A few weeks ago a good friend of mine left for Houston, America to peruse his career in engineering. And I will never forget our first meeting.
I had just finished my course and finally made it back home to relax after the stressful final year of creating and exhibiting. I'm not sure why, maybe I just had more time on my hands or maybe something was working in me and I wanted to pursue my faith again.
And so I started going to mass again and to get involved with the church more. One day after mass I decided to go to the "journey of faith" group. I prayed before hand for God to give me confidence and to let it go well.
I then got up and almost decided to leave, I looked around trying to decide whether to run or to find out where the group was held. Then a lovely man saw my confusion and helped me in a very kind manner.
It took many weeks to settle in and make friends and he made all of this possible. Without his reassurance and help I may not have bothered in the end.
But now I have been blessed with many wonderful new friends with similar faith. My spirituality is growing and my knowledge of my religion too.
Before my friend left I wanted to give him a present. And since my creativity had been lacking I wanted to use this as an opportunity to do a small but meaningful project. I looked out my bible app and found one of my favourite quotes from proverbs 3:6 "in all your ways consider him, and he himself will direct your steps" a very fitting message for someone about to embark on a journey! I used an app called "Stitch Sketch LE" and used it to plot the crosses with my handwriting. I then searched my button box and threads for a nice colour scheme suitable for a male. I chose gold and blues to highlight the religious context of the piece and also to create something quite classic and harmonious. I found the border on Pinterest and thought the inner crosses would be a nice addition to the bible theme and reminded me of the hosts we get at mass. The crucifix I collected when I was in Newcastle County a Down, N. Ireland in the summer. And the frame was from a charity shop, which I had also used in my exhibition. I was very pleased with the final product and my friend was too and couldn't believe I had made it!
Good luck Akhil! And God bless all my readers!
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