It's an all day rain.

My favorite kind. Takes me to unknown places out of time. Places to drift and dream in.

This was at 9ish this morning. I had to turn on the lights in the studio. My plans were altered a bit.

There are only a baker's dozen skeins of a new color drying under the lights.

Followup. An intersting experiment. I made a mix with all the new colors. A like amount of each. The pomegranate seems to be dominating which means it has a flash a fuchsia. I have been warned.

The writer got a whole lot of pages edited and I've started to tinker with the idea of cover art, which is much more science than art, I'm learning.

Any doubts about the book's genre? Didn't think so.

You know what aisle you're in.

storm light

Tomorrow, I'll spend some time picking through this. See what jumps out at me, making obscene demands.

Heavy weather predicted for the whole weekend. The colors arrived yesterday so I may be trying something new in the rain on the dye deck.

Sweetie curled around my feet against the thunder.

raven. steel. bronze. deep space. peacock. blueberry. pomegranate. soft orange. goldeneye.
rain, thunder, and lightning.
Should be interesting.

Summertime

 Celebrated my wedding anniversary with a good friend. Jim would have approved.

 As per tradition, we celebrated two days in a row -June 4th and June 5th - thanks to the judge who got lost coming to do our wedding and who made us come to town hall the next morning to repeat our vows to make it legal.

First pages

Prepping some elements for something new. 
The trick is how wet the cloth and how long to wait.

shop update

If you order today, I can get them to the post office by noon tomorrow. Remember, if you claim a set, you must email me to follow up.

(The international experiment seems to be working so far for Australia and Canada.)

church

a chill friday

I went out to shut off the hose filling the pool and something failed and drenched me. These colors won't run.

The blouse is so old that the tiny print was nearly invisible and there is a seed burn hole on the back (think on it). Forty years? More? I got it from a second-hand store in NY sometime in the '70s.
The hand of the cloth is like lawn but more substantial, and the construction and fit were so fine, I could never part with it. Dye has it born again in the best way.

Then, with grim determination, I dismembered a piece that's been hanging around the river basket like a case of poison ivy. It's done and 90% of the cloth bits were saved, including the base - a really fine huck tea towel, plain vanilla.

a raft of a day

for the rest of the summer, the middle of my week will be a small raft of time away from most other concerns. Charlie will spend a day and a night and another day.

We've decided to tour the parks of Gwinnett - there are tons. Starting next week, we'll focus on the parks with water features, fountains and such. Pools we have at home. There will also be strange eats. New things. The old things, TV cartoons, and toys will have their place too, as a matter of comfort.

We had to hike a bit to get to the new playground in Lilburn. It was very hot and, step by step, I was thinking, "this is too hard." But he was running out ahead of me across the dusty grass, fully expecting that I was right behind him. One foot in front of the other. Lunch with La Luchador.

This was lunch on the first day. That's my sorry Ceasar salad in the foreground. The kid gets cake. He said, "This is not good for you, Nana," and made a point of not leaving any leftovers.

For all of it, shockingly, I feel better today than I have in weeks.

One foot in front of the other it is then.

Marks and decay

dreaming. procrastinating. suspended in time.

 In the story, the little girl secretly embroiders messages into clothing and bed linens. White on white. "sweet dreams", "he loves you", and "run while you can".

I just bought some new dye colors: raven. blueberry. soft orange. bronze. peacock. deep space. pomegranate. brushed steel. robin's egg and goldeneye.

Everyone is off...

...but me. I'll be taking tales of woe starting at 3:30. Hopefully, very few of them.
It's been a busy, productive weekend. There was production,  cooking, cleaning, some stitching, and writing. By nightfall, I'm hoping the pool will be filling - our latest start ever, but that's life.

What's disturbing is that there seem to be almost no signs of life out there in the murk. Normally, we are up to our asses in tadpoles. I heard the frogs this year, but what were they doing?
Colin will confirm one way or another shortly.

There were none. Zero. No polliwogs to relocate as we have been doing year in and year out.

There are new sets of Dirty Thread and the Fat Baggy Scrap basket has been restocked with some wild stuff.

On the wall

Ace of Cups and Four of Cups. I need a new project.

Early returns

It's cooler outside than in this morning. One of the perks of living in a hollow.

All windows are open for a while -purging the conditioned air- the scents of gardenias, magnolias, and all the other fecund greenery taking its space. Just until the sun gets over the ridge.

Last night I picked a few random skeins from the deck and force dried them. Not what I was looking for, but at least I know the "why" behind the results.

Nothing to do now but wait for the heat of the day to dry the rest. Some spinning off while I do the day job tonight. It gets slow on the weekends and I'm glad to have something simple to do with my hands other than surf the web.

experiments

I get requests.

Whether or not I can grant them remains a mystery.

Can I duplicate a thread? I can try, but it's not looking likely.  The colors here are not part of my current pallet.

The bigger problem. Can I make enough of one color so an artist can approach a larger project with more than just one bobbin of a favorite color?

That was the aspect I tackled today. With a slight change of process, I might have hatched out some close cousins. Won't know until everything is dried and spooled.

