March

Last year when I went to visit my sister and her new baby I happily booked myself a flight, and since I am not the most seasoned traveler, and since there was only one direct flight a day between our two cities, and because that one flight departed at 6:30 a.m., which meant getting up at 4:00 a.m., I found myself Very Disappointed when the airline said that there were some problems with the weather and that none of the luggage and some of the passengers would have to be left behind. It so turned out that I ended up being one of those passengers. Very Disappointed Indeed.

However, it came with a small compensation. I got a guarented window seat on the next flight that they put me on and I also got a $200 travel voucher. Good for 1 year. Anywhere Air Canada traveled.

Which puts me to March of this year.

But first we have to go back to November.

My friend Rachel has family just outside of Ottawa and frequiently flies home. Which puts her on the list of people who get e-mails about specials that the airline is having. And last Novemebr she found a deal that was too hard to resist. Flights one way to Ottawa were $79. And seeing as she likes me and knows that I have a nephew in the Ottawa area (not to mention a sister and brother-in-law that I am quite fond of) she let me in on the deal and the special "code" that you needed to know.

So I booked my flight. The same 6:30 a.m. flight. But this time there were no delays. Well there was the small delay when my sister and I were on either side of a divider waiting for the other one to show up, but I don't really count that. I had a great time and was amazed at how much my nephew had grown, and was charmed by him once again. I also enjoyed hanging out with my sister and brother-in-law too.

It came time for me to fly home. Once again a direct flight but this one was in the early evening.  Just as the sun was setting. And we were flying into the dark.

I had a window seat, and although I had a book that I was quite interested in, I spent most of the next 30 minutes with my face pressed to the window looking down and out. I was quite intrigued by the patterns on the ground. More specifically the patterns of the street lights. The dark with that spark of light. We have all been on residential streets and have seen street lights and most of the time I am sure that we were happy that they were there. We have all looked at maps of our neighbourhood.

This was the first time that I had seen the two melded together.  I was intrigued. And inspired.

When I got home I had an idea of how I was going to translate this vision into a felt vessel. Cut holes in a black vessel, stitch in beads, and add a light.

So I made a small black vessel and started cutting holes.

With scissors.

Tedious.

But it worked, so I continued clipping until I had enough holes to give myself an idea whether or not it would work. I stitched in the beads and liked the preliminary results.

But there had to be a better way.

After thinking for a bit about ways to punch holes into fabric, I realized that you can get punches for inserting grommets. Off to the store went I and found a punch that looked like it would work with my chosen beads. I put a stick in a vice and the upper end inside the vessel to have a hard surface against which to hammer and punched a line of straight, even holes.

Small punch tool

Success!

 

Now I could continue onto the final piece.

I am still stitching beads into the holes but should be done in the next couple of days.

Check back soon for the continuing story of March!