Heart Mending

If you know me well, you know I am not with out emotion. Everything I experience weather I choose to participate or not, I have an emotional reaction to it. Emotions are what color our lives. They bring ebb and flow. They bring in the new and get rid of the old. They help guide us. To have none or to always make decisions based on logic can rob us of truly living. Truly loving. Even the emotions that bring pain, sadness and sorrow, just like tears, they too have a very special job of clearling out what is not needed in our lives anymore. I've been meditating on this last thought over the last few days as I tried to sort out the reasons someone close to me decided to leave my life. I had spent so much time anticipating this that when it finally happened, it still shocked and hurt. But as my week came to an end and a new one was beginning I could feel the weight of a choice I had to make. I could choose to continue to wonder about something I would never know, which would only bring me mroe sadness or... I could do something else. Live my life.

It took a while on Monday, but I eventually realized what I needed to do. While on my morning walk Monday morning I took the route to the East End Beach. It was low tide and I walked slowly along trying to spot the clear shapes almost hidden in the sparkle of the sand. As I knelt down to pick up my first piece, a rather stout dog trotted over to me and head butted me in my left hip. I didn't fall over but thought it was rather funny and it made me smile. Which was a nice change. It was also hard not to be hopeful in the kind of day where it was nearly 50 degrees at 8:00 in the morning. The sun made everything look brand new. And hopeful.
That same evening I did something I had been meaning to since the summer. I learned the Tango. And it was fabulous. Every other Monday at the North Star Cafe here in Portland, there are Tango lessons offered for $5 and then a live band plays. I danced with several partners and with each dance, it felt more and more natural... to be having such a simple and elegant conversation with a stranger that was solely based on the trust of movement and sinking together into the sound of the music. Completely Beautiful.

I am so thankful to myself that I got out of the house, away from my sadness and made myself try something new and kind of freightening. It was empowering, I plan on going back and learning more, and not only was it a fantastic start to my week, but really a new chapter for my life.

Spun Hand Dyed Silk with a Navajo Ply

This is a small skein of Navajo plied hand dyed silk I took off the wheel last night. It is my new favorite thing to spin (actually to ply). Now that I've gotten the hang of spinning silk, which isn't so tricky especially from a cap pr square, it's quite delightful to spin. Now what to do with it... I'm picturing a small knitted change purse with a metal clasp...

Morning walk.

This morning I decided to buck up and take a walk. I check the temp, bundled up, got my favorite station ready on pandora (Jaymay), and my camera. It was wonderful to be out and move through the air!

I'm committing myself to doing this everday. Now I have to because I just put it out there. I walked down Eastern Prom, around the gazebo, down the hill, not having any destination in mind- just that I knew I wanted to walk for at least 30 minutes. As my face started to burn with the bitter cold as I walked further down the hill, I reached the bottom, turned the corner and... warmth.... or my face becoming numb. Either way, it felt great. Walking into the sun between the tracks and the water. My pace picked up and I was off. While listening to Jaymay, the Weepies, Ingrid Michaelsen. Thoughts started to filter in and out of my mind for what my day would be and further plans for my life. I reached the trail path that leads back up to my apartment. Several stone stairs. I ran up all of them, hurting slightly in my thighs and not breathing as heavily as I thought I would or at least as much as I would have if I walked up the stairs. I stood for a moment at the iron gate breathing and stretching my hips. I looked down the steps where I had just run up and was surprised what I had just done. Realizing also that when life looked a bit bleak, I just had to grab it and tackle it.

It's amazing what happens when we linger a little too long at a cross roads. If we linger too long in the negitive space of our own hearts and minds, it will manifest into a hardship. If we look at it from the other end of failing is not an option for me, it becomes success.

Encouragement

Encouargement is sometimes the best medicine. The best motivation. Thank goodness for friends and family and loved ones who support and believe in us. Because sometimes life gets to be just a bit too tricky which then can quickly snowball into great hardship if we ride along the negitive thought process. We really need each other in our lives to help lift us up when we are surrounded in our own overwhelming thoughts.

As my younger sister has always told me and of which I need to remember everyday:
Do not breath life into something you do not want.

