Tag: stitchings (Page 3 of 36)

In Our Own Language 18

Ocean1

The ARC
last Friday . . .

Jeanne: Do you want to ride in the convertible?
Nancy: Yes.
Jeanne: Do you want to spend the night with us at the hotel?
Nancy: Yes.
Jeanne: Do you want to go shopping?
Nancy: SHOPPING!!!!!!
[I took that as a yes.]
Jeanne: Do you want to walk on the beach?
Nancy: [crickets] [Nancy does not like to walk.]
Jeanne: Do you want to look at the ocean?
Nancy: It’s green!!!

Nancy12Dec15

We went down to visit Nancy this weekend.
She didn’t know we were coming.
There were rides in the convertible

NancyInHotel

a spend-the-night in the hotel on Saturday night

NancyShops12Dec15

shopping

AndyNancyWatchWaves

and time spent looking at the ocean
the lacy, green ocean.

There was also drawing
of course.
86 drawings made at school since our visit in late October
and 46 drawings made in the hotel room.
The two batches make up
In Our Own Language 18.
132 drawings.

IOOL18Colorchoices

Note the color choices

IOOL18PositiveNegativeSpace

the use of negative space

IOOL18Borders

the border

IOOL18Movement

the movement.

IOOL18Symbol

She continues to make this shape
a vessel, I call it.
It will play a prominent role
when I begin to stitch these.

