Remembering

The last few days have been full of remembering for my family and I as my father-in-law left

...a Christmas Eve, gathered around the table, telling stories

this earthly place and was called to a better one last Thursday. His wit and ability to tell a story or joke was supreme. Over the years much family time was spent around the dinner table listening to stories from his past be told. We'd heard them many times before but his enjoyment in remembering kept us on the edge of our seats with intrigue and usually much laughter. These stories and memories are comforting to us now and we will carry them forward into the generations to come.

I'm the kind of person that enjoys looking back, hearing about the past and learning from it. In this moment of my life when we've said good bye to the man we called "Sox" I am so thankful that God gives us the gift of story, recollection and gleaning knowledge from those that go before us. And maybe that's one reason I enjoy connecting God's Word through art on ministry stoles at Carrot Top Studio. 

symbols on ministry stoles tell the story of our faith

Story telling is powerful in so many ways. The stories engage us, give us hope, and they can awaken us. I realize that a stole on a pastor, minister, or priest isn't essential to the ministry. But our anticipation is that if it is your tradition to wear a clergy stole that it will be a tool that helps you tell the story of our faith.

*curious about this Advent stole? Read about it here.

*BTW-we called him "Sox" because of an incident in the golf course locker room...involving stinky socks....and that's just one of the stories!

Preparing for Advent

We're preparing for Advent. Are you? For us that means assessing our Carrot Top Studio clergy stole stock for what might be missing. It also means searching for inspiration for new ideas. The light bulb recently went off when we read about a shibori dying technique that we thought would translate well to an Advent stole.  Shibori is the Japanese art of shaped resist dyeing. The fabric is compressed by using wrapping, stitching or folding techniques that create a resist when dyeing the fabric; this is, the "resist" creates areas where the dye is not adsorbed into the fabric. The result is soft patterns that made us think of the stages of preparation we move through during the time prior to Christmas.

The technique we used required us to wrap fabric around a PVC pipe and then push it together to compress it. This creates the resist that forms the patterns and textured lines in the fabric.

Here is the resulting piece of yardage. Watch the website or our Facebook page for the stoles created from this beautiful cloth.

Do you have dreams of an Advent stole that isn't currently part of our collection? Tell us about it and we'll see if it fits into our repertoire.