Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Got it and I'm off.

Well, I was able to go to the camera shop and find the cord for the camera.
This is the quilt as it hangs in the Woodland Cultural Centre Art Gallery until the end of this month. I mentioned that I worked on this while I sat with my aunt and uncle and had it finished just two days before she died. My cousin Ron, who is their son, is also a fabric artist who makes pictures of crewel embroidery using just ordinary four ply yarn. My quilt is hanging between his two pictures in the gallery.

I downloaded pictures that I took on my trip to the Rochester Museum of Science. There were a lot of artifacts of beaded clothing from the Iroquois but the ones I wanted to see were in Germany on loan to another museum. I was told that there were some in Albany but I don't know if I will go there.
This next picture is one of the ones in the archives at the museum. It is bead work done by Caroline Parker - the sister to Ely Parker who was a General in the United States Army and adjutant to Ulysses S. Grant.You can find all kinds of information on Ely Parker on the internet if you are interested.
This piece was part of, if I remember correctly, a shawl. I'm not sure now. I'm not an historian that takes pictures and documents them in a "correct" manner. I take pictures of what I like to see.
This next picture is of bead work done by someone else. I don't have the names - because the museum doesn't have the names of most of the artists either. A lot of the pieces that museums carry are "collections" from Army, Indian Agents, and other affluent people who could buy things. This piece is a "Glengary Cap"
being held by one of the curators at the museum. She wasn't sure if it is one worn by the Iroquois men or the women as both were known to wear that type of hat.
These hats were modeled after the hats worn by the "visitors" that came to North America but these hats were decorated, as a lot of their other pieces of clothing were decorated, with beads. Maybe I'll sort the pictures and show you more later.

Right now I'm off now to go and visit friends in Massachusetts, Connecticut and maybe Vermont. I'm going to see a play in NYC with my friend Donna and we are going to visit our other friend Maureen. Then to a writing retreat in Connecticut. I may go and visit my friend in Montreal on my way back home. That too hasn't been decided. So  I will see you when I see you. Have a good one. 

Sunday, July 14, 2013

Lost

Good Morning;
I haven't been lost or gone away but I've been absent from this blog. I've been wanting to come back and edit and add pictures but I just haven't - no excuses. Busy trying to find myself since my aunt passed away at 94. It's funny I never thought that I'd be like this. I'm mature, I'm aware, I was a counselor for many years and I've helped a lot of people with their grieving but it is different.
I cannot explain the lightness, the freedom I felt from being or feeling responsible for my aunt and uncle's care. It isn't that I don't or didn't love them but I've been looking at my self and my feeling of being responsible. I've come from the place of feeling responsible for the whole world to knowing I'm responsible for myself only. What do I mean by that? I've always, from the time I was little, felt responsible for all my family, and all my friends, and all my clients when I was a counselor. I was a "super-responsible" person and to quote a friend "that ain't healthy". I'm not taking care of anyone else now but myself. My mom and I had a talk about that and she told me "you have to look after yourself" when I told her I wasn't going to look after anyone. Mom is 89, still doing good except for a bum leg and she has lots of people who will look after her.
Today I decided I wanted to up-date this blog and I wanted to put pictures of my quilted wall-hanging here because it is hanging in the show at the Woodland Cultural Centre here in Brantford along with the Two Goofy Birds Return from Mardis Gras. Alas, not possible because I cannot find the cord to my camera. So, no pictures of the finished piece.
I'm back from not being lost but now I see that my cord is missing - so it too is probably not lost - it just isn't here right now. So no pictures of a completed wall hanging. But!!!
I do have a picture of the quilted wall hanging
called "The Tree of Life" before it was finished. In this picture, it is hanging on the line at the quilt shop Red Red Bobbin where it was machine quilted, but the beads have not yet been added and the binding has not been put on.
I'm glad that it is finished. It took me seven years to complete all the applique and embroidery but it isn't because I was slow - or slower than usual. It is because I had to collect the fabric, and cut out the pieces and prepare them. I then put it aside while I worked on other things - like my dolls.
But when Uncle Jesse started to fail I would sit with him and auntie and work on the quilt and put it away when he passed at 93-almost 94 to help auntie and make more dolls. Then when auntie was failing I picked it up again after making the dolls.
I showed her the finished quilt on the Tuesday afternoon before she passed. I'd arranged for different people to sit with her and visit while I did some errands and picked up the quilt. When I got back to her room, my brother was there with her and I showed it to them and then she went to sleep. She was able to see it finished but I don't believe she really saw it. It seemed a cursory glance and then on Wednesday she asked about it.
I stayed with her and she went to sleep again. This time she didn't wake. She died on February 14th - it's nice to know that she went to be with Uncle Jesse for Valentines Day.