One perfect day:

Waking early, refreshed, easily
A tiny kitten for company
Yoga outdoors for an hour
Walking to the beach and back over a big hill - hard work but easy too
Making art from scraps
Visiting the Art Gallery - blown away by Hotere
Gelato - raspberry&rosewater
Meeting up with a series of beloved friends
Receiving a delightful gift
Contemplating an emotional challenge, moving toward resolution
Drinking a single glass of superb wine
Resting in peace in beautiful surroundings

Large and leftovers

Here's a ladybird block. I've made a lot more. So many that there were enough for a small tablecloth quilt. 

Silence

Isn't it strange how the sound of rain doesn't interrupt silence?

Sixty millimeters of rain fell one night recently - in torrents on a seemingly oceanic scale. The house shuddered like a kayak under a cataract. It was a cathartic immense passion of water emptying heaven of its pent-up tears.

And yet. This huge elemental thundering had no effect on my own silence, tranquility, isolation. I slept in peace, woke in calm awe, slept again unconcerned.

Silence is more than the absence of sound. There is often sound in my silence. I've learned how to create silence amid the clamour, and a joyous calm from cold silence

Silk purse from a pig's ear

How to honour the dishonourable? How to discover the wisdom in foolishness, the maturity in childishness?

How to redeem my own strange choices, transforming them into a rich vein of creativity and insight?

How to create peace within my turmoil?

As always, with love and compassion. I'm only human. To recognise and allow for the truth that I'm weak, foolish, self-indulgent. I don't need to be perfect, just to remember to do the best I can.

Waking up to making

Space and time are always the requirements for creation. The stuff of making. This week I have the blessing if both. I'm making - completing - a very simple project long in the making, but I'm also beginning to feel a renewed interest in something with much more potential. Starting somewhere, sometime, like this

Fabric yet again from Dye-it. I had a buying spree when they closed. I love their work.

Simple pleasures

Here's my two friends for the week : the Singer Featherweight - well, its carrying case - and the kitten. Also a featherweight. Hours of entertainment guaranteed.

I haven't let the kitten anywhere near the quilt I'm laying out, but sooner or later she's going to influence the design. Here's how it's starting to look without her help.

Wherever you go, there you are

This holiday season I'll spend just 3 of the 12 nights at my official home. The working season can be similar. Many friends have asked about how tiring that might be. I don't find it so. That's partly because I've learned to be at home wherever I am.  Or at least, something close to that. 

I've learned:
  • to pack for a week's travel in 15 minutes
  • to know what the essential stuff is - and it's a very short list
  • to bring the essentials and not much more
  • to make it work with what I have
  • to find help when I need it
  • to sleep anywhere
  • to wake knowing where I am and get ready for the day without confusion
Yoga has been a big part of this - and coming to understand that how I feel isn't dependent on where I am or who I'm with. So, I'm at home everywhere....although I always prefer to be near the water.



Family Christmas

Merry Christmas! 

This year, unexpectedly, in the company of my step-family. Or about a tenth of it! There are hundreds of them: friendly, relaxed, interesting, funny. Welcoming. 

I'm beyond glad that my mother found him