IOOL4 22

In Our Own Language 4:22

Right now,
I’m still stitching
In Our Own Language 4.
Yes, four.

~~~~~~~

Nancy, my developmentally disabled sister-in-law draws.
I, the woman who flat-out loves her, stitch her drawings.

Thrift Shop Treasures

Christeninggown2

I am bad to rescue cloths stitched by other women.

Christeninggown1

I like to give them new life,
sometimes by using them,
sometimes by completing them,
sometimes by giving them a place of honor in a new piece.

Smockeddress2

It makes me sad to see
handwork
in a thrift shop.

Smockeddress1

Overlooked.
Set aside.
Left behind.

Quiltsquares1

I can do something about that,
and I do.

Quiltsquares3

And have fun doing it, too.

Transportationquilt3

You know my fondness for quilts,
so you can imagine how excited
and horrified,
in equal measure,
I was to find this quilt

Transportationquilt11

in the bin at the thrift shop.
At $1.29 per pound,
The Engineer and I calculate it set us back $3.57.

Transportationquiltmending1

A story is already brewing
starring the quilt,
and projects have already been sketched
starring the dresses.

My fingers itch to get started.

Everything here is hand stitched.
The transportation quilt measures 62″ x 78″
and the red and white quilt top is 78.5″ x 90″.
This is gonna’ be fun!

Elixir

Elixir16

I made this for my son, Kipp
to tell the story of the time his dad and I took him to Sliding Rock, NC.
I call it Elixir.

Elixir12

It’s made from the sleeve to a jacket I never got around to finishing,
representing the shoulder he used to lay his head on to cry
or to sleep.
The arms that once cradled and rocked him.
It’s reversible, this sleeve,
going inside out
just the way he continues to turn my heart inside out.

Elixir6

The border fabric reminds me of Georgia’s red clay,
parched in Kipp’s birth month of August,
cracked like the back of an old man’s neck.
The driftwood came from our falls here in NC,
the rock is a piece of granite from Georgia,
perhaps from the same quarry where his Granddaddy once worked.

Elixir1

Not only did The Engineer cook so I could keep stitching,
he helped me figure out how to hang it,
and found the driftwood,
so we both signed the label.

Elixir7

It is one of my favorite memories,
this story of resilience
and determination
and a fun day spent together.

There will be more stories,
some perhaps saved in stitch,
because next year I add Grandmother to my resume.
But don’t call me that.
Help me come up with a name that’s much, much more flavorful.
Something tarty, perhaps.

Closed for the Season

Stormatsea8

This time of year is hard for me.

The expectations.
The disappointments.
The memories.
The losses.

Most years I manage to peel myself out of bed,
put one foot in front of the other,
and turn up the perkiness factor
so I don’t drag others down.
But that requires more reserves of energy
than I can muster this year.

Stormatsea1

So I’ve tucked into the studio to stitch.

Stormatsea4

Cloth and thread in my hand
comforts me
and restores my soul.

77: Still Grappling

2014 06 16 10 38 49

In tenth grade, my world geography teacher Mr. Holloman, a rather odd-looking man who wore brown shoes and brown pants with a brown belt came to my desk one day before class. He knelt down, leaned in close, and quietly said, “I’ve been thinking about this. You know what your problem is? You have created high standards for your life, and you think, do, and live by those high standards.”

“I don’t understand,” I said. “What’s wrong with having high standards to live by?”

“The problem,” he continued, “is that you expect other people to live by high standards, too. That’s always going to cause you a world of hurt and pain.”

2014 06 16 10 39 05

I believe we retain certain fragments of life like this brief, unsolicited exchange because there’s something important in them that will serve us well to decipher. I still don’t have this one figured out, and trust me: it was a l-o-n-g time ago when I sat in the tenth grade World Geography class seat beside the window in that upper hall classroom.

The questions plague me to this day. I want a nice, tidy package, a story that comes with a ribbon of wisdom and epiphany and moral lesson. I long for this to be a life-changing, unexpected happening that set my life on a different course entirely. Maybe one of those important contracts I made in a former life that I forgot all about when I was born.

Mr. Holloman didn’t say that I expect others to live up to MY high standards – is that significant?
Is it good or bad that I don’t expect others to live up to my high standards but to develop their own high standards?
He said I expect others to have and live by their own high standards, and I still wonder: what’s wrong with that?

Goethe observed that people live up to your expectations of them, a touchstone that served me and my special needs students well. I recognized that each one of my sixteen fourth graders had significant learning and behavior challenges, but I still expected them to behave and perform according to certain high – and often individualized – standards. They could walk the short distance to the lunchroom without talking, for example. They could be kind to each other and look out for each other. They could tell the truth. They could be quiet while somebody else was talking. They could try to do the math, even when it wasn’t the part of their brain that lit up with joy and ease. Did I do them a disservice by harboring these expectations?

I had high standards and expectations for my chiclets, and I think I would’ve been less than a good mother had I left them to run willy-nilly and hope they developed some high standards to call their own . . . right?

I do, however, know that I have (on more than one occasion, I’m embarrassed to tell you) expected (or at least strongly hoped) (maybe even prayed) that Certain Others would live up to my standards and definitions of integrity, trustworthiness, reliability, self-sufficiency, and such. And quite frankly, it has definitely caused me pain when they didn’t. And when I’m especially tired, I’d go so far as to say that the world would be a better place if they did live up to my high standards. Is it wrong of me to impose my standards on others?

I know it’s human nature to make up stories to explain pretty near everything that becomes part of our life, but so far, I’ve got nothing on this other than the story of what happened. In our 42 years of togetherness, The Engineer has often cautioned me that on occasion I make too much of things, and while I’m usually not even in half agreement with him on that (though I do afford him the freedom to let his brain think such notions) (bless his heart), I reluctantly wonder if he might be right about this particular moment in time. Maybe I am making a mountain out of a molehill. All these years later, it’s about the best I’ve got.

2014 06 16 10 41 56

Communion 3
a series of visual and non-representational descriptions
of what it’s like to have a conversation with Nancy

58: She Really Made a Splash, and I Couldn’t Be More Proud

PGPABH6

Her mother raised her to be afraid of the water, thinking it would keep her from drowning in the creek that ran behind their house. (Sometimes mothers get love and safety all mixed up.) As an adult, she spent one week every summer at the beach, never staying at a motel with a pool and never wading into the ocean over her knees. When the Medford Manor pool was built, she dropped her children off every morning on her way to work, brought them lunch on her lunch hour, and picked them up on the way home from work, having them sit on one of the quilts her mother made spread over the backseat to protect her car’s interior from chlorine-laden swimsuits. She made sure every one of her children learned to swim.

One day she woke up in her fifth decade and decided she wanted to learn to swim, so she did what any woman does when she’s ready to grow fins:

1. She designed a swimming pool.
2. She found a place for it in the yard.
3. She hired a contractor.
4. She found a swimming instructor willing to travel.
5. She bought a cute, flattering swimsuit.
6. She hired the swimming instructor who was willing to travel.

And I want you to know that in less than two months, I attended my mother’s first swim recital. Can you imagine being taught to be terrified of the water as a young child then learning to swim – of your own initiative – some 50 years later? That right there is why Ada Ballard Hewell, my mother, is a Pink Galoshes Woman. (She’s the tall one in the above photo, and the pint-sized one wearing the obviously out-grown, handed-down swimsuit? That’s me, her favorite daughter.)

PGPABH3

Pink Galoshes Portrait: Ada Ballard Hewell
17″ x 21″
cut-up discarded clothing, cheesecloth, seed pearls, embroidery floss
photo transferred to fabric
hand stitched

Oh, and those other words on her Pink Galoshes Portrait – gardening, entertaining, reading, socializing, learning, cooking – those are other things she’s good at.

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If you’d like to read shotgun, mash the “right-this-way” button in the orange strip at the top of the screen, and follow the directions. It’s free, fast, easy, and much appreciated.

55: Insert Foot In Mouth (And This Time It Wasn’t Me)

DailyDahlia24Sep15

The Daily Dahlia . . .
in a beautiful mug created by my friend Sorrow

