Hadn't really thought about that but it makes a certain amount of sense. I'm not sure how much time I'll have for shopping--I'm on a mission trip, after all, not a tourist jaunt--but I'm definitely going to be keeping my eye out for some authentically Thai fabric while I'm there.
The reason for my trip is that our city, like many others around the country, has received a sizeable number of refugees from Burma; those refugees come here after living (sometimes for many years) in camps in Thailand spreading up the long border between the two countries. In addition, my denomination has historical ties to Baptists in Burma, so many of the Baptist refugees are seeking out our sister churches in the cities where they're being relocated--my church among them. Over the summer, our church's attendance increased by about 100 in a few short months, and we now collectively sing hymns in English, Karen, and Chin every Sunday.
I have been volunteering with the families who have located in my city--working with a large network of volunteers like me who are all hoping to make the refugee community's transition here to the chilly northeast as comfortable as possible. Because of my denominational and professional ties as well, I am going on this trip wearing a couple of different hats and will be listening with a couple of different sets of ears!
In any case, one connection I made with some members of the refugee community was when I received the first request for a sewing machine. As I asked around, it turned out that the Karen Women's Organization--active in the refugee camps--ran sewing classes in some of the camps to help teach marketable skills to the refugees. Women and men both avail themselves of these classes. Once they're here in the U.S., some of them are then able to work in tailor shops or clothing manufacturers to earn their living. (A little background: The Karen are one of the ethnic groups in Burma--it's pronounced "kah-RYN". Although there are many different ethnic groups from Burma in the refugee camps, the Karen are disproportionately represented because they've been historically oppressed in Burma.)
Several women and a couple of men had asked if we could find them sewing machines, so I put the word out on my quilt guild's newsgroup and on our local Craig's List, and within a few weeks I had received 7 machines, yards and yards of donated fabric, reams of thread, and passels of zippers and other notions. After having distributed a few machines to people I knew had specifically requested them, I brought the rest to church this past Sunday and invited members of the community to take what they needed. Within ten minutes, it was all gone.
I was struck once again by the connections we can make with one another in the most unlikely of ways. Those quilters who donated machines and fabric were thrilled to be able to help out fellow sewers. Those who were the recipients were thankful for the ability to practice their art and have another possible avenue to self-sufficiency. I am very much looking forward to perhaps meeting leaders in the Karen Women's Organization while in Thailand so I can know more about their sewing classes, as well as all the other work they do.
In fact, much of my trip to Thailand will be awash with meeting women who work hard to help other women and girls find self-sufficiency. Poverty, war, lack of education, and health issues all work together to force women and girls (especially) out onto the streets--forced to beg, work in strip clubs, or sell themselves to earn enough to support themselves and their families. I am looking forward to the opportunity I'm going to have to meet some of the incredible people who have devoted their lives to eradicating human trafficking, to ministering to women and girls coming off the streets, out of the bars, and away from situations of abuse, and to helping to provide education, health care, and job training so that all might have the opportunities to support themselves with dignity.
It's just two short weeks. It's taken me several weeks of preparation to get ready to go. I imagine it'll be years before I have an inkling of what it all means once I return.
I couldn't resist--I spent a little time today googling "Thailand fabric". I've seen some of the traditional tribal weaving, but I wasn't as sure about what other fabrics may be considered specialties in Thailand. And of course, it's silk. Hadn't really thought about that but it makes a certain amount of sense. I'm not sure how much time I'll have for shopping--I'm on a mission trip, after all, not a tourist jaunt--but I'm definitely going to be keeping my eye out for some authentically Thai fabric while I'm there.
The reason for my trip is that our city, like many others around the country, has received a sizeable number of refugees from Burma; those refugees come here after living (sometimes for many years) in camps in Thailand spreading up the long border between the two countries. In addition, my denomination has historical ties to Baptists in Burma, so many of the Baptist refugees are seeking out our sister churches in the cities where they're being relocated--my church among them. Over the summer, our church's attendance increased by about 100 in a few short months, and we now collectively sing hymns in English, Karen, and Chin every Sunday.
I have been volunteering with the families who have located in my city--working with a large network of volunteers like me who are all hoping to make the refugee community's transition here to the chilly northeast as comfortable as possible. Because of my denominational and professional ties as well, I am going on this trip wearing a couple of different hats and will be listening with a couple of different sets of ears!
In any case, one connection I made with some members of the refugee community was when I received the first request for a sewing machine. As I asked around, it turned out that the Karen Women's Organization--active in the refugee camps--ran sewing classes in some of the camps to help teach marketable skills to the refugees. Women and men both avail themselves of these classes. Once they're here in the U.S., some of them are then able to work in tailor shops or clothing manufacturers to earn their living. (A little background: The Karen are one of the ethnic groups in Burma--it's pronounced "kah-RYN". Although there are many different ethnic groups from Burma in the refugee camps, the Karen are disproportionately represented because they've been historically oppressed in Burma.)
Several women and a couple of men had asked if we could find them sewing machines, so I put the word out on my quilt guild's newsgroup and on our local Craig's List, and within a few weeks I had received 7 machines, yards and yards of donated fabric, reams of thread, and passels of zippers and other notions. After having distributed a few machines to people I knew had specifically requested them, I brought the rest to church this past Sunday and invited members of the community to take what they needed. Within ten minutes, it was all gone.
I was struck once again by the connections we can make with one another in the most unlikely of ways. Those quilters who donated machines and fabric were thrilled to be able to help out fellow sewers. Those who were the recipients were thankful for the ability to practice their art and have another possible avenue to self-sufficiency. I am very much looking forward to perhaps meeting leaders in the Karen Women's Organization while in Thailand so I can know more about their sewing classes, as well as all the other work they do.
