A Quilting Story

Stitching by hand and by machine, I made this large quilt for my son

My son has an interest in Astronomy so I purchased this material and hand quilted it in random lines. I’ve also made a lap quilt for my daughter and before that a ‘postage stamp’ style quilt as well.

A Quilting Story

Growing up, I watched my Mother, Dixie, develop many interests including Quilting.

Quilting Books, templates, fabrics of all kinds gradually filled up her ‘Sewing Room’. We often said that she could open her own fabric shop, amused by the volume of textiles added to her collection of many yarns, sewing machines, threads and just about every accessory ever invented for Sewing, Knitting and Quilting. As well as learning needlework from her Mother, Dorothy, she took adult courses at the local highschool for Sewing and Quilting. She also had lessons from a professional Quilter in that lady’s home when Mom was boarding there to attend a college training course to be a Registered Nursing Aide. Mom excelled in her nursing because she genuinely cared. Her passion for Quilting led her to create a total of about five baby quilts I’m told. I never actually saw them but I’m sure they were cherished gifts.

As for the fabrics, well, she brought most of her years of gathered inventory to a Church craft and yard sale. Dad and I helped Mom set up her tables piled high with many colours, patterns, textures and lengths of material. It was a sight to behold. It all sold.

For about $100.00 an excited Vietnamese refugee couple sponsored by Church members became the enthusiastic possessors of thousands of dollars of fabric . Mom was so pleased to help them out. She made $300.00 that day. I still recall seeing Dad’s face as he quietly chuckled and shook his head. As did I.

March 18, 2023

Shelley Audrey Wilson

Victoria, BC

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Playing With Sticks

My young child self playing with sticks

Playing With Sticks

I’m old in years, young at heart,

still a child entertaining myself,

randomly moving Thoughts about-

playing happily with sticks

in the playground of my mind-

sticks like ‘Crafts for a Practical Purpose’,

‘Arts for Aesthetic Pleasures’,

‘Art for Art’s Sake alone’…

Sometimes Definition-Descriptions

seem to overlap, lines get blurry-

a weaving to hang on a wall,

a painting to complement a couch,

a chair never meant to sit on,

a clay pot to admire, not to use,

a song to advertise products to sell,

a drum roll to start a revolution,

a book of writings to pay the rent,

an arrangement of flowers celebrating occasion,

a sculpture to support some weighty books…

When does Fine Art serve Practical Purpose?

Why does Fine Art hold higher Status?

What gives it Value…Provenance-

the record and status of Owners,

the Creator’s location, associations,

personal history, educational foundations,

the Creators artsy story,

their cultural-national identity,

technical skills and accuracy,

originality of style, composition,

trending themes, power to please,

the placement and jargon of Display?

When does Craft become Fine Art too?

We seek and make many kinds of Crafts

judging usefulness, quality, design-

both Functions and Aesthetics of Design.

We deem several Arts Fine-

Human Creative Expressions

that we hold in high esteem

but then judge much what is or isn’t ‘fine’

depending on tastes, yours and mine.

Opinions vary, people invest money,

Subjective-Objective Decisions of Value,

buying or selling, commodity trading,

marketing Creations and Creators-

those still living or profitably dead,

compounding praise and short or long term gains.

Often, Arts and Crafts become Competitions

of Winners and Losers, Victories and Defeats,

a myriad Creative Expressions Valued or Not.

Some people make and buy them just for Fun,

some to be in the presence of Beauty

in whatever form it takes.

Some people thrive on, invest in Ugliness,

a Subjective-Objective Opinion, a Statement

of how they feel and see Life around them,

the makers, the sellers, the buyers-

a Declaration of who they choose to be

in the presence of Ugliness, a Dissonance.

Arts often express and stir Imaginations.

Crafts often inspire, evoke Imagination too.

Both stretch Education beyond mere Knowledge,

beyond Rigid Data of Information

by Sprinkling Stardust on Numbers and Words,

Symbols, Sounds, Physical Actions

merging the Mundane into the Sublime.

