I can think of about a dozen other things I should be doing right now. Truly a dozen. But here I sit wanting to be quiet and still. Really I just want to make tea, knit sweaters, and curl up under a quilt. Or keep working on a quilt.
I don't know if I should blame Daylight Saving on my desire to hole up? (On that subject,...why? Just why? Let's all protest!!!) Maybe it's the Steamboat winter/spring/no,-it's-winter-again/or,-oops!-It-IS-spring weather that comes this time of year? Yesterday I was out walking the Core Trail in town, and today we are waiting for the beginning of the expected snow to begin falling, which will continue to fall into next week.
It could be that it's because I haven't had sugar since Ash Wednesday, and I know that I still have eighteen days to go before the Lenten season has concluded for this year. I made a deliberate decision to cut the sweets out. It's a sacrifice. It hurts. I wish it didn't, but there it is. Naturally, this would be the year that my brother and his wife would drive up from Texas with a cooler stocked full with Blue Bell ice cream in the back of their car. I had forgotten that both my son's and my husband's birthdays would be happening, full of cake and chocolate and apple crostata and more ice cream. But I need this time of saying, "No". How seldom do we really tell ourselves, "No. Not today. Wait. Be patient. Rest. Be refined. Be restored. Be at peace."
I had no intention of talking about Lent when I sat down to write this post, but it is ever-present in my mind. I did not grow up in a church tradition that observed Lent. Some viewed it as an unnecessary and meaningless practice. We didn't know what we didn't know. My priest shared the most beautiful sermon on the first Sunday of Lent three weeks ago. I wish every single person I know could have heard it. Not two days before that Sunday, I found myself knocked down and out and in tears over something, and I understood in my heart the call that I heard. "Let go. Lay it down. Quiet yourself."
"I have calmed and quieted myself, I am like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child I am content."
Quiet and still. Because I have what I have need of. No fidgeting. No fretting. Only peace.
The beauty of Lent, for me, is that I see myself more fully. I acknowledge my deep need to be filled with One greater than myself. Every time I tell myself, "no", I see my weakness. The ache of surrender brings quietness and contentment. The ache precedes the healing. My head is spinning with so much these days; things that I cannot put into words just yet.
Thanks be to God.
I told myself that I would take more pictures the next time we had visitors, and I started out doing so, but I didn't keep up too well. We had a wonderful time eating and drinking, smoking meat and baking bread, talking and laughing, playing and singing.
But right now I notice the first hints of spring, even as snow falls. Right now I linger in winter just a little bit longer. Quiet.
Colorado Sampler Quilt blocks:
Log Cabin block pattern: Delaware Quilts
Fabrics: Avalon by Fig Tree Quilts for Moda Fabrics
Farmhouse by Fig Quilts for Moda Fabrics
Somerset by Fig Quilts for Moda Fabrics
2 unknown fabrics from stash
Snow by Kona Cotton Solids
The very first quilt block that I learned to make (and still my favorite!). I was a teenager and wasn't really interested in quilts, but a lady from our church was offering to teach a little class on the Log Cabin Quilt, so I went. And I was hooked! We used Elinor Burns' Quilt in a Day book. (Anybody else use that book back in the day?) I included the Log Cabin block in this quilt to represent all of the log cabins in the Colorado Rockies. I chose a traditional red fabric to represent the hearth of the home. I chose classic browns and beiges for the logs, to represent our log-sided home. If you look closely, you will see that one of the dark fabrics that I chose is a dog print. I fussy-cut a terrier, and placed her curled up next to the hearth. My Molly.
The Scottish Cross block pattern: Quilter's Cache
Fabrics: Avalon by Fig Tree Quilts for Moda Fabrics
Strawberry Fields by Fig Tree Quilts for Moda Fabrics
Snow by Kona Cotton Solids
A personal choice of block to represent my faith, especially its growth and its changes, its mystery and its beauty.
"And I believe what I believe is what makes me what I am. I did not make it. No, it is making me." - Creed, Rich Mullins