I first learned about the provenance of serendipity when I was in my late thirties.  I’d just found out that the man who raised me was not my biological father.   My mother still insists that I knew the truth about my past,  and  it was my decision at six years old, never to speak of him again.  A few weeks after I met my biological father, a letter arrived in the mail from his sister that cleared up a thirty year old mystery for me.  When I was six, I had a huge collection of stuffed animals that mysteriously vanished from our house while I was at school one day.  In the letter, my aunt explained how she used to work at a department store, and every payday, she bought a stuffed animal for me.  I also learned that my stepfather officially adopted me when I was six, and the day the paperwork was final, everything about my past went into the dumpster.

I am also reminded more frequently now of the power of serendipity thanks to the 10 pound Shih Tzu who lives in my house.  We got a phone call last winter to apply for seasonal jobs at the local ski lodge.  We headed up the mountain on a Tuesday afternoon at 2:00 and as we rounded the corner, a half frozen Shih Tzu with a huge chunk of hair missing from the middle of her back sat shivering in a snow bank.  She was emaciated and matted, and we adopted her on the spot.  We also found out we’d gone the wrong way to the lodge.  There was absolutely no reason to be in that particular place on that particular day….except for the provenance of serendipity.

A few days ago, while I was working at one of part time jobs, I got a phone call from a woman I would never have had any reason to meet otherwise. Her name is Shirley Lucas, and she was one of a very famous pair of sisters who worked as stunt riders, trick riders and rodeo queens in the 1940′s to the 1960′s. They doubled for everyone from Lucille Ball and Betty Hutton to Lauren Bacall and Esther Williams.  Shirley is 88 years old now and has a new book out called IT TAKES  A GOOD HORSE.  The book is self published and in desperate need of wider distribution and acknowledgement, so I put her together with Bobbi Jean Bell, owner of Outwest Boutique and Marketing, because Bobbi used to work for the Gene Autry Western Heritage Museum and is as in love with the Old West as I am.  In fact, I admitted to Shirley that I wanted to be a cowgirl when I was growing up so badly I could hardly see straight.

I was also surprised to learn she is not in the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame, and has never been interviewed for a feature story by Cowboys and Indians Magazine.

This is the link to her website and the new book, and if anyone knows ANYONE who can help get this woman the recognition she deserves, then please, do whatever you can to make sure Shirley and Sharon Lucas are not forgotten. Because it seems to me that the path to this remarkable woman and our new friendship was meant to be.

Over the years, we’ve helped each other through all sorts of things, not the least of which were the two years her husband was serving as a doctor in Afghanistan.  When he got back, they decided they needed to change their lives completely, in part because they’d both lost their jobs, and in part, because they both realized it was time to ask themselves what really mattered in life.  A few weeks ago they decided they wanted to buy an RV and travel the U.S. in search of the place they wanted to spend the rest of their lives, and within days, they found an amazing deal on an RV, sold all their things, and headed to Flagstaff to begin their journey.

Sometimes things happen in this lifetime that make absolutely no sense to me at the time.  I’ve had a love/hate relationship with the idea that “things happen for a reason” most of my life.  When things happen that I don’t understand,  I am convinced there is no possible reason there will ever be a good outcome, until the day the lightening bolt hits me and I discover that everything about the events leading up to that revelation happened exactly as they should.  I wanted to tell the story about Suzie, because I think Michael met Suzie, who met Toni, who met me, because Suzie needed a confidente and  a best friend at a particular point in her life, and so did I.  And now Suzie has become my hero, because she made a decision, focused on that decision, and made it happen.  I told her I marvel that she found what she wanted out of life so quickly, and that it took so damned long to get there.