Simple, really.

iphone posting please.

Ok, Here I am. Trying to figure out (please, please, please. Work. Please!) (Please!) I would love to be able post from my iphone. As this is- believe it or not, my sweet iphone is also my computer. With all it's free apps and limits glory- I do make do. Sort of. For now. But I am now trying and wishing that I could post images from my iphone library to the blog. Possible?? Anyone? Anyone?



So, while I figure that all out, let me say I have been very absent from posting. Like 4 months about. Many things have been going on such as new projects, old projects completed, obsessions being fed, for example learning about sheep breeds and early childhood education in the Reggio Emilia Philosohy.



Just yesterday as I was exploring where this philosophy has reached, I came across a very thought provoking, and moving article from the University of Nedbraska, Lincoln extention.

http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1045&context=famconfacpub

As I spend time thinking about, planning and applying for Art Teacher positions, I come back to this concept. Not as the idea being something seperate, but as a vital piece that helps in making my creatively educational career more complete. I am reminded to think outside of the box as I think of and come across institutions to which I apply for a teaching post. I'm reminded of being an assistant preschool teacher at the Bowdoin College Children's Center. After hearing a women speak of an approach and philosophy that had been created and carried out more than 50 years before in Italy, I was overcome with excited emotion, including hope and excitement because it completely co-insided with what I had been doing this preschoolers. Giving them materials, stepping back and letting them do what they would while observing, using their investigations as teaching moments and intervening when problems arose. Which became less and less when children were able to discover for themselves how things worked and they weren't told how to play. Now, I understand there may seem like a big gap here. I am leaving a lot of other information out. But here I am only recaping some highlights on one aspect of what I was discovering with these children. After hearing the presentation of the Reggio Emilia Approach, I was finally given validation for the activities I would do with the preschoolers. I also created an art space that was "open" all through the day along with all other spaces in our classroom. Through observations of the children and what they explored, so much was learned on the part of the teacher. I will blog more on this in the very near future.

Testing and warp for new weaving project.

So far it's working!!! Very exciting to think I can post a blog from my iPhone- a major selling point for this device. Today I spent time winding a warp for a new weaving project with very delicate and some what old single ply yarn. It is going to be a delicate process as we will need to be so careful when beaming on. So let's publish this little bit and see if it worked....

Transfer of names

I have finally decided and settled on keeping the name 44 Clovers. For good. I used to use Shamrock Sheep which I must say has grown on me over the years but it does not belong to me. Not truly. It was not my original thought or idea- I don't think, but someone else's who was helping me think of names way back when. Waaaaaaaaayyyyy back when I did craft shows- well, the once a year craft show. I haven't done a craft show in 2 years and I have to say, though I miss the money- I don't miss doing IT. The stress of having enough for the weekend to sell, and all the other details that go along with it. The right tags, bags, sets, decorations. Will I have a good spot, will there be good traffic, bla bla bla. Enough. I am done doing the craft show thing. Because really, I always want to do WAAAAAAAYYYYYYYY more than I have time for. That is why I admire people who do this for a living. It is amazing to me the amount of stress they can handle through out the year.

So for now I will stick to etsy.com. Which I am very happy about. My shop name is 44clovers (all 1 word) and I will soon be listing more of my art work, watercolors, oils and possibly sketches, and handmade small books. In the past when I had a shop there at Shamrock Sheep, I made maybe 5 sales. Which consisted of a hat, mitten, scarf set in sherbet colors, a delphinium blue seed stitch scarf made from yarn I got on the Dingle Peninsula, mohair booties, a scrapy bear and a commissioned set of 5 mohair knitted jackets for a Walforf doll.

This whole endeavor is really an adventure for me in so many ways. But mainly because I don't have my own computer at home where when I complete a project I can snap away pictures and then upload them to my shop or to ravelry. com or to here but rather I need to wait until I can hit the computers at the local library on the hill. Which honestly I haven't tried to do any of that stuff with yet- uploading at the library and such. But will be attempting soon and I'll see how it goes. I am learning great patience along with what a close friend of mine holds dear is "slow communication".

breathing.......breathing..............