traveling "O" Magazine wall hanging

So, here I've sat most of the evening cruising the net, when I discover for the second day in a row a picture that I haven't seen since 11/11/08. I've seen it at least a dozen times in the last 24 hours. Hm... I grow a bit suspicious of that. I ask myself what does that mean to see something that has meaning to me? And, to see it numerous times after not seeing it for five years?

Here's the story. In 2003 I took a photo-transfer quilt class in Boulder, Colorado. The interesting thing was that every time I tried to copy my pictures onto fabric using the instructor's printer, the pictures came out in shades of browns and golds instead of the bright oranges, purples, and yellows they were originally. The fabric I brought with me was not going to work with the fabric photos now, so I skipped the rest of the class, took my fabric photos home and tossed them onto the top of a pile of fabrics on my floor in the studio.

Days if not weeks went by before I finally noticed that the photos were on top of African fabrics that matched them beautifully. I grabbed the pile off the floor and within hours had composed a wall hanging with all the "discolored" fabric photos and African fabrics. While looking at the almost completed top hanging on my design wall I realized that I had unknowingly placed the photos in a way that looked like an African woman. Hm...

The other thing about the wall hanging??? I had made it from "O" Magazine's pictures, so I could not sell it. I never made something that couldn't be sold, so why I chose copyrighted pictures is truly beyond me. I finally finished the piece in 2004, sewing my name and date, which ended up looking like 2009, into the quilt. A few months later I decide to get a divorce. For some reason that wall hanging went with me to my next destination -- Steamboat Springs, Colorado.

In 2008 I was given a gift certificate for a joint session with an intuitive and massage therapist. Megan Sisk told me during the session that I was to move back to Dallas area because I had unfinished business with my daughter. I said absolutely never would I move back to Texas. And, she also told me that Oprah figured into my life. She asked me if there was anything I knew of that connected me to Oprah in any way. The only thing I could think of was the quilt hanging on the wall in my studio, so I told her about that. She told me I needed to get it to Oprah. I told her I had already emailed people to no avail. No response whatsoever. I knew I couldn't sell the piece and I had offered it to Oprah as a gift.

Megan told me I was going through the wrong venue. I needed to contact Gayle King, Oprah's best friend. I remember being so relaxed from the massage that I think I might've agreed to anything at that point. I wasn't really so sure Megan was reading me very well because she said I was moving back to Texas. I already thought she was off her rocker.

Well, within the month I was headed back to Texas and living with my daughter. Before I left, however, my friend, Jamie, who was helping me move my studio belongings  into the U-Haul took down the quilt, and remembering Megan's advice she offered to package the quilt and take it to Fed-Ex right then and there. I found an address for Gayle King and off Jamie went with the package.

Fast forward to a little over five years later when I'm seeing a picture of African children's feet in a circle, a picture I hadn't seen since that day Jamie and I were in my studio. And, now I see it over and over and over.

I don't take this lightly. I really pay attention to what shows up in my life, and this picture has been in my face many times today. So, what does that mean? Well, for kicks I thought I'd just throw my story out into the internet world and see if anything shows up. I have never heard from anyone related even remotely to Oprah that the wall hanging has ever been received. As a matter of fact, I have forgotten all about it as my life has carried me through so many paths that Oprah has not even been a part of my waking hours -- until now.

So, there you have it. My name was quilted into the bottom right corner with a "2004" that looks like a "2009". If anyone knows the whereabouts of the quilt it would be fun to know what happened to it.