Summer of Surprises

If I had made any plans this summer, I can’t remember many of them. It has been a summer of total spurs of the moment.

I may have had an idea about making the vast amount of quilts necessary for my imagined one-person show, but have I? Nope.

I may have hoped that this summer would be the one when I really got into surface design and made up some wonderful stamped or shiboried fabrics, but have I?

Nope.

I may have had some plans about doing some large scale paintings, or some small scale artwork involving watercolor, colored pencils or pastels, but one painting hardly seems like a major thrust into the field.

Nope.

I have on the other hand, been enjoying myself in ways that I never dreamed would happen. I have actually relaxed enough to have a nearly normal life. Stress free, mostly. Really.

Stress has always been the motivator for me and yet we all know it is a killer. I try to keep stress away from Dave, as it is not good for him, but hey! Is it good for me?

Nope.

Good decisions, like hiring Angie to dye my kits for example, has really made me step aside and take a breath. Because she is doing such a fabulous job, I can make my dye days more productive and less angst ridden. I allow myself to only dye fabric until the dye solution is gone, whatever that amount that is. The results are superfantastic, because I don’t stress out about it. Duh.

Another good decision, buying The Car.

Seeing how happy Dave is, relieves me of trying to MAKE him happy. I can’t and that always causes stress. I know you know what I mean. I cannot will him to be happy. But he certainly is and that is worth a bijillion bucks. (He murmurs, “I can’t believe I am so shallow that a car could make me this happy”). I swear I haven’t heard him refer to himself as ‘happy’ as often in our whole marriage as he has since the owning moment. That’s a good thing.

Having fun with my girlfriends

and especially having had two parties, a family visit

and a blogger visit here in the last month. So so so important to me and my entertaining gene. We in the family are burdened blessed with this gene, and it really makes us want to make a nice meal, have a clean house and laugh really loud way past bedtime. Not to mention using my new dishes, woowoo!

Mostly though, the stress reliever of all time is having the Blog. It clears my head and starts my day. When I write to you and hope you read it, I feel so connected and not rejected. How this helps is so strange but it does. It puts all my ducks in a row and then wraps it up in a pretty ribbon.

And now to prove the rule I am packing my bags to go to our art quilt meeting and then Frieda and I are going to Tommy’s house on Lake Michigan, near the Indiana Dunes, for a night and a day of artplay. Woowoo! More social life!

I am giddy at the prospect! Plus she has wireless DSL, so prepare for mucho pictures. Double woowoo!