I made the hard decision to quit art a year ago to try to save my house.  I was five months behind on my mortgage with no idea how I would manage to avoid foreclosure, when I got not one, but three jobs in a town were jobs are almost impossible to come by.  I am also convinced that I had a guardian angel on my side.  There is no evidence whatsoever to support this conclusion, but again, the “coincidence” is hard to ignore. I went to New York last summer to audition for Project Accessory.  The trains to Pearl River  where I was staying at the time were under construction so I had to take the bus back.  I was in a tiny waiting room at the Port Authority, when I began a conversation with a woman who was also waiting for the bus.  When she told me she worked for JP Morgan Chase, I told her how unhappy I was with the way they had handled my home loan modification.  Meaning, they kept turning me down but never bothered to explain why.  She asked for my card and told me she would have an in-house mortgage counsellor handle my loan.   I figured she would toss the card the minute I was out of sight….instead, I qualified for a permanent home loan modification in three months time.  I can’t prove this woman had anything to do with it, but considering the abandon with which JP Morgan Chase forecloses on homeowners,  it’s the only thing that makes any sense to me.

“All of the sudden”,  I am in three new galleries and completely revised my website  to focus on these new galleries, as well as the new corporate gifts line I’m excited to launch.  My work was accepted to the Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology for their spring fashion show.  I am in discussions with  a Los Angeles based company about providing Academy Award nominees with evening bags as part of their “swag bag” offerings.  I am also scheduled for a radio interview on January 28 at 9:15 PST with Bobbi Jean Bell, owner of  OutWest Boutique and Cultural Center in Santa Clarita, California.  I was also invited to create a new line of handbags inspired by the designs of Yves Saint Laurent by the Spirits In the Wind Gallery in Golden, Colorado in a show to run concurrently with the Denver Museum of Art’s YSL retrospective.  The show runs from April 6 to June 30th.  And last, but not least, I have brand new work at a gorgeous new gallery in Florida called Gallery One, which carries an amazing collection of art and artists that I am extremely proud to be a part of.

It seems a new phase of the journey has begun and I can’t wait to see where it takes me.

I’ve been to all three Hollywood premieres of The Lord of the Rings (as well all three after parties) and even  borrowed the executive producer’s limousine  to take me back to the Motel 6 where I was staying at the time!    I’ve been a celebrity wrangler at the Palm Springs Film Festival where I outfitted the legendary composer, Michel Legrand, with a bowtie he never paid me back for, and managed to swing a backstage pass to a  David Bowie concert where I met the great film producer, Ray Stark (who left his table and a fleet of people lined up to pay homage to him, to greet everyone at MY table when I naively asked if he would mind saying hello to my friends!).  I’ve been behind the scenes for the chuckwagon races at the Calgary Stampede, toured the stables at Cavalia (Cirque du Soleil on horseback), soaked in sulphur hot springs in Thermopolis, Wyoming, taken a helicopter tour of Kauai, auditioned for Expedition Impossible, Project Accessory AND The Amazing Race.

Last year  a friend of mine introduced me to a friend of hers over drinks, and when I found out that he was a flight captain for the big balloons at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade, I immediately asked if I could participate.  I have always loved MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET and watch it every year after setting up my tree.  I know every frame of that movie by heart and I still cry every year when Natalie Wood gets her dream house. I swoon whenever I drive through Teaneck, New Jersey (if you need to ask then you don’t deserve to know!) so being a part of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade experience shot to the top of my bucket list like a rocket.

You can’t just call Macy’s and ask to be a balloon handler; you have to be sponsored by a current participant, and they give first crack at the balloons every year to Macy’s employees.  Because there are about 1800 volunteers for the parade overall, spaces do open up, and this past April, we received our online application to be balloon handlers for none other than the Spiderman balloon.  With the help of a very generous friend who agreed to trade  a hotel room for artwork, we were able to stay at the Marriott on 49th and Lexington, and with an outrageously inexpensive flight from Charlotte to Newark, we headed off to New York City on November 21 to walk in the most famous parade on the planet.

