her world is new

lucy is almost 3. she was born on summer solstice. her world is still brand new. she moves through it slowly , with care. she is now full of questions. my explanations to her questions without predjudice or judgement. i wish her world could always be so simple.

a pleasant invasion

my daughter edith and the little family have

come for a four day visit. adam (my son-in-law) is scouting a large renovation contract in woody point.

when they come to my small house, it turns upside down. nothing rests. inside and out. room to room. it's all in motion. i sit back and let it flow over me. the children perching on my lap for stories, songs, cuddles and then off again.

a shawl for thich nhat hahn

the june challenge for the etsy fibre arts team is "heroes". my hero is thich nhat hahn. his writings have given me a structure for my spiritual beliefs. i'm knitting a shawl mostly from bamboo that beth of whorlingtides.etsy dyed and spun for me. the colours are like buddhist robes.

attention to detail...

on our east coast trip we visited janet davis's print studio at norton's cove (near wesleyville (famous for david blackwood's imagery)). janet and duke bought the abandoned house behind the shop and have spent 6 years refinishing it. they moved in last july. what struck me the most was their attention to detail. i could have stood in any room and with my camera, pivoted 360 degrees and captured exquisite and simple details.

my home is not like that. too many piles of clutter. dusty shelves of unattended and unnecessary objects. i look at this and it fills me with heaviness and guilt. so the decluttering continues. today is "big garbage day" so more incentive to push on. i feel lighter already.

a life of it's own

i always come back from a trip to see my home with new eyes. i work in my home so i think i become, to a certain extent, myopic and oblivious to my surroundings. this time i was shocked to see the excessive amout of "stuff" i surround myself with. and i find it overwhelming. yesterday i spent the day reorganizing and decluttering. my studio is now ready to open to the public for the season. my garden has taken on it's own life. when i left 2 weeks ago it was new and full of promise and ready to burst. it has. and it's wild and rampant with colour and no longer in my hands.

i can mow the lawn and trim the edges, but mostly i have to stand back and listen to it's conversation...

backwards and forwards

15 years ago my (then young) children and i were part of a protest about a green space in the centre of downtown corner brook being turned into a condominium and parking lot. the project was stopped. for 15 years i've waked along the path in that space almost daily. yesterday keith and i joined a quiet and heartfelt "beautification" of the same space. it has been sold to tim horton's and a large drive-thru tim/wendy will be built there causing traffic confusion and car emmissions. because of the current city's ideas of "progress", it won't be stopped this time.

and moving forward - robyn and her children dropped by after the "planting" for dinner and helped me assemble the kiwi spinning wheel and give me a demonstration. pure bliss. today i have to stay away from it because i just got a wholesale order for 6 mailboxes (and a charity birdhouse...)

a few things i saw on my trip

our first stop was in chapel's cove to pick up my spinning wheel and linda who was joining us in lumsden for the craft council agm. her "hobby" farm was everyone's dream - "baynoddy" studio is attached to her home. she has 8 sheep, 2 goats and a llama. she spins their fleece for her beautiful traditional knitwear. it was good to see where my wheel was coming from...

in gloverton we visited the "diamond house" where kevin blackmore (of "buddy what's his name" fame) and cathy sweetapple gave us a tour and talked of their hopes to turn it into an artist resource centre.

we arrived in lumsden around 5:00 and had meetings late into the night. next morning we spent at the barbour historic village in newtown. a bleak and wind swept landscape on the edge of the ocean. we had a lesson in "knitting" or mending fish nets. more meetings and the following day janet davis (new chair of the board) offered a linocut workshop from her norton's cove studio. i've done alot of lino so i spent the day wandering around brookfield and wesleyville, and knitting (i knit 5 scarves and a shawl while i was away).

brenda and i got home late last night. the leaves are out on the trees (we're further ahead here than on the east coast) and the garden has gone wild...