Barefoot in October

Hi.

Thanks for the great response to my announcement last week. I’m really excited to launch the website for PatchworkFolio next week (yikes – I’d better get that finished). For those of you who expressed an interest in having me design something for you or host your Wordpress site, feel free to contact me as soon as you’re ready because I’m working, even if my website isn’t.

Designing the site has kept me pretty busy and yesterday I got a full-day break. I took Denyse Schmidt‘s advanced improvisation class in her Bridgeport Studio. I signed up with a friend of mine from high school with whom I have reconnected through the miracle of Facebook and blogging. When she got out of her car in front of my house yesterday morning it was the first I’d seen (or even heard her voice – as all our plans were made via email) of her since the day I graduated high school (in 1987). As it turns out, we were the only two students in the workshop and had Denyse and Richard all to ourselves. While it’s possible that we missed out on some of the group dynamic that happens when there’s a full-house, it was a pretty intimate and productive five-hours of creating. Much of the day was spent head-cocked, chin in hand, standing back from the design wall rearranging and auditioning designs.

Mostly what I took away from this class was a reaffirmation of my process. It was reassuring to be encouraged and respected by three such talented designers. It felt comfortable to converse with them in a language we all speak and to participate in discussions of style, theory and creation and be treated as an equal. While I’m proud of my quilts, I design and create in a vacuum (also known as my bedroom) and to be told by someone who’s work I admire so much that my work was beautiful meant quite a lot to me. (Perhaps this is why so many of us blog about what we make.)

Did I also mention that the workshop was held in Denyse’s studio? Which is not in my house. And that there were no children there? And no husband. And no phone. See where I’m going with this? When was the last time you spent five hours doing something just for you? Try it. I’m sure you’ll come away refreshed and inspired.

And just in case that wasn’t enough, Niall brought the boys down to meet me after the workshop and we spent a glorious late-afternoon on the beach in Bridgeport letting the already-cooped-up-monsters out of their cages.

I highly recommend taking off your shoes and getting sandy if you’re starting to feel the constraints of cooler weather and shorter days. Come to think of it – I highly recommend taking of your shoes and getting sandy for no good reason at all.