Modern quilt contest

The project on my sewing table is something I've had in the works for a few years. I recently saw the contest that The Modern Quilt Guild has going on. It challenges us to create a quilt from a picture. The deadline is TODAY! Luckily, I have, not only the pictures that I've used for my inspiration, but I also had the quilt started... all the fabric bought, and cut out since last Spring. This contest is the perfect motivation for me to finish it. Unfortunately, I've also had a lot of other quilts that I needed to get done by certain deadlines, so I'm not sure this will get done today. Wish me luck!

Here's the picture of the inspiration. It's tile work from the New Orleans International Airport. Until my dad passed away 2 1/2 years ago, my family has lived in New Orleans or Baton Rouge for 40+ years. About a year ago, my mom moved from New Orleans to Dallas to be closer to my brother and her sister. This pictures was taken on our very last visit to New Orleans, in June of 2009. The kids and I flew there to help my mom pack up all of her house. Because of Katrina, there wasn't as much of it as there would have been. My parent's house had about 2-3 feet of water sitting in it for weeks, and almost everything was ruined. But that's another story.

This last trip was very bittersweet for me. This very airport terminal was the sight of a horrendous exodus, as people fled from the storm and its aftermath. In older parts of the terminal tiles are missing, broken, and a bit neglected, kind of like the city and the people of New Orleans, and the Gulf Coast, following Katrina and the BP oil spill. But I managed to snap this picture in a newer part of the terminal right before our own final flight away from New Orleans. It makes me so sad to no longer have family there, but I do have some friends still there, and hope to some day return. Until then, I DO know what it means to miss New Orleans. This quilt will remind me of the joyous city and place that I called home for many years.... Here it is in progress. Wish me luck. I'll try to post a picture of it finished as soon as it is!

PS It's Tuesday, and I'm linking up with Quilt Story's "Fabric Tuesday"! Take a look over there at the other wonderful fabric projects others are working on!

Louisiana oil spill

Words don't even begin to describe what I'm feeling right now. From the first mention of the BP oil rig exploding on the news, my anxiety level started rising. I've personally known people who worked on oil rigs, and even worked in a job at an environmental lab in Southern Louisiana, testing effluent from these places. I've been on chartered fishing trips that anchored near them to fish, drove along stretches of coastline where they stretched from horizon to horizon. I've been to Port Sulfur, and Venice, LA. My husband and I were even married in the swamp at the Louisiana Nature and Science Center, a place that was destroyed in Hurricane Katrina. I worked at the Audubon Zoo's Wild Bird Rehabilitation Center. Some of the beaches and barrier islands that I've spent youthful summer afternoons on no longer exist as they once did. For me, it's so personal! The oil coming ashore right now will have an enormous impact. It'll impact the wildlife and fisheries, plants and ecosystems and the people who depend on them for their livelihood. Most importantly, there are 11 families who lost loved ones during the explosion. My heart is aching.
I grew up learning about the environmental impacts of canals being dug through the marshland and swamps of Southern Louisiana, the impact of putting levies around the Mississippi river, introduced Nutria eating away the marsh, the oil rigs, refineries, pollution from agricultural chemical run-off from half the country traveling through the Mississippi River and being spilled out into the Gulf of Mexico. I knew when Hurricane Katrina hit that it wasn't only the storm to be concerned about. I'd seen first hand how easy it was to overwhelm the pump system in New Orleans, which siphons off excess rain water from its below-sea-level neighborhoods.

As a Louisiana native I feel a pull to the place I spent most of my childhood. After 3 years in Kentucky, I responded, to attend college and stay another 5 years. I still feel it's pull, and at times like these I want to be there helping. All of the horrible emotions I felt during Hurricane Katrina are starting to surface again. As before, I'm thousands of miles away. I'll do what I can. Write a blog, send money, try to connect with others here who understand my pain. But it just doesn't ever seem to be enough...

In my grief and anxiety, I must remember the positive lessons I learned from Hurricane Katrina. Namely, that there is hope. The people and the land that is Louisiana have an incredible mystifying way of recovering... a zeal for life and a strength that defies all odds.

A Time to Mourn, and a Time to Dance

One of my most prized possessions, given graciously to me by my mom, after my dad's death, was my dad's clarinet. I was fortunate to grow up in a family of music lovers, my dad included. He played clarinet in schools in Amarillo Texas where he grew up, as well as for LSU, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where he (and my mom) attended grad school, and where I was born. I have fond memories of my dad playing his clarinet for us, and I was always mesmerized by the sounds he could make with it. My dad was a huge fan of classical music, as well as jazz, and we regularly went to concerts at LSU and in and around Baton Rouge. One of the highlights of Mardi Gras for my dad was seeing (and hearing) Pete Fountain's "Half Fast Walking Club" stroll by on Mardi Gras Day in New Orleans.

After my dad's sudden death in May 2008 my family drove down to New Orleans over Christmas Break last year to help my mom go through all of my dad's things. As you know, their house had 2-3 feet of water in it during Katrina. So not only is this clarinet a cherished memento, but a Katrina survivor as well... tucked as it was up high in a closet and lucky to have been protected by its case. It was over Christmas that my mom allowed us to take it with us, intending it to be used for a potential instrument for my son as he started 6th grade band this year.

Now I have no experience at all with band. I learned piano and violin growing up, so I had no idea how to even put the clarinet together. Plus having sat in a closet in Southern Louisiana for many years unused, it needed maintenance and cleaning. The case was musty (to say the least), the key pads separated, corks old, etc..

As my son started band this year, I didn't' want to put any pressure on him to choose clarinet as his instrument, and made that clear. But choose he did.

Last week I sent this clarinet off to school to be repaired through the band program. It just came back last night! This past week I've shed so many tears thinking about this clarinet and my dad. I deeply mourn the fact that my son never got to see his grandpa play it, and that my dad will never hear the instrument played by his grandson. Grief is such an incredibly difficult journey. There's no telling when it'll cripple you, even months after a loved one has passed. But with this gift, I know there will one day be a time to dance.