Stages of Life (warning....it is not truncated)

 You may have noticed in the last year or so I've written fewer blog posts and I've not been as exuberant as I once was....perhaps I've been in a reflective phase of my life and I've spent much more time looking around and taking in what I see, thinking, reflecting and marveling.  I've tried to share some ... yet I've really felt the need to turn inward.

I'll be 50 on the 18th of March and that feels really big to me.  So many changes....

Last December my Mother was not able to come for Christmas because she thought she had the flu...January brought the diagnosis of stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer....May brought passing from this place.  October brought the sudden and unexpected break of my ankle....which brought plenty of time on my fanny.

My youngest daughter just finished school and has become a Nurse Practitioner and will leave for Officer Training in the Air Force this coming weekend.  My oldest son is now a Boy Scout...no longer a Cub Scout.

I recall the passing of my Father, he was just 61 years old and also passed in 4 short months...went from a strong and lively man to a string bean in 4 months....he was almost unrecognizable to me....

"Life on Lifes Terms" is what tumbles through my mind....."Allow each person the diginity to walk the path of their own lifes" ...a quote from a lecture I'll never forget while I was in college, lingers frequently in the front of my mind.

Thoughts, memories, feelings....all tumbling around my awareness as I pass through each day and all the while....I cling to my needle and thread...it comforts me, guides me and brings me peace as I marvel at all the beautiful fabrics and think of them as representing each one of us....all beautiful, interesting, yet different.   Those of us who are quilters are very blessed to have such comfort...something we know, something to do and a community to challenge us, recognize us, encourage us and feed us....something I'll always be so very grateful for.

None of this brings for exuberant blog posts....a deeper melody is being exposed in me....I welcome it and I know many of you are with me in this journey.

This morning I spent some time looking for appropriate images to express some of what this stage of life brings....

 

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A bit of humor never hurts...it's probably darn good for my heart.

 

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 Could not pass up this image....I love frogs....but dang...if this represents anything to me it is there is only the end frog and that would probably be this stage of my life....is it the end? 

 

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Men in their underware....much more pleasing to my eye than me in my underwear!  If this correlates to my life then I honly have two more stages to go.  Oh noooooo

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Who ever made this graphic clearly must be very young.  So many figures to illustrate youth and so few for middle and end stages of life...not very fun if you ask me.

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The last one is the best of those I saw...the same number of ladies are on each side of the stair case...that is relieving...giggles.

Then I thought....none of these seem to reflect how I feel about my life stages....after all, I'm a quilter.  If I had more skills with photography and graphic software you'd be looking at an awesome graphic to show my version....however neither of those are the case (yet).  Until that time, I'll do my best to show you my version using borrowed pix....

We are cotton seeds that bloom into beautiful cotton buds....

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beautiful puffy cotton buds

we are picked by beautiful and loving hands (ok...I know picking cotton makes people's hands bleed...just hang in there with me for a moment longer)

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our seeds are separated from our soft fluff and then we are spun into gorgeous strands of many varieties of threads

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OR

Now you're talkin'....that is a whole lot of process if I don't say so myself :)
Then we become thread, yarn, or fabric.....all so useful and amazing in their own right


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THEN

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Ahhhh we can be bathed in a rainbow of colors

and are transformed into a endless variety of things...for example

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 and Aurifil Thread....tons and tons and tons....ecstasy in my mind....

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OR

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Did I just type ecstasy....this is ecstasy to infinity in my world.....

Then, join any or all of the varieties of cotton to make quilts and you end up with my version of heaven....and this is what I'm considering to be the life span of a quilter....so much longer and richer than those depicted above....

I'm levitating now....

Yes...I wrote this blog post for myself....the experience of writing it and putting it together has lifted my spirits and given me great pleasure....if you have enjoyed any part of it...that is a bonus....because sometimes it is all about me....ROFL.  Sorry, I just had to type that.

Hystical laughter fading out into content smiles,

Kelly