A True Celebration!

I feel I need to record here what an amazing day we had yesterday with our family and Mum's friends down in Essex.  If you'd rather not read all about our celebration of Mum's life then please do skip past and I'll be back to tales of travels and creativity soon.  I just need to record it here as part of my blog before I forget the details.  I don't mean to be maudlin just recording a special day.  Please do pass by if you want to.

My DH and I went down to Mum's hometown of Canvey Island this week so that her many friends could say their goodbyes.  We always knew that mum had lots of friends but we were taken aback by the number of people who were able to come to her church yesterday. There must have been near on 100 people, family, neighbours, church members, and friends from her innumerable clubs.  The vicar, Reverend David Tudor, led the most uplifting and joyous service, most of which had been devised by Mum in preparation for when such time came.  David made great play of how pleased he was to finally be able to relieve himself of the papers and photographs that Mum had left with him 9 years ago in readiness for the occasion. (All spoken in jest).  He had carefully stored even a photograph of herself that she had left with him in readiness!  What could have been such a sad event became a truly smileworthy and funny recollection of what made Jessie the person we all knew and love.  Her passion for looking beautiful for every occasion, everything matching, little hat on her head, matching jewellery, matching shoes.

The love of dressing up running over into fun nights with her ladies' club raising money for charity.

I didn't like to tell her that the 'wedding cake' dress pictured has been reincarnated into some stitchy projects by me when she asked about it recently ;-)  I know the witch is her becaue I recognise her hands and feet :-)

More glamorous dressing up for cruising with wonderful friends like the ZigZag Dance Factory who welcomed her with open arms and gave her such wonderful dancing holidays so late in her life.

 David talked about her love for gardening, including 'acquiring' cuttings and seeds from gardens she visited, no stately home garden was safe if she saw a seed she could rehome!  She had been a stalwart of church fundraising, baking cakes whenever required and I have fond memories of frenetic kitchen activity when friends were coming for Sunday tea, baking scones and cream horns and preparing trifle.  You may remember I made a quilt with her aprons which still bear the scars of Sunday morning baking before the days when Mum joined her Church community.

I have to admit I had not been looking forward to the memorial service but the whole church and David Tudor made it a wonderful family affair with great warmth and vitality and even messages from Mum to look forward and be strong.  I have to admit I am no longer a church-goer but St Nicholas Church and its family churches are very lucky to have David and his team to forge such a strong sense of love and community that can lift you up and wrap you in such comfort.  There were tears aplenty but lots of laughs and smiles too, testament to a very strong lady who I and my brother and our DH and DW are very proud to call Mum.  Even her flower club friends had gone to the effort of making two lovely floral displays to flank the altar.

I read on Facebook yesterday a quote that said that however much you think you have prepared yourself you are never ready to lose someone you love and this is so true.  We have all lost
very dear people, family and friends and it never gets any easier.  None of them are paragons of virtue, we are all flawed but we do our best and we all saw the best of Mum yesterday, the great joy and happiness that others brought to her and that she gave to others just by being Jessie.

She only got on this camel for the photo shot, she couldn't quite cope with the thought of riding it lol

Rest in Peace Mum and always in our hearts ♥ ♥ ♥

PS  I've been talking to my friend about yesterday and just wanted to add here that at the end of proceedings they played the Radetsky March by Strauss which Mum had requested.  Quite spontaneously the congregation started to clap in time to the music.  A perfect end to it all.

When you watch the video you will need to wait about a minute while Daniel Barenboim shakes hands with the individual members of the orchestra.  It's worth the wait!  I remember watching this concert with Mum last year.

"Lovely sunshine!"

There's been a bit of a lull here as we've been coping with some sad times and I havn't felt able to share them here, although I did talk about it on Facebook.  On 21 September our beautiful Mum, who you've met here from time to time, passed away after a serious stroke.  We were in Cornwall when the stroke happened and got back as quickly as we could and were able to see Mum before she passed.   I believe she knew we were with her before she went.

 I think I am in a bit of denial although I do know she's gone.  We've had the necessary offices and next week her friends in Essex will be able to say their goodbyes too at a service in mum's church.

Our service here was, as much as we could make it, a celebration of mum's long life and I am so grateful for my beautiful mum who always gave my brother and I her best.  She had the most beautiful smile despite her difficulties and was a brave and courageous lady.  She was kind, warm, generous, thoughtful, adventurous, sometimes very frustrating, loving, creative, an elegant ballroom dancer and I am so proud that she was my mum.  I have lots of lovely memories to take along with me and when I guffaw outloud I can hear her.