In fact, much of my trip to Thailand will be awash with meeting women who work hard to help other women and girls find self-sufficiency. Poverty, war, lack of education, and health issues all work together to force women and girls (especially) out onto the streets--forced to beg, work in strip clubs, or sell themselves to earn enough to support themselves and their families. I am looking forward to the opportunity I'm going to have to meet some of the incredible people who have devoted their lives to eradicating human trafficking, to ministering to women and girls coming off the streets, out of the bars, and away from situations of abuse, and to helping to provide education, health care, and job training so that all might have the opportunities to support themselves with dignity.
It's just two short weeks. It's taken me several weeks of preparation to get ready to go. I imagine it'll be years before I have an inkling of what it all means once I return.
Monday, February 4, 2008
On Legitimacy
Nope--not the baby kind. I am confident in my parentage and I certainly remember every second of my two children's births so I'm not talking about lineage legitimacy. I've been reflecting for a few days, however, on the sense of our own legitimacy. At what point do we feel like we really are who we are?
My husband and I got engaged after we'd only been dating about three weeks. Now, mind you, we'd been friends for about three months before (I'd been dating a friend of his--gasp). But still, all things considered, deciding we were going to be together the rest of our lives happened pretty darn quickly. We did have the benefit of a 2 1/2-year-long engagement, however, since we wanted to graduate from college before getting married. And it all worked out in the end--we're in our 21st year and definitely looking forward to the next who-knows-how-many-decades together. But we joke sometimes about how, when we were first engaged, we used to say, "We've been together for three months now--does that make us legitimate yet?" "We've been together longer than either of our longest prior relationships--does that make us legitimate yet?" On our 20th anniversary we decided that yep, we were pretty much legitimate now. But there was clearly a sense in our early stages that no one would take us seriously as a couple until we'd been together for some indeterminate period of time.
I am part of the Baby Buster generation--I was born a little after the generally agreed-upon final year of the Baby Boom. This meant that I grew up younger than almost everyone around me. I'm the youngest child, the youngest cousin, the youngest offspring in most of my parents' circle of friends, and so forth. Actually, it was many years into my adulthood before I finally stopped being the youngest one in almost every room. In my profession, age matters--and older is better. I was the only one of my friends who did a happy dance on my 30th birthday because, as I said, "People will finally take me seriously!" Actually, what I was to find was that didn't really start happening until I'd passed my 40th birthday. (We are very aware of ageism as a society in respect towards older adults feeling passed by for youth, but there's a very present and real ageism in our society in which younger adults aren't taken seriously either.) It's only been relatively recently that I began to feel as if people were taking me seriously as a legitimate adult.
I have a 17-year-old and a three-weeks-away-from-being-15-year-old. I've always known that I was a mother and really enjoyed that role, but I realized a little while ago that I've only recently begun taking myself seriously as a parent. I think part of the mental transition is that my most clear memories of my own parents come from my teenage years--so now that my kids are teenagers I can see myself through their eyes a little more clearly. I remember what I thought of my parents at that age, so I can pretty much guess what my kids think of me--which, admittedly, is a somewhat frightening mental process to undertake! Fortunately, I had a good relationship with my 'rents and my kids seem to feel that they have a pretty good relationship with my husband and I, so I think it's OK. I used to feel a sense of surprise when I handled a parental situation well, or when my kids did something right--as if it was purely by accident. But in the last couple of years I've sensed a change in myself. It's almost as if I approach situations thinking, "OK, I've done this before. I can do this again--maybe even do it well!" I've learned from past mistakes and just have a stronger sense of who I am in relation to my kids. I definitely feel myself approaching my parental role a little differently now--with more confidence than in the past--because I actually think of myself as a legitimate parent.
And then, finally, there's the quilting thing. I think I mentioned in a previous post about not being sure when I could finally call myself a "quilter". Like my husband and I in our engagement phase, I had a vague sense that I would only be able to legimately call myself a quilter when I got to some indeterminate point--was it completing a certain number of projects? Was it spending so much time per week? Was it having been doing it a certain number of years? Was it having reached a certain skill level? I didn't know--I couldn't have told anyone what I was waiting for. I would easily define my mother as a quilter, but I'd follow it up with "and I've made a few projects myself," or "and I'm exploring it a little bit" or some other casual, but obviously dismissive, comment about my own engagement in the sport of quilting. It's only been in the last year or so that I've actually been referring to myself as a quilter or quilt-maker. I actually said to someone just yesterday, "My mom and I are both quilters." And no, I couldn't entirely tell you what changed. But somewhere along the way I began to think of myself as a legitimate quilter.
Ultimately, I think, it comes down to this: I am who I am. I'm legitimate. I don't have to pass any particular tests or cross any imaginary boundaries to be able to be seen as who I am, either. In fact, one of the things that age has taught me is that people don't tend to think about me nearly as much as I used to think they did! (It takes us a LONG time to outgrow that teenage sense of everyone watching and judging every little move we make, doesn't it? Now I can say, with confidence, that if someone truly is watching and judging every little move I make, they need to just get a freaking life!)
Doesn't mean I'm not still aware of what image I may present to the world--and I still attend to that concern in my professional and personal life when it matters. But the rest of the time I can now say, with freedom, my husband and I were a legitimate couple when we went on our first date; I was a legitimate parent the second my first child was conceived; I AM a quilter, darn it, and have been since I fondled my first bolt of fabric; and I have certain wisdom and experience that others can learn from no matter what age I am. And I can learn from others no matter what age they are, because they're legitimate too.
So the next time I find myself thinking I don't have the credentials to call myself something or another, or that I don't entirely measure up to some imaginary rule, I will remind myself: I am legitimate. To paraphrase Descartes, "I do, therefore I am."
