This has been an interesting year

In case you hadn't heard, I suffered a stroke back in May.  I have gone from being barely able to get out of bed to being able to hobble around with a cane. I am definitely getting better as the days go by.

I have been to lots of physical therapy sessions. They gave me lots of exercises to do. But one of the most important things they told me was to do familiar things around the house. And what is more familiar to me than sewing?!?!? I have been doing lots of sewing in the last couple of months. It has really helped with my rehabilitation. And it's been a change from my usual sewing where I am trying to make enough items to sell at shows. Since I am physically unable to do shows, I can take my time and enjoy the sewing process.

I started out with smaller projects like the crossbody bags and eyeglass cases. Then I moved on to a more difficult bag project, a padded laptop/music bag. Then it was on to the quilts. Those ended up being a real upper body workout. You don't really realize how much effort it takes to push around several pounds of fabric. It was great exercise!

With all that rehab work I was finally ready to tackle some artwork. But I thought I would start small and do Christmas cards. More on that in the next post.