Heeeey Bonnie Louuuuuu! =)

Today I have really sad news.  My good friend, Bonnie Lou, passed away!  She was 58 years old.  So this post is in honor of my Bonnie Lou.

Things friends do for each other:
1. teach each other how to quilt
2. grow gardens for each other and share produce
3. exchange your very best recipes
4. pray for each other
5. sing together
6. help put a bra on after surgery, clean amputation sites and put on clean bandages
7. call at 3AM and know that you will come running to help save all the fabric and new sewing machine in the basement when the sewer water is shooting like a geyser from the toilet in a horrific summer storm and the water is up to your knees
8. eat pickles together, honk when you drive past their house, volunteer together
9. buy sewing buttons for each other just cause they are colorful and buttons make you happy
10. cry with each other when you find a lump in your breast and then hoot and holler when it's just a cyst
11. listen but don't judge when your kid screws up
12. tells you when your shorts are caught in your crack
13. Ooo and aaah over the fact that one of you is going to be a grandma
14. help the other one clean house like mad because out-of-town company is coming
15. love your friend's dog even if he is the size of a Buick and weighs more than you and sheds and slobbers like no dog you've ever encountered
16. go to seedy Mexican restaurants on the 'bad' side of town to eat the best tacos of your life together...and go back again the next week just because it was so good
17. panic when you can't get in touch with them when they've been out driving in an ice storm
18. buys you a new hand mixer when the one you lent her won't hold the beater in---even though you told her it was that way for the last 20 years when you lent it to her
19. encourages you all the way
20. hugs you to your bones

Bonnie was a good friend.  She was a fabulous Southern cook (won ribbons at the state fair!), she loved her own family, she loved my family, she loved anyone she encountered.  She had excellent fabric choices in quilting, she made quilts for children with terminal diseases, she prayed all the time for anyone who needed it, she was generous to a fault, and very encouraging...she just plain ol' cared!

I am ashamed to say that I hadn't been in contact much with Bonnie since she moved from our town.  And the day she died, I had been out in my garden and thought, "When these tomatoes turn red, I'm going to get a hold of Bonnie Lou and take her a bag of them.  I should call her."  I should have listened to that voice and contacted her that day.  Shame on me for not listening.  But you know what?  Bonnie Lou would understand, she was a good friend.

Waaaay freakin' fun today!

Well, yard work and cleaning the photography studio isn't exactly my idea of great fun, but I got to make some art today and used beeswax for the first time to do some encaustic work.  Ohhhh boy!  That was waaaay freakin' fun!  I am goofy over it!

When I was a little girl, I got into soooo much trouble because I was melting crayons and candles in my room and dripping them on paper to make cool designs.  My brother ratted me out, but it was probably a good thing since I could have caught the whole house on fire.  So I guess I was doing encaustic back in the early 70's before it was "cool"---ha!  Boy, did I get grounded.  That squelched my wax days until now!  I was seven or eight years old, now I am 44 years old.

So, I'm in Suzi Blu's La La La class, and the first assignment was to make a cute pink bunny.  I love bunnies, and used to raise them as a child, but as I got to making it I sort of felt silly for some reason.  Like it wasn't really art or something.  What dumb gremlin snuck into my head? So in a rebellious mood, and thanks to some inspiration from my friend Kelly, I made an alternate version...a zombie bunny!  I posted it on my page at Suzi Skool, hope she doesn't expel me.  Ha!  I love my zombunny!  He makes me happy.

I bought a new art book this week, called Plaster Studio.  I'm really excited about it, maybe because I have a ton of drywall mud leftover from when our basement flooded last year and I don't have to run out and buy a million dollars worth of supplies to try something new.  So maybe this weekend I will try something out of that book.  We'll see.

Well, that's all for now.  More again, soon!
Maggie xoxoxo

I WON!!!

I am sooooooo excited!  I just joined "Little Glimpses" group and found a place where they were asking what you do consistently to pause and assess.  Well, during Kelly's visit, she said one of the most profound and yet simple things that has totally changed my outlook each day.  She said instead of asking someone who is ill every day, "How are you?"---instead, ask, "What's good today?"  It makes you focus on positive things.  Poor Jeffrey, every morning was being woken and asked to concentrate on what hurts and what felt yucky when I asked, "How are you?"---now he gets a grin on his face when I ask him, "What's good today?"

SO!  Actually, Regan won the contest by a random generator, but she wanted to give the artwork to ME!  What an awesome and selfless act!  I am so excited and honored to have a piece of artwork by Mystele!  It's titled, "Sadie Paused" and is a wonderful, wonderful reminder to Jeffrey and me to continue to pause and think of "What's good today" even when he feels so crappy all the time.

Today I got to surprise him with a, "GUESS WHAT'S REEEAALLLLY GOOD TODAY?!?"  And I got to tell him that we won a painting and he was genuinely excited!  Hooray!

Maggie  xoxoxo