A Jaunt, an Anniversary and a Quilt

Well, we took our germy selves off to the east coast last week for a few days with the flimsy excuse that it was our wedding anniversary and we thought some sea air would help chase the grotty cold and cough germs away.  You know what thought did?  It thought wrong but at least we did have a lovely week and the weather was kind to us.  

We stayed at a little place called Kessingland in Suffolk in a compact and bijou bungalow on a small private site.  The owner lived just around the corner and let us in and made us feel so at home from the get-go.  The bungalow was metres away from a footpath to the beach and the everchanging skies were beautiful.

DH took a photo of our anniversary cards - 8 years wed and never a cross word!  Well, hardly ever ;-)

There was lots of inspiration in the patterns in the dunes and the edge of the sea.

We didn't go very far as energy was decidedly lacking but we did take the bus to Lowestoft (why drive if you don't have to?).  Here again there was plenty of inspiration in the sand and groynes.

On our last day and our wedding anniversary day we took another bus into Southwold.  The bus driver spotted hubby's camera and told us to go to the harbour instead of the pier end of town as he thought we would get better photo opportunites.  He wasn't wrong, although we had to play dodge the very heavy showers and had to shelter in the pub, twice!  It's a hard life!

I hadn't exected to see this style of shed here.  You get similar black boarded buildings in Hasting but they are twice the height to dry the fishing nets.

This little shed on its raised up blocks really appealed to me and made me think of  Scandinavia.  The little windows are draped in nets.

I'm sure I can use this text somewhere.

Since we've been back we've both got worse with our coughs and 2 trips have been made to the doctor's, returning with antibiotics of the strongest order.  I think today, finally, I can sense a bit of a turnaround and I can actually speak without collapsing into coughing.  DH is still making a fair amount of cough-y noise but he is improving.  We have to be better for tomorrow as it's Mothering Sunday and we want to fetch Mum from her care home.

I havn't been completely idle this week while I've been stuck at home.  I've been working on the back for the Take 20 quilt top that I have been making with mum's pinnies etc.  I decided to carry on using the vintage fabric for the back so that the quilt will effectively be reversible.  So, I have made 30 blocks, some of which have had to be pieced as I didn't have big enough pieces of fabric left.

Above are 2 squares 15" x 20" which the whole back will be made up of.  I am pondering whether to cut the blocks through and rejoin them combining different colourways to break the big chunks of colour up, but that may be a step too far.  The beautiful hand dye is by Maggi Birchenough.

This is the pile of blocks waiting to be ironed and then designed into a quilt back.  I think I may have to use a room at Stitchcraft Studio to sort out the arrangement as our bed isn't big enough and I don't have any floor space that size either.  I can hire a room there for just £5 for 3 hours so well worth it.  Once I have everything ready I am going to get Trudi Wood to do the quilting as it is way too big for me to cope with.  The quilting will break up the solid blocks of colour so maybe I won't fiddle about with it.

I think my fat quarter drawer is a bit revealing:

Liking blues?  Moi?  I think I need to have a dyeing session and get some reds, oranges and yellows in there!  Obviously this is not the only fabric I have, larger pieces are stored elsewhere.

As I said earlier, it's Mothering Sunday here in the UK tomorrow so if you are lucky enough to be spending time with your mum have a lovely day.  If you cannot be with your mum I hope you can enjoy happy memories of good times past. 

Three Go On Another Adventure!

In all that torrential rain last weekend Wendy, Tina and I went on another foray down the motorway, this time to the studios and shop of Art Van Go in Knebworth.  The occasion was a playday that Lynda Monk was having with several friends to check out her new printing press and thermofax machine.  I had never been to Art Van Go before although I had met Kev and Viv many times at the various Shows they attend at the NEC.

This is less than half of the sales space and it was a real treat to be able to browse without the crowds that you get at Shows.  

 Opportunities for  indulgence continue into the large workroom where Lynda and her friends were busy with printing throughout the day.  It must be lovely here in the summer when you can spill over into the garden.  

The central room provides further workshop space and also displays exhibitions.  The works on display included pieces by Marian Hall and Buffy Fieldhouse.  I've just realised that this is part of the exhibition that we  missed when we were travelling back from Cornwall in November.   The work was very varied although I think some of it may have been removed.  As well as Marian's work I was particularly taken with work by Buffy Fieldhouse which spoke to me of layers and transparency.

(Buffy's blog is very new so there's only one post there so far).

Obviously as we were at a shop I did indulge in a little retail therapy but it was all very unglamorous being sketchbooks, fancy paper and things to make marks with.  Wendy was far more adventurous and bought a Thermofax machine from Lynda!  I can't wait for her to get to grips with the thing so I can persuade her to make a few screens for me.