First, we took in the Broadway performance of Spiderman at the Foxwood Theatre on Tuesday night after a taping of the David Letterman Show that afternoon to prepare ourselves for what was to come.  The rush seats we had gave a perfect view of the flying sequences, but everything stage left was blocked so it was hard to see some of the actors.  Even so it was a great way to start the week.  Two attempts at winning lottery tickets to the Book of Mormon on Wednesday fell flat, and so did our trip to Macy’s to sit on Santa’s lap (turns out the old guy leaves the North Pole for Macy’s  Thanksgiving Eve, and because of the parade, doesn’t actually make it into the store until the day after) and go ice skating at Rockefeller Center (Justin Bieber was shooting a segment for the Christmas Tree lighting on November 30 so the rink was closed to the public).

By Thursday morning, I was about to burst.  We left a wake up call for 4:30 in the morning to give us time to pack our stuff and check out of the hotel.  By 5:30 we were on the subway headed to 34th and Penn Station, and as we rounded the corner to the hotel where we would get dressed, the line of volunteers stretched past us for two entire blocks.

My excitement level peaked when the delivery door to the hotel burst open and several people dressed as bees, bananas, and bacon and eggs rushed out onto the street.  Pretty soon we were in the lobby and on our way to the fourth floor where there were signs all over the place for the big balloons.  Kermit the Frog and the Sonic Hedgehog were down the hall to the left, while Ronald McDonald and Square Bob Spongepants were at the other end of the corridor.  I stopped to use the restroom before putting on my jumpsuit, and fought to hold back my laughter.  There were clowns, pilgrims and cowgirls all waiting to use the facilities, and if we were allowed to have cameras in the hotel, I would have taken a picture because it was an absolute  riot.

We dressed in our Spiderman jumpsuits, which consisted of blue coveralls, red vests with Spiderman eyes on the front an the word, Spiderman on the back, grabbed our red knit caps and fur lined gloves and boarded a bus for the flight line.  We sat across the aisle from Mother Goose and some beefy men dressed as fairies in purple wigs and tights, then headed for the Spiderman balloon on 81st street beside the Natural History Museum.

The parade starts on Central Park West, so balloons, floats, performers and bands all filter in from different side streets.  650 teenaged girls were literally squashed together at the entrance to the parade in an effort to stay warm, dressed in thin nylon costumes, leggings and fingerless gloves, while marching bands and Southern Belles in gigantic pastel dresses milled about.  After a brief tutorial on proper balloon etiquette and directional signals, we took up our positions.

Michael and I were in the very front,  and as we stepped onto Central Park West, the view was amazing.  It was 50 degrees and clear as a bell.  The street lights and traffic signals were moved up against the buildings, and between the barricades and 80 billion police,  the street was wide open. The NYPD Marching Band was right in front of us (we weren’t behind any horses, thank god) and up ahead, Uncle Sam bobbed along against the clear blue sky.  There were people EVERYWHERE.  Stacked several dozen deep on the streets, and in the apartment buildings and office buildings above us, people were gathered at the windows and on rooftops to watch the parade go by.  We had a man dressed in a Spiderman costume who was sent by Marvel comics to work the crowd, and he ran from one screaming group of kids to the next for photos and handshakes as we walked down the street.

I think the thing I loved the most about the parade was how it ended.   Just past the Macy’s grandstands, the parade just stopped.  Meaning the bands went that way and the floats went this way and the balloons went down a street covered with a tarp where we deflated Spidey, rolled him up and loaded him into a giant basket, then headed back to the hotel to change out of our jumpsuits.  People were disassembling the floats on all the side streets, and loading individual parts into bags, while cartoon characters  in costume were assisted onto golf carts and whisked them away to destinations unknown.  The streets were jammed with people trying to get home for Thanksgiving dinner, so the train station to Pearl River, where we had dinner, was a zoo, but all in all it was a total trip and I can’t wait to do it again next year!

I haven’t written anything in the last few months, because quite frankly, I have been embarrassed beyond belief to admit just how hard this economy has hit me.