Creative Processes enrich Cultures.

Will we let Machines create Everything-

making us the Robots, the Working Consumers

increasingly working for the Machines?

I wonder about such things

while playing with sticks in my mind.

March 8, 2023

Shelley Audrey Wilson

Victoria, BC

Pastimes 4

This is digital art from my hobby photography. I am a retired floral designer.

I call these my Number Doodles.

Playing with Numbers, I began my own meanings to them.

On the right is more Number play adding my own meanings to them. Ti the left are some of my Number Shapes I created on my desktop. I am pretty much Math illiterate, a psychological block one might say but it would be so much more fun if I was Math literate. I explore many Arts and Crafts so play with Numbers that way. 🤩😍💕✨

Some of my weavings as personality portraits for family and friends…

More Personality Portraits for Family and Friends

And a few more…

Acrylic paint, beach glass, digital art… I have four large canvases waiting for acrylic paint or oil paint or both but will wait till the Spring warmth or early Summer to play with them outside because of the fumes they give off. I wonder what these canvases will become…🎨🪄💕✨

Glimpses of Pastimes 3

One of my Acrylics on Canvas Paintings

Weaving in Progress for Memories of Egypt

Digital Computer Art of my Photograph

Creating a Vision Board and an old photo of me at Le Foret Enchante in a former trading post, Eastern Quebec

Crafts done years ago with my husband

My next posts won’t upload so I may assume this free sight is Full. If you wish, I have a new site as FlowerpoetShelley now residing at flowerpoetshelley.wordpress.com

My Vancouver Island Shawl

This Shawl began as a Scarf I designed in 2017 and perhaps finished yesterday.

My Vancouver Island Shawl

This is a revised creation I call

my Vancouver Island Shawl.

It will keep me snuggly warm

as when my Husband Lover’s arms

wrapped around me in embraces,

those youthful, Not Forgotten Days

‘midst Northern Ontario wilderness.

That Lovely Land of Lakes and Rivers

saw many a hug and a kiss

as I now fondly recall.

I am drawn to quote myself

of something I once wrote:

She Said To Him…

Come lie with me on the soft green moss

in the heat of this summer’s day

and I’ll give you delicious, impassioned kisses

to take your breath away.

Let Nature witness our wild love-sport

among the spruce and pines-

hunting rare ecstasies with our senses-

tracking each other’s pleasure signs.

Deep, desperate growls and surrendering moans

will guide us on our way,

bringing us stealthily toward the unity

of Love predator and prey.

…

Now those Days are long gone.

With my Memories, I Moved On.

I know I am where I Belong.

Once again, I gained through loss.

Everywhere I look it seems

the fulfillment of strange dreams,

the kind I can’t ignore.

I’ve known this Island long before

I was This Version of my Soul…

Is my Poem finished? I don’t know.

January 21, 2023

Note- the poem ‘She Said To Him’ was written in August 1996 and revised in April 2014

Shelley Audrey Wilson

Victoria, BC

Woven Portrait of My Youngest Brother

A Woven Portrait of my Brother Brian

How I see my youngest Brother

This is how I see my Brother Brian. He’s a bit of a puzzle, friendly and sociable yet a very private person. He was in the military for a short stint with honourable discharge and later went into Mining in several positions over the years including safety officer who helped keep others safe underground. Sshhh… don’t tell anyone!

Added Details

Woven Portrait with Added Details

One of the bookmarks my Daughter created

Alissa writes beautifully inspirational short stories

One of Alissa’s floral designs

I’ve added more things to show a glimpse of my wonderful daughter’s creativity.

Woven Portrait of My Son

Woven Portrait of My Son Aaron

Details with his two sci-fi books

The colours, textures and add ons are a glimpse of how I see my wonderful son Aaron. Thanks to my daughter, Alissa, I was able to add these mini versions of Aaron’s creative writing. He’s in the process of writing his third book. His day job is highly technical and goes over my head at ufo speed but we do have some great conversations about time travel and space travel. I’m grateful to have two children as my best friends.

