I am back in Jersey but I swear that the smell of cool, crisp mountain air is lingering in my hair after an amazing weekend at The Makerie in Boulder, Colorado. I don’t even know how to begin to describe this weekend.
I could describe what I made…a color story, a mini quilt, a birdcage and an embroidered banner.
I could give you straight information about my classes. tell you about my workshop with jenny hart when I fell in love with her and successfully embroidered for the first time. how that was followed up with an exhilarating improv quilting session with the amazing heather jones. only to wake the next day…after yoga and a beautiful breakfast…and sprawl out on the floor with amy butler (it’s really something to chat with her about art, design, finding time for inspiration and soak up her warmth and encouragement). and finally find myself wresting with wire and fabric while tamar mogendorff walks us through making the bird in a birdcage with the beach boys playing in the background listening to tamar’s wonderful israeli accent call strips of fabric ‘stripes’ for four full hours.
or, I could talk about how I made sixty new friends all of whom are exploring their creativity and shaping a world full of beauty. how the organizer ali and her partner emily are both incredible forces of nature in the kindest way possible. or how the mountains are quiet but we got loud and laughed until we cried and then cracked open and just cried (but only a little). I could tell you about how my one journal entry was this “something special is passed between people when in a room full of women who trust in themselves or are learning to trust themselves”. but, none of that would be enough. nowhere near enough.
so, I decided to put down an excerpt from a poem I came across on the plane ride home. it just felt appropriate.
from walt whitman’s song of the open road:
{photo is of tamar’s soft sculptures}
I am larger, better than I thought,
I did not know I had so much goodness.
All seems beautiful to me,
I can repeat over to men and women You have done such good to me I would do the same to you,
I will recruit for myself and you as I go,
I will scatter myself among men and women as I go,
I will toss a new gladness and roughness among them,
Whoever denies me it shall not trouble me,
Whoever accepts me he or she shall be blessed and bless me.
The efflux of the soul is happiness, here is happiness
I think it pervades the open air, waiting at all times,
Now it flows unto us, we are rightly charged.
{my jersey mates…keeping it real in the hills of colorado}
meg says
it looks absolutely lovely and I am full of envy. next year maybe?
ahappystitch says
YES PLEASE! We could even drag Lily along.
Melanie says
Great post. I hope I can do something like this next year too.
ahappystitch says
You would have loved it Melanie! Yay for next year!
kristen powell says
Beautiful post, so happy for you, what an experience. and what beautiful things you made in a weekend!! that’s it, I am going to start saving up.
ahappystitch says
Yay! We all need to go together next year. I would love that so much
Michelle says
Oh my word, MQ! This sounds like a life-altering spiritual retreat a lá Catholic convent. How amazing! I am so proud of you for going. High five!
ahappystitch says
Thanks Michelle. I can’t wait to fill you in, in person!
mama-pan | mary frances says
So very, very glad you did this for yourself. It will bear great fruit.
(also: That birdcage is so lovely!)
ahappystitch says
Oh, thank you. It was really wonderful. Would be lovely to do WITH YOU sometime.