i just hung up from talking to my friend,   My Friend,  Jane.   she's in Alaska.  and here, i say:

Jane…IF you should ever read this, IF you should ever come to this blog, which i don't think you do, but if you do, know i mean this in the most loving way.

anyway, we have been friends since 16 and 17 years old.   50 years.   We have HISTORY between us. We KNOW each other.   She is a quilter.   Has always worked with fabric, with fiber in many ways.  Has a gift with it,  a  Strong Artistic Bent.   in the conversation, she emailed me a fiber figure to look at, saying she saw it in a shop recently and it was the closest to anything she'd ever seen like the ones i used to make.  we talked about that and i mentioned Charla Khanna, the "doll" maker that is in Taos who used to make dolls way back when we were in our 20's in Ann Arbor and has continued,  when i Did and Didn't Did and Didn't and there was a lot alluded to but not really Said., Charla's dolls sell only through Jane Sauer Gallery in Taos and are thousands of dollars.  They are in the Smithsonian and in other Fine Art Museums around the world.

i knew what she was getting at.

She came to visit me a while ago…when i was still working on the Magic Diaries Cloth.  She saw what i was doing.  She has heard long words about the classes with Jude, with Spirit Cloth.  She LOVES me.   Like really. 

and it makes No Sense to her.   These rags i make.  Crude. 

and in the morning i will box up the Grieving Cloth,  the Other Cloth, and the more simple 6 bales of alfalfa cloth.   i will include words about them.   Their stories.  and send them off, away from here.  It was perfect timing, really.   and Judy,  Judy Martin,  had trepedation about how thinking about selling what i might make would change it.  might cause me to changed the Raw.  well…it didn't.  and it won't.  because for whatever reason, i am hopelessly in love with rags.  with how the threads live free, the edges are ever so imperfect, that there are holes here and there,  things don't meet up, are left dangling,  too long or too short and on and on.  i am just    In Love.  Hopelessly In Love.  and i  don't care.  and i don't need to know.

Here is a gift for Us.   When i was splitting wood,  there was that sudden Felt/Sense….stop!!!!!  and there on a chunk that had been wrecklessly dumped by the wood guy

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the most elegant Praying Mantis egg case i have ever seen.   Ordinarily, they are a carmel color, all the same color, but look,  this one has that central cream white color.   So,  i have set it aside.  once the warm comes,   i will watch.  Every day.  All day.  and if We are lucky,  i will be there when they Release themselves….MANY tiny perfect fully functional Praying Mantis.  and  in between this Vigilence,  i will stitch rags.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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38 responses to “hopelessly in love”

  1. Valerianna Avatar

    Its sooo good to know that with which one is hopelessly in love – it is an immense thing, this knowing, I think. Threads living/flying free, I like that, too.

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  2. grace Forrest Avatar

    it is the Ultimate. i have loved in so many ways. and
    This…This is the best. it is the most all consuming.
    who’dve guesses????????

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  3. nemo-ignorat Avatar

    I am so glad for you. What a gloriuos feeling hugs from over the sea

    Like

  4. Marti Avatar
    Marti

    The rags, the fringes, the crooked bits that fray, the whole of it, the story that tells the why of it. I hold this post so hugely in my heart. You know I don’t come from a cloth background but in the past two years have opened myself, have used eyes to see thread strands, have crookedly stitched and found a meditation…how rich to hold a simple thing in our hands and to transform it by our dyes, our threads, our vision and in the process, not so much transform ourseles but bring us to an intuitive knowing of ourself…it has been such a gift and continues so and it all began with you, nance, jude and India and we journey on…

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  5. Mo Crow Avatar

    Oh yes! aaarrrk aaaarrrrrk! aaaarrrrrkkkk! thank you for this beautiful inspiring post for bringing in the New Year!
    “Let it go. Let it out.
    Let it all unravel.
    Let it free and it can be
    A path on which to travel.”
    this quote is from my favourite artist poet Michael Leunig (scroll down to see his cartoon on this link)
    http://itscrowtime.wordpress.com/2012/01/01/sharing-the-magic/

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  6. linda Avatar

    i am so happy to read this. i think very few of my friends like my spirit cloth pieces. i don’t even try to show anyone unless it is someone with like minds. i don’t care. i agree.. i love doing it. i love the way it feels and way it hangs and the way it seems like a part of my spirit.
    i think we all can look back and see different parts of ourselves. if i had just kept on with one thing i could have been the master of that.. but i would have been bored out of my mind. it is so true that there are seasons for everything. this is a special season of coming into who we are now.
    happy new year, friend.

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  7. Chris Linton Avatar

    What a wonderful find, that egg case, do hope you see it hatch. And the loose threads, the imperfect edges – only discovered the pleasures of these last year, took a chunk of lifetime to find out nothing needs to appear perfect because nothing is, and that’s ok.

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  8. Deb G Avatar

    I love that you follow your heart…

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  9. nance Avatar

    grace your spirit is spilling over in contentment and love here in this post. you are lucky to have had a friend for that long and you appreciate and know what a rare and valuable thing it is. and then as if to acknowledge and celebrate your feelings… the egg case! i am happy for you, my friend.