Then a few months ago, I met a pair of business partners who book celebrity guest speakers, clergy and artists for luxury cruise liners, and within seconds the entrepreneur in me was reborn.   I headed straight into the studio that afternoon to design a handbag that not only highlights their company spirit, I also found a way to print fabric from that image that allowed me to line the bag with their company logo and create a handmade clutch to match!

I am working hard to launch a new corporate gifts link on my website, with humidors, jewelry boxes, decorative boxes – just about anything and everything  made from wood – because corporations will always exist and so will holidays and special occasions.

My friend Kim, who lives an hour from Manhattan, graciously agreed to get up at 4:30 in the morning to drive me into the city with my suitcase full of handbags and portfolios, but when we pulled up in front of the hotel where the casting session was going to be held, no one was there.  I thought, well hell, I have the wrong hotel and then I thought “Oh My God…I have the wrong weekend!!!!”  I was immediately disavowed of this notion by a porter who asked if I was there for the casting session, then sent me upstairs to the lobby, which was on the fourth floor of a hotel that looked like a cross between a gynecologists office and left over sets from some recent Star Wars convention.

Clinical didn’t even begin to describe the Japanese inspired futuristic white molded plastic interior with “space age furniture” that would have made the Jetson’s proud.   Three other people were waiting on the gigantic purple ottomans that doubled as couches, looking for all the world like a bunch of overgrown kids on a Romper Room set.  One man came with his mother and brother and another man was frantically filing out all 24 pages of paperwork – paperwork which, by the way, took a practice copy and four hours for me to fill out, but he was whipping through it like it was a Sudoku puzzle he had to finish before his train pulled into the station.

The casting director showed up fresh from her workout in the hotel gym and told us we had to wait in line downstairs, so I headed to the elevators and out the front door, when the same porter who initially directed me upstairs accosted me in a thick Slavic accent to ask why I was back downstairs again. When I  told him the casting director sent me there, he loaded me back into the elevator and off we went again to the lobby, where the casting director loaded us back onto the elevator again and down we went.  By this time it was about 7:00 in the morning and we still had another two hours to wait, so the woman in  line in front of me and I traded life stories until a card table was produced with copies of the application on it, and the judging staff began to arrive.

There were three people in line ahead of me; a woman who looked like Rachel Zoe, and who’s participation in the series appeared to be a foregone conclusion.  She knew everyone in the place and had ten times as many samples as any of the rest of us, plus she was assigned a rather attractive young man to help her carry all her crap into the casting room.  She was supposed to be in the casting room for three to five minutes. Fifteen minutes later she came out with an envelope, which was the sign that you had been invited to the next round of casting.  Natasha, the jeweler I had been waiting in line with all morning, was next, and she came out with a very odd look on her face. She asked me if I wanted her to stick around so we could talk after my audition, and I said sure, if for no other reason than to find out what that look meant.  Well the design student who went in next, the one with recently dyed red air that was not a color  found in nature, dressed in yellow and black with a flap on her skirt that had a tendency to stick straight out and who showed up with her mother and fiancee, came out crying, and then I was up.

The door opened and I was ushered into a dimly lit room where eight or so people were lined up on folding chairs against one wall who never said a word.  There was a small folding table under a single beam of light in the middle of the room, and four women at the other end of the room in front of a draped wall with their names on a placard on front of each woman.  I recognized one name from the website that had originally sent out the casting call, but I went ahead and addressed the entire room, as if I were a hostess who was late to her own party.

Now before I go any further, I feel it incumbent upon me to describe the women on the judging panel, at least half of whom appeared to have divorced VERY well, once, if not twice, and they were certain by their appearance and their demeanor to let you know they were someone we were all privileged to be in the presence of.  Between the pilates instructors, manicurists, pedicurists, massage therapists, facialists, stylists, hairdressers, therapists, personal assistants, housekeepers, personal shoppers, drivers, clothing and jewelry budget, and expense report, I would guess that the collective budget for that day’s appearance was in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, a fact that was later confirmed by the $150,000 Birkin bag that was burnished in my direction, but more on that little tidbit in a moment.

