Pretty Amazing

It has been a pretty amazing week in several ways. Maybe you don't remember, but the first 3 months of this year were incredibly busy and focused for me. I had obligations and I had deadlines and opportunities so I really put a lot of time in during those months. This week I am seeing some of the fruits of all that labor.

A couple days ago this little book arrived on my doorstep.

My quilt "What's left behind" was juried into a show called Beneath the Surface, which will first show at the International Quilt Festival in Long Beach later this month and in Houston in the fall. The organizers had a small book made which can be ordered directly from Blurb or purchased at the shows. Each quilt and artist has a nice 2 page spread in the book. (by the way—if you go to the Blurb site you can actually look through the whole book)

Yesterday the CD of season 6,  including my three segments, of Quilting Arts TV showed up on the doorstep.

This was something I was both looking forward to and dreading. After I taped the show in March I told Pokey, the editor of Quilting Arts and hostess of the show, that I had stepped way outside my comfort zone. She laughed, but I was serious. The thing that was shocking was my total amnesia about what I had said on camera. I really had no sense of how it had gone. Had I grinned maniacally? (I tend to do that when I am ill at ease.) Had I hemmed and hawed—cleared my throat obsessively? Repeated myself? I really did not have a clue. And it has worried me since then. I have no experience with this. I watched it with some trepidation last night and I was relieved and pleased. I wasn't bad! It was nicely edited and I especially noticed that a lot of the time I was talking, the camera was focusing on the details of the project I was talking about and Pokey's reactions, so I was not as "on view" as I had feared. My voice sounded fine (though eerily like my sister's) and my hands did not shake in the closeups. You don't know how relieved I feel. Really.

Probably the most amazing part of the week happened yesterday, when I got, by email, the lazer proofs of the 12 x 12 book. It went to all the twelves for our final edits and looks like the book will look, minus the cover, which we have not seen yet. Can I say this? It is awesome! I could not tear myself away for two hours yesterday and each page was a revelation. It is the whole story. It is all the artwork. It is each of us in our own words and pictures. It is funny and touching and inspiring, even to those of us who lived it. It is one of the most satisfying things I have ever been associated with. Wish I could show you a peek. But I can't. Yet.

And last, and definitely least, I finished my dress to wear to my niece's wedding. It does its intended job of making the pretty shirt jacket look good. It fits and does not reveal parts best left unrevealed. That's all I needed.

I am thinking about wearing the coral necklace I bought in Ecuador with it. If you read yesterday's post you will recognize a variation of  my color scheme.

Now, if I am to attend the wedding, and wear the dress, my grandson needs to stick to the plan and not be born early. His due date is a month from today!