writing in the snow

I had forgotten how expressive free motion quilting can be given the right combination of surface, thread and a well set-up machine.  I didn't even waste time with a practice piece, just jumped right in and before I knew I was speaking in tongues with the aliens... again.

this is inspiring me to think again about whether and how to use machine quilting on the big works in progress that are so stalled.

wonky snow jewel

To keep the frenzy of production work in perspective, I got the blue horse (or is it a blue cat?) out of the UFO pile and hooped it up. No more vacillating about machine or hand stitching this one will take more time - time that I am going to make and effort to give it.

Meanwhile, back at the factory, things are going smoothly because I am still working with the colors/fabric that appeal to me the most (there are two more courses of three not showing ) . The backing for this quilt is a beautiful damask tablecloth - not vintage, because it has to hold up to use - but with an exquisite pattern.

Tomorrow I will give the Janome a new needle, a quick cleaning and work some equally wonky white feathers in around the color blocks. Don't I sound confident?  I am NOT.

time well spent

Like Nellie, I'm turning out wonky log cabin blocks to be turned quickly into functional, warm quilts. These are going to be set in a dazzling field of white, like flowers in the snow.
It's satisfying work and adds up quickly to something that will matter, one way or another.

more shopkeeping

I'll be working on stocking up the store this weekend.

I've been digging through the bins and there are treasures galore! The holidays are upon us, like it or not.

More later!

the joy of being useful

Here they are, fresh from the dryer, all warm and nicely cobbled from the experience.



To me there is nothing quite as satisfying as completing a project that is useful, well made and fun to look at. Some little person is going to drag one of these two blankies around with them as long as they can get away with it. It will give warmth and comfort for many  years.

In my present frame of mind, all other studio activity seems self-indulgent and rather pointless.  These two will be for sale and I have another started that will be donated to the Red Cross hurricane relief.

I sent two quilts to Japan last year. I figure I owe NY at least the same effort.

enough digression

and monkey business, I have three large pieces in varying stages of completion and need to come back from fooling around.

two of the three are troubling me and and I don't want to rush into the home stretch on the third.  All this futzing around with blankies and obtuse techniques..I know what's really going on - stonewalling with the works in progress is all.

spectacle

Staggering around the internet yesterday I came across the blog of Sheila Frampton Cooper with great images the quilt festival in  Houston. One of the winners in particular slayed me - "ElaTED" by Ted Storm. I remember a similar fascination with another one of her quilts, "Nocturnal Garden".

Then this blog post at Wonkyworld came into my radar and I finally did some research on "broderie perse"

Are you shocked that I would be absorbed by something so traditional? I have always loved chintz-the colors, the gloss, they all appeal to the Magpie brain.

The technique of clipping elements out of the whole cloth and reorganizing them to my own satisfaction and all that obsessively tiny stitching has grabbed me by the tiny attention span. I watched the video four times and still cannot get the buttonhole stitch..maybe if I watched it in the mirror.

I found a half napkin with my embroidered initials in the scrap basket. The reverse applique Easter eggs were raided from another UFO and the cranes clipped out of a scrap of chintz gifted to me some time ago..there were only about four whole birds left because I've been using up wings on other things. It's my day off and all I wanted to do was a little hand stitching.

wicked commerce

Sat down at big J this morning to get this top wrapped up into what I call a Kindergarten quilt..bigger than a baby blanket, smaller than a twin.  It was pure fun to free piece the top which has both commercial and hand dyed cottons, no vintage in this one. It's backed with a wonderful commercial print of dancing blue waters and I used one of the IKEA fleece as batting.

The design is a little wonky - at the last minute I wanted some length and added on that keyboard looking business, kinda like a counterpane (she tells herself). Waste nothing!

For about thirty seconds I thought about hand quilting it...then I remembered who I am making these for and why. These quilts have to take the licking, get washed, dried, and keep on kicking - and they do just that when I machine quilt them! I'll post this one for sale in the store for a while and then off it will go to NY when I get the word that the venue is back up and running after Sandy.

the (better) lost week

I know it's the worst kind of sin to wish away ones  days but this week has been so hard on everyone in so many ways.