~~~~~~~

Once upon a decade, I did some freelance graphic design for the local board of education. I reported directly to the Superintendent – a man I liked immensely – and got to do things I enjoyed. Like marketing, for example. Making the system, schools, individuals put their best side forward on paper just made me love going to the computer. One of my favorite projects was the in-house newsletter the Superintendent suggested we create and publish each month, highlighting all the varied wonderful things schools, staff, and students were doing. It was, by all accounts, a smashing success as people enjoyed putting their best foot forward to all the other schools in the county.

Things were rolling along swell . . . until a new Director of Marketing was hired. She was young and you had only to spend two minutes with her to know that she felt she had something to prove. Her attitude reeked of step-aside-and-let-the-girl-with-the-title-show-you-how-it’s-done. She took an immediate dislike to me, along with anybody else who had been there before her and whose job description overlapped hers in any way, big or small.

Br’er Jeanne, she lay low.

You know the type: to the Superintendent, she was Miss Cheerful Optimism. A real can-do, rah-rah kind of girl. Behind the Superintendent’s back, she shot daggers and glares and stuck her proverbial foot out to trip you up at any and every opportunity.

Needless to say, she did not make friends easily.

And Br’er Jeanne, she continued to lay low.

Fortunately for me, I was only in the office about once a month and I continued to report directly to the Superintendent, not her. The Superintendent asked me to show up weekly to help her learn the ropes . . . something I did not tell her because with her attitude, I didn’t see any way that was going to do anything good. You know what I mean?

So Br’er Jeanne, she just showed up weekly to see if there was anything she could do, and continued to lay low.

One day, Miss Director of Marketing informed me that she’d scheduled a meeting with the Superintendent, me, and herself. From her smug demeanor, it was obvious she had a plan to get me fired.

Br’er Jeanne, she lay low.

We sat at the small table in the Superintendent’s office, and the Superintendent asked her to start, since she was the one who requested the meeting. She started out with little nit-picking things, all delivered with a lot of batting of her eyes and a broad smile.

Br’er Jeanne, she lay low and took notes to look attentive.

Then in an unexpected turn of events, Miss Director of Marketing suggested that we do away with that “ridiculously frivolous and unnecessary in-house newsletter.”

Now Br’er Jeanne, she lay really low, somehow stifling a smile and forcing herself to stay focused on Miss DOM without so much as a sideways glance at the Superintendent.

“Nobody likes it,” Miss DOM informed the Superintendent. “It’s a big waste of time and money that we could surely put to better use somewhere else. I’ve never heard of an in-house newsletter that reports only good and positive things. Oh, I’m sure it was a good idea at the time Jeanne suggested it, but now, well, like I said, it’s just an extravagant waste of time and money.” And with that, Miss DOM shot me a quick smarmy got-you-now smile just before directing her gaze back to the Superintendent.

Br’er Jeanne, she lay low . . . and also turned her gaze to the Superintendent.

The Superintendent smiled like he was kind of enjoying himself, paused a beat, then said, “The in-house good news newsletter was not Jeanne’s idea, it was mine.”

Br’er Jeanne had to bite the inside of her mouth to keep from laughing out loud . . . but still she lay low.

