I smile when frequent emails arrive which thank “all of the folks involved” in putting out this magazine, and I share the compliments with the whole crew - three big dogs and three little cats. They are the only staff I have found willing to work for the wages a free magazine can offer, and they don’t “do” a whole lot, but they are great company. Although I favor the editorial “we” in most of the writing, there is really just “I” here.

So when I started this publication last July, even with restrictions like the fact that it would not be “real world” published (I will never understand how Nancy does VSN every month!), it became instantly obvious that there was no room “on the plate” for it. But I loved doing the magazine, and so other stuff had to go.

I had already closed the last of our three art galleries, but that did not make enough room. I could not do the magazine and continue the weekend workshops that I had been holding at my townhouse studio here in Santa Fe either. So a plan began - to sell off that property, move the annex studio and all the other “stuff” we had moved out of the galleries, and bring it all “home” to one place. Then completely rearrange the primary studio and construct a village of storage sheds on the home property. My Dear Husband joined the crew for those activities and joked that it “takes a village” to house Jessica and all her “stuff”. The rest of the crew “marked” the new stuff and new storage sheds as “our territory” in their own charming way, and we began the job of making things functional again.

In the middle of all that was the show we were committed to do in Mesa, a visit from Mom, and a necessary trip to the Bay Area - where, by the way, I learned about editing video on my Mac, and got excited about the instructional videos I will produce in 2003. See, I just don’t learn, do I?

So, no matter where I looked for the minutes to put out the magazine in October and November, I couldn’t find any, and I finally had to admit a huge thing - one I had never admitted before - “I couldn’t do it!” Wow, what a catharthis! How liberating! And nobody actually died because of it either.

It’s a healthy thing to say “impossible” once in awhile. We are not actually SuperWomen - no matter how much we would like to be - and how much society expects us to be.

In the end, it won’t be “How much did I overachieve?” that we ask ourselves, but rather “How much fun did I have?”

From this day forward, I will do my best, but when my best is not enough, I will be proud enough to grin and proclaim what is sometimes just true for the moment: “I am woman - hear me squeak!”

Hope you enjoy this issue. Art School 101 is on a semester break, and is replaced this issue by “Craft School 101”. Projects that would have been great gifts for this Christmas, had you heard about them in October, will be just as exciting for next year - and you will have the time to enjoy making them! Tracing articles will continue with next issue.

We (the crew and I) wish you and yours a New Year full of special blessings and hope all of your wishes come true.

Jessica