 I would shout TGIF from the rooftops except that I have to work this weekend but just reminded myself that the weekend clients can be quite entertaining and I can further amuse myself by practicing my Downton Abbey accent on them with an effort to pare down the snobbery case by case. Yeah, I watched a few episodes and I'm hooked hard.

I have busied myself with this little gem of a crib quilt constructed from a tiny fraction of the commercial batik fat quarters I was recently blessed with. So much cloth! So little time!  There's a little more machine quilting to go here and then into the washer and dryer with it to get the full effect of how it will be when it's gifted away.

On the shopkeeper front, it's restocking time.

I've packed up half a dozen baggies with very small pieces culled from this huge pile of hand dyed treasures. Read more about Bites over at Random Acts of Dyeness.

developing the pollock

I really have to start calling this something  else. As I work on it, I'm realizing that all my stitch and thread choices are about construction - the stitches are smaller and smaller and the color of the thread blends in with the fabric. All the big white lines of basting are slowing being removed.


The shapes, color and placement of all the elements are what matters here - I could be gluing them on, or painting them on for that matter, but I am staying with stitching for my own satisfaction.


The pace slows me down, forces me to consider and reconsider and, if something is not right, it's not a huge pain to clip the thread on the backside and snatch it out so the wayward scrap can be relocated or replaced. Slow going on purpose.

election day

After a sleepless night and a busy morning, all I felt like doing was mixing up these jewels and starting another pieced top.

We went out in the cold and rain and voted. Now it's nap and wait and see.

last of the trio

This is the third of my QN entries. "Los Dados Encantada" was inspired in part by Grace's black and white kids .

The ground pieces for this one (dyed and discharged vintage sackcloth, damask and sheeting)  have been "in waiting" for some time. Once I paired them with the high energy of the graphic pieces, the whole thing fell into place within 24 hours and is entirely machine stitched and finished out at 59x34 inches.

Despite the simplicity of the graphics, there's a lot going on when you come in for a closer inspection. This is another line that I will following in the months to come.

detail from Los Dados Encantada

a wistful day

Today is my Mom's birthday and I've given over much thought to her today.
I have to admit that I could never remember her birthday spot on..it floated between 11/2 and Election day in my mind but today, for the first time it was fixed and correct.

Jim read my mind and brought home a bouquet of red roses in her honor (she adored my husband).

This photo was taken in 2002 on one of her rare visits with us down south. She loved Jinx and Jinx seemed to love her right back. Miss you Rosie.

waiting in the wings

I'm finding there are some  problems and benefits to having a string of works-in-progress, especially if the the pieces are, if not a series, at least cousins in some way.

You fool with the thing until it begins to annoy you but don't set it aside at that point or you are asking for a permanent UFO bound for the shredder.  Find the problems areas and at least take some notes somehow towards remediation...that way you won't be stonewalled when (and if) you pick it up again. I unfolded this one grateful that I had pinned some bits and pieces of maybes and possibilities on it's face.

The base cloths for this piece are two very old huck tablecloths that came out of the dyes looking like a rainy weekend. Dreamy but coma inducting except for the way the woven textures came to light.

For a long time I wanted to examine just what the hell Jackson Pollock was up to/looking for besides wrecking his head. Without doing any reading or presupposing - except for that damn Ed Harris film - this piece is my exploration in that territory. It's going to be some time in the making because it will be all hand stitched in keeping with the very old and tender fabrics. I don't know how fast Jackson flung the paint around but I do know how long it takes to stitch a large piece by hand. Come next summer, maybe.

And now I have to go out and buy a new iron. The 9$ special that is at least five years old has bit the dust and puked on my cloth for the last time.

a push

My new business cards came today..I did away with the extravagant glossy color image on the other side, saving myself a bundle,  opting for a nice clean space where whatever could be written.

Now I have to challenge myself to the rest of the nitty gritty and finish the website makeover.

I taught myself as much html as I needed years ago and used to have real fun with it but the gloss has worn off that toy entirely. I'd really like to just hand it off to a pro..but I'm too cheap.

TGIF

I've been machine quilting this all morning and, as I suspected, have not much more than cold feet and hunched shoulders for my trouble. I'll keep at it though now that I'm committed.

