March 1 2024 When we left on our road trip at the beginning of March, the ice still covered Manitowaning Bay,   and while we were gone, the ice went out.   March 15 2024 Over the past few days, I've finished the couching on my new wool textile.  I love to hold the heavy cloth.   I love to run my hand over the dense threads.  I love how the six strands of cotton floss have a sheen and the red sewing thread that holds it has a strength. Did you know that the back is red silk?   Last Thursday, I placed an organza circle and r ..read more

A post about the small wool textile that I've been working on these past two weeks.        I'm adding complete skeins of cotton floss in horizontal rows to a wool patchwork, couching the thick threads firmly with red sewing thread.  I want to make a texture that you will yearn to touch. I took it with me and stitched while Ned drove us to visit family in Eastern Ontario and Quebec.  We took the rural roads whenever possible, and there was no snow. Look.  This happens so often and is not planned.  Suddenly I notice the similarity in what my ..read more

He seems to me equal to gods that man who opposite you sits and listens close to your sweet speaking  and lovely laughing -- oh it puts the heart in my chest on wings for when I look at you, a moment, then no speaking is left in me no: tongue breaks, and thin fire is racing under skin and in eyes no sight and drumming fills ears and cold sweat holds me and shaking  grips me all, greener than grass I am and dead -- or almost I seem to me. Fragment 31, Sappho I received this white whole cloth quilt that was beginning to rot away from passage of time.  The back was the wors ..read more

At the age of 91 years, Louise Bourgeois created Ode a L'Oubli, (Ode to Forgetting),  a book of 35 fabric pages made from her own saved clothing.    (2002)   In the catalog for the 2022 exhibition, Louise Bourgeois: The Woven Child, Bourgeois' books are shown as grids so that we can see all the pages at one time.  Each of Louise’s pages is about 11 x 12 inches.  If you want to see how this book looks when it is closed, or opened page by page, go to this link:  MOMA.   In 2004, she made another book, The Woven Child All of the pages i ..read more

  I put one of my embroideries into a pillow and called it the Lucky Pillow because seven is a lucky number and my granddaughter turned 7 last week.   I finished it on the drive to Toronto to visit the family. The seven year old has a 3 year old little sister and they play together.  Here they are playing with the small quilt that I am making for little sister. It's made from hand pieced pinwheels, one of my favourite ways to place half square triangles together.  To up the playful feeling of my hand dyes, I visited local quilt shops and purchased some new prin ..read more

Kindness is our only hope. We were with our family in a Mexican resort during that unreal time between Christmas and New Year's.  We had a very beautiful escape.   I took my handwork with me and there were moments of quiet when I turned to it, mostly in the early evenings in our very clean and white room when it was a relief to be away from the sun. I am pleased to finally be able to share on this blog that I have been invited to mount a solo show at the Festival of Quilts in Birmingham England this coming August.  For the exhibition, I plan to finish up the quilt tops ..read more

Ned and I celebrated our 50 years married at a resort in Mexico over New Year's.  Our four children and their families celebrated with us.     There were eighteen in our party. It was a blast and I am so very thankful. A note about the t-shirts we are wearing in this beach photo.  Created as a surprise for us, the youngsters marched into our room in a large group and they each wore a t-shirt.  The one year old twins, the school age sisters, the teen boys, the adults in their 30's and 40's.  They had a playlist from their childhood / our marriage.  The ..read more

And my love is poured.   ..read more

Elizabeth Babyn from Caledon, Ontario, Canada Jeanette  upcycled textiles assemblage  This piece is from the series: Her Industry, Reclaimed.  a body pf work that began as an homage to my mother and the generations of other women who have toiled with textiles in our domestic, industrial and creative spaces.  Utilizing various approaches with up-cycled textiles that include deconstructed men's suits, I recast and subvert the meaning of these materials in a more feminine light to create large complex multi-layered wall hangings.    B R Goldstein  North Caroli ..read more

  This post is about the beautiful catalogue for the exhibition In the Middle of the World, featuring the hand stitched work of Canadian artists Penny Berens and Judith E Martin, with a scholarly essay by Miranda Bouchard, curator.   All images are from the catalogue, all text is from the final paragraphs of Miranda's essay.  As testimonials to their processes, experiences, labours, and love, the works of Berens and Martin communicate uniquely and bravely about what it is to be human and alive in this world. During a talk delivered in March 2020, Martin expressed,  ..read more