Today's snow storm from my studio window, the first all winter

Today  I did something I’ve been thinking about for a long time and have been afraid to do.  I decided to get paypal on my website.  I’m sure being afraid to get paypal will seem silly to many people, it even seems silly to me intellectually, but most of  my fears have little to do with intellect.  So I went online and got some information then emailed Chris at Mannix Marketing, my web designer, and told him I was ready for paypal.

I think my fear has to do with losing control.  I have this idea that people will start ordering and paying for work that I don’t have and I will be overwhelmed and not be able to give them their money back.  See what I mean, not very rational.   This imagined fear has kept me from even just checking out paypal for a long time.

It was selling Jon’s notecards (and a desire to make it happen for a long time)  that made me see the light and take the plunge.  In the past few weeks I’ve spent so much time sending emails back and forth and figuring out the paper work, I figured  there must be an easier way.  And from what I’ve seen, paypal can make a big difference.    This doesn’t mean I won’t answer emails anymore or take checks, ( I actually love making that personal contact) it’s just another option and should make less paper work for me.   I like that.

And it’s funny, like most of my fears, once I actually do what I’m afraid of, the fear goes away.  Yesterday I was really nervous at the idea of getting paypay, after email Chris, I can’t wait to use it.

I may be slow like tortoise, but it’s a steady and constant slow, in the right direction.

I Woke Up Dreaming Of Endless Possibilities

There are some days when I can easily  go from one piece to another.  Today was like that.  I had a couple of  streaming pieces to finish up and some potholders to make and I was immersed in each of them.  I started by finishing a wall piece  using a fabric with a Celtic design as the inner border and red velvet from a Choir dress that someone had sent me, as the outside border.  The words are: “Heal me myself I’m part of the whole, there’s a sun in my belly and a fire in my chest, slow down see all, find your tribe”

After that I made a few potholders.      By then it was 2:30, almost time to feed the donkeys and cats.  And I had paper work to do too.  Shipping and bookkeeping and I hadn’t gotten to my email yet.  So I gave myself a half hour to design the other streaming piece, sampling the RoseAnn Cash record The Wheel on itunes while I worked. (Ever since I heard an interview with her on the radio show Being  and read her memoir, I’ve been a fan) For this piece  I used the red liner from the velvet  Choir dress as an inner border and found a great pinkish striped piece for the outer border.  This stiped piece of fabric mesmerized me.  I couldn’t stop starring at it, it seemed  familiar to me.  Then I thought of  outfit Daniel Day Lewis wore in the movie The Gangs of New York.  His clothes, which were wild compared to the drabness of the scenery, is the only thing I remember about the movie.   This  striped piece of fabric didn’t look like his outfit, but…well somehow it reminded me of it.   And although it isn’t outrageous it evoked that feeling in me.

Suddenly I was caught up circus imagery, bright and sinister, colors and shapes larger than life, when  Simon started braying.   Brought back to the studio I searched for the corner pieces ( I knew the stripes needed corner pieces) and came up with the iridescent red that shimmers when it moves.   And as much as I wanted to piece it together, I knew I  had to feed the animals and get my paper work done. So I left it for tomorrow, the pink stripes filling my head and making my heart beat a little faster.

Rose and Roses

Carolyn, from the Image Loft, who prints Jon’s note cards called the other day and let us know that she had a shoe box of  mixed note cards that she found in the shop.  In the box I found 6 more packs of Rose and Roses note cards.

Sorry, They Sold Out this morning.

Each pack comes with five 5×7 note cards signed on the back by Jon. They are $15 + $5 shipping.

Jane McMillen's pin cushions and wallets

Remember Jane’s pincushions from the Functional Art Show at the Pig Barn last fall?  Well, Jane has a new blog called Little House.

For all you button lovers her first post is about buttons.   Jane wrote ” A one of a kind button with a sculpted cluster of grapes that I would run my fingers over and reminded me of something my great grandmother would use to keep her shawl closed. It was nothing I could picture on something I would ever wear, but a button requiring a set of gnarled fingers to get open and closed and a set of hefty bosoms to support the weight of such a button.“

So check it out, I didn’t see a way to purchase her work anywhere on the blog, but I’ll ask her about that.  I use her pincushions almost everyday, and they are a pleasure to work with.

Jane and one of her pincushions in front of the studio barn last fall

  Some more of my potholders in their new kitchens.  Joan sent me this photo and below is an Everyday Goddess potholder from Karyn.

Jon's photo of Mary mowing her lawn on the cover of her book Whistling Woman

Jon and I just got back from taking Mary Kellogg out for her birthday.  Mary is one of those admirable women.  After seeing her I always think “That’s how I want to be when I’m her age.” (She’s 82 today) She lives alone in an old farm house on a quiet dirt road, volunteers in the community, has lots of friends,  is connected to her family,  is always up for something new, mows her own lawn, gardens and writes poetry.

Mary has two poetry books, (with a third on the way, we saw some of her new poems at dinner)  My Place on Earth and Whistling Woman both with photos by Jon in them.   Song At Milking is one of my favorites.

Song At Milking  by Mary Kellogg

Dad was a quiet man
especially around the cows

evening chores begin
he pats first cow gently
and settles on the three legged stool
resting his soft farmers hat against her thigh
begins to pull the milk down
silver milk bucket resonates zing zing on metal

I am watching from the doorstep, feet flat on cement
warm moist scent of hay and cows wrap around me
cows wait stoically
grinding hay and grain in sliding motion

I like it here I start to whistle

Dad says  Whistling women and crowing hens
are no good for mice and men

smiling he says, My mother used to sing.
She had a beautiful voice
The neighbors loved to hear her singing in the garden

Did you ever sing?  I ask

Used to, sometimes.