And I am taking more than just a moment to give thanks for a roof over my head, a dry bed, someone elses cooking and loving companions here to help me make it through the day.

fretting & rejoicing

The problem with mixing hand and machine stitching on a piece is recognizing when your hand work is no longer for the purpose of the design...when you keep on stitching because it's a comforting action, like my drug of choice.

To keep from running off the rails I put this one back up on the design wall this morning and found a few places where less was more and few others where something else was needed. I hope to get it back under the machine needle tomorrow.

I meant to post this here yesterday...everyone is doing as well as possible under the circumstances

This morning Jake called to tell us that he has proposed to Missy and she has accepted and we are thrilled!

a sad sort of Halloween

2008

no pumpkins and no posers this year.

something new

Back in August I had a giveaway of a couple of test pieces done with what I can only describe as the direct print method. I've added a new page called "A little piece of my Art"  (there's a link on the side bar too) and I'll be adding new items as time goes on.

It's a pretty simple and I encourage other fiber artists to give it a go. Put the work right side down on the (recently cleaned) glass of a high quality, color printer first, making sure the piece is  absolutely spotless or you'll be marveling over images of cooties, lint  and pet hair. Take your StickyBuddy with you to the copy joint.

(The staffer at my local Fedex/Kinkos was a great help steering me to the "queen" of her machines once I explained my purpose to her.)

I pulled a test print on plain paper to make sure of the color quality and then used a card stock weight semi-gloss finished paper for the actual prints.

The level of detail captured this way cannot be reproduced digitally. The hardest part is the cropping. With only an 11x17 inch print surface it's tricky to position the work on the glass deciding what to keep in the frame and what's to be left waiting in the wings.

fall for real

I just brought all my houseplants in from the deck where they have been flourishing all summer. There's no freeze in the works but why risk it. It's cold, windy and damp for the first time in memory -  a perfect day to spend curled up in the chair stitching with good company and a fun movie on. I'm staying with the challenge of combining hand and machine stitching on this large piece. 

Yesterday I finished off a single sized quilt...no batting but a pieced top backed with an old flannel blanket. Once it was done I realized that it looked like an old flannel blanket back there so I put the whole thing into the washer with some navy/intense/boysenberry dye, let it stew til cold and then soda ash into the second go round..that's it folded up on the table..in the background, bits and pieces for another pieced top, gathering forces.

fiber frenzy

The reason behind this frenzy of organizational activity, you ask? Aside from not being able to turn around or find anything, A gift! A boon!

A box arrived the other day with 33 pounds of fibrous glory inside - a trove of premium commercial cotton prints from my dear St.A.

She buys the cloth for the love of it and commands me to be creative...mission accepted my friend!

I hardly know where to start but the beautiful collections from Japan are already set aside  in the "do not touch...yet" pile and you know I'll have to start pulling the strings on those little bundles of batik fat quarters just to see what I have been missing.

I've covered the shelves with bits and lengths of heavy vinyl wallpaper that was rescued from some restaurant renovation years ago. It's interesting stuff but I never had enough of it to make sense of the pattern.  So very functional - I came close to chucking the whole many times and now I'm so glad I didn't.

The floor! the floor! I can see it! a beautiful dark navy blue carpeting..badly in need of a thorough vacuuming!

That dark pile in the foreground is the cloth I dyed yesterday..but for one span of ocean blue, all murky and in need of further work.

Time to test drive that new FM foot that arrived the other day.

a good day's work before noon

TADA!  tomorrow I'll cover the wood with a layer of this slickey restaurant wallpaper that fell into my clutches and then get everything loaded back up..
OR I could hang out the Opium Den sign and rent out the shelves to four dragon-chasers...just close the doors and turn off the lights. Can you tell by the crazy that it's FRIDAY!?!!

I have a squadron of flags stewing in the dye - everything bagged up on black plastic to take advantage of the sun's heat and earlier, buzzed around a the print joint this morning and took about 20 Fabulous (if I must say so myself) prints of the pieces that just came home from the latest show..I'll scan a few and drop them into the store later.

Now, it's off to the Whine & CYA mine for the afternoon.

the Pomodoro technique

When I read Robert Genn's newsletter this morning I realized that I have been doing my own version of the Pomodoro time management technique all week, without the windup tomato time.

