Today, as I put make up on my face in preparation for my cardiology appointment, I looked at my hands. Really looked at my hands. The first thing I saw was how much they look like my mother's hands. The shape of the fingers. The way the nails are colored. Then I looked again and realized how much my hands have done for me and given to others and forged my career, my life's work. I saw them caressing a lover, a husband. I saw them cradle and soothe my sons. I saw them lovingly plant a garden and move through household chores. They pet cats and dogs and any animal that would hold still long enough to be petted. They drew and painted and knitted and beaded and used saws and tools to make wooden furniture. They continued to use smaller saws to make jewelry. They tried to make my face beautiful and my legs smooth. Such busy hands that keep moving through my day, through my life, through my work. I love them as much as I need them. The blessing in this story is looking at something we see and use all the time through the eyes of wisdom, age and timelessness as my hands will carry on through the next generation.

After Tucson

Honestly I thought that I would be able to get so much drawing and knitting done in Tucson while working the show that I packed a bunch of art supplies and three ( what was I thinking? ) knitting projects. The weather was extra warm, the show kind of on the quiet side, the friends amazing as always and the work day, just plain wore me out! I managed two drawings and nearly finishing one knitting project which now waits to be rinsed and blocked.

I love my annual Tucson trips not just for the bead shopping and friend filled dinners but because of the light in the sky and the green growing things so different than here. I like the textures of the palm trees' trunks and the way their leaves ( fronds? ) make a linear pattern against the bluest of skys. I like the way the clouds form, high and white against the pink/ purple/ mauve of the Catalina Mountains. I like the artistic touches that line the freeways and overpasses. I like adobe walls and the seclusion of homes behind walls, especially walls with lots of textures. I like the long, skinny spiky brown branches that are made into fences and deck roofs. I like the smoothness of flowers on a blooming cactus against the thorns of the big green arms of fine, ancient cactus plants.

My fingers don't hurt there. I give my hands a rest from jewelry making but I think it is the warmth and dryness in the air that makes me pain free. I enjoyed for the first time this year, chocolate nachos as a dessert. An angel treated four of us to our dinners without leaving a name. Only a card with " please pay it forward " on the reverse. We will. I loved my time there and look forward to next year when we are hopefully deep in a winter that needs escaping, a winter that missed us this year.

I like the piles of gemstones and beads at the shows. I hunt and search for only the finest treasures to bring back to the shop. This year I literally reached deep into piles of cheap, imported junk to find stones worthy of bringing home. My trunk show will be worth the wait for my customers and filled with intriguing beads and stones.

I am just not one to remember at the times I am involved or having fun to take pictures. My camera may be at hand but my thought processes are definitely somewhere else! 

For now it is getting late and I am sleepy waiting for my teenager to come home so I will end this posting for this wee early morning hour. Until next time. 

It is my last night in Tucson and soon I will be heading off to dreamland. It is the end, maybe temporarily of an era for me. I have been selling in Tucson for 21 years now and I want and need a break! I am planning on taking a year or two off from doing the show down here. I'll still be shopping, playing, touristing and visiting with friends. Can not possibly give that up! I have been craving a break like this. Actually starving for a break like this and with the economy as it is and time becoming more precious and living in the creative wasteland; everything seemed to come together to make that time now. I want to spend more time crafting one of a kind pieces, work more in my shop and be home with Phil, Jake  ( even though he mostly ignores me ) and Clementine. I want to finally plant flowers in the dang pots on the porch!

I have had the best show customers and enjoy each and everyone who stops by my booth. I will be on line. I will be drifting in my own little artist world, where they know me quite well there! XO