I set my bags down on the table and was immediately asked if they were cigar boxes.  I thought to myself, this is the perfect lead in, so I launched into my well rehearsed explanation about how they were made, when the sound man said he wasn’t ready….awkward pause, followed by a brief salutation to the one woman on the panel I actually sort of “knew”.  The sound man said he was ready, and the entire interview took a nose dive followed by a right turn.  All four women started asking me questions at the same time, and not one of them let me answer until the scrawny little one the second from the left said, “do you compare yourself to Timmy Woods”, a handbag designer who also works with wood because her last name is, well, Woods.  That is kind of like asking an F16 mechanic if he compares himself to a Volkswagon mechanic.  Just because both work with engines doesn’t mean the two are even remotely related, so I said, no, I actually think of myself as the next Birkin bag.

Well I might  have well as been a maitre’d at Manhattan’s hot new restaurant who turned them away at the door, because the scrawny one absolutely imploded.  For the uninitiated, a Birkin bag is handmade in France by Hermes, and because they are handmade one at a time, and delivered on a somewhat unreliable schedule, it can take years to procure one, which makes them the most expensive – and most exclusive – handbag  on the planet.  They cost between $75,000 and $280,000. Victoria Beckham has two.

The woman in the middle, who looked just like Patty, the Millionaire Matchmaker, reached behind her chair, and waved HER Birkin bag over her head while the scrawny woman on her right launched into a lecture about the Birkin bag and why there was absolutely no comparison between MY exclusive, handmade bags and THOSE  exclusive handmade bags and finally Miss Matchmaker said that my line was too “niche”, but she would keep my information on file in case they thought they could ever use me.

There was a moment when I thought, I didn’t crash this casting call to SELL my handbag line to you, I answered a call for one of a kind accessories,  and anyway, you didn’t ask me to produce a pair of shoes I’d made or a piece of jewelry I had fabricated either, so if by niche you mean “one of a kind” as long as it looks like everything else on the planet, this clearly isn’t the reality show for me anyway.

As I hit the door to pack up my stuff in the lobby, a woman who showed up about an hour after the line started, and who looked liked she’d woken up that morning face down in stale beer after a particularly hard night as a cocktail waitress in the Tenderloin District, tottered up to me on her eight inch heels and said, “Your bags are beautiful….how did it go in there”.  I looked at her, smiled sweetly, and said…”it was tough” then had breakfast with Natasha, scored a rush ticket to see a matinee performance of Spiderman,  took in the Alexander McQueen show at the Met, and walked back to Port Authority through Central Park on an absolutely gorgeous afternoon.

With any luck this new show will be at least as dreadful as EXPEDITION IMPOSSIBLE, which is another reality series I tried out for this year.  We got as far as the third round before being cut.  That casting call called for “ordinary people” but if you’ve ever watched it, these “ordinary people” look like they were genetically produced in a laboratory to exacting specifications based on a rigid set of blueprints regarding what specific types SHOULD look like if those types were going to be featured in a magazine spread in Vanity Fair  shot by Annie Leibowitz.

I’m told that its considered bad form in business to admit when things aren’t what you want them to be.  Everyone wants to be in league with a winner, and I want to be a winner more than words could EVER begin to describe.  This economy is not only making it hard to maintain a respectable level of success no matter how much time or effort I invest,  it adds an additional level of pressure to appear as though business is booming, even though, its not.  I want my collectors to feel as though they have made a wise investment by supporting my business, but I also feel I am doing other artists a disservice by trumpeting a career that, at the moment anyway, isn’t what it used to be.

