Making a Life

For my granddaughter and her American Girl doll

“Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven’s sake. Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward. You will have created something.” Kurt Vonnegut

Scrapbook for our trip to France

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Quilt for my granddaughter

I dream of a handmade wardrobe, creating more gardens, getting my book published, and spending all day in my art room. Right now, I’ll settle for finishing that sweater that has been languishing in my drawer for a couple of years…..15 if I’m honest. I always have multiple projects going at any time: scarves & sweaters I am knitting, art journals laid out on my art table, quilt pieces ready to sew together, oracle cards planned and partially executed. I’m fine with the chaos in the creative sanctuary above my garage because whenever I walk in, I am inspired to listen to my heart. Folders of papers, yarn stored in baskets, colored pens and pencils in holders on the counter under the eaves, collections of ephemera, stickers, dodads, and paper, tons of paper. I have an architect’s flat file cabinet filled with over 2000 rubber stamps, a large Rubbermaid tub of quilting fabric and a carpenter’s multi-drawer cabinet, each one holding scrapbook goodies. Sometimes I just sit in my room and dream of new projects.

My garden

I feel the need to make things every day. I always have. As a child I drew, learned to knit & sew, and wrote poems. I followed my mother to antique shops and nurseries where she purchased house and garden items, always rearranging rooms and adding quiet color and texture. I grew up in a creative environment although some would not think it so. My mother was extravagant with fresh vegetables, handmade dresses & coats for my sister and I, and her very favorite-her rock garden where she planted her beloved Lady Slippers. She showed me that it doesn’t take a lot of money to make life beautiful.

Scrapbook for my youngest

“When we stop knowing how to use our hands to meet our most basic needs—we become estranged from nature, from the value and meaning of things, and from the empathy that we need to care for one another and our world.” Melanie Falick from Making a Life

Creating yoga class for babies

As a young woman I folded bright papers into cranes and strung them from the ceiling as a partition between kitchen and living room. I knit baby clothes for my little ones, and sewed quilts made from my old clothes. My neighbor invited me to a workshop on making lampshades. Of course I went! I made slipcovers for old ratty sofas and chairs, curtains for my bedroom, a huge vegetable garden to feed my family, and grape jelly from the vines in my backyard. Creating a home for my boys was a priority, so I made party favors for their birthdays, down-filled vests to keep them warm, and stenciled their bedroom walls.

My essay published here

More recently I made jewelry and sold it to shops and through home parties with other artists. Knitting is still my favorite creative activity. It always will be. Because it is therapeutic but even more, the tactile sense of yarn passing through my hands satisfies a desire to experience the world through my skin. I breathe in the scent of flowers in my garden, or soup simmering on my stove, and I admire my rubber stamp mail art, or a beautifully turned seam on my quilt. And still, it’s the feeling of comfort I get from the yarn, its softness, its beautiful colors and its incredibly cozy drape when it’s made into a garment or a blanket that thrills my heart.

knit for my cousin’s babe

I will always be a maker. Knitting while my yoga students are in shavasana or while I’m at a restaurant, cooking for my family, rearranging plants in my perennial beds. I am creating a sanctuary for my soul. Blessed be.