Marlene

This is probably one of my first hand carved stamps. It is at least 15 years old, if not older. This pocket is being made for Marlene. A Pool Party mate. We exchanged emails this week. She is having rocky times right now. So I whipped up a pocket for her and this stamp just seemed the right imagery to use.

See that scrumptious Laura Wasilowski thread? May I say, “Yum”? I will buy this thread again. I would like to see her colors in person. This is a rainbow skein, it is bright, which is not my normal ‘go to’, but it really suites this pocket.  It sews beautifully. 

I look forward to hugging Marlene, next time I see her. 

Cleverly Lisa

 I don’t really advertise this fact but I give private lessons in my home studio, when asked and if I am able. So when Lisa Chin emailed me last month, asking if I would be teaching any classes during this week, I suggested she might take a private lesson. Lisa was in the city for a personal celebration and wanted an ‘art class’ to have a little fun. Do you think I could have taken more pictures? Yes! 

We worked with thickened dye on mostly cotton, we did some monoprinting, stamping, ruling pen, freezer paper, we used stencils, we gabbed, laughed and nibbled some nosh. I love how our worlds are made bigger and smaller by the internet, I read Lisa’s blog, I keep up with her through Facebook, she has made breast pockets for me!

And better still?

She encouraged her twin daughters’ volleyball team to make breast pockets for my project. These are the first paper pockets that I have received, and they brought tears to my eyes. The red one on top is my favorite (is it OK to have favorites?) It reads, 

The beating

Heart

inside the chest

is what counts 

more than the

breast

When I lifted the three pockets that Lisa made off the top of the pile of paper pockets, to read this sentiment, my heart strings sang. The young woman who wrote it is 15 years old (and unknown to Lisa, one of her daughters made it). Big happy sigh. Wednesday was a great day.

Cloth Paper Scissors is putting out an eBook of projects related to up-cycling, that includes a project that I wrote for them a few years back, Recyclababes.

Download your copy today!

Leslie Riley interviewed me for her Art and Soul Blog Talk Radio program. I would love for your to listen to it!

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/btrplayer.swf

Listen to internet radio with Art And Soul Radio on Blog Talk Radio

Round Up!

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I participate in a pool program, offered by my hospital to help survivors recover. I love this program, I go once a week, I connect with other survivors in a predominantly physical but also, at times, emotional level (which works best for me, I can’t go deeply into the emotional side or breast cancer or its treatment, I would rather enter into a more physical connection with other survivors) and we stretch, play and laugh together. Teri, our instructor is well versed in Range of Motion issues and the exercises that will help with them.

I made sure to ‘represent’ for us Flatties, and I squealed when they mentioned me specifically. 

I would never have thought that an aspect of the cancer experience would madke me feel so passionate. I firmly believe the ability to ‘Go Flat’ is an issue of women’s rights. This is an issue of body autonomy, women must have complete control over the only thing we can control, our bodies. As a result, Going Flat must become normalized. Women who forgo reconstruction should not wear breast forms for any other reason than having a preference to do so.

When the beautiful, deminuitive 75 year old fella pool program attendee, looked at me and pinched her ‘bubby’, which is what she calls her breast form, telling me she hated wearing it for the last — years (more than 2 decades). I fell in love with her, and fell in love with being a feminist, again. Her daughter keeps telling her to put the breast form away. But she does not feel able to leave the breast form behind! 

She called me brave. A teacher. She looked at me in awe.

And I am brave, many women cannot imagine leaving home without their breast forms. Others very much want to leave them behind, but feel pressure to wear them for their jobs, and for the people in their lives who expect them to look a certain way. As more women like me, Margaret  W. Smith and Jodi Jaecks put their bodies and their choices out there, normalization of this bodily form, this aspect of women’s lives, will occur. Society will  re-member the full array of shapes that an individual woman’s body can take in a lifetime. But no woman should feel compelled to wear forms because our society is misogynist and ignorant and has set up an expectation of what the female form should look like. Especially in light of breast cancer.

