two trees at fifty years

Ned and I celebrated our 50 years married at a resort in Mexico over New Year's.  Our four children and their families celebrated with us.    

There were eighteen in our party. It was a blast and I am so very thankful.

A note about the t-shirts we are wearing in this beach photo.  Created as a surprise for us, the youngsters marched into our room in a large group and they each wore a t-shirt.  The one year old twins, the school age sisters, the teen boys, the adults in their 30's and 40's.  They had a playlist from their childhood / our marriage.  They brought shirts for us to wear.  

The design is of two trees:  a white pine for Ned, referring to the Georgian Bay family cottage and an Elm tree for me, referring to the Elm tree on my parent's farm near Fort Frances.  Each tree is growing form its own root system, tall and strong, side by side.  

I've written about this 50 year thing before and I promise that this is the last post about it.  Shall we go on into the new year?  Best wishes to your family from mine for 2024.  xoxo  

fifty

Most of the things in our lives that make us who we are - our hearts, minds, bodies, ideas, passions - have kept the same as they were in our twenties when we met (me 19, him 21) and then married (me 22, him 24).  (bodies not so much)

We celebrated 50 years of marriage on September 8.  I am so grateful for him.   

He has been a rock for me and a companion and a lover.  He has supported my art.  We didn't know when we started this adventure in 1973 that he would end up being a financial planner for social work and that I would end up being an artist, but that's what we have evolved into, along with being a lucky couple.

Ned and Judy.

September 8 2023

celebration quilt

I finished my indigo checkerboard quilt last week.  

The one I've been working on for nine years.  Completely hand pieced from muslin and commercially indigo dyed cotton, using the nine patch method.  

I took it with me on all the trips that Ned and I have made over the last decade.  Whether plane or car, I pieced it and then hand quilted it.

It nurtured me through the pandemic as I quilted it in its hoop.

In a way, it is a celebration.

I'm glad that I finished it this year - the year that Ned and I celebrate our 50 years of marriage.

It is also the year that the family cottage turns 100 years.

our sleeping cabin 

We slept under it for three nights to celebrate all those things.  

It fits the Amish four poster bed that Ned made for the annex.

the dining room

This cottage, with it's old wooden furniture and floors and crooked windows has a timeless quality. 

the middle bedroom of the main cottage

the front bedroom of the main cottage

Our daughter April thrifted this quilt top and then hand quilted it.

the living room looking towards the dining room

the living room looking towards the bedrooms

looking into the kitchen from the dining room

Puckwana cottage today

the drawing I made on our honeymoon, 1973

Celebrate life my friends.

wanting to continue on

This post is about my count-down quilt.
I put two days of work into it every 6  weeks,
sewing log cabin blocks to foundations from scrap fabrics that have arrived in my life.

The intent is to celebrate that my husband and I will be married 50 years in 2023.

I'm making one log cabin block for each week as we count down to the 50th anniversary.
This is the first quilt top.
Probably there will be four such quilt tops when I'm done - as long as things continue on.

Wanting them to continue on.

This quilt is like a prayer.  I hope that nothing changes

166 more weeks to go. 

In 50 years

Art making is a positive act. Even when the artist is in despair. Even when the artist has fear. BECAUSE producing an object that is intended to be looked at by others (in 50 years) implies a belief that there will be a society of people who are able to respond to that work. (in 50 years)