My husband and I got engaged after we'd only been dating about three weeks. Now, mind you, we'd been friends for about three months before (I'd been dating a friend of his--gasp). But still, all things considered, deciding we were going to be together the rest of our lives happened pretty darn quickly. We did have the benefit of a 2 1/2-year-long engagement, however, since we wanted to graduate from college before getting married. And it all worked out in the end--we're in our 21st year and definitely looking forward to the next who-knows-how-many-decades together. But we joke sometimes about how, when we were first engaged, we used to say, "We've been together for three months now--does that make us legitimate yet?" "We've been together longer than either of our longest prior relationships--does that make us legitimate yet?" On our 20th anniversary we decided that yep, we were pretty much legitimate now. But there was clearly a sense in our early stages that no one would take us seriously as a couple until we'd been together for some indeterminate period of time.
I am part of the Baby Buster generation--I was born a little after the generally agreed-upon final year of the Baby Boom. This meant that I grew up younger than almost everyone around me. I'm the youngest child, the youngest cousin, the youngest offspring in most of my parents' circle of friends, and so forth. Actually, it was many years into my adulthood before I finally stopped being the youngest one in almost every room. In my profession, age matters--and older is better. I was the only one of my friends who did a happy dance on my 30th birthday because, as I said, "People will finally take me seriously!" Actually, what I was to find was that didn't really start happening until I'd passed my 40th birthday. (We are very aware of ageism as a society in respect towards older adults feeling passed by for youth, but there's a very present and real ageism in our society in which younger adults aren't taken seriously either.) It's only been relatively recently that I began to feel as if people were taking me seriously as a legitimate adult.
I have a 17-year-old and a three-weeks-away-from-being-15-year-old. I've always known that I was a mother and really enjoyed that role, but I realized a little while ago that I've only recently begun taking myself seriously as a parent. I think part of the mental transition is that my most clear memories of my own parents come from my teenage years--so now that my kids are teenagers I can see myself through their eyes a little more clearly. I remember what I thought of my parents at that age, so I can pretty much guess what my kids think of me--which, admittedly, is a somewhat frightening mental process to undertake! Fortunately, I had a good relationship with my 'rents and my kids seem to feel that they have a pretty good relationship with my husband and I, so I think it's OK. I used to feel a sense of surprise when I handled a parental situation well, or when my kids did something right--as if it was purely by accident. But in the last couple of years I've sensed a change in myself. It's almost as if I approach situations thinking, "OK, I've done this before. I can do this again--maybe even do it well!" I've learned from past mistakes and just have a stronger sense of who I am in relation to my kids. I definitely feel myself approaching my parental role a little differently now--with more confidence than in the past--because I actually think of myself as a legitimate parent.
And then, finally, there's the quilting thing. I think I mentioned in a previous post about not being sure when I could finally call myself a "quilter". Like my husband and I in our engagement phase, I had a vague sense that I would only be able to legimately call myself a quilter when I got to some indeterminate point--was it completing a certain number of projects? Was it spending so much time per week? Was it having been doing it a certain number of years? Was it having reached a certain skill level? I didn't know--I couldn't have told anyone what I was waiting for. I would easily define my mother as a quilter, but I'd follow it up with "and I've made a few projects myself," or "and I'm exploring it a little bit" or some other casual, but obviously dismissive, comment about my own engagement in the sport of quilting. It's only been in the last year or so that I've actually been referring to myself as a quilter or quilt-maker. I actually said to someone just yesterday, "My mom and I are both quilters." And no, I couldn't entirely tell you what changed. But somewhere along the way I began to think of myself as a legitimate quilter.
Ultimately, I think, it comes down to this: I am who I am. I'm legitimate. I don't have to pass any particular tests or cross any imaginary boundaries to be able to be seen as who I am, either. In fact, one of the things that age has taught me is that people don't tend to think about me nearly as much as I used to think they did! (It takes us a LONG time to outgrow that teenage sense of everyone watching and judging every little move we make, doesn't it? Now I can say, with confidence, that if someone truly is watching and judging every little move I make, they need to just get a freaking life!)
Doesn't mean I'm not still aware of what image I may present to the world--and I still attend to that concern in my professional and personal life when it matters. But the rest of the time I can now say, with freedom, my husband and I were a legitimate couple when we went on our first date; I was a legitimate parent the second my first child was conceived; I AM a quilter, darn it, and have been since I fondled my first bolt of fabric; and I have certain wisdom and experience that others can learn from no matter what age I am. And I can learn from others no matter what age they are, because they're legitimate too.
So the next time I find myself thinking I don't have the credentials to call myself something or another, or that I don't entirely measure up to some imaginary rule, I will remind myself: I am legitimate. To paraphrase Descartes, "I do, therefore I am."
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
I Think I Can't...oops...
Over lunch yesterday I was watching a recorded episode of Simply Quilts, and Alex's special guest was someone who does a lot of work with batiks. She was walking us through a relatively simple pattern for a quilt done with batiks, and I was thinking, "That's pretty--I could easily do that. Maybe I'll go online and download the pattern."
Just a few minutes later, Alex had the guest talk about some other quilts she'd brought along with her: a wide variety of patterns, although all using batiks. I haven't entirely been bitten by the batik bug yet--just a little bit nibbled--but I was struck by the beauty of the way the guest had put colors together and how she'd used relatively simple block patterns that really highlighted this unique fabric. Looking at one particularly nice one, I thought, "Boy, I wish I could figure out how to do stuff like that. I'm not good at that kind of thing."
Uh, what?
I stopped at the realization of what a negative message I'd just sent myself.
OK, here's where I give you a little backstory. I have led workshops and written program sessions on creativity. I have been invited as a guest speaker at women's events and asked specifically to speak on creativity. I've written countless articles (mostly for women and girls) on creativity. My saying is, "Creativity is only looking at something in a new way." My pet peeve is women who say they're not creative, and I expend a tremendous amount of my personal and professional energy in trying to help them see otherwise.
