Travel Diary Quilt - More Blocks Complete!

Day 14 of work on my 2014 Travel Diary quilt.. and still loving it!!! I have completed 32 of 57 pillows (or blocks, the traditional quilting name for a component of a quilt top), most of them the easy ones, the ones I have a quick sense of how to embellish them. The remaining blocks are bit more challenging, forcing me to remember what I always tell my bead embroidery students:

 When you get stuck,

pick up a bead or a doo-dad you love,

and sew it on your piece.

Here are a few recently finished blocks... The one above is my God-daughter, Emese, with her husband, Jacob, ready to drive me to Sonderborg, Denmark. Since just prior to departure for Europe, I had been in a one-day workshop with Sue Spargo (waaaay fun), I took my wool applique with me on the trip. In Denmark, I had a number of happy stitching hours, and the interest of Emese, Jacob, and their kids to keep me going. So, of course, I had to put a chick on this block.

Generally the pictures are about 3-4" x 4-5", but the close-up pictures of people, I generally printed smaller, about 2" x 2.5".  These were challenging to embellish, because there isn't much room to tell a story with the beads. Here are four of them grouped together. You may recall, I made an "I Spy" quilt for Emese's daughter, Olivia (below, top right).

I had a great time with Sabine in Bremen, Germany (above, top left). In the block below, I am standing by the Four Town Musicians of Bremen, the donkey, dog, cat, and rooster. As the myth has it, I have my hand on the donkey's hoof, and am making a wish. Although I dare not tell the exact wish, it did have something to do with Donkey-oti, my dear donkey friend back home.

You see the adorable donkey, bead embellishment? I must tell you about it!

I guess you can get an idea of the size! It was made by Shelly at Ginko 305, who makes and sells miniature animals on Etsy. Although she had not made them as beads previously, when I messaged her with the request, she readily agreed. Now she's thinking she'll make more of her animals in bead versions!  I've got to have more of them... a reindeer will be the next one.

The above blocks are grouped together, because they are all at Anna Feher's home in Felsöpakony, Hungary (except the selfie of her and me taken on the train from Budapest). When I'm with Anna, my friend and best bead companion for 25 years, I feel totally at home, and as her chalk sign says, totally welcome. We beaded and talked beads and got together with other beady friends for a whole week... pure heaven!!! With her husband, Attila (lower right), I share a love of Hungarian folk and American blues music, so we found time for that too!

I also had a great week with Lies Koster, above. We share love of beading, quilting, folding paper, and full moons, among other things.

In closing, here is another block from last summer's road trip, from the northern unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park, where we saw perfectly round boulders, 3 feet in diameter, and wild horses (although not together at the same time, as the embellishment suggests). There were only a few humans in the park that day. Shhh, don't tell anybody what an exquisite place it is...

You can see what I will do with these quilted blocks here, and view a few more of the finished blocks here.

Message to Elders - April BJP

My Bead Journal Project for April concerns a topic not everyone wants to discuss. Please stick with me on this one, and feel free to post your comments, even if you disagree with my thoughts on the subject.

If you've been following my BJP pieces this year, you know I've been greatly concerned for the future of the world and the children who are yet to be born. Countdown, a book by Alan Weisman (a well-researched, yet readable, book about the recent history of the growing human population in all areas of the world, and the effects this growth is having on us and on our habitat) greatly influenced my piece for April. Although I began working on it before getting the book, you can see the like-mindedness between my divided piece (in progress) and the art on the cover of the book (which I think is fabulous).

Message to Elders of the World (in progress)

Cover Art by San Chung for the Book, Countdown, by Alan Weisman

Watching environmental documentary films on many topics over the past few years, a foreboding sense of the damage our ever increasing growth and demands place on the earth has brought me to a voluntary, world-wide, one child point of view, as the only thing the citizens of the world can do to save it. I call it 1+1=1, and it is the theme of my BJP pieces this year.

For April's BJP, I direct my hopes toward the elders, the grey and white haired folks, like myself.

Message to Elders of the World

Above is the finished piece. And here is a poem I wrote while beading on it and the message I hope it conveys to others who are grey now, like me:

I Am Grey Now

I am grey now –

no longer so self-absorbed

as in the greener phase of my life,

looking beyond my pile of beads,

considering the colors of the whole world,

wondering how long before

there are no more red or green apples,

how long before the abundant waters

under the earth's crust are gone,

how long before order turns to chaos,

and most of all wondering what I can do,

in my grey years, to help.

        Robin Atkins

Message to Elders of the World

For the sake of your grandchildren and great grandchildren,

wake up to the possibility of massive hunger and thirst,

the depletion of resources and environmental destruction

caused by the demands of an ever increasing human population.