Woven Portrait of A Woman

Woven Portrait of Mireille

This is how I see Mireille, my son’s partner. She is a very energetic sportswoman, sports coach for children, and devoted mother of two boys also active in several sports. As with my other portraits, there is far more to each person than can be read in one artistic statement. You might think of this as my interpretive expression of personality with added details.

Feeling These Colours- A Weaving

This is another weaving I created this past September. I took photos while it was still on the weaving boards. Hand-weaving on the flat surface of our table takes its toll on my back and neck so I propped it up against my large camera tripod. (Hoping Santa will bring me a sturdy table easel this year…) The inspiration came with a desire to interpret my current feelings through colour choices from my yarn collection. As ever, there was no actual plan in my head for making this. It just gradually ‘happened’. The wired word ‘Poet‘ was something I made before. I preferred to do ‘Poetry’ but didn’t have sufficient wire. I also had some fun beading from my ‘treasure chest’ of beads and ‘whatnots’. My small collection of metallic threads is smaller now too. I love the freedoms of spontaneity, choices of materials, processes and techniques. And the fun of it all.

Weaving Completed

As ever with my weavings, Victoria The Beautiful is not perfect but it’s exactly the way I want it to be. I enjoyed the unhurried and unplanned process. Although I say it’s finished, I think perhaps I will add one or two small scrolls of my poetry and some momentos I’ve yet to gather.

The fringe on the right refers the the colour feelings I identify with this city of Victoria, BC, Canada…calm, cool and collected even in challenging times. The greens represent the mosses, lichens, leaves of trees and shrubs, the pinks and whites of the cherry trees, the purplish pinks of heathers, the yellows of broom blossoms, bright pinks and oranges of the many flowers here, the grey of the sea and sky, the blue and white of the sky on sunny days, the pebbles and rocks of the beaches, the peacock colours I identify as the vibes of this beautiful city…

As I said before, it’s not perfect but it’s exactly the way I want it to be.

The World Between

Come. Let’s cross boundaries…

You have nothing to fear as we go.

Let’s walk through gates of definitions

into a glorious, Global Garden of Beauty-

the realm of Arts and Crafts there.

Let’s explore that vast World Between,

where definitions of Fine Arts and Crafts

are sometimes seen to merge and blend…

Let’s walk where aesthetic artistry

and reverent responses to Beauty

send us beyond simple perceptions.

Here are Crafts inspiring imaginations,

stirring emotions to flow…

Here, they meet with Fine Arts too-

those wondrous creations made through

skills, talents, techniques and tools.

Here, Beauty speaks the same language

understood in feelings we all know.

Come. Let’s cross boundaries…

You have nothing to fear as we go.

February 17, 2021

Shelley Wilson

Sage, Sweetgrass and Cedar Hearts

Three Prayers Weaving and A Bow

Memories and A Photograph

This photo flew off the fridge door when I was wondering what to add to the Memories of Northeastern Ontario weaving. I understood when this happened that my Dad wanted me to place it in the area of Winter and snow on the left. My Sister, Bev, took this photo shortly after Dad passed from the physical body. Bev was on her yacht in Southern Ontario when a country song about hunting and fishing and love began to play. She felt an urge to look into the sky. There was this cloud formation that looks like someone on a snowmobile moving across the snow. Dad had loved snowmobiling. Then she had a vision of Dad and Mom laughing merrily as they danced to the music across the water. Dad was an ‘outdoors-man’- a hunter fisherman ‘huntin’ and ‘fishin’ like in the song. We were a modern family of ‘hunters and gatherers’ for food. We also grew much of our food on a quarter acre of mostly clay ground by a lake. Our ancestors did much the same in other lands and cultures and climes. Some of us even lived the lives of some of those ancestors too. Reincarnation puts a whole new slant on the subject of ‘cultural appropriation’.

July 30, 2020- Shelley Wilson)