Breast Pockets are being made around the world!! I have put out a challenge for folks to make 1000 breast pockets to raise awareness for the women who choose not to reconstruct their bodies after breast cancer and to pave awareness for those who would like to put their forms aside entirely. October 22 is the deadline, you can make pockets in whatever way you choose, paper, cloth, mixed media. You can use this pattern, if you feel the need. If I have not answered your email (they are piling up) on where to send them, please be a greasy wheel!  😎

The above pocket was made by my good friend Elliot (who will be turning 9 on October 31) and can be seen here with her sister Alex, snuffling. 

Alex (who is 5 years old) and Cricket (we will leave her age up for debate!) also made some pockets. I have heard from folks as far ranging as Hong Kong, Australia, Finland, Canada and here in the U.S.  I really hope to get 1000 pockets made in a very short period of time. Will you please help?

To update you on my knitting world, my Boardwalk is coming along just fine! I need to knit about 5″ of stockinette stitch before the neck detail will start. I love the Malabrigo yarn I am using. The color stacks up beautifully. I am hoping this pattern will become a favorite, one that I can knit again and again.

And one last thing.

My mother has begun a new venture, a store featuring ‘Coastal Inspired Items for You and Your Home’ (I love this summation) called The Captain’s Chest. I am so very proud of her for doing this and would love for you to click over and see what she has in stock, perhaps you’ll see something you cannot live without! My mother is passionate about coastal living, entertaining, food and family and she does a beautiful job combining all of these into this new endeavor. Please check it out.

Steeped in Breast Pockets

As you know, I am asking for help to make 1000 breast  pockets in memory of or to honor your friends and loved ones who have decided against reconstructing their bodies after breast cancer. I posted this ‘Call For’ on Facebook, because it seems we all hang out there! Libby, from Mija Fiber Art quickly emailed me saying she had been saving breast pockets, taken from the clothing she uses to make her art for the last 10 years, she went on to offer me two boxes of breast pockets.

I could not refuse. 

The two boxes are so jam packed, the pockets ‘stick’ together. They are also somewhat loosely arranged by color!  I have not counted them. I love them though. I love that cloth has memory. The seam allowances remain turned back, there are snippets of thread left where the pockets were ripped from their original home. They become ‘documents’ (information or evidence that serves as an official record). And they each have personality, funky, wild, subdued, loud, quiet prints. 

My goodness. Largess comes in interesting, fun and exciting ways.

This is a pocket taken from Mija’s Largess. I am using hand dyed pearl cotton to highlight the printed leaves. This pocket is not yet complete, but it is calling my name as I type. 

If you are making pockets, please post them to facebook, or your blog, and let me know! I am keeping a pinterest board with all the pockets that we make and post about. Thank you for helping me get the word out.

Now I am off to go make some tea!

Saturday, oh saturday.

I bought this: Six Strand Embroidery Cotton, 500gm, White and I have no regret. I am falling in love with embroidery, and I mean head over heels in love.  And Procion MX dye has some part in the picture. 

I have been having a post cancer dialog with myself as to whether I would continue to use Procion MX dye.

Pros and cons:

It is a synthetic chemical.

It isn’t conducive to apartment living/studio space. 

I still drum up projects using Procion MX dye  for at least a portion of the project. 

I own a full set of colors and all of the equipment to go with it.

So what I have decided is, I am going to use the dyes I own and I am going to use it sporadically, as I see fit.  Embroidery is my current obsession and I want a full array of color gradations in every color of thread, so I prepare to dye them. I am on a mission to use the cloth I have been making for the last 10 years. Some dye use here and there, if tidy, succinct, and abbreviated is OK.

Discussion closed. 

 David and I walked through Red Hook this morning. There was a tag sale. I bought this set of stamps for 5$, no wait, 15$, oh, I mean 10$. It was a confusing negotiation. The cigar box had a 5$ sticker on it. I told the guy I wanted it, he said, “15$, please. You get the idea. We settled on 10$. I wanted the set. It also has a full set of numbers. The box they are nestled in, not the cigar box is the original.

Great find.

We also found a brand new wash board. I have been wanting one, we hand wash a lot here at Casa Testa. This washing board is metal, has two textures, one flat, one grated. It really is Dubl Handi.