And yet my first thought when looking at someone else's creativity is, "I can't do that."
Doh.
Of course I can. I just have to get over myself. I do normally think of myself as a creative person--although my creativity tends to show itself in much more pragmatic ways. I'm able to view problems creatively, set up creative organizational structures for groups...basically, I'm able to look at things in a new way and help people find new ways to address issues. But artistic creativity has often felt like a completely different thing for me, and an area in which I'm less confident in my abilities.
I vividly recall my mother once saying to someone, "Oh, I'm not creative", completely discounting the several stacks of beautiful quilts she had made over the years. But simply because she typically followed patterns rather than designing her own, she saw what she did as something less than creative. And yet she took those patterns and made them her own--used her own fabric choices, tweaked sizes, or block placement, or border treatments--what turned out was not just a carbon copy of what the designer had originally created. And yet my Mom didn't see what she'd done as creative. And might I also comment here, raising 5 kids and several foster kids on limited budget and in a self-built house and subsistence farm in the country required a tremendous amount of creativity!
I realized a few years back that my admiration for my Mom's creativity and my sadness that she couldn't see that in herself is quite a bit of what has inspired me to preach the word of creativity to women and girls today. I firmly believe that a lot of women have been trained to see what we do as "less than"--we do crafts, not create art; we have hobbies, not artistic passions. We are very quick to discount our own talents and explain them away as something that's not really all that and a bag of chips. And that's why my knee-jerk-reaction to what I was watching on the television--"Oh, I can't do that, I'm not that creative"--really surprised me. Dang it, practice what you preach, girl.
Why is it that we relegate artistic creativity to the experts? Why do we relegate anything to the experts? How does someone become an expert, anyway? I'm not knocking artists--there are several quilt artists whose quilts I pore over in fascination and try to learn everything I can from seeing how they put fabric, stitches, and embellishment together. But why is it that I see what they do as something so completely removed from what I do?
I have to remind myself to change the tape in my head from "I wish I could" to "I want to--how do I get there?" and from "I can't do that" to "Gosh, I could do that. What do I need to learn to get to that place?"
I have often gotten called in as computer tech support for various members of my extended family and a fair number of people I work with. They all know I spend the better part of my life on my computer and use a wide variety of software, so they call or email me with questions. Most of the time, I can figure out their issues and help them solve them. One of them said to me once, "I'm sorry, but I've never been trained on any of this." To which I responded, "Neither have I. I'm just intensely curious, and positive that any software I buy should be able to do what I need it to do, so I just keep poking away at it until I figure it out."
I'm not afraid of computers, so I'm able to work easily with them. After watching the Simply Quilts episode yesterday and thinking through all of this, I realized I had to apply the same thinking to quilting. It's only fabric. So what if I screw something up? I can always try again. No one ever needs to see it. If I even end up throwing it out, is that such a big deal? And it's not nearly as expensive to replace as a crashed computer!
So I'm planning on embarking on a journey of getting over myself. Stop thinking in terms of "cans" and "can'ts" and thinking instead of "hows" and "let's trys". There is no such thing as failure...it's all "a learning experience". And if some projects end up hitting the trash can, that's just a good excuse to make another trip to my favorite local quilt store, isn't it? How can I lose?
Just a few minutes later, Alex had the guest talk about some other quilts she'd brought along with her: a wide variety of patterns, although all using batiks. I haven't entirely been bitten by the batik bug yet--just a little bit nibbled--but I was struck by the beauty of the way the guest had put colors together and how she'd used relatively simple block patterns that really highlighted this unique fabric. Looking at one particularly nice one, I thought, "Boy, I wish I could figure out how to do stuff like that. I'm not good at that kind of thing."
Uh, what?
I stopped at the realization of what a negative message I'd just sent myself.
OK, here's where I give you a little backstory. I have led workshops and written program sessions on creativity. I have been invited as a guest speaker at women's events and asked specifically to speak on creativity. I've written countless articles (mostly for women and girls) on creativity. My saying is, "Creativity is only looking at something in a new way." My pet peeve is women who say they're not creative, and I expend a tremendous amount of my personal and professional energy in trying to help them see otherwise.
And yet my first thought when looking at someone else's creativity is, "I can't do that."
Doh.
Of course I can. I just have to get over myself. I do normally think of myself as a creative person--although my creativity tends to show itself in much more pragmatic ways. I'm able to view problems creatively, set up creative organizational structures for groups...basically, I'm able to look at things in a new way and help people find new ways to address issues. But artistic creativity has often felt like a completely different thing for me, and an area in which I'm less confident in my abilities.
I vividly recall my mother once saying to someone, "Oh, I'm not creative", completely discounting the several stacks of beautiful quilts she had made over the years. But simply because she typically followed patterns rather than designing her own, she saw what she did as something less than creative. And yet she took those patterns and made them her own--used her own fabric choices, tweaked sizes, or block placement, or border treatments--what turned out was not just a carbon copy of what the designer had originally created. And yet my Mom didn't see what she'd done as creative. And might I also comment here, raising 5 kids and several foster kids on limited budget and in a self-built house and subsistence farm in the country required a tremendous amount of creativity!
I realized a few years back that my admiration for my Mom's creativity and my sadness that she couldn't see that in herself is quite a bit of what has inspired me to preach the word of creativity to women and girls today. I firmly believe that a lot of women have been trained to see what we do as "less than"--we do crafts, not create art; we have hobbies, not artistic passions. We are very quick to discount our own talents and explain them away as something that's not really all that and a bag of chips. And that's why my knee-jerk-reaction to what I was watching on the television--"Oh, I can't do that, I'm not that creative"--really surprised me. Dang it, practice what you preach, girl.