And then comes an event that puts my struggles in perspective.  An extremely talented artist I know posted  few days ago on her facebook page that a good friend of hers lost her 37 year old husband recently and without warning, leaving her with two small children to raise on her own.  My friend, Julie Miller Havel, is spearheading a raffle to help raise money for this young mother, so I immediately offered to donate a handbag, and was glad for the chance to do so.  I can’t imagine what it must be like to suddenly find yourself without your husband, or how on earth you explain to your children that their father is gone, and if not having the art career I had hoped for at this point in time is the worse thing I can say about my life, then I am very lucky indeed. http://www.sarahmoorefamily.org

I also have the chance to support a zoo fundraiser in Salina, Kansas called the Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure Zoo-La-La Raise the Roof Celebration.  Its June 3 at the Rolling Hills park starting at 6:30 pm. This is what they will be auctioning off….

I have a brand new handbag as the centerpiece of a Ladies Night Art Walk in the cities of Golden and Littleton, Colorado from 4 to 8 pm on May 5 (the horse handbag at the top of this post). I also have a pinto tote up for grabs in a drawing for the event.  Check out the Spirits in the Wind Gallery, one of the hosts of this remarkable evening. www.spiritsinthewindgallery.com

I am not sure where the next few months will take me, but I continue to remain hopeful that everything happens for a reason, and that even though I have been ready for great things for more years than I can count, “God’s timing” as they say, “is not my timing”….and from what I hear, waiting never killed anyone….

My timing isn’t always great;

I sent a canvas tote to Sandra Bullock just DAYS before the Jesse James scandal broke….

You can clearly see why this was a mistake…

I also sent a handbag to Kyra Sedgwick, even though I’ve heard through the grapevine that she’s no great fan of the “Six Degrees”game…

I sent a Scrabble Handbag to Oprah Winfrey after I heard she was a fan.  Apparently she’s not a fan of responding to her mail, although to be fair, I’m sure she probably gets a lot of it….

I sent a bag to Drew Barrymore, along with a script I wrote many years ago about the only known female stagecoach robber in America…

I’m still waiting to hear on that one….

Then, last year, when I heard that the Obamas were going to vacation in Asheville, I made a leopard evening bag for Michelle, a tiger tote for Sacha, and a cheetah tote for Malia.  I tried to deliver them to the Grove Park Inn where they were staying.

Funny, but they don’t allow packages to be delivered to a President and his wife at a hotel…..go figure….

Well a few days ago, and almost eleven months later….

I was so inspired to finally get a response from someone, that I went hog wild this morning and updated my website. I’ve added pictures of some of the new decorative boxes I have been doing, as well as some paintings, and my first love, gourd art…..

I was SO inspired, as a matter of fact, that I have decided to have a half off sale on all evening bags. The sale ends this Sunday, so act now! Because if it takes as long to get a thank you note these days as it does to update my website or have a sale, it could be a LONG time before I am THIS inspired again!

I am back from the Natureworks Show in Tulsa and before I go any further I just have to say this.  I wish every art show on the planet was like Natureworks.  This event was started over thirty years ago by Bill Cox and Ken Greenwood in an effort to provide artists with  an exclusive outlet for their work (and a MUCH appreciated respect for the incredible diversity of sheer talent on BOTH sides of the “artistic fence”), and the citizens of Tulsa with a host of arts programs and public art works, paid for with the proceeds of the sale.   High school art students compete for and receive generous college scholarships, the riverwalk near Oral Roberts University features dozens of wildlife sculptures from some of the most talented wildlife artists on the planet displayed in a beautiful park setting, the Federal Duck Stamp Program and the National Elk Refuge all receive support and donations from the organization.