Breast Pocket production is in ull swing around the world. I have spoken to folks in Hong Kong, Australia, Finland and all over the U.S. Someone read about the project over at Craft Gossip, which I have never heard of but I like very much. Great name, too.

Here you see the western pocket. I will Kantha Stitch this piece, dense straight rows in the negative space around the ribbon. Can you see it in this picture? For no particular reason, I am stitching this pocket for my paternal Grandmother. Maybe it is because she used to enjoy watching Westerns on Sunday afternoon television.

I love the Kantha Cloth that uses stitch along with pictorial story telling. I will be researching more about Kantha.

Sewing, Stitching, Embroidery.

The Little King has been doing quite well. He loves Chicknbits. Arrow can no longer hear well, his sight isn’t 100%, but he knows Chicknbits. He will lead me to the cabinet when he thinks of them. He has been a snuggle bunny, lap focused. He is warm. He smiles a lot. We put an old bed pillow on the floor, under my sewing tables and he loves it. You should see his happy baby, buddha smile. I treasure each moment with this little cat.

Speaking of Arrow, look who made it onto a Sew-plies Purse? Do you remember this stencil?

The owl, vaguely seen at upper right was copied from a bottle of Haden Fig wine. That was a good bottle of wine! We drank it over dinner one night in Seattle. It was a bit too much to drink and we enjoyed walking for a few hours afterward, it is fun to get too tipsy now and again. It is especially fun to get tipsy with David when we have the time to really enjoy one another’s company.

This Sew-plies purse will be a memory catcher, or a stitched journal, of sorts. Because if the nature of hand sewing (it takes a little longer), I have a bag of receipts and a pile of papers and cards that have logos, times, dates and ideas for further exploration here. I would love for this bag to be dense with stitch and the story of our trip to Seattle.

In the lower left you see a metal box. I am quite an obsessive compulsive person when I cotton on to an idea. The Sew-plies purses are really opening the way for me to sew wherever I go. But sometimes I just don’t want to be strapped into one. So I introduce, tiny sewing kits. The idea is that you can throw them into your purse and never be without something to do!

I am buying candy tins left and right, the smaller the better. I throw the candy out, rinse the box and gather a few choice items and ideas. This box has everything needed to create tags or labels. The white paper tag you see up there came from the scissor sharpener, when I brought my scissors for sharpening and I would like to use the written words from that tag to create some cloth labels. This box has cloth, a needle, pins, embroidery thread and a few scraps of cloth, for ‘just in case’.

And, of course, breast pocket production is in full swing. Kathy York has been making some. Will you? I need 1000.

Breast Pockets: A morph

Many people have contacted me and are making pockets to raise awareness for the breast cancer survivors who have decided against reconstructing our bodies! This is fantastic. I would love it if you too, might make a pocket! If I can get 1000 pockets, I will call the reporter I met on Monday and ask her if she will do a story! Please talk about this project on your blog, Facebook, by tweet, on Pinterest, wherever you think you might spread the word.

Just a few words on how I began doing this. I have been working with stitch and embroidery for a few months. At the same time, I am deconstructing and reconstructing the clothing that I own so that I can continue to wear them. Lots of women’s clothing is fitted , darts are used to accommodate the shape of the bust, my wardrobe has a fair amount of fitted garments that no longer hang properly on my frame, so I am taking them apart, removing the darts and putting them back together. When the darts are taken out, the breast pockets need to be temporarily removed and reattached after the dart is removed. I often have at least one set of breast pockets on my work table as a result.

That got me thinking about breast pockets, breast forms, prothesis, bra pockets and (of course) how I could make this into an artistic statement.  

The pockets we will make for the 1000 pocket project are not meant to be useful, they are an artistic statement, a showing of numbers and a way to create awareness that relates to real women and their choices related to the disease. The pockets should be ‘pocket shaped‘, or, as a pockets appear on the blouses in your closet. These pockets can have raw edges, you can fold the seams under as you would if you were going to sew it on a blouse, you can make a “pillow case” style pocket and hide all the raw edges, you can make it out of paper, you can knit pockets, it doesn’t matter how you do it, just that you do it. And please do it in memory or support of someone you know who has been diagnosed with breast cancer and decided against reconstructing their body, it does not matter if she wore breast forms. 