Why is it that we relegate artistic creativity to the experts? Why do we relegate anything to the experts? How does someone become an expert, anyway? I'm not knocking artists--there are several quilt artists whose quilts I pore over in fascination and try to learn everything I can from seeing how they put fabric, stitches, and embellishment together. But why is it that I see what they do as something so completely removed from what I do?
I have to remind myself to change the tape in my head from "I wish I could" to "I want to--how do I get there?" and from "I can't do that" to "Gosh, I could do that. What do I need to learn to get to that place?"
I have often gotten called in as computer tech support for various members of my extended family and a fair number of people I work with. They all know I spend the better part of my life on my computer and use a wide variety of software, so they call or email me with questions. Most of the time, I can figure out their issues and help them solve them. One of them said to me once, "I'm sorry, but I've never been trained on any of this." To which I responded, "Neither have I. I'm just intensely curious, and positive that any software I buy should be able to do what I need it to do, so I just keep poking away at it until I figure it out."
I'm not afraid of computers, so I'm able to work easily with them. After watching the Simply Quilts episode yesterday and thinking through all of this, I realized I had to apply the same thinking to quilting. It's only fabric. So what if I screw something up? I can always try again. No one ever needs to see it. If I even end up throwing it out, is that such a big deal? And it's not nearly as expensive to replace as a crashed computer!
So I'm planning on embarking on a journey of getting over myself. Stop thinking in terms of "cans" and "can'ts" and thinking instead of "hows" and "let's trys". There is no such thing as failure...it's all "a learning experience". And if some projects end up hitting the trash can, that's just a good excuse to make another trip to my favorite local quilt store, isn't it? How can I lose?
Monday, January 28, 2008
....Pause....
I did some machine quilting tonight. That's something I always approach with great trepidation. My skills are pretty bad, but yes, they're improving with use. They're also improving because I'm no longer assuming it's a skill I should be able to pick up quickly. Rather, I'm being much more intentional about playing around on a practice quilt sandwich (if you're not "in the know", that doesn't involve ham on rye, which would do unspeakable things to my Janome; my quilt sandwich is a small practice quilt made out of fat quarters I'd decided I'd probably never use so they may as well give their lives to me improving my stitches). I'm also s...l...o...w...i...n...g down. No longer do I blithely stuff my next quilt victim under the needle and plow away at top speed. Now I roll a little at a time, gently easing my quilt friend a few inches at a time while entreating it to play nice with me.
And every now and again, I pause. Take a deep breath. Regroup. Reposition my hands, take another deep breath, roll my shoulders, remind myself to relax, and move on.
Hmmm. Yet another life lesson.
I started back to work today after my three month sabbatical. Last night I found myself dreading what I would find waiting for me. I'd had a few hints here and there (I hadn't completely cut myself off from communication) but I wasn't sure how I'd react to it, or if there were nasty, hidden surprises. But the day went along as if I'd never been gone. I caught up on projects, moved some other ones along, began a couple of new ones, and even found myself feeling excited again over certain possibilities. Part of what made the day go well, I think, was that I had very conscientiously taken the time to pause--something I haven't always been good at doing. Went to the gym early, before work--an active pause but a pause nonetheless. Throughout the day, occasionally reached down to pet my faithful doggie laying at my side--a pause with a very grateful recipient. Allowed myself quick 30-second daydreams of what quilting I'd get done after work. I was very careful not to slide into my usual "head-down-blinders-on-nose-to-the-grindstone" mentality. And I was just as productive, if not more so, than usual. What a surprise.
So after my workday was through, I sat down with one of my machine quilting books, reminded myself of some technique tips, practiced on the aforementioned quilt sandwich--none of which were things I usually did before--then began work on my wallhanging. It's a simple quilting pattern--that's all I can handle right now. Since the wallhanging looks a bit like a mosaic wall in an Italian villa, I'm doing vines climbing from bottom to top with leaves hanging off in random intervals. I chalked it out just to have an idea of spacing, but I'm not being rigid about following my own design. After all, the chalk will erase and no one will know what my original intentions were, and there's great beauty in that fact. But still, I chalked one out on the practice quilt just to make sure I'd know where I was going from point A to point B before working on the real mccoy. And then I began.
Every few inches, I'd stop with needle down, breathe, roll my shoulders, reposition my hands, glance up at a distant point to relax my eyes, and then slowly start in again. Another few inches, breathe. Another few, breathe. And after I had only one complete vine done...stop. Quit while I'm ahead. Don't put some arbitrary deadline in my head. Just...breathe. I've done enough for the night--I've gotten my quilt fix and made progress. I can pick it up again tomorrow evening.
I remember my flute teacher telling me once that, in music notation, the rest is the most important thing--it allows the notes to be more of themselves, more prominent, heard more clearly. Without rests, the notes will just run into themselves, tripping one after the other, and the listener will get exhausted. But the rest makes you stop and really hear what it is you're listening to. In quilting, even the most experienced, excellent machine quilter takes frequent pauses to allow him or herself to regroup. Without those rests, the stitches would tumble into one another, skipping and tangling, and one would end up with a mess rather than a work of art.
Why wouldn't daily life be the same way?
My quilt has been gently moved off to the side of my sewing cabinet and the machine is shut down. I'm going to catch up on emailing some friends and spending time with my family. A pause is a beautiful thing.
And every now and again, I pause. Take a deep breath. Regroup. Reposition my hands, take another deep breath, roll my shoulders, remind myself to relax, and move on.
Hmmm. Yet another life lesson.