The show is run by volunteers from all walks of life; there is a retired general, a bank manager, a mortgage broker, an ex-sheriff…you name it.  Every year they put up the booths and most of the lights, help unload and unpack, host an artists dinner, feed us lunch, host an opening night event that brings in hundreds if not thousands of prospective buyers.  There is a hospitality suite, an artists breakfast, and every year, a gift of some kind to say thank you to the artists for participating in the show.  A few years ago, it was a directors chair with our names on them.  This year it was a cooler.  Sometimes its a handmade pencil box, or a thermos.  The point is, the people who run the show treat us like they think we are worth something, and while that may sound like a no brainer on one hand, you’d be surprised by the number of art shows and promoters who feel artists are a dime a dozen.  I’ve been kicked out of shows for something as simple as telling one show promoter that I didn’t want to be across from a particularly disruptive artist because his constant, unpredictable and explosive outbursts were unprofessional and severely impacting my sales (and, consequently their percentage of my sales) and he got invited back the next year while I didn’t.  So being at a show where the promoters treat you well is truly an added benefit.

I didn’t make a tremendous number of sales at this years event, but I came away from the show with some fantastic trades, some wonderful memories, and the feeling that I am loved and appreciated by people I truly admire and trust. So thank you Ray and Linda Goldsmith, Lon and Bonnie Canada, Tiny and Barbara Thompson, Doug Collins, Steve and Mary Ann Iverson, Treak Trasker, Sue Gideon, Chelley Wallack, Glenn and Judy Wright and Jon and Leigh  Reaves, among DOZENS of others.  You guys are the absolute BEST!

I am back in the studio again and working on all kinds of ideas for upcoming events.  I have started doing decorative boxes and hope to branch out into wine boxes, jewelry boxes and trinket boxes, plus I also started doing gourds and paintings again, so I am also going to be updating my website to reflect the new works I am adding to my product line.  I am not sure where all of this will lead, but I am finally at the point in my life where I truly believe that every day is the best day of my life because its the only day I have.  And I intend to make the most of each one.

A few weeks ago when I was in the studio finishing work on the big cats handbag, I was listening to part two of “Oprah’s Favorite Things” to help pass the time.  When I heard Oprah say that she is a huge Scrabble fan, I looked up with great interest, since Scrabble handbags are not only fun for me to make, they are also one of my most popular accessories.

By the following afternoon, I had a custom made  Scrabble handbag and a handmade clutch ready to go in the mail along with one of my new 2011 calendars, a brochure, biography and letter of introduction.  I decided to send the bag to “O Magazine” because I have seen video of the piles upon countless piles of mail she gets at Harpo Studios in Chicago every week.  And, anyway, I’d sent a pair of gourd masks to one of her producers about ten years ago and never heard anything back.

Last April when I found out that Sascha Obama had decided to make saving the tigers a priority in her young life, AND that the Obamas were set to visit the Grove Park Inn in Asheville, and I dropped everything I was doing to create a leopard evening bag for Michelle, a tiger tote for Sacha, and a cheetah tote for Malia.  After packaging the bags in boxes lined with matching prints, I drove up to the The Grove Park Inn to deliver them, but alas, they wouldn’t let me leave the gifts, so I mailed them off to the White House that same day.

My  point is this.  I have never been one to let an opportunity pass to promote myself or my work, because I have to believe that somewhere along the line something amazing will happen, that the right person will come along to propel my career into the stratosphere, that whoever I have been waiting on, or whatever I have dreamed will unfold, whatever chance encounter, or opportunity I once acted on that “never went anywhere” (at least not in my time frame) is all part of a larger plan that I have no control over, but which I chose to continue to believe will happen, even when it seems as though I have run up against a brick wall.

I believe in serendipity and in the idea that even though I might be ready for the next phase of my career, the people and events that will carry me to the next level, might not be in place yet.  I haven’t heard back from either Oprah Winfrey OR Michelle Obama, but you never know when the phone might ring, or who might be reading this blog and think, I can do something to help this along.