Will you sing a song for me?

He begins, Yankee Doodle went to town riding on a pony
put a feather in his cap and called it macaroni
Yankee Doodle keep it up, Yankee Doodle dandy
mind the music and the dance and with the girls be handy

in bubble of mirth I whistle Dad’s tune up the step
and out the door

Mary’s books are available at Battenkill Books

Today's Potholders

There comes a time for me, when the winter is just over.   Today was that day.  I’m not sure what it is exactly, something to do with the light, and longer days,  the feel of the air, the smell of mud and a feeling I can’t explain, but know deep inside of me.   It’s been a warm snowless winter and yet  still there’s a change.

When this happens I take down the winter lights in my studio window, I stop wearing my winter coat, I open my doors and  windows and let and the cold cleansing air move through my studio.  The animals felt it too, Meg laid an egg, the first in months and Lenore jumped in the mud hole on the path and went for a swim.

If I had to choose, I’d say Spring is my favorite season, but I think it may be the change of seasons that really appeals to me. No matter what the season, moving from one to another is always a new beginning.  And that’s what draws me, that momentum of endings and beginnings.  The spiral that constantly moves forward with each upward and downward turn.

Freedom Beats my Heart, today's unfinished streaming piece

Ben working on the Studio Barn

Since I started working in the Studio Barn there has been a big hole in the floor. (really bad Fung Shiu)  It was cut out for a water pipe and never repaired.  I covered it with plastic and rugs and boxes.  I rearranged my furniture around it.  Today, Ben fixed it.  Bless him, and  what a pleasure it is not to have that hole in the floor. When I didn’t see it, I didn’t think about it, but I always knew it was there.  Cold, dark and dirty, it belonged under my studio not in it.    And now the hole is where it belongs,  under a piece of plywood that can be removed if we ever need to get to the pipe. Now I can slide my desk over another foot, where I always wanted it and have more room to spread out.   Oh, it’s the little things.

Ben also made new screen doors for the front of the studio.

Ben making the doors, not bothered by the cold weather

They fell apart last summer, after 40 years,  the bottoms just rotted away.  They weren’t a standard size, so Ben  found some pressure treated wood (which we hadn’t had a chance to throw in the dumpster yet)  in the barn and in a couple of hours  made new doors.

It all started when I found a roofing shingle on the ground yesterday morning. (which Ben also fixed)   There was not question in my mind that it needed to be repaired.  And then I thought of the doors,( which not only looked terrible, but weren’t even functional ) and the hole in the floor.  I though of what Patti, who read our Tarot Cards last week, told us about taking care of anything that might be holding us back from selling the Farm.  How could I expect anyone to be enchanted by my studio when the front doors are hanging on their hinges and there’s a hole in the floor?

Sometimes it takes moving to get me to do something that is otherwise too easy to put off.  It also shows me that I’m still sometimes stuck in the old idea that “I’m not deserving”.  I’ll easily fix my studio for someone else, but not so easily for myself.  So now it’s done and we all benefit.   And hopefully I’ll be more aware the next time I put something off because I feel I don’t deserve it.

Inbetween taking orders for Jon’s notecards (they’re Sold Out) I pieced together my latest quilt.

This is the one whose colors I dreamed of.  It  came to life when  I was given bags of fabric by a friend.  Like the potholders, from the same batch of fabric, it came together quickly.  In my dream the colors glowed like stained glass and the pattern was that of a turtles back. Dark lines contrasting and surrounding the glowing color.

In a recent Tarot card reading a turtle card was drawn.  “Slow down” it read.  I keep thinking of The Tortoise and the Hare.  Slow down and look around you, the Tortoise sees everything.  And although it came together quick and easy, and it also speaks of shadow and light, I think of it as the Turtle Quilt.  Or maybe it wasn’t quick, just easy.  Maybe the slower you go, the easier it is.

"The Hare" a card recently sent to me by a friend

Organizing Jon's note cards

Jon and I had a Tarot card reading when we were in Vermont.  One of the ideas that came out of it was that we needed to do something physical to help make our move to the New Bedlam Farm possible.  So when we got home, Jon ordered a dumpster and I started sorting through our books and donating them to the library.  Today we went through some of the cabinets filling up garbage bags to throw in the dumpster when it gets here next week.

I love cleaning out the old stuff and getting rid of it and once I start it’s hard for me to stop.  By the end of the day Jon had had enough, so I headed upstairs where I had 7 boxes of Jon’s notecards waiting for me to organize them and prepare them to sell.

It didn’t take long and my head was so in the organizational mode already it was a pleasure to do.

I’ve sold Jon’s note card at the Pig Barn Gallery, but never on my website, so this is a first.

So, I’m offering 2 sets of notes cards with images of Rose.  The first is Rose At Work, Jon’s photos of Rose herding sheep.

Rose at Work

The second pack is Rose and Roses. These are Sold Out.

Rose and Roses

The notecards are 5″x7″, there are 5 to a pack and each one is signed on the back by Jon.  They are $15 per pack  + $5 shipping.  If you’re interested in Rose At Work just email me at maria@fullmoonfiberart.com or go to CONTACT ME.