The meeting ended shortly after that when Miss DOM remembered that she had a Very Important Phone Call to return. She left, and we somehow let the door close behind her, the Superintendent and I, before we cut loose in that kind of laughter that’s just downright good for the soul. Despite Miss DOM’s horrendous attitude, behavior, and intentions, our laughter wasn’t malicious or self-righteous. It was just plain ole’ delighted guffawing cause we both knew that it’s not often you get to see somebody hang themselves instead of the person they were gunning for.

~~~~~~~

IOOL4 20

In Our Own Language 4:20

Nancy (my developmentally disabled sister-in-law) draws.
I (the woman who flat-out loves her) stitch.

~~~~~~~

Thank you for reading along.
If you have stories or comments to share,
I’d sure love to hear them.
To see more of the Daily Dahlias, join me on Facebook or Instagram.
And if you want to keep up with these 100 Stories in 100 Days
or my stitchings,
just mash the black “right this way” button in the orange bar
at the top of the screen and follow the directions.

54: Tickling the Ivories

GMBPlaysABHPianoSept1975

Katie Belle Wesley Ballard (a.k.a. Grandmother) September 1975

Upon her graduation from high school, Grandmother received what is now known as a full-ride scholarship to the Piano Conservatory. She went the first year, and as she prepared for her second year, her father told her that girls didn’t need a college education – especially in music – and declared she was to stay home and find herself a husband. She stayed home, found a husband, and her children all agree that Granddaddy married up.

She may have left the Conservatory, but Grandmother never left the piano. At the end of each summer, she set up a schedule giving each grandchild a day and a time to come for piano lessons. Granddaddy picked us up after school and treated us to ‘cream and Co-Colas (in the small bottles cause they taste better). When Grandmother beckoned us to the piano, more often than not, Granddaddy followed us into the living room, sat on the sofa across the room from the piano, and said “Play me a tune.” We’d roll the piano stool up or down, depending on our height, take our seat, and loosen up with five-finger exercises.

What are piano lessons without a recital, right? So every Christmas came the two words that struck a chord of dread in every parents’ heart: The Program. In early September, Grandmother sent Mother to Newberry’s in downtown Atlanta to fetch the sheet music on her list. Assignments were made, sheet music handed out, and practice began in earnest in early October. By Christmas Day, we were ready. Or at least as ready as we were ever gonna’ be. We all moved to the living room (well, not all of us, really. Daddy, for example, who never spent much time with babies suddenly loved them and volunteered to hold at least one of them. In another room.). Grandmother called us to order, introducing each grandchild, and we took our turn, adjusting the piano seat and playing our piece.

I always wanted to play Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town because it was such a fun tune, and it was the hardest piece on Grandmother’s list, but that song always went to my cousin Cynthia (remember, Grandmother did not abide nicknames) who, I have to admit, really could tickle the ivories better than any of the rest of us. (She still can.) The boys: Jerry, Scott, and Brain played the same thing for 32 consecutive Programs: The Caisson Song. My cousin Stacy bypassed the piano altogether and went for the trombone. He lived in New Jersey.

She never talked about it, and I often wonder if Grandmother ever really got over having her daddy yank her scholarship from her. If this letter is to be believed, she was very good. And I can’t help but wonder – even if it means I wouldn’t be sitting here writing this – how her life would’ve been different had she finished the program.

GMBPianoConservatoryLetter

~~~~~~~

IOOL4 19

In Our Own Language 4:19

Nancy (my developmentally disabled sister-in-law) draws.
I (the woman who flat-out loves her) stitch.

~~~~~~~

DailyDahlia23Sep15

Today, we feature the Daily Dahlia’s flip side

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Hey, if you’d like to join the chorus:
To see more of the Daily Dahlias, join me on Facebook or Instagram.
And if you want to keep up with these 100 Stories in 100 Days
or my stitchings,
just mash the black “right this way” button in the orange bar
at the top of the screen and follow the directions.

53: Late Bloomer

KYDerbyPrograms2

Swizzlestrut.

Jet Assembly.

Mississippi Mama.

Dark Pet.

I love race horse names.

Mother and Daddy always came back from the Kentucky Derby bearing gifts. Armloads of goodies. Suitcases filled – nay, Steam trunks filled to the brim with all sorts of things to let us – their three children – know they were thinking about us and missing us the entire time they were away. For my sister, they brought stuffed animals, new dresses with socks and shoes to match, a new bicycle. My brother got footballs, golf clubs, a new four-wheeler. And from behind those cateye-with-sparkles glasses, my eyes glazed over when they put their Official Kentucky Derby Program in my hand along with a fistful of bookmarks.

