I am gathering up yards of fabric, wrapping it around my forearms, letting it move through my hands. It slips across the threshold of the sewing machine, changing before my eyes from simple yardage into the magic of a gypsy tent.

I gather the lengths up in my arms, run up the stairs to a room large enough for its spread. I measure and clip, and pin; then run down the stairs again to sew another long, almost-perfect seam. Through the din of an almost-ignorable migraine and the slight fuzz of vasoconstrictors, I watch as the purple velvet joins the blue-on-blue stripe knit joins the panels of mahogany micro suede joins the remnants of dark denim embellished with ivory ribbons. … {read more…}

I am in my studio. Magpie Girl Studios. Catie think’s it suits. This morning she said, “You are like a Magpie, Momma. That words sounds spunky and….cool, like you!”

It does looks like a magpie’s den. For starters, there are three vintage glasses on the book shelf: the umber wineglass spilling over with marbles, the green pudding cup filled with skeleton keys, and the emerald water goblet a resting place for my cell phone. Next to them lies a rusty tackle box rescued from a junk shop on my glorious Rockaway retreat with Jen. For my birthday Paul cleaned and painted the interior and now its accordion trays house the flotsam and jetsam of my craft – saint medallions, sparkling … {read more…}

you may not understand that some of her best stuff is in pictures on her flickr site. I’ll just help you along by posting the link here.

A few weeks ago I offered this, my viritual living room, as a place for women to tell thier stories of painful interaction with what has been described as the ‘hard complementairan’ model preached at Mars Hill Church.

Although I have been honored to hear some women’s stories about thier experience at Mars Hill Church, these stories, out of fear of verbal retribution, have been told in confidence and so I have not posted them.

I recently recieved this story from someone who wishes to remain anonymous on the blog (though she has revealed her identity to me via email conversations.) It’s a telling tale, one I feel is told in a genuine, measured, and mature manner. In … {read more…}