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  10. nance Avatar

    marti, we have been on a journey together. how meaningful it has been and threads hold us together.

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  11. Nancy Avatar

    The egg case is amazing. Your long-time friend, your elation and contentment…all so meaningful to read about. I am happy for you and feel good things on the horizon of 2013 🙂

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  12. Peggy Avatar

    I loved reading this and I love the sense of almost witnessing this journey of yours. I think there’s a lot for me to learn here. xxx

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  13. patricia Avatar
    patricia

    just back. and looked here first. thinking, yes, i missed this a LOT. a grounding.

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  14. patricia Avatar
    patricia

    the praying mantis–is that cedar?

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  15. grace Avatar

    a Sea Hug…thank you!

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  16. grace Avatar

    opened yourself, your heart to it, yes you Have. i only
    wish everyone could see what you do

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  17. grace Avatar

    i’ve never been bored with things, but they just didn’t
    go far enough…Cloth goes forever
    and yes…almost Happy New Year to you, love

    Like

  18. grace Avatar

    Chris…to me, the definition of perfect has taken on an
    entirely different dimension, and again, it’s endless.
    it is SUCH great Happiness.
    and yes…that egg case.

    Like

  19. grace Avatar

    Love you…….

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  20. grace Avatar

    that’s the best thing of all, the alot to learn…cloth
    gives that to me over and over and …….

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  21. grace Avatar

    i was just wondering this morning when you get back….

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  22. grace Avatar

    yes. he brings cedar, pinion and juniper. like burning
    incense.

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  23. mimmin dove Avatar
    mimmin dove

    I am glad you have found the thing that makes you so very happy. I think you are a writer too though. I love reading your stories. And that egg case is amazing, and the colours in the photo are beautiful- we don’t get praying mantis here. I will look forward to the warmer weather. xox

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  24. mimmin dove Avatar
    mimmin dove

    Ooh I just Googled it and I think your mantis case is from the Carolina Mantis (Stagmomantis Carolina), beautiful! xxx

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  25. grace Forrest Avatar

    are you SURE? that there are no Praying Mantis in
    Scotland?????????
    if so, then OHHHHHH and EEEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
    i will watch,
    ever so closely for you.
    They are extraordinary beings. If i leave the door
    open in the summer heat, for sure, one will come in.
    and doesn’t just come in, but Comes In. Comes In to
    where i am, to whichever table i am working at and
    lights…..with a papery flutter. and it’s beautiful
    head turns, oh so slowly, and Stares into my face.
    I WANT you to have them in Scotland

    Like

  26. mimmin dove Avatar
    mimmin dove

    Yes no mantises except perhaps in zoos or kept as a pet maybe. Too cold in the winter I am thinking. Wish we did have them as they sound fascinating and pretty wonderful.

    Like

  27. wholly jeanne Avatar

    rags. scraps. unfinished, softly frayed edges. these things speak to my soul, too. i came here at just the right time . . . when i was on the verge of doing something a certain way because i thought i had to do it a certain way (mainly finishing the edges and hiding the knots) to make it acceptable to others. i now feel fortified. and sure.

    Like

  28. grace Forrest Avatar

    they are all over the United States and in parts that
    have long months of snowy cold, so cold wouldn’t be
    the reason. hmmmm. i’m going to investigate.

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  29. grace Forrest Avatar

    well, i think the majority like things “finished”.
    That’s why i was so amazed to find Spirit Cloth, to see
    Jude’s work…it was dumbfounding at first…how much
    i just LOVED it, how it merged and blended but each
    piece, each fiber of each piece being singular and
    critical to the whole…
    fortified. i like that word a LOT. and that YOU are
    fortified, fortifies me. THANK YOU for saying that!

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  30. grace Forrest Avatar

    are you speaking about Nancy’s drawings?
    if so, i think stitching them with their natural edges,
    with knots right there…unhidden.. will be totally
    right and very sensitive to Her work.

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  31. Jeannie Avatar
    Jeannie

    I am so behind in my reading of your posts, but tonight I had to visit, to catch up with a like minded person. And here I read about love of cloth, of making cloth that speaks to yourself, and of mantis egg cases. I watched a hatching egg case years ago and have never forgotten it. It was attatched to a walnut branch bird bath I had made. I was pulling weeds and noticed my cat in rapt attention. He was watching these prehistoric creatures come out of the case and down the branch. I was entranced. I watched as they marched like an army through the garden bed and then to the fence. Where did they go? Now when I see a case or an adult, I wonder if it is a relative to that day long ago. Happy New Year. I hope 2013 is glorious.

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  32. grace Forrest Avatar

    it’s one of those things that just transports to an
    entirely different Sense of Everything. the perfection
    of it, the precision or it. How Could Such a Perfect
    thing come to be……..
    i would like sometime to see how they make the egg case,
    deposit each egg in it’s cell, seal it up. i hope
    someday in my lifetime to see this.
    I wish good stuff to you too, Jeannie, in this new year
    xoxo

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