Connections


vine and leaves, originally uploaded by ivoryblushroses.
Life is filled with connections. Where I'm at on this crazy quilt block is a good example of how one connection leads to another.
First, I saw the lovely crazy quilt lavender hearts at My Country Cottage Garden. She wrote about being inspired by Baumcat. Baumcat's lovely work inspired me to get out the fabrics and try my hand at it. One of the links on her blog led me to Jo's blog in New Zealand ~ No Matter Where I go... I always find myself there. On one of her posts, she had these lovely crazy quilt postcards with a vine and leaves of buttonhole and stem stitch that I loved.

From a completely different direction, I commented on a post at Blumn Studios which led to receiving an invitation to participate in an Art Journal challenge. A link provided in this challenge, led to this one, which led to discovering various techniques for preparing pages for an art journal. And in experimenting with this technique, I sketched out a freeform pattern of vines and leaves ~ which actually was inspired by a memory of reading about a family tree drawn as a vine with small leaves that covered the walls of a room in a book by Anne Rice.
Purple Leaves
At which point, the "ah-ha" light went off and I realized I knew exactly what I wanted to embroider on this crazy quilt block next.

So, at the very least, I figure this crazy quilt block so far involves inspiration from at least 5 or 6 other blogs and a book, some of which are not related at all except in the time frame of my working on the this quilt block! Pretty amazing how it all comes together!

In other connections, I've been enjoying hearing from various readers of how they found out about my blog! One friend tells another, who tells another. Some add a link to their own blog which leads on to others finding it. What an amazing world blogging opens to us. I love being able to see how someone in Sweden or Finland decorates their home, or what beautiful things someone in Norway or Australia is creating, or having the opportunity to share my art with someone in Spain or the Netherlands. Twenty years ago, such a thing would have been an impossibility.

Back to the embroidered vine. In the past I have been one of those people who needed a pattern, who could only play music from the page, who needed to read the instructions or follow the recipe. Lately, I'm finding that sometimes it is good to work "freeform", to work as the spirit leads. This vine grows, bit by bit in seemingly random fashion, but everything connects. There is no starting point, no ending. It grows out and could continue on indefinitely. As I work, it reminds me that connections bud out in our lives all the time, taking us down new paths, leading us to new experiences and friendships.

We are all interconnected! All part of the vine! Isn't it amazing?
vine and leaves 2
If you want to read more, I realized I've written on a similar topic at my Rosebud Cottage Blog back when I was in nursing school. This connectivity is at work in SO many levels in our lives!

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