I started back to work today after my three month sabbatical. Last night I found myself dreading what I would find waiting for me. I'd had a few hints here and there (I hadn't completely cut myself off from communication) but I wasn't sure how I'd react to it, or if there were nasty, hidden surprises. But the day went along as if I'd never been gone. I caught up on projects, moved some other ones along, began a couple of new ones, and even found myself feeling excited again over certain possibilities. Part of what made the day go well, I think, was that I had very conscientiously taken the time to pause--something I haven't always been good at doing. Went to the gym early, before work--an active pause but a pause nonetheless. Throughout the day, occasionally reached down to pet my faithful doggie laying at my side--a pause with a very grateful recipient. Allowed myself quick 30-second daydreams of what quilting I'd get done after work. I was very careful not to slide into my usual "head-down-blinders-on-nose-to-the-grindstone" mentality. And I was just as productive, if not more so, than usual. What a surprise.
So after my workday was through, I sat down with one of my machine quilting books, reminded myself of some technique tips, practiced on the aforementioned quilt sandwich--none of which were things I usually did before--then began work on my wallhanging. It's a simple quilting pattern--that's all I can handle right now. Since the wallhanging looks a bit like a mosaic wall in an Italian villa, I'm doing vines climbing from bottom to top with leaves hanging off in random intervals. I chalked it out just to have an idea of spacing, but I'm not being rigid about following my own design. After all, the chalk will erase and no one will know what my original intentions were, and there's great beauty in that fact. But still, I chalked one out on the practice quilt just to make sure I'd know where I was going from point A to point B before working on the real mccoy. And then I began.
Every few inches, I'd stop with needle down, breathe, roll my shoulders, reposition my hands, glance up at a distant point to relax my eyes, and then slowly start in again. Another few inches, breathe. Another few, breathe. And after I had only one complete vine done...stop. Quit while I'm ahead. Don't put some arbitrary deadline in my head. Just...breathe. I've done enough for the night--I've gotten my quilt fix and made progress. I can pick it up again tomorrow evening.
I remember my flute teacher telling me once that, in music notation, the rest is the most important thing--it allows the notes to be more of themselves, more prominent, heard more clearly. Without rests, the notes will just run into themselves, tripping one after the other, and the listener will get exhausted. But the rest makes you stop and really hear what it is you're listening to. In quilting, even the most experienced, excellent machine quilter takes frequent pauses to allow him or herself to regroup. Without those rests, the stitches would tumble into one another, skipping and tangling, and one would end up with a mess rather than a work of art.
Why wouldn't daily life be the same way?
My quilt has been gently moved off to the side of my sewing cabinet and the machine is shut down. I'm going to catch up on emailing some friends and spending time with my family. A pause is a beautiful thing.
Friday, January 25, 2008
The Joy of Community
I spend much of my life alone.
OK, so that sounds pathetic, but it's actually just a statement of fact. I work from home--so when the kids go off to school and the husband heads out the door for his office, I have blissful solitary peace. Well, almost solitary--the dog waits patiently for me to finally ensconce myself at my computer so that she can curl herself up in her little bed at my side. She gives me dirty looks if she thinks I'm dawdling--she likes her schedule. The cat comes to visit when he feels the need to remind me that his food bowl is empty and would I please take care of that RIGHT NOW. But other than furry friends, and the occasional visit from UPS or the meter-reader, I spend my day by myself. And I'm perfectly okay with that. There's a strong hermit gene that runs through my family--we're all serious introverts--so the fact that I've been working from home for about 7 or 8 years now suits me just fine.
And most days, email relationships feel like real conversation. I'm happy enough with literary friendships rather than face-to-face meet-ups most times. But then I go to my quilt guild meeting and realize how much I've missed being actually in the same room with other people who have gathered together around a shared interest and simply want to have a good time.
I've been a part of my guild--or, rather, "bee" since we don't have bylaws and don't see the need for them at the moment, gol dang it--for about two years, but my attendance was very hit and miss until this fall. I travel for work and somehow my travel seemed to frequently fall on that second Tuesday of the month. Or the kids would have stuff going on. Or whoever was assigned to make dinner that night (notably, the offspring) would manage to drag out a very simple recipe for several hours and I wouldn't be able to get out of the house on time. And although I found it mildly frustrating, I also hadn't connected with enough people in the guild yet to truly feel part of things (see the introvert comment above) so I didn't miss it so much.
But this fall I managed to attend several meetings in a row, including our Christmas banquet, and ended up with a couple of guild members in a class I took at our local quilt store during the early part of my sabbatical. Fellow guild members were beginning to learn my name and I was beginning to learn theirs. I was being greeted by name, and able to greet others by name, when I entered the room. One person began saving a seat for me. Suddenly, I was part of things. I had a community.
And then last month it started looking like I wasn't going to be able to go to my guild meeting due to conflicting family schedules, and I almost cried. At that moment, I realized how important those meetings had become to me. I bribed my daughter to let me go to my guild meeting instead of taking her to her optional event (she's easy--all it takes is the promise of a trip to the bookstore!) and later told my entire family that from now on, they are not to plan anything involving me on guild meeting nights. They need to work around me that one night a month, contrary to the rest of the month when mostly I work around them.
I felt guilty for all of about five minutes, then I realized how important having a community is to us as human beings. I have other communities, of course--I'm very fortunate to have a close and fun extended family on both sides of my marriage, and my husband, kids, and I have no end of great times together. I have a church community and a work community too, but while they're both wonderfully supportive they also both come with responsibilities that occasionally start feeling overwhelming. My quilt guild, on the other hand, is just a fun bunch of women that enjoy quilting. We expect nothing of one another than just to laugh, admire one another's work, and have a good time.
