The creative process

I recently spoke with someone that I hadn’t talked to in 12 years. She said, “You were always so creative. Are you still doing watercolors?” My response was “??!?” Watercolors? Really. Eventually I remembered that phase. I’ve also tried out any number of other pursuits. I’m not any good, but it’s fun anyway. Why, just today we did some shrinky dinks. A whole tableful of adults and kids. It’s a good stress reliever, focusing on something artistic. If you can call shrinky dinks art.

Anyway, so, when my niece Heidi was born, I started a quilt-embroidery-beaded sort of project, to be hung on a wall, theoretically. She just turned 3, and I finally pulled it together to finish the thing. Originally it was going to have a bunny, but I thought it might be good to wrap it up before she left for college. As anyone who has tried a new craft technique, it takes a certain leap of faith to complete the process. When the vision isn’t quite clear enough to continue. When failure seems inevitable. Here’s proof that you can pull back out of the inertia, even a couple years later.

Oh, yes, and you aren’t seeing double. I made two, since I thought it would be nice to keep one for ourselves, and making two didn’t seem like it would take too much longer than just one. Which it probably didn’t. It would have taken 3 years either way.