For the Baltimore Couple

Now that I've received notice that the package arrived safely, I can share some pictures of a recent wedding gift I made. Katy and Martin met at Beloit College in Wisconsin where I earned my degree. We shared a lot of good times during those years and I was disappointed to miss their wedding last October. They are a lovely couple with a jovial, youthful spirit and a heap whole lot of creativity.

The inspiration for their gift was a picture of their halloween costumes from last year. They sported the personas of two major Baltimore faces: "The Utz Girl" of potato chip fame, and "Mr. Boh"from National Bohemian Beer. Both are particularly quirky representatives of Baltimore consumption. So is the couple.

As you can tell by looking at the date of their wedding (OCT 2011!), it took me a long time to get around to getting this project done. Once I started the process, however, it only took a couple evenings to finish the embroidery.

I stretched it so that it would fit in any 8x10 sized frame (that way they could pick a frame that would go with their chic home decor). That freed me up to send the gift via cheap-o snail mail. It was fun to wrap it up in brown paper and to stick several stamps on it, knowing that it would arrive at some unknown date between 3-5 days later. How I love the postal service!

I feel good about the way it turned out and am pleased to hear that Katy and Martin like it too. I think I will file this design for when I get my Etsy store finally up and running. There might be a market for it in the Northeast.

I hadn't been in touch with this couple much at all since graduation from college. These life moments punctuate the time between then and now. A wedding a month or so. Recently, the babies have started to appear. I am startled to find that 6 years have passed since I was a college student. I still sometimes think of myself as a high schooler. Perhaps that's the fault/benefit of working with young people all the time.

I'm always making embroideries to mark the big moments in other people's lives. I think the next project I take on should be a sampler for myself. What should I make? Perhaps a map project? (Ala The United States of Sinda & Niko) Maybe a treasure map, or a Family Circus style bouncing dotted line map. What do you think? What are the landmarks I should include in my-awesome-life-so-far-journey embroidery?