I was a sophomore in college before I knew that those bookmarks were actually swizzle sticks.

~~~~~~~

IOOL4 18

In Our Own Language 4:18

Nancy (my developmentally disabled sister-in-law) draws.
I (the woman who flat-out loves her) stitch.

~~~~~~~

DailyDahlia22Sep15

The Daily Dahlia

~~~~~~~

Hey, I’m sure glad you’re here.
To see more of the Daily Dahlias, join me on Facebook or Instagram.
And if you want to keep up with these 100 Stories in 100 Days
or my stitchings,
just mash the black “right this way” button in the orange bar
at the top of the screen and follow the directions.

52: Ink, Paper, Stamps – Remember Them?

StrattonLoveLetter1

The letters – written on khaki-colored YMCA stationery – begin with loving salutations like “My Dear Byrdie” and “My Own Dear Baby” and “My Dear Sweetheart”. They close with a little more formality: “With all good wishes, I am” and “I am as ever” though occasionally a little sweetness creeps in: “Yours until death” and “With all my love and kisses”. He signs them as “A. J. Jack Stratton.”

ByrdieAndJack1

ByrdieAndJack2

Andrew Jack Stratton (The Engineer’s grandfather, affectionally called Pops) penned the letters to Jakie Byrd Wright (The Engineer’s grandmother, affectionately known as Maw) as he wooed, then courted, and eventually married her on April 20, 1918, a scant three months before he shipped out to France to take his place in history by serving as a Doughboy in the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) of World War I.

StrattonLoveLettersBundle1

In late 2000, I found the bundle of love letters Pops wrote his new bride during World War I, all 67 letters held together with a piece of orange yarn. They are so precious and such a treasure of family history, I set about replicating a set for each family member, scanning the letters and creating a collage of scanned stamps, postmarks, and addresses that I printed then cut, folded, and glued into envelopes. Once all the letters had been recreated and stuffed into envelopes, I tied them together with a piece of orange yarn and put each set in one of the antique wooden boxes I’d been quietly collecting.

StrattonLoveLettersBooklet2

Because some of the letters were near illegible, I transcribed each one and put together a little book along with the little research I had time to do about the places and events mentioned in the letters. As I worked, I channeled Pops and Maw through the silver Mont Blanc fountain pen that Pops actually used to write the letters, his name inscribed on the barrel.

Newlyweds1

Through his letters, we get to know the young Jack and the woman he loves, Jakie Byrd. We witness his flirting, his declarations of undying love, his pledges to stay away from the French wines. We are with him when he checks in at Camp Lee, as he petitions his Captain with a plan to get his sweetheart to visit, and later as he finally sees land from the boat as he arrives in Europe. We feel his homesickness, his angst at not being promoted, his eagerness to “show the Kaiser what the US boys can do.”

SoldierJack1

SoldierJack2

The centenary of World War I began in 2014 and continues through 2018, so it seems a fine time to dust off the letters and give them another read. Maybe do some more extensive research about where and how he served. Though the letters are deliberately devoid of details and effusive emotion to allow them to pass through the hands of censors, much can still be gleaned about Pops, Maw, and so-called War to End All Wars, and the climate of America at the time. We know so much about history thanks to handwritten letters, and I fear how much will be lost to future generations because, really, who’s going to sit down and sift through the thousands of emails in our computers? Preserving history – especially primary source history – is not an expenditure of time, but an investment. So let’s get out the pens and paper and write more letters. It’s a fine legacy to leave, and our posterity will thank us. I’m sure of it.

~~~~~~~

IOOL4 18JPG

In Our Own Language 4:18

Nancy (my developmentally disabled sister-in-law) draws.
I (the woman who flat-out loves her) stitch.

~~~~~~~

DailyDahlia21Sep15

The Daily Dahlia

~~~~~~~

Hey, I’m sure glad you’re here.
To see more of the Daily Dahlias, join me on Facebook or Instagram.
And if you want to keep up with these 100 Stories in 100 Days
or my stitchings,
just mash the black “right this way” button in the orange bar
at the top of the screen and follow the directions.

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Hey, Sugar! I'm Jeanne Hewell-Chambers: writer ~ stitcher ~ storyteller ~ one-woman performer ~ creator & founder of The 70273 Project, and I'm mighty glad you're here. Make yourself at home, and if you have any questions, just holler.

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