I would like to take the reporter I spoke with on Monday up on her offer to do a story about non-reconstructed breast cancer survivors, can you help a girl out? So far, about 40-50 people have ‘signed on’. Which means we need another 850 people! Let’s make a huge pile of pockets and help the women who decided against reconstruction know, they have your support. 

Breast Pockets-with deadline! 1000 pockets in 3 weeks?

I feel passionate about being a ‘flattie’, a woman who chose not to reconstruct after breast cancer treatments and doesn’t want to wear breast forms either. I am getting used to being flat and am experiencing the stares of curiosity that is a normal part of our humanity but also a showing of how few women chose to ‘go flat’ after breast cancer treatment. You may have read a recent article I wrote for Role/Reboot, an online magazine questioning gender in society. Here is the link:
 
 
The article pretty much sums up why I think women are hesitant to put their breast forms aside. I am active in an online forum for breast cancer survivors and the women on this board really would like ‘Flat Awareness’ to occur. We cringe at the thought of Plastic Surgery Reconstruction Day (October 17, search google-!) We don’t want foreign objects in our bodies. We don’t want to wear forms to maintain a ‘socially acceptable body image’.  We want to be accepted as women who have decided against reconstruction and we want to push this image into being widely accepted in the societal visual lexicon of what a female body can look like over the course of a lifetime. This isn’t just a choice for women who are ‘of an age’ (i.e. having no stake in the game, and believe me, this is often the response I hear when I say that I decided against reconstruction, it goes like this, ‘Oh! My mother (aunt, grandmother) decided against reconstruction but she was _ _ years old.’). We want to turn the repressive body image pressures off and create a new sexy, strong and beautiful but we are flat or half flat!
 
Today, I participated in a taped segment about my hospital’s Breast Cancer Survivors Pool Program. This is a local ABC News at 5 program. And believe me, I made sure I would be taped with no towel covering up my beautiful flat chested body. I went to represent me and my fella flat chested survivors. Hopefully, my interview will make the 90 second segment! At the same time I spoke with the reporter about the Breast Pocket project to raise awareness for those of us who decide against reconstructing our bodies. The reporter said, “If you can get 1000 pockets, contact me, we will try to do a story.”
 
—
 
I seek a physical representation of the women that you know, who made the decision not to reconstruct their bodies after breast cancer by way of making breast pockets (explained below).
 
Women who decide against reconstructing their bodies often wear prothesis or breast forms, as they are also called. These breast forms need pockets sewn into bras, camisoles and swim suits in order to hold the form in place. These forms can be quite heavy, uncomfortable, they shift, rub against our scars, often contribute to the dreaded, under-studied and life long struggle with lymphedema. Many of the women on the cancer boards I frequent do not want to wear forms, these women often feel compelled to keep up a ‘good image’ in their workplace and on the streets of their hometowns. We want to see acceptance of our choice and to let other women who have to make this decision to know that it ain’t all bad! So, won’t you please make a breast pocket in the name of your friend, mother, aunt, sister? Lets break the walls down, stop being quiet and making nice, lets build a world where it is acceptable to go flat after breast cancer treatment. With this call for breast pockets, I am using the idea of the shirt pocket, also called breast pockets to make an artistic statement about breast cancer and deciding to forego reconstruction.
 
Please, help me to take this reporter up on her offer to build awareness for us ‘flatties’. 

 
Call For Art: Breast Pockets (pockets as you would find on your favorite button up, pocketed blouse). There are many shapes of pockets, the western, patch, button down flap, choose a style! 
 
 
If your aunt had a unilateral mastectomy without reconstruction, make just one pocket and/or flap. If I am the only ‘flattie’ you know? Oh, well, you will need to make a pair!  The point is, I would like a physical representation of how many women forego reconstruction. I am lifting the curtain and peeking in. How many women do you know? Make pockets for each one, unilateral or bilateral. Each pocket should have a name attached to it, first names only. Please use the pattern on my site (see link below), or make your own pattern, because breasts come in all sizes and shapes, make them with your tools and media, don’t think twice about it. These pockets can be cloth or paper or. 
 
