Lots and lots of love from the whole team here-

Rachel, Jill, Tamara and Cecil

shana tova-happy new year- from new world ketubah

The Rabbi instructs the man to bring the chickens into the house to live with him and come back in a week. Of course when he returns his despair is even greater- now in addition to the people in his house, the chickens are driving everyone crazy. The Rabbi instructs the man to bring his goat into the house. So the next week, the man returns in true distress, what with the chickens and the goat and the chaos they create. The Rabbi says ‘Bring in your donkey’. The third time the man returns he is distraught beyond belief. The Rabbi says- ‘Ok, now, get the chickens, the goat and the doneky out of your house.’
The man returns the next day to the rabbi in great high spirits. His house is suddenly huge and quiet, with only his wife, children and in-laws in there! How can he ever thank the rabbi?
That’s how I feel, now that that darned donkey has finally moved out of my lungs….
Happy Summer Everyone!

Yellow Bird of Happiness...and Health!

So, what I want to know- universe, I’m talking to you here- is where are my elves? I have a pile of work to do, no bandwidth to get it all done and yet when I wake up (waaay to early, thank you Miss Mena) it’s all there waiting for me. Not done.

Elfin assistance notwithstanding, I have actually been busy and am posting weeks and months later to share.

First-an AMAZING new artist- Tamara Jones- has joined my little coven here. (if I ever get my husband to sit down and contribute some of his awesome artwork, I’ll have to rename that, but until then, coven sounds appropriately magical, no?)

Tamara is an incredible artist who has been hiding her huge talent under a bushel. We have known her for some time, but it wasn’t until she walked into our studio to discuss printing some of her work (we print local artists’ work here from time to time) that I saw what she was doing. Of course I was all over her in a minute, demanding to grab her juiciest work for New World Ketubah.  We worked together onteh collection a few months back and came up with something we are both very excited about. The Tamara Jones Ketubah collection is so lovely- her colors just boggle and the complexity and layering of her botanical images just get you lost in the images. Veil of Flowers is a favorite, but I love them all.

Next- Budget Ketubahs! Already up and running, but I haven’t really written about them yet. Next post.

Now I’m going to hunt me up some elves…

Ketubah by Tamara Jones- Lace of Flowers

Ketubah by Tamara Jones- Veil of Flowers

Ketubah by Tamara Jones- Pink Lily

Ketubah by Tamara Jones- LilyPad with Flowers

We are very pleased and excited to introduce the Tamara Jones Ketubah collection, produced exclusively here at New World Ketubah. Tamara’s beautiful floral artwork is delicate, intricate, bold and bright.

New World Ketubah | Custom Ketubahs | Ketubah Designs | Modern Ketubah » Ketubahs » Ketubahs by Tamara Jones

'Lace of Flowers' Ketubah by Tamara Jones
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'Veil of Flowers' Ketubah by Tamara Jones
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'Pink Lilypad & Flowers' Ketubah by Tamara Jones
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'Lilypad with Flowers' Ketubah by Tamara Jones
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I can’t say enough about how thrilled I am to be working with Jill. We’ve known her and have been privileged to have owned her work for a long time. Jill has been a neighbor, first of my husband’s then mine for years. She’s always got something fun going on in her studio and is always up for a friendly visit. It’s always a source of great inspiration to stop by.  When I was there the other day she showed me a fantastic new painting she’s doing in honor of her son’s upcoming wedding.  It will be his ketubah (see this post about non-jews embracing the beautiful ketubah tradition) and eventually will join the collection here.

Please enjoy the new prints and let us know what you think!

Adagio ketubah by Jill Sykes

Sycamore ketubah by Jill Sykes

It was really great to read about this growing trend. I have always felt happy and honored to make this work and the idea that this beautiful practice is spreading beyond the Jewish community just makes me happier to be a part of it.

This year I suggested we make something for each other. I had been asking C for a piece of art for a long time, but inspiration had not yet struck.  This year he powered through and the night before the big day he presented me with a framed print- wonderful! (C makes amazing digital paintings, so even though it’s a ‘print’ the artwork is original- I wrote earlier about our friend Tamar’s ketubah he designed. Hopefully he will be making some ketubah designs for New World soon…)

I, of course, had not even started mine. I had a notion to do a small portrait of us and made a few sketches, but portraiture is not my forte. The I thought about ways to think about our life, and the home we are building. An image of a treehouse came to me. Treehouses have always felt magical to me. I always wanted one as a kid. There is an enchanted autonomy to them, something self-contained that really appeals to me. I saw our life as a kind of tree house- a home inside a living thing. Once that image had planted itself in my head, the rest was easy.

Here’s the painting I made for C, and no it is not yet framed. I call it three and counting. His artwork is also shown. I like how he used my colors… or I used his?

3 and counting- anniversary painting

3rd anniversary artwork by Cecil Schmidt

puma californias- now lost

Been thinking a lot about loss. My daughter had an awesome pair of Puma California sneakers, given to her by our neighbors. We are the very happy recipients of a tidy flow of hand-me-downs from up and down the block. Lucky.  These shoes were especially prized because I’ve been wearing Californias for years now and have worn out several pairs. So how cute for the two of us to have matching shoes! M loved it and I was able to scratch my seventies mother-daughter outfit nostalgia itch.

Somehow, about a month ago they just disappeared. I assumed they’d show up because how do you lose a pair of shoes? I don’t know the answer to that, but seems you just can. And somehow the loss of those shoes- she had others, plenty- has impacted me much deeper than I would have expected. I still find myself turning corners or shelves inside out hoping to make a happy discovery.

I am a little puzzled by my sadness at the loss of the shoes, awesome as they were. I suspect it’s more than that. I think it’s the latest in a series of losses that have kind of rocked me. And somehow this little loss has opened up the memories of way bygone losses. And it’s made me think about the way I hold on to things, and what it means to lose something of value and how to assign value that is meaningful.

Two months ago, the day before a trip back east with my daughter (husband to follow a week later) I had an errand day, cleaning up my to-do list. I felt hugely accomplished as I drove home with a trunk full of groceries for my husband’s stag week home and a head of newly colored hair.  Until. Until I looked at my right hand on the steering wheel and there was, well, nothing. My anniversary ring- so lovely and meaningful and shiny- just gone. It was such a part of my hand I have no idea how long it had been gone. I instantly felt nauseous. C had bought that for me just the previous year, during a time of real financial struggle (sort of like the one we are in now, come to think of it) and painstakingly paid it off. I was chagrined that he’d bought such an expensive gift, but loved loved loved it and never took it off. Until somehow it fell off. Of course I retraced my steps and made frantic calls, but I knew it was just gone. C was a prince about it. Though clearly upset, he immediately reassured me that the meaning behind the ring was intact and only the symbol of it was lost. I didn’t feel any better until I put a place holder ring on, something much less wonderful, to at least feel the presence of it on my hand.

So that was a big one, and a bit before M’s shoes disappeared, it was a wad of cash, just gone. I started thinking about other losses- the car stolen the day I arrived in my new city- with all my cds still inside. I think I regretted the loss of my music more than the car. Suddenly there was this ghost parade of missing items from years past, and the losses felt fresh. Funny how some things will just stay with you for years- it’s like the outline of whatever’s missing sort of floats beside you.

Of course all this is spoken from a perspective of great privilege. After all, these losses are things, not people, not limbs or organs.  Loss is change and change is inevitable, life flows and ebbs.  This morning my daughter went off to preschool for the first time. She was excited and happy and I was happy for her, entering into this new independence.  But the tiny baby, crawling infant, the tottering toddler, they are all gone now.  Time is the greatest loss of all, isn’t it?

I’m not really sure what it all means. I wonder if it’s some great life changes (which have certainly happened to me in the last few years) I wonder if the changes sometimes make themselves felt in these moments of loss.