We, the elders, must help our granddaughters and grandnieces

to understand it is on their shoulders to save the world,

with only one way to do it: world-wide, voluntary, one child.

No government can make this happen. Only they can do it.

        Robin Atkins

If you are like me, worried about the world, concerned for the future of all the babies being born every second, and especially for our own children, it follows that we must take on the responsibility of coaching them in stewardship, which includes green living as well as voluntary one-child. My other three bead embroideries on this theme are:

Message to Young Brides of the World

Message to Women of the World

Message to Citizens of the World

My available tools of change are art and words. Thus, I am making these bead embroidery pieces (2.5 x 3.5 inches each), which can be displayed on small easels, and writing poems for whoever will see or read them, in the hopes of helping others to envision and question the future, to ask what they can do for the world.

Thank you for staying with me to the end of this post, and for considering the questions it raises.

Save the World Bead Embroidery

I'm definitely NOT a political person, not especially well-informed about current affairs, never a protest marcher or letter-to-the-editor writer.

But, in recent years, I've been watching a lot of documentary movies, many of which address the film maker's concerns about the well-being of the world, films about water shortages, about problems with fracking, about the polar ice cap and glaciers melting, about famine and poverty, about disappearing wildlife habitat, about oil spills and coal dust, about tsunami and hurricane damages, to name a few.

An ever-thickening cloak of despair settles over me, as I become convinced that we are slowly destroying our world, and worse, that I am powerless to stop any of it. At some point, looking at all of the things going wrong, I knew, beyond doubt, that the core issue, the root of all of it, is the demand we humans place on the earth. Nothing can stop the demand, short of decreasing the population; not just curbing population growth, but actually dramatically decreasing population.

There is only one way to decrease world population: to do so, every person must voluntarily embrace this world-saving motto:

Message to Citizens of the World

1 + 1 = 1

One + One = One

When every couple has only one child, the population will decrease significantly in just one generation. Demand for power, for water, for fish, for just about everything will decrease dramatically. Life will seem more precious. We will, in a single generation, improve all of the concerns we now have.

For 5 years I've been thinking about making a 1+1=1 bead embroidery. Finally, here it is. This is my Bead Journal Project piece for January, 2014. I'm starting the year by doing something, doing the one thing I know how to do that might help our beautiful world survive. I may do more of them, trying different ways to show this concept. In this one, there is a message to all citizens of the world:

Message to Citizens of the World

Our home is crumbling, burning, blowing away, and melting,

as we take and trample, and continue to take what we want

from it. In our clear heart and mind, we know the truth,

and we fear the future even as we continue to consume.

What can we do? When we sit up, pay attention, and learn,

we realize there is only one way to repair and restore our home.

For the sake of our child’s child, we must voluntarily decrease

our numbers by embracing world-wide, voluntary, one child.

Robin Atkins

January, 2014

 

I even have a fantasy that maybe others from around the world would join me, illustrating their concern and this solution in their own style and materials. I have started a 1+1=1 Facebook group , and encourage artists, quilters, beaders to join me. Maybe we'll have an exhibition one day, maybe it will become a quiet, yet powerful, movement. If you agree with me, I'd love to see your version of 1+1=1!

This piece is only 2.5 x 3.5 inches, and is entirely made with size 15 seed beads. My next post will be a technical one... how to bead nice, even circles. Yes, the circular pattern of blues and greens represents the world. I've learned a lot making "the world" (trial and error) that I want to share with you.

Bead Embroidery Makes Me Happy

Getting back to bead embroidery definitely makes me happy, although this piece really isn't about being happy. It's my Bead Journal Project for April, a month that was all about separation and change, about moving, about finding a new way of being, living alone and being single rather than married. Both the beading and the process of changing my life are still on-going. I don't know what the future will bring with either.

I worked on this piece (no name yet) while teaching two different Improvisational Bead Embroidery workshops during the month. As always, I have the students write poems on the second day of class, poems about self based on words and phrases that come to mind while looking at their beadwork. These are the two poem I wrote based on this piece.

#1

I am scattered
I want to be one of the other
words or phrases
such as I am peaceful
or I am purple
or I am flowing
but the truth is
I AM scattered right now
as I cut through
the crumpled remains
of the soft colors
of my marriage dream
I am scattered
as I pack all my things in a box
drained of energy
traffic noise in my head...
oh flower fabric and aqua beads
may you refill my cup of life
               March30, 2013

#2

I am delicate
emotionally delicate I guess
a little unusual for me
my heart is folded
my wedding rings still on my finger
my life flowing along
as if everything was normal
as if everything was the same
I am circled by beads
beautiful, graceful, pretty beads
are supporting a new phase...
like the butterfly
I will take a new form
yet with the same life blood
and the same heart as before
                  April 14, 2013

I'm doing post-card-sized (5 x 7 inches) pieces again this year, like the first two years. This one seems to be going in the direction of being solidly beaded, which takes a lot of time. I don't know if the others will be encrusted or not.