I've heard horror stories of some guilds that still have the old-fashioned quilt police and members who make snarky remarks about one another's quilts, but my guild is not like that. I wouldn't bother going if it was. We spend the bulk of our meetings laughing, and every single quilt that is shown gets it's fair share of "oohs and aahs" and applause, regardless of the skill level or quilting style of the person showing. I can attest to that because mine are definitely at the beginner end of the spectrum and I occasionally have very visible errors--and yet I still get applause! And as hokey as it sounds, that feels really good.
So I no longer feel guilty about prioritizing my guild meetings. If I had a card-playing group or a book club, I suspect it would fit that same need. But for now, my bee will suit me just fine.
OK, so that sounds pathetic, but it's actually just a statement of fact. I work from home--so when the kids go off to school and the husband heads out the door for his office, I have blissful solitary peace. Well, almost solitary--the dog waits patiently for me to finally ensconce myself at my computer so that she can curl herself up in her little bed at my side. She gives me dirty looks if she thinks I'm dawdling--she likes her schedule. The cat comes to visit when he feels the need to remind me that his food bowl is empty and would I please take care of that RIGHT NOW. But other than furry friends, and the occasional visit from UPS or the meter-reader, I spend my day by myself. And I'm perfectly okay with that. There's a strong hermit gene that runs through my family--we're all serious introverts--so the fact that I've been working from home for about 7 or 8 years now suits me just fine.
And most days, email relationships feel like real conversation. I'm happy enough with literary friendships rather than face-to-face meet-ups most times. But then I go to my quilt guild meeting and realize how much I've missed being actually in the same room with other people who have gathered together around a shared interest and simply want to have a good time.
I've been a part of my guild--or, rather, "bee" since we don't have bylaws and don't see the need for them at the moment, gol dang it--for about two years, but my attendance was very hit and miss until this fall. I travel for work and somehow my travel seemed to frequently fall on that second Tuesday of the month. Or the kids would have stuff going on. Or whoever was assigned to make dinner that night (notably, the offspring) would manage to drag out a very simple recipe for several hours and I wouldn't be able to get out of the house on time. And although I found it mildly frustrating, I also hadn't connected with enough people in the guild yet to truly feel part of things (see the introvert comment above) so I didn't miss it so much.
But this fall I managed to attend several meetings in a row, including our Christmas banquet, and ended up with a couple of guild members in a class I took at our local quilt store during the early part of my sabbatical. Fellow guild members were beginning to learn my name and I was beginning to learn theirs. I was being greeted by name, and able to greet others by name, when I entered the room. One person began saving a seat for me. Suddenly, I was part of things. I had a community.
And then last month it started looking like I wasn't going to be able to go to my guild meeting due to conflicting family schedules, and I almost cried. At that moment, I realized how important those meetings had become to me. I bribed my daughter to let me go to my guild meeting instead of taking her to her optional event (she's easy--all it takes is the promise of a trip to the bookstore!) and later told my entire family that from now on, they are not to plan anything involving me on guild meeting nights. They need to work around me that one night a month, contrary to the rest of the month when mostly I work around them.
I felt guilty for all of about five minutes, then I realized how important having a community is to us as human beings. I have other communities, of course--I'm very fortunate to have a close and fun extended family on both sides of my marriage, and my husband, kids, and I have no end of great times together. I have a church community and a work community too, but while they're both wonderfully supportive they also both come with responsibilities that occasionally start feeling overwhelming. My quilt guild, on the other hand, is just a fun bunch of women that enjoy quilting. We expect nothing of one another than just to laugh, admire one another's work, and have a good time.
I've heard horror stories of some guilds that still have the old-fashioned quilt police and members who make snarky remarks about one another's quilts, but my guild is not like that. I wouldn't bother going if it was. We spend the bulk of our meetings laughing, and every single quilt that is shown gets it's fair share of "oohs and aahs" and applause, regardless of the skill level or quilting style of the person showing. I can attest to that because mine are definitely at the beginner end of the spectrum and I occasionally have very visible errors--and yet I still get applause! And as hokey as it sounds, that feels really good.
So I no longer feel guilty about prioritizing my guild meetings. If I had a card-playing group or a book club, I suspect it would fit that same need. But for now, my bee will suit me just fine.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Great Expectations
I was recently discussing with my husband my surprise at discovering how much satisfaction I was deriving from quilting. I was trying to express that it was more than just enjoying myself doing it--it was more than appreciating the aesthetics of pretty fabrics or the sense of pride from a nicely completed project. There was something deeply fulfilling and extremely relaxing about the process for me.
Later, it struck me. Fabric doesn't expect anything from me.
I am in the stage of life that most of us hit sooner or later--lots of people needing lots of things from us lots of the time. Work, family, extended family, volunteer responsibilities...Like many women (or men) my age I'm sure, I sometimes go through weeks or whole months where I feel as if I'm constantly disappointing people that I can't do more, be more, accomplish more. Logically, I know no one probably actually feels that way about me--that's just my own stuff to deal with. But there it is--my overly-responsible-guilt-genes won't listen to my logic-genes, darn them. I wish they would.
But when I'm alone in my sewing room with stacks of fabric under my hands, I don't feel guilt. Or, at least, I don't when I haven't promised anyone I'll make them something--but that's another blog entry. I managed to finish all promised projects several weeks ago so lately it's just been me and whatever the heck I wanted to do whenever the heck I wanted to do it. And all that lovely fabric. With no expectations of me.
Fabric doesn't ask to borrow the car or forget to turn in homework. Fabric doesn't need me to meet a deadline (which is why I absolutely refuse to be part of a round robin right now!). More importantly, fabric doesn't expect me to behave a certain way, believe particular things, or be a particular kind of person. Fabric needs nothing from me other than my adoration--which I'm happy to give.