Christmas and New year seemed to be a very long period of limbo and I was really glad when Stitchcraft Studio reopened their doors last week.  Our first Sit and Stitch day was yesterday and it was great to get back to stitching and catching up with friends.  Tomorrow I am back there for a workshop with Mary Sleigh which will continue onto three more sessions.  The workshop will be a bit of a departure from my quilting activities as it will focus on embroidery.  I've met Mary a few times before and I'm looking forward to some hand stitching for a change.

Getting back to the fact that we have had Christmas and a year change since I last blogged I should say that we had a good time at Christmas.  For the first time we decided not to fetch Mum from her care home on Christmas Day as we wanted her to save her energy but we did go and see her on Christmas morning.  We were very virtuous and walked down and back. (I hope my doctor is listening).   The whole point of not bringing Mum out on Christmas Day was so that we could have a family day with her at my brother's on Boxing Day.  I was so delighted that our strategy worked and Mum was on top form when we got her up to Lincoln to see the family.

(Excuse the quality of the photos which were taken with my phone and the hat which Mum didn't seem inclined to take off)  Mum was delighted with the photograph my brother had got for her of his family (taken by his son Johnathan Clover, a professional photographer based in Cheshire).  She was equally, if not more, taken with a week-a-page flip calendar that Johnathan had made for her full of photographs of her great grandsons and spent a very long time turning the pages backwards and forwards enjoying all the images.  I was so thankful for such a good day for Mum as she is so often tired and disconnected so this was a special day.  I could not believe my eyes when she walked into the lounge and then flung her arms wide to welcome the children!  It is so rare for her to react like that.  My heart sang!

2014 has come in with howling winds and appalling rain, high tides and tidal surges which have battered our coasts and caused extensive damage and flooding both at the coast and inland.  The east coast  suffered from high tides and a tidal surge before Christmas and this time it has been the turn of the western shores.



Sadly there has been loss of life caused by the weather and the RNLI have been fully involved in helping people escape their flooded homes and in rescuing the unwary.

If it can be said, even worse is the Arctic weather being experienced in the United States of America and Canada as the result of a polar vortex dragging arctic air down.



I am just grateful that we are past the shortest day and the nights will soon be pulling out and Spring should be coming along soon so that every day that we go without snow is one day nearer to warmer times.

January is going to be a busy month here in Lincolnshire.  I have several workshops coming up at Stitchcraft and will be teaching my Curved Piecing and Funk Portraits workshops as well.  Like many others I have been using the holiday time to take stock of where I am in my creative life and where I want to go next.  I'm not sure I have arrived at any answers yet but one thing I am clear on is the need to de-clutter, yet again, my work spaces.  Lena Krawczyk has been making a timely series of posts about her own efforts to organise her creative space with the help of Mary The Wonder Organizer and I have been trying to put some of her ideas into practice.  There is a considerable amount of throwing out (to recycling or charity shops) of all sorts of things that havn't seen the light of day in ages and I am pleased with how it is all going.  I decided I was being stifled by the amount of "STUFF" in my garden studio and I am determined to create a space that I can breathe and work in.  Photos will be forthcoming when I can see where I've been.

Right, I'm off outside to see if I can detect the Aurora, there's supposed to be a good chance of seeing it this far south tonight.

Happiness

Today is my birthday and I quite often go out for the day but this year I am at home as DH had a cataract operation yesterday so we are keeping things relaxed for a change.  I am pleased to report that the op went well and DH reports some improvement so all is good so far.

Yesterday after the op

This morning

I keep nagging him not to overwork the eye but it's falling on deaf ears!  Actually he has the ability to only use one eye at a time as his left eye is lazy so he is actually resting it while he looks at the screen with the other eye (hope that doesn't sound too gross!).  We have had fun in the past when with friends as he can be apparently looking at one person and actually talking to another.  Bless!

I have never been particulalry religious, especially in more recent years but today the postman brought a letter that may have converted me in an instant.  When my Mum lived in Essex she was a regular churchgoer and supported her church in all their fundraising efforts over the years.  She was part of a great community of friends there.  Last year the church had decided to replace part of an outside wall with a magnificent stained glass window and invited the congregation to make donations to have their names included on the glass.  Sadly I found out way to late about this and Mum was very disappointed that she could not be included alongside all her friends.  Fast forward to today and I received this photograph from the Minister:

My Mum's name is on the purple shard.  The minister had included Mum right at the start and promptly forgotten all about it!  (In the meantime we had sent a donation for the organ restoration instead).  I cannot tell you  how moved I have been by the arrival of this amazing letter and photograph!  My mum always told me it was unlucky to cry on your birthday but there have been happy tears here today.  God or the Cosmos does indeed move in mysterious ways and I can't wait to show Mum the photograph!  Happy Birthday to me :-)