And please, invite your friends, in fact, forward the link to this post freely, please speak up, talk about it on your blogs. 
Email me when you have your  pockets completed and I will tell you where to send them. 
 
Deadline: Please send the pockets to me during the week of October 22. Comment on this post and I will put your name in an already growing list of participants. I will let you know where to ship your pockets in a private email.

Thread Dyeing and other Fun. Also a Call For:

Yesterday, I was making coffee and who ran past the window? A black Squirrel. I immediately grabbed some granola and put it on the sill. Grey Squirrel quickly ran over and started eating.

It is funny! At our subway stop there is a transgender person and a shoe shine man who both ‘beg’ change, the shoe shine man is new to the stop, he has priced his shine at 1$ hoping his customers will give more. I gave some change to the transgendered woman and she asked me to give the shoulder to the shoe shine man as I walked by!

Grey Squirrel didn’t ask, he just shouldered right in!

I am dyeing a color wheel gradation of embroidery thread in four steps for each color of the color wheel, 48 hanks of thread in total. I am doing this in preparation for the upcoming Boro Bag/Hip Bag class at The Clever Guild.

And Look! what just fell into my cart over at Amazon. I have been doing lots of embroidery over here and I find that I like 6 strand floss the best! I love the look of a single strand of floss, I like the ability to use all 6 strands, three strands, two, I am forming preferences related to embroidery threads.

These ‘100 calorie’ zip tight bags, all in a row, happy sigh. I am so glad you can’t eat the content of these bags! That would be a lot of calories.

I don’t think I got the recipe for the gradation down pat. I will be washing these samples today or tomorrow and I will need to tweek it a bit.

The 4 red thread samples you see here, told me the middle two gradations were ‘too close’. But they are so pretty all the same.

Who doesn’t like a gathering of good stuff to get the juices flowing.

 

I now have a fascination with breast pockets. I have been making breast pockets, not the blouses to go with them, just the pockets. I am changing my wardrobe to printed, button down blouses and pockets are key! Really, I like the name breast pocket, I no longer have breasts, but I can wear breast pockets!

When breast cancer survivors wear breast forms or prothesis, they need pockets sewn into their bras, camisoles and bathing suits to hold the forms in place. And flaps? Some reconstruction techniques use the word flap in the description of the procedure. I am not interested in any of that, but I like thinking about parallel ideas. In talking about clothing, when breast pockets have buttons, I think of them as nipples. When they have snaps, those too are nipples, with the added benefit of the actual shape (the male portion of the snap is nipple shaped). And with breast pockets on shirts, you can be prepared to stuff them full and change out the size of your ‘breasts’ in minutes flat (pun intended)! It is always good to have some useful pockets! In fact, I was putting embroidery floss in my breast pockets while laughing my head off in this in this post.

Do you know anyone who has had a mastectomy without reconstruction, unilateral or bilateral? Say you or aunt (mother, sister, friend, wife, coworker) was diagnosed with breast cancer and didn’t have reconstruction? In her name or memory, make either a single or a set of pockets and flaps appropriate to her choice, unilateral breast pocket or bilateral pockets and send them to me. I would like a huge pile of of pockets, in effect creating actual ‘awareness’, with a physical object that represents a real person.

And in preparation of the ‘pink month’, I figured I would ask for some help in creating awareness that does not exploit, or misrepresent me as a survivor and to go further, to shed light on us half/flatties! Some of the half flatties call themselves uniboobers! Funny, right? So, I invite you to make pockets and help raise awareness and pride in a choice I hope none of you ever face.

You can make them out of cloth, paper, I don’t care how or what you make them with, just make them. If you are interested in helping me out, please comment on this post. I will let you know where to send your pockets.

Here is a pattern for  a BreastPocket, if you feel you need one.

Edited to add:

Here are a few examples of the pockets I have been making, showing some pockets with flaps and just flaps: