I was invited to participate as an artist to sell my needle felted hummingbirds at the September 8, 2012 “Canvases in the Canyon Art Show” in North Cheyenne Canyon Park. The show featured local artists, chocolate samples, live music and was a fundraiser for the new visitor center building at Helen Hunt Falls. It was a lovely and relaxing day, with perfect weather, and beautiful art. Best of all though, it was a day I got to spend with my brother since he came along to help at my booth.

My needle felted hummingbirds are based on broad tailed and ruby-throated varieties. They are about the same size as an average hummingbird and are entirely handmade. I am offering a few remaining hummingbirds for sale and if you are interested in purchasing one please e-mail me or leave a comment with contact info.

Once again our group of suffragettes appeared at the annual Rock Ledge Ranch 19th century Labor Day Baseball Game to protest for the women’s right to vote, temperance and the need for a servant girl’s union! Who cares if these issues are a century behind the times! We just have fun interrupting the game each year with our “Votes for Women” signs, and it is all for fun.

This year I spent Saturday August 25 doing a lace making demonstration with the Rocky Mountain Lace Guild at the Colorado State Fair. I worked on needle lace most of the time since we already had several members doing bobbin lace and tatting. Many people had never seen lace being made by hand and were surprised at the detailed and time consuming process.

My needle felted doll “Dancing Flame” took a trip to the Colorado State Fair, winning 1^st place for needle felting! She is one of my favorite creations that I have made and it was fun to see her on display at the fair for others to enjoy. She looked peaceful and happy dancing in the display of needle arts.I also entered two small pieces of handmade lace; my needle felted columbine flower won 1^st and my Idrija style oval mat placed 2^nd. I am thrilled that both pieces placed because they were class projects!

I find that the State Fair is a great motivator to finish projects that have been set aside for awhile. I finished and entered a square stitch beaded bracelet that I had started and set aside last year, but I started working on it again a few weeks before the fair and actually finished on time. The pattern was from the book “Beading Her Image” It was my first square stitch project and took forever to complete, but happily it placed 1^st for beaded off-loom jewelry! (Too bad they displayed the bracelet upside down…)

What could be better than spending an evening with my awesome brother, while walking/running the trails at one of our beautiful local parks? We love these trails so when I heard about this event I had to sign up, even though neither of us are runners! We may have come in 25th and 26th but we finished together and that is what counts! It was a perfect evening to be outside, with great weather and the blue moon was incredible. The evening was great and everyone who put on the event was friendly and encouraging. The run was followed by snacks and awards. Sometimes in life showing up is what counts. My brother was the only man running the 5k in his gender and age group, so he won one of the prizes. Way to go!

On July 30 I hiked to the summit of Mt. Sherman. For most of the ladies in our group, including myself, this was the a first time to hike a 14er. We started our hike at 7:30 am and passed by a pretty stream with small red flowers, and some large yellow flowering plants that looked like they were from another planet.

We hiked for a little while past a few old mine buildings and over some rock fields. I can only imagine what life was like for the miners who lived and worked in such a harsh and remote environment. The view was incredible though!

After a little time we came to a slope. It appeared that our trail went straight up the hill, so we followed it and missed the easier trail that wound to the left. It turned out to be a grueling ascent up the side of a hill covered in small loose rocks, but after a lot of effort we made it to the top! I feel like 90% of the effort I put into the hike was this one hill!

This was probably not the easiest way up!

Once we got to the top of the hill the view was great and the rest of the ascent was just fun and easy. We met a few nice people at the summit including a professor from Cairo, Egypt, a grandpa with his eight year old grandson and a few very happy dogs with their owners. We signed the guest paper for July 30, 2012. Someone before us scribbled some wisdom on this rock at the summit:

We stopped for a little break on the summit to eat lunch and we started hiking back down before the storm clouds blew in.

Here we are at the summit! 14,036 feet!
Thanks to everyone for the fun and memorable hike!

Just for fun, here is a picture of a friend and I with George Washington, at the annual Old Fashioned 4th of July at Rock Ledge Ranch Historic Site! We both made our dresses.

I recently faced the moment dreaded by many artists and crafters: evacuation from a wildfire. On Tuesday, June 26th, I was evacuated from my home as flames, ash and smoke raced through the Mountain Shadows community in Colorado Springs. Over 30,000 people were part of the evacuation and many of us were out of our homes for almost a week. It was a terrifying ordeal, and one that has made me pause and reflect on what is important in life. This is what we saw:

I have discovered that being an artist and crafter presented me with a unique set of difficulties. One sentiment that I heard after evacuation was “things don’t matter, at least your family is safe”. While I agree that people are more important than things, I cannot deny that as an artist it is not easy to just drive away from years of effort. When you spend a year of your time making an original lace shawl it becomes something more than just a garment. Part of your time, your energy and yourself went into that piece.Thanks to some very courageous friends I managed to get out of my house with a significant amount of my handmade objects!

The problem is that in an evacuation you have only a small amount of time to make decisions about what precious items mean the most. What do you have room to take? Should you save the many handcrafted gifts received from friends, or the collection of historic clothing that took years to stitch? Should you call a friend to come and help, or would it be too dangerous? How much time can you take before you absolutely have to leave? I would recommend to anyone the importance of being organized and at least having an idea of what you would grab in an emergency.

In my case I left when the heat reached 115 degrees in the house, the power failed and the police knocked on the door to make sure we got out. By the time we left we had to wear masks to breathe because of the thick smoke and ash.

I am so thankful to the police and firefighters for their efforts to stop the fire. I am also so thankful to all of my friends who came immediately when I called for help, gave me places to stay, a shoulder to cry on, phone calls, hugs, food, and so much more. Thank You!

In elementary school I was introduced to the story of “Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes”. Folding a thousand origami cranes seemed like such a huge task and I always wondered if I would ever be able to do it. I have done some origami since elementary school but did not start my collection of cranes until recently. My project of folding cranes started shortly after watching an episode of “Ghost in the Shell”. In the episode a character who has lost the use of his right arm learns to fold cranes with his left hand only. Of course, I had to grab a piece of paper and try to fold a crane with only my left hand, and with a little effort it worked. So, knowing that it is possible to fold a crane one handed with the weaker hand I decided to start 1000 cranes to see if that was possible as well. I used 3″ squares of paper, so the finished cranes are only about 2″ across.

So why did I fold 1000 origami cranes? Folding origami cranes was a calming form of meditation during a very stressful time in my life, and it gave me something to work towards. The papers themselves are very beautiful and lovely to work with. Some people even believe that a person who folds 1000 cranes will be granted a wish! I am not sure I believe that but who knows, maybe it is possible. In January 2012, less than one year after I started, I finished folding my 1000th paper crane. Now I just have to decide how to display them!

So this is what my 1000 cranes look like:

One of my recent projects was to design needle felted hummingbirds. Hummingbird feathers seem to take on different shades and colors depending on how the light hits them so it was a challenge to find wool colors that would come close to the same effect. I started getting requests from people to make more hummingbirds for Mother’s Day. Making these brought back good memories of my grandmother who passed away. My grandmother always loved to watch hummingbirds, and as long as I can remember she always kept feeders by her windows. When I was a child I helped her to mix sugar water for the feeders. She would have loved a needle felted hummingbird and would have hung it with her collection of miniature birdhouses.

A friend found a book at the library called “Renaissance Patterns for Lace, Embroidery and Needlepoint” by Federico Vinciolo and Apparently the patterns are reprints from books originally printed in 1587 and 1606. Of course I had to try one! It is magical to think that I can work the same pattern that a lace maker used over  four hundred years ago!This is my first piece of filet lace. I made the mesh and did a cloth stitch to fill in all the solid squares. I do need to finish the edge still. I took this picture while the lace was still on the frame.

The thread I used was linen, and I only have the one size so I had to pass through each square four times rather than two to fill in completely. That took awhile. The linen thread is not even so the lace does not look perfect, but I actually do love the imperfections in this piece. This lace reminded me of a pattern that Isolde might have made…if she made lace!