Potholder Stories

This morning I could feel myself slip into my self-imposed artist residency.

Today I realized that it’s not going to happen because I declare it.  The only difference between it and what I’m doing now is how I think about it.  For me that isn’t going to be like flipping a switch, it’s a gradual process of changing the way I think.

I saw it happen as I decided to make some potholders this morning.

I found myself thinking that I was going to forget about time and get lost in what I was doing.  For each potholder, I would put the colors, shapes, and patterns together to tell a little story.

But first I had to find the fabric.  Just one special piece of fabric to begin each potholder story with.  And as I searched my shelves I pulled out the old quilt top.

It was already cut up into a bunch of small chunks from the last few times I used it.  But those times I had been looking for something different than this time.  And today, every piece of fabric I wanted was there.

I designed ten potholders today, created ten little fabric stories.  And when the voice in my head broke in saying “no one’s going to buy that”.  I shrugged my shoulders and kept on working.  Either way, these were stories I needed to tell.