Monday, October 18, 2010

ocean homes progress

After spending all day building a back by machine cobbling strips of various blues into large spontaneous log cabinish blocks (there's enough for a whole 'nother  top!) I remembered this gigantic cutwork tablecloth that I dyed ages ago.

It was on a hanger in the closet, all pressed and ready for the dance. With a little fussing around holes that I had chopped into it, I fit it to the back of Ocean Homes Since there is no batting I'm now backfilling under the cutwork holes with a little fire.


Sunday afternoon I spent several pleasant hours at a friends house stitching outside in the October sun while we talked. It was a nice way to reconnect with the piece and the friendship- both were languishing.

The decorative edge of the tablecloth has a real water's edge feel where I lapped it over to the frontside and stitched it fast. If I had only thought about putting the glow behind the holes before I stitched the edges all the way around!

Thursday, October 14, 2010

blues, we got the raggedy blues...



Not me! It's my birthday and I'm celebrating with a day off, time in the studio, new ideas, burgers with my crew and a new flick later. Thanks for the many kind thoughts and wishes!

The stash has
beaucoup blues and I'm trying to make some sense of them and start something new. Of course the first order of business is piecing a backside for "Ocean Homes" -what else would I use?

The beating back of Chaos (always a temporary state) has freed up the Janome and its been calling me over..."sit here,... that's it, fiddle about.get the feel of it again..".Then there's Little Feather chirping from under the table "Use ME, use ME!"


As an exercise, I made these batted and backed leaves and now can't think of a really practical way of joining them up to make a blanket of leaves without any other stitching showing.



And did I ever show you the Blue Snakes? I can't remember why I made them.
Rayon stuffed tight with poly. If anyone wants them and are willing to pay the postage, drop me a line.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

speaking of endings




When I set about photographing this one yesterday I discovered that there was an entire section of paint that was unfinished so I dragged it outside (it's over 7 feet tall) and painted in the final metallic elements.

"Pirate Circus"   







and I finished the hand stitched binding on my own private "Beach" .

Season's End





Thanks to my family and friends who have put up with me during the baseball season. I'm not a fanatic, just a fan. The Atlanta Braves season ended last night with a loss to the Giants and retiring manager Bobby Cox said goodbye to the team and the