The first few weeks of my sabbatical, I treated quilting much as I had all my work deadlines--I worked in a frenzy to clear my shelf of as many of the UFOs that had been gathering dust as possible. I gave out a slew of Christmas gifts and when the last UFO got the binding sewed on I breathed a deep sigh of relief. Now I didn't have any UFOs expecting my attention! I had no unfulfilled promises to other people sitting on my shelf! I was free!
Before I rushed into the next project, though, I had to stop and remind myself that I had no deadlines now. There were no expectations about the next quilt. I could take my time and maybe even do a slightly more complicated project rather than choosing everything by how fast I could get it done. I had to keep stopping myself from mentally planning fifteen different Christmas gifts for next year. I repeatedly told myself, "Quilt for yourself. Just see what happens." And I suddenly slowed down, and saw the light.
It is possible, in some cases, to define my own boundaries. Although people may have expectations of me, I don't always need to meet those expectations. But to be honest, in my particular case, I know perfectly well that very few people have expectations of me that are higher than the ones I have of myself. And I need to cut myself some serious slack. I joked with my personal trainer (see the introductory blog post) that I tend to be an "all or nothing" kind of person. If I can't do something full out, I tend to end up not doing it at all. I fully immerse myself into things until I burn out. I tried to be SuperMom/ SuperEmployee/ SuperVolunteer until I found myself getting SuperCranky.
My trainer gave me words of wisdom about the gym that I've begun applying in other parts of my life: Something is better than nothing. OK, so I may not have time for a full 60 minute workout. But if I can get there for 20 minutes, that's 20 minutes more than if I hadn't gone at all. I may not be able to give my son the car every time he wants it, but I can give it to him some of the time and ask him to find rides the other times. I may not be able to meet every need in my volunteer responsibilities, but I can prioritize which ones I am able to meet. My sabbatical is over so I won't have as much time for quilting as before--but something is better than nothing. I've retrained myself to think in 10 minute chunks rather than gnashing my teeth because I can't get hours at a time.
I've begun working on lowering my expectations of myself, and on redefining my ability to meet other people's expectations. I'll obviously continue to struggle with this all the time--I am who I am, after all. Meanwhile, when I start feeling overwhelmed by the world I'll remember how good it feels to pet the fabric in my stash and I'll retreat to the place where no one expects anything of me. And I'll just be.
Later, it struck me. Fabric doesn't expect anything from me.
I am in the stage of life that most of us hit sooner or later--lots of people needing lots of things from us lots of the time. Work, family, extended family, volunteer responsibilities...Like many women (or men) my age I'm sure, I sometimes go through weeks or whole months where I feel as if I'm constantly disappointing people that I can't do more, be more, accomplish more. Logically, I know no one probably actually feels that way about me--that's just my own stuff to deal with. But there it is--my overly-responsible-guilt-genes won't listen to my logic-genes, darn them. I wish they would.
But when I'm alone in my sewing room with stacks of fabric under my hands, I don't feel guilt. Or, at least, I don't when I haven't promised anyone I'll make them something--but that's another blog entry. I managed to finish all promised projects several weeks ago so lately it's just been me and whatever the heck I wanted to do whenever the heck I wanted to do it. And all that lovely fabric. With no expectations of me.
Fabric doesn't ask to borrow the car or forget to turn in homework. Fabric doesn't need me to meet a deadline (which is why I absolutely refuse to be part of a round robin right now!). More importantly, fabric doesn't expect me to behave a certain way, believe particular things, or be a particular kind of person. Fabric needs nothing from me other than my adoration--which I'm happy to give.
The first few weeks of my sabbatical, I treated quilting much as I had all my work deadlines--I worked in a frenzy to clear my shelf of as many of the UFOs that had been gathering dust as possible. I gave out a slew of Christmas gifts and when the last UFO got the binding sewed on I breathed a deep sigh of relief. Now I didn't have any UFOs expecting my attention! I had no unfulfilled promises to other people sitting on my shelf! I was free!
Before I rushed into the next project, though, I had to stop and remind myself that I had no deadlines now. There were no expectations about the next quilt. I could take my time and maybe even do a slightly more complicated project rather than choosing everything by how fast I could get it done. I had to keep stopping myself from mentally planning fifteen different Christmas gifts for next year. I repeatedly told myself, "Quilt for yourself. Just see what happens." And I suddenly slowed down, and saw the light.
It is possible, in some cases, to define my own boundaries. Although people may have expectations of me, I don't always need to meet those expectations. But to be honest, in my particular case, I know perfectly well that very few people have expectations of me that are higher than the ones I have of myself. And I need to cut myself some serious slack. I joked with my personal trainer (see the introductory blog post) that I tend to be an "all or nothing" kind of person. If I can't do something full out, I tend to end up not doing it at all. I fully immerse myself into things until I burn out. I tried to be SuperMom/ SuperEmployee/ SuperVolunteer until I found myself getting SuperCranky.
My trainer gave me words of wisdom about the gym that I've begun applying in other parts of my life: Something is better than nothing. OK, so I may not have time for a full 60 minute workout. But if I can get there for 20 minutes, that's 20 minutes more than if I hadn't gone at all. I may not be able to give my son the car every time he wants it, but I can give it to him some of the time and ask him to find rides the other times. I may not be able to meet every need in my volunteer responsibilities, but I can prioritize which ones I am able to meet. My sabbatical is over so I won't have as much time for quilting as before--but something is better than nothing. I've retrained myself to think in 10 minute chunks rather than gnashing my teeth because I can't get hours at a time.
I've begun working on lowering my expectations of myself, and on redefining my ability to meet other people's expectations. I'll obviously continue to struggle with this all the time--I am who I am, after all. Meanwhile, when I start feeling overwhelmed by the world I'll remember how good it feels to pet the fabric in my stash and I'll retreat to the place where no one expects anything of me. And I'll just be.
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