It was too damn hot out there for this old spider. I think I may try the next run by the full moon and maybe a candle. The colors will be a mystery even to me.

the picnic table...pity the colors won't stay

TGIF even tho I only went back to work just yesterday.

My Swedish ivy is loving being back outside. I need to get some small pots to start a squad of offspring for gift giving.

On sale at the grocery store. I'll be having a smallish house guest from time to time. We are going to cook something. These will bring some fun.

My mood this morning. Keeping the blank slate at the ready, coffee light and sweet while I get drunk on the scent of the gardenias.

I have to work this weekend including the holiday.  Not a suffering as I had no plans.

my dark materials

There's still a small clutch of dirty threads available. If you want to get crazy and split up the foursomes in some way that suits you, email me and we'll work something out.

(I kept this one)

I'm at least ten days away from the next round, despite perfect dyeing weather. At that time, I'm going to be taking some requests!

what spring?

Nothing like a summer cold in Georgia. You just think that being outside in the air and sun would be a good thing until you try it.


Charlie's school had a little year-end celebration yesterday and this morning, it was clarified that today, not tomorrow, is the last day of school. All of these days together have made life so sweet.

Dracarys!

by Gemina Ferrari

In case you were wondering how I felt about a bunch of old white men making decisions about women's healthcare and what they do with their bodies.
This aggression will NOT stand.

New dirty threads updated

Like a bowl of sherbert.

Hectic week

Not that the week itself was so hectic for me. Just different. Colin sent this today. Wonderful start to the morning. The rest of the day ate itself in chunks of errands and nonsense.

By the time I had to sit down to the day job, this was happening out under the hot sun. I'll be going downstairs to rinse them out in a little while. See if my experiment ran the way I intended.

Yesterday was given over to socializing - yes, actual face to face conversation with an adult peer. Remember that? We brought stitching but not much got done for the yakking. It's nearly finished anyway. The Ace of Cups.

But the crown of my week was this: Charlie busting out of Pre-K!

something different

Never fool with technology when you are bored and not paying full attention. Still, this is not a bad layout and it's supposed to be mobile friendly.

Started the day early with a little stitch and music while I mused on the nature of Evil. I know, weird, but this is what writers do.

Then I went downstairs to take care of the kitchen and was seized by the spirits of the next book. Got a big chunk of that out of the way.

Then we got to renew the thrill of hearing vinyl on a turntable. The Flaming Lips have a 45 of  Bowie's "Space Oddity".  Great stuff!

TGIF - updated

Nothing terribly significant going on, just my over-reaction to the ordinary.

I think I may have found a solution to sending threads internationally. Time will tell.

This is just part of the process.

TODAY, 5/11 at 8pm est is the last chance to bid on Revisions. Right now at a mere 310$ (last time I checked) 
Pounce on it  here

Revisions getting ready to fly

Revisions  44x29    2019

If you are interested in owning this piece, please go to the Writer Unboxed website and bid on it.


I finished it just about the same time that I finished (ha!) writing Prophets Tango so I decided I wanted to do something to give back to the organization that has been so instrumental in my progress as a writer. 

You don't have to be a member to bid. Your money will go towards one of this year's scholarship packages.

If you get lucky and bold, you'll be able to say that you own a piece of art done by a famous novelist back when she was still stitching her life together with pieces of thread and cloth.

Remember this? I'll never forget the feeling. 

If you have any questions about the work or the bidding please email me. 

leaps and bounds

You really don't forget how to ride a bicycle or hand code HTML. For the first time since 2012, I think, I've renovated my

  main website. 

It was a lot less painful than I thought it would be.

The reason for this dive off a cyber cliff is exciting, but I'll keep it under my hat for another 12 hours.

The site is necessarily spare for the moment and will be fluxing like crazy in the coming weeks and months.

Some eye candy for today. It was nice to sit outside in the sun for a few hours but I have to rethink that plastic Adirondack chairs. Not great for stitching.

a napping house

I could digitally remove all the crud from the carpet, but as I'm too lazy to vacuum.....

This is a section of cotton bed ruffle that I've (insanely) decided to pick all the seams out of. Really good, French seams. I do a few inches and have to set it aside.

Sweetie thinks it's all for her entertainment.

The weather has swung between noisy thunderstorms and steamy sun blazing about four times today. Napping seems the best way to deal with it.



Midday, there was mayhem right outside the front door. Colin captured this. The hawk was undeterred and returned to his good hunting place within the hour. I sincerely hope that is one of the rats that has been plaguing my kitchen and I'm very glad I did not resort to poison.

illuminating

speak in the language of darkness.

hands and fingers, know them and each other.

By the night ways, mouths and tongues, discover the grain and strength.

By heart, what to clutch for comfort and who to cling to in certainty.

Beltane fruits

I'd forgotten how the strong serendipity factor in my technique pays off in miracles.

To be sure, there's plenty of mud, but even now they are undergoing further treatment, some ghosting.

I'm setting aside a few pieces, but a lot of this is headed for the scrap hamper. You'll see bits and pieces here.