Marriage & Beading

Today is my wedding anniversary. Sadly, it is not the happy day it should be.

Robert and I tied the knot January 12, 2001 in Victoria BC after being together for 3 1/2 years. We were both over 50 and had never previously been married. When we were saying our vows, Robert jokingly answered the 'til death do you part query under his breath, whispering maybe (not yes, but maybe). Although it was sort of funny at the time, perhaps I missed an undertone of truth, a current of unease that has run through our relationship.

Intersections - Robert & Me, 2011

If you know me, you know my bead embroidery is almost always improvisational, meaning unplanned and spontaneous. I like to stick a thought in the back of my mind, letting it guide my beading in a subconscious way. During our 16 years together, I've beaded about our relationship several times. I thought it might be interesting to take a look at some of these pieces in this post.

Marriage Bag, 2000

This is the first. It is Marriage Bag, started shortly after I met Robert and completed just before we got married. My intent was to explore the idea of marriage and commitment, to ask the question, Do I want to get married to this man?

Marriage Bag, Totem Animals, 2000

The first side of the bag I beaded seems to have a division. Looking at it 12 years later, I think it's about the two of us as individuals, apart from one another. My totem animal is the rabbit, so I think the left area is about me. There seems to be a lot of sunshine on my side. Robert's totem animal is the bear. His part is a bit darker, with just a hint of sunshine. There is a small heart at the bottom in each part connected by intertwined strands of beads, in retrospect a rather frail connection.

Marriage Bag, Intertwined Pathways, 2000

As I beaded the second side, the intertwined strands, representing our connection, grew much longer and stronger. It suggests a good and lengthy future together, don't you think? Back then beading this part gave me great encouragement and optimism about our relationship and marriage. Things looked pretty good during the "honeymoon phase" of the marriage, a time when we both turned blind eyes toward the signs that all was not well.

His Parents Were Alcoholics, 2007

This piece, from the first year of the Bead Journal Project,  is a portrait of Robert, showing childhood wounds, inflicted by parents, altered by alcohol, who probably did not meet his needs. I see scars, a wall, and the spirals of recovery passing under small holes in the wall. I see beaver, able to pass to either side of the wall, facing outward toward the light. I hoped that the wall would gradually fall apart, allowing us to be closer.

Hearts in Delicate Balance, 2008

A year later, I beaded this visual statement of our relationship. Look what showed up.... the same intertwined path, which I think represents the part of me that still held optimistic hope for our marriage to be well-rooted and to grow upward in a healthy way. But more dominate in this piece is the precariously balanced hearts. Even the thing upon which they stand is unbalanced. Bear is there, climbing up hill. Will we make it?

Lunar Marriage Dance, 2009

Three months later, this piece again shows my optimism. Yes, we sometimes drift apart, but then, like the cycles of the moon, we come together again, a "close dance" in the fullness of the moon. As I stitched the last bead and looked at it, I had a sense that the dance between us is good and that it passes naturally through phases, yet remains and will continue to remain a good dance. Looking at it now, I wonder if it actually predicted how the future would find us drifting apart, spending more time in solo dancing than in partnership.

Forgive, 2010

The next year, I was trying to re-invent myself, trying to make changes that would improve our marriage. This piece is inspired by two words: forgive and flow. I wanted to flow through our relationship in a peaceful way and to forgive us both for all the rough spots along the way. In retrospect, I notice that the flow divides the branch and the birds. The two birds closest to the flow have their backs to one another. Improvisational works seems to be like that, suggesting different interpretations at different times. Ten years earlier, on Marriage Bag, the two birds on the branch were facing each other (see the second loop of the intertwined pathways).

Intersections - Robert & Me, 2011

Here is another improvisational piece about our relationship, the intersection of Robert and me. I am the red/pink arm of the intersection; he is the blue arm. This is a tough one to interpret. There is a small black heart at the top of the wooden heart in the intersection. What does that signify? Wedding rings are most often shown overlapping. In this case, they are side by side. Again, I believe my choice of fabric with spirals represents hope and optimism.

None of my beadwork in 2012 is about our marriage or him. I don't know what will happen in the year ahead with either my beading or our relationship. Maybe it's time to tuck the word marriage in the back of my mind, pick up some beads, and start stitching...