Idle Hands And All That

2020 has been a crazy ride, hasn’t it?

2016 was lightweight compared to this year, (the year we lost a lot of great musicians and artists) and as many of you may or may not know, I had a rough 2019 when pretty much all I own in my daily life was stolen – clothes, shoes, boots, camping gear, art supplies, my studio tools (think x-acto knife and t-square and other items I’ve had since art school forty years ago) – so when shelter in place came into effect this year it was just icing on the cake.

I live in a VW bus, so I don’t really have a studio to work in. I mean, I can do small pieces in here, work in sketchbooks and work on editing my photographs in here, but I don’t get to do my big work. And it doesn’t really matter since my ink and conte crayons and pastels and all of that vanished last year. At the end of 2019 around Thanksgiving I took up crocheting again, mostly to start replacing stolen clothing. And as a sort of meditation practice. Right when the pandemic hit I ran out of yarn and while I was whining about it on facebook, my cousins back east were packing up their leftovers and sending them to me.

There are times when creating isn’t all about the art, it’s just in the making. It doesn’t matter what it is, just so my hands are not idle and something comes out of it. I think I learned that from Grandma K. She grew up in The Depression and never let any of the grandkids forget it. She also taught me how to knit, crochet, and sew.

Here are some of my pandemic scarves that were made by my idle hands. I also made a blanket shawl before the pandemic and a striped “leftovers” blanket (made out of merino wool and cashmere!!!) and I’m currently working on a wide shawl, but the pandemic scarves were the most fun. I worked with what my cousins sent to me and now I’m better equipped for the next mini-ice-age!