August "Talk About" Blog - Handmade Division

On the 15th of every month, members of the HandMade Division - a team of artists from many different fields - "talk about" a preselected topic on their blogs.  I wasn't able to participate in the last two "blog discussions," but I hope to get back into this with August's topic:

Talk about something you'd like to create, that you maybe don't have the skills or technology to do currently.

That list is so dauntingly long that at first I wanted to ignore this "talk about" completely.  Why even open that door?  And so, rather than explain one of the many "when I find the time/the perfect bead/the right loom/the fabric" wishes, I'm going to share a different kind of creative project with you, one that I started not knowing what it would / will turn in to, much less why.


My best friend in high school was Melissa Freed. I adored her. She was everything I wasn't: outgoing, bubbly, smart, popular, and pretty. Oh, and she had curly hair and the biggest, most wonderful blue eyes!

In our twenties, we had a "falling out" (over a man, of course) and after that our paths didn't cross often, but despite, or perhaps because, of all the pain we had caused one another, our deep abiding love for each other never died. We would find ourselves there for each other at the oddest (and right) times.

During one of our last phone conversations (she lived in Maryland, I in New Mexico), she was horribly depressed and spoke of what a failure she was, that she had never lived up to her potential, had never become the star she and her family had expected her to be. After we got off the phone, I began work on a quilt, a quilt to remind her that she had always been a star in my life, even when she was a dark star.  I pieced a quilt of nine different large blocks using various star patterns. Once the piecing was complete, I added some machine embroidered stars to the top.

I was able to use the long tables at my friend Pam Moore's Gallery 28 in La Union to baste the quilt. And then, then life got in the way somehow, as it so often seems to do with me.  The quilt sat on a chair in my sewing studio, waiting to be quilted...for a few years, I'm ashamed to admit. 

And then I got the call, three years ago on August 11, letting me know that Melissa had died in her sleep. She never got to see her quilt.

Mel left a younger brother, Dale, and sister-in-law who, along with their children, absolutely adored her. She left some old friends to whom she will always be important.

What I want to create is set of art quilts from that star quilt, one for each of us whom she touched so deeply. But I haven't had the emotional courage to even look at that quilt yet. It's been three years. It may be another three before I can do this.

Let the stars in your life know that that is what they are. Do it while you still can!


Please be sure to stop by the other blogging participants. 

Andes Cruz: http://andescruz.wordpress.com/
NEDbeads: http://www.nedbeads.blogspot.com/
Lisa Hopkins Design: http://lisahopkinsdesign.blogspot.com/
Jewelry by Natsuko: http://jewelrybynatsuko.blogspot.com/
Beth Cyr: http://bcyrjewelry.blogspot.com/
ArtJewel Designs http://www.artjeweldesigns.blogspot.com/
Abhaya Fibers http://abhayafibers.blogspot.com/
Purified http://purifiedart.blogspot.com/
nova of sweden http://nova-designs.blogspot.com/
Bella-Bijou Jewellery http://bellabijoujewellery.blogspot.com/
Pink Crow Studio: http://www.pinkcrowstudio.typepad.com/
Alice Istanbul: http://istanbuldesigns.blogspot.com/
Thomasin Durgin: http://metalriot.blogspot.com/
Moxie & Oliver: http://moxieandoliver.blogspot.com/
Tosca Teran http://nanopod.wordpress.com/
Delias Thompson http://deliasstudioinc.blogspot.com/

Please note: Not all our members post their blogs at the same time of day; and~ we’re global. We try to get it all on in the morning, but if you happen to get to a blog, before the topic is posted, I do hope you’ll come back later. And likewise, you may not be reading this on the day it posts; therefore, you most likely will not link thru to the writer’s exact Talk About Blog post. For this purpose, most of the team members will keep a Category for the Talk About blog – so you can search that. Also, we try to use tags on the blog – such as the date, words from the topic, and of course “Talk, About, Blog” etc. these too can help you search the writer’s blog for their Talk About blog posts.