I know Malcolm Gladwell thinks that there is no such thing as luck, that people only get to where they want to be based on where they were born and what family they were born into, but I believe that while family dynamics play a role in how we start life, the choices we make about what to do with the talents we’ve been given as we grow up, can take us where we want to be, even if the journey takes longer than we would like.  Or to be more accurate, where I would like because, as I have said before, I was ready to “be somebody” when I was twenty.  Thirty years later, I am STILL ready to be the next Prada, or Gucci, or Balenciaga.  And while I don’t have the money or the prestige, I have the drive, the goal, and the desire coupled with the steadfast belief that I didn’t get the talent I have by accident…there has to be a reason why things haven’t happened the way I have wanted…..

When I was twenty I knew EXACTLY what I wanted to do with my life, and I often felt that if I could have barreled ahead without restraint, I would have been where I THOUGHT I wanted to be a long, LONG time ago.  But I am also reminded of two quotes that have defined my life, and how grateful I am at this particular point in time that I didn’t get where I wanted to be thanks to the lessons I learned along the way.

Patience is NOT one of my virtues, as anyone who knows me well can tell you, and yet, when it comes to my art career, I will take all the time I need to get things just right. I had no idea how to make a purse, or where to market one, where to find the hardware…I used to carry a BACKPACK, if I carried anything at ALL, and, anyway,  I’d invested fifteen years of my life in a career as the top gourd artist in the nation. I’d been on HGTV, had articles written on my work in the Wall Street Journal, Southwest Art Magazine and Wildlife Art news, participated in group exhibits, had one woman shows, gave demonstrations at gourd festivals and gallery shows all over the country and even presented a gourd commemorating the 40th Anniversary of the Gombe Research Center to  my hero, Jane Goodall.  I  sold a gourd to golf legend Hale Irwin, was commissioned by the executive producer of the Lord of the Rings to create a piece for the Lord of the Rings; The Two Towers with Golum, Frodo and Sam Gangee, and I still hold the record for the most expensive gourd ever sold at $22,500.

It always bothered me that people spent HUGE sums of money on artwork they left at home.  No one buys Christian Louboutin shoes, a Rolex, a Prada bag, or a Christian Dior dress JUST to leave it in the closet, so why do people buy gorgeous works of art to leave them at home?  It seemed to me you could have an AMAZING accessory that was ALSO an incredible addition to your art collection.

And so, I embarked on the journey of a lifetime when I decided to combine art with function in one of a kind and limited edition handbags…I wasn’t going to line the purses at first, until one very wise woman  pointed out that without a lining, you would hear everything you carried rattling around inside it.  I knew I wanted to work with wood but I didn’t know how to protect the purses against water damage. I knew I wanted to hand bead some of the handles, but the last time I tackled a bead work project with any great enthusiasm,  I wound up with a pile of very expensive seed beads and a loom that gathered dust for years until I finally gave it to the Goodwill.

As the saying goes, “If you want to hear the sound of God’s laughter, tell him your plans” and I am convinced I have had God in stitches most of my life.  I spent HOURS on the internet trying to find fabric and handles and beads and varnishes, craft shows, art shows, wholesale shows and boutiques, and just when I thought I had one aspect of the design process worked out, something else came along to challenge my approach; how do you secure all the things on a travel trailer handbag that make the handbag so fun to carry without sacrificing its function; how do you finish the back of a leopard handbag when the front and the insides are so captivating; how do you wrap images around handbag when it has irregular sides, and THEN finish the entire thing in gold leaf?

Its been an interesting process but, as the other saying I define my life by so eloquently states, “Its the journey, its not the destination”.  I have had some amazing support this past year from some truly remarkable women, and I thank you all for believing in me when I’d started to think this might have just been the dumbest idea I’d ever come up with….

I can hardly believe that 2011 is right around the corner, but I already have two very exciting shows lined up in February and March (The American Crafts Council Show in Baltimore, MD and Natureworks in Tulsa, OK) that are inspiring me to hit the studio with great passion and determination.  I have so much I want to do and such great opportunities ahead of me that the sky is the limit.

There will be more insights in the days to come, but for the moment I just wanted to say to all of you who have been on this journey with me, whether you know it or not, your faith in my work has been the fire that has helped light my way.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart….