Astonishingly

We are having warm days with sunny afternoons generously sprinkled about this winter season. I can not believe that I could be outside without a coat, play with Daisy and pull weeds and feel like it is  a spring day. What is it with this weather? No matter, I am enjoying it and so are these flowers in a clay pot at the edge of my porch.

A Story for You

Solid copper caps.

Several years ago an older gentleman walked into my shop to sell me glass feathers he had made. He was dressed in a carhart overalls and was quiet spoken. I said I did not need the feathers and that they were not something that I felt I could sell. He said what would you like and I replied, what can you make? After a few more moments we agreed that he would make deer antler buttons for my yarn shop. He returned a couple of weeks later with lots of carefully crafted buttons and explained that he had never made them before. I bought a nice sack full. Soon he returned with more buttons and again, I bought his buttons. The next few times he returned, I did not need buttons as my little drawers were full so he brought in deer antlers for me to display with. The following weekend he came, looked around my shop and said he would return with more things he would make that he thought I could use and would like.  Each time he stopped in, I was told a bit more of his story.
Turns out that he lives about 40 minutes from here, is retired and has cancer. He has been making and selling things to help pay for his chemotherapy and his trips to Seattle for treatment. He says he could not do any of this without the love of his wife. I like to think that being in my shop opened a window of creativity for him as all through his illness, the loss of his hair, the tiredness etched in his face, he kept making things for me and I kept buying them.
Just before Christmas he asked what I would like to have made and I said shapes in copper. He had made a few things last year -  I made jewelry from them and took several loose pieces to sell in Tucson. Customers loved his work. I asked him to make a bunch more and I would buy them to sell again at the gem shows. He confided in me that his cancer had returned and he had elected not to undergo anymore torturous treatments. I am saddened by this but he kept his word and made a bunch of things for me. Copper and brass buttons, copper caps, earring shapes, drilled wheat pennies and pendants. I bought nearly everything when we sat in the yarn shop to look at his work. It was the most I had ever seen him make. At the end of our business deal, as I realized his hearing was not working and his energy seemed depleted, he reached out to hug me and wish me a Merry Christmas. I like to think that he will be around for a long time in his little work space, crafting things in copper and brass, bone and other found materials and that he will still stop in to sell me his work from time to time but I know that soon this will all stop. I like to think I have helped him and I know that I have learned lessons from him about finding a passion and keeping busy in the face of illness. Odd how at times like this, with found friendships like ours, that I remember how much we can mean to one another.

Pictures from out of Time.

Nothing much to post this evening and nothing really much to say except that the energy around people and places seems very intense. I don't mean to be all new age like on you but so much seems to be going on in the world and with people that I feel as if I am in a time warp and things are moving ahead and around me as I stand still and say, " whaaaat? ". Weird. The clouds are different. The weather is different. I am not. I feel a change coming and I am almost sensing the direction it is coming from but I have not fully turned in its' direction. My path is seeming clearer as to what I want to do with the creative energy that flows through me. There is a direction I want to take but that first step is awesomely scary. Do you feel it too?

Resin hearts, an experiment with UV curing resin.

Handmade charms in patina free copper.

The pepper for our salad with seeds forming a perfect heart.

Our pretty dinner salad.

The New Year

So begins another chapter, a fresh start, a clean slate, a journey that begins without completion in sight. Happy New Year all. I have not made any firm resolutions. In the abstract sense, I am still thinking of what I would like to accomplish. I have much to be grateful for and many things that I feel are blessings in my life. I am not going to list them here but trust me, this next year promises some exploration into uncharted territory on my part and a nesting with family as we approach a few milestones in 2012.

"I hope you will have a wonderful year, that you'll dream dangerously and outrageously, that you'll make something that didn't exist before you made it, that you will be loved and that you will be liked, and that you will have people to love and to like in return. And, most importantly (because I think there should be more kindness and more wisdom in the world right now), that you will, when you need to be, be wise, and that you will always be kind."
Neil Gaiman

Jake and his energy drink in a fancy glass.

Thinking of all of you and wishing for you all that you dream and hope for in the coming year! xo

Stringing Beads

Multi strand necklace with my hand finished cones. 

Today I spent the morning in the studio making a few things for the shop, trying to fill up spaces emptied by holiday shoppers. Before I leave for the Tucson shows, I am trying to get the shop all readied and filled in. No empty spaces when I leave town!

After all the Christmas gifts were opened....

..... Jacob had me cover my eyes and Phil brought in my final package from the garage work bench. He and Jacob had made a shadow box with pictures of my beloved Regina dog along with her collar, tags and leash. As they placed it in my hands and I opened my eyes, I could not help but crying. I loved that girl so much! Honestly, with all the love they placed in the making of it and the box containing pictures of Regina so close in my heart, it was the best Christmas gift ever. I do not think the two of them have ever made anything for me before. I feel so loved and embraced by my family.

Jesse spent the morning with us watching us open gifts and sharing breakfast. She is so old now and even as I cried over Regina's shadow box, I know that Jesse will probably not make it to next Christmas. That knowledge made the day even more bittersweet.

With some of the highest tides of the year today and with the wind blowing in a westerly direction, we thought a drive to the beach would be fun. All of us love the sound of the waves crashing on the shore and hearing the wind in the trees. North Beach is Phil's favorite beach and Jake was especially excited because I let him wear his new pajama pants into town.

Clowning around early in the day in the living room, I took photos of Jacob to send to Michael so that he could see just how tall his little brother has become. Before we know it, he will be driving, then off to college.

As for me, I spent part of the day nursing my bruised foot. Jacob in all his excitement to present me with Regina's shadowbox, stomped on my foot and left a sizable bruise if not a broken bone. Here it is just beginning its' color change. I could not get upset though, he was that excited and that full of love!

Finally, I will leave for the evening and close with a picture of the Olympic Mountains and how they looked this morning around 8:30, partially clear with thick clouds hovering in the valleys and foothills.

I am truly grateful for everything tonight. For my friends and family, for my shops and for work  that lets me do what I love. I feel blessed to be loved and to give love. As December wraps up for a close, and 2011 is nearing an end, I say thank you, thank you, thank you and may you enjoy all the blessings of the season and look forward to a spectacular new year.

I tried to add snow to this blog with a widget but somewhere; like much of the snow not happening in the Cascade and Olympic Mountains, it is lost. I want snow. I miss snow. I love feeling snuggled into the house as snow falls all around. I work on projects in the studio and a strong desire to bake and make soup comes over me. Maybe before winter is over, I will figure out the snow on this blog but in the meantime, I am just going to dream of all that white stuff!