Hand-made Christmas presents from old jeans, fabric scraps, bells / Dec. 2008
Fabric Flip-Fold / New Jersey / Oct. 2008
My old leather card wallet finally came apart. I liked it because it fit in my pocket (it was approximately 2.5 x 3.5 inches) and held the necessary papers of our times: driver's license, credit card, library card, business cards, stash-of-cash (and a few inspirational words tucked in, too). In the spirit of the times — re-use/re-cycle/re-store — I fashioned a new one out of fabric and ribbon scraps. It took just a few hours to put together, sewing by hand, and holds my “personal effects” in style. If you want to make one, the directions are here:
Download fabric_flipfold_102108.pdf
.
Mosaic mixture of a Mexican tile, bowl fragments, blue tile, Italian flower pot fragments, and leftover bits of white subway tile with terracotta-colored grout (mixing orange and red paint into antique white grout) / New Jersey / Sept. 2008
I heard a man on the radio say this: we should practice being kind. What a beautiful idea. We practice so may things to "better" ourselves. Why isn't kindness taught in schools the way reading and math are? Acts of kindness can make us better people and impact all the people we touch. Let's resolve to practice being kind.
* kind 1. gentle, considerate, and friendly in nature or behavior; 2. proceeding from or characterized by good-heartedness.
Silhouettes on the boards / Wildwood, NJ / June 2008
How to be Creative (a few excerpts from Hugh MacLeod's illustrated-with-cartoons list):
11. Don't try to stand out from the crowd;
avoid crowds altogether.
13. Never compare your inside with
somebody else's outside.
16. The world is changing.
19. Sing in your own voice.
36. Start blogging.
Summer Project #4: Simplicity 2892 handsewn in black and white batik fabric; how quickly the summer has moved and here we have fallen into the month of August / New Jersey / July 2008
“See, a hand sweeps stars
from the August sky,
as if my mother swept off the supper crumbs from the table at home.
Her apron, slipping now and then, smells of parsley
and chives—
The sweet scent of her long-gone garden
sending me to sleep beside you tonight again.”~ August Evening by Hungarian poet Sandor Csoori (translated by Len Roberts)
A summer project with the girls / New Jersey / July 2008
Some attributes of creativity:
Challenging assumptions
Being receptive to new ideas
Recognizing similarities or differences
Making unlikely connections
Taking risks
Building on ideas in new ways
Looking at things in new ways
Taking advantage of the unexpected
Taking chances(Source: The Art of Looking Sideways by Alan Fletcher)
Summer Project #3: Another variation on a peasant blouse (Butterick B4685) with a ruffled neckline and small sleeves / New Jersey / July 2008
“The imagination offers revelation. It never blasts us with information or numbs us with description. It coaxes us into a new situation. As the scene unfolds, we find ourselves engaged in its questions and possibilities, and new revelation dawns. Such revelation is never a one-off hit at the mind. The knowing is always emerging. The imaginative form of knowing is graced with gradualness.”
~ John O'Donohue, from Beauty The Invisible Embrace
Entrance Court on Forsyth Park / Savannah, GA / August 2006
Many older buildings have beautiful and intricate tile work in their entrances or vestibules (derived from the Latin vestibulum, i.e., “entrance court”). Colors and patterns and tiles laid at angles. It always feels so welcoming — like they've been expecting you and prepared something wonderful. Entrances make me think of “beginnings” — new jobs, houses, babies — and how we celebrate them with parties, gifts, flowers, champagne. I like to think that being welcomed into a building by a beautiful entrance is a bit like being offered a glass of champagne.
Simplicity Pattern 2892 / June 2008
The onset of summer and warmer temperatures makes me think back to the days of having the entire summer free and the creative projects that often filled my days. Tie-dyed t-shirts. Beaded macramé necklaces. Candles made in milk cartons using crayons for color. All types of sewing projects including a hooded pull-over sweatshirt made from a bright green stretch terrycloth. To recapture that feeling I bought some colorful soft cotton and a pattern for a top with a ruffled neckline. I've been hand-sewing it which has been interesting. When you concentrate on something creative you barely feel the heat.
Out our seaside window on the Adriatic / Opatija, Croatia / May 2005
“Empower the doves
Declaw the hawks”~ A Suggestion Box suggestion
Hey, would you like to make a suggestion? With that simple question and an enormous white Suggestion Box, Illegal Art canvassed the five boroughs of New York City, collecting suggestions from passersby. Suggestion Box is a project of the New York City based public art group, Illegal Art (a collaboration of artists whose goal is to create interactive public art that inspires self-reflection, thought and human connection).