The studio has been in turmoil as I am finally getting proper shelves set into the closet. Everything that was stacked so precariously  (and impractically) in the closet is piled all over the studio with barely a footpath for my Goodman to work.  It will be finished today!

My own dayjob has had me on early starts all week leaving precious little time for anything else. The weather has been glorious all week so I have been grabbing the River basket and skipping out with this piece to the park. I make camp at a picnic table by the pond and, with no phone calls, no music, no books on Ipod, no TV in the background - just focusing on stitching for a full hour. Why does that small chunk of time seem so remarkable?  When did I let my day get eaten up by stuff that doesn't pay off??

This mornings precious free time is going to a quick  and dirty dye session - today the temps are supposed to scratch at 78 but will plunge to the low sixties tomorrow. This is really it and I want it for my own.

not robot-rabbit buggery!

A good friend has reminded me to keep pushing my art - reaching beyond my comfort zone. Thanks for the prod St. A.

Here's another of the three pieces that I had to keep under wraps all these months.

 "Jazz Takes Over" is 41x40  and was the middle piece in a progression of work moving from all hand stitched to completely machine stitched. This piece is the crossover or hybrid and a jumping off point for all of the things I have in progress right now. It was a lot of fun in the making. This post title was one suggestion from my in-house critic for a title..it was hard to deny him.

detail

calavera

well that was fun but now I'm over it.

facing the work week

It was such a great weekend that I plan to wrap myself in the good feelings and fly them into the next five days. We cooked (chili and home made chicken noodle soup) enough that no one has to monkey around in the kitchen much for a few days. A little laundry and vacuuming out of the way early and I'm already thinking nap.

There was a little picking up (in preparation for the new closet shelves that I have been putting off) which revealed that I four large works in progress and at least two on the mind-shelf.And last night I somehow  convinced myself that I needed to make a calavera since it's been that kind of year.

more help in the studio

I spent 20 minutes organizing these in the basket in order so I could buy some replacements from the web without doubling up. I looked down after staring at the computer screen to catch this performance.

tight focus

I got an early start again today and was alone in the house for most of the morning. Anyone who does free-motion quilting will know that you can become quite oblivious to anything other than sewing your fingers to the piece. (If I do not find a proper FMQ foot for this Janome I'm going to freak). Stitching loosely woven cloth like damask is pesky as hell. The cloth will do every thing in it's power to avoid the needle.

I had stopped sewing to replace an empty bobbin when a hairy paw reached through the harp followed by it's body (who barely made the squeeze) .

Sweetie insisted it was time to stop that noise and do something else with my day. A split second after this shot, I got the gentle face-bite.

with a witness

All this closet digging and retrospection had me asking myself about all the large, machine stitched pieces I was so focused on five years ago - what was the draw? 

I made a point of NOT taking peek back at those pieces and just set about this one before the sun was really up this morning. It's about 5 feet wide and will go under the needle tomorrow with out too much further ado. 

then I went looking and found Roadkill from '08 and remembered why.

out of the loop

Annulus

I was out and about yesterday re-celebrating my birthday with my buddy Janice. We scared them at I-Hop, pillaged the 50% off goods at the Salvation Army (great cloth scores!) and then caught a mid day showing of "Looper" - my idea of a great day on the town!

It's not often that I am lost for words when it comes to a film. I like this one so much that I need to see it again.

Going to the movies in the middle of the day has a way of taking me out of time.

This morning I pulled a box out of the closet and packed it off to NY. Most of the pieces were from 2005. It's weird to think they've never been in public before. I wish them luck.

Leaking Transom

a good days work

I got this one finished by midmorning and gave it a hot water machine thrash and dry  to test the fleece as batting. Very nice result..it has that "been loved and dragged around lots" look to it. Packing it off to Kara tomorrow. Thre are sixteen more blocks waiting to be organized.

Late morning I got outside on the dyedeck to soak up some vitamin D...the sun was blazing but the air was cool and dry..a rare day in Georgia. I was out there so long a group of vultures were circling overhead.

The pool is well on it's way to swampland..these colors are just a little bit lurid. My camera has a "foliage" setting but I wonder on what planet?