sarah in nyc

I am sitting at a phone charging station in the Santa Barbara airport waiting for our flight to board. This trip has been an uneventful one spent mostly with family. We didn't do any tourist activities.  Mostly we hung around, and went on some walks. An easy walk up a path got us both mountain and ocean views.  I loved the vegetation. It has been an especially rainy winter.   On my last visit this was all dry and scrubby. We had seen hang gliding lessons on this hill last year.  We learned that this is the best spot to learn how to paraglide in the area. We watched people we were told were beginners taking to the air. I am afraid of heights.  I have terrible balance and can't even manage down escalators. Watching gave me a moment to pretend that I was flying. 

I have been thinking a great deal about the difference between working with a pattern and my own work methods.  When one works with a pattern someone else has planned out all of the tasks needed to get the job done. That's one way to work but it isn't how I work. My way towards getting a job done requires a whole lot of decision making  throughout the whole process.  My painting teacher in college used to say that it isn't enough for a painting to be pretty it needs to be a response to a question. I think that this is true for my latest tallit. From a distance, it's pretty. Close up, you realize that there's a whole lot going on. I got the tallit completed but had to also make a bag. I had two small bits of the striped section of the tallit left. It wasn't quite enough to make the bag but it could work for the flap of the bag.  There is  lots of unseen inner construction to beef up the white raw silk  outer bag. My ini...

The other night I delivered the brit milah pillow to my friend. When I arrived at her office the sun was not yet setting but her building was glowing in that incredible late afternoon light that makes everything seem magical.   The low sun picks up details in the masonry that otherwise get bleached out by full sunlight. After a warm chat, I made my way home.  It was a bit later, the sun was making it's way down in the sky. While it wasn't a knock your socks off sunset it was still pretty. I loved how the mundane was changed by the quality of the light and the shifted colors. Last night we went out to celebrate my nephew's engagement and to meet his lovely bride. My husband and I walked north along Broadway.  The sunset became spectacular. As we walked north more and more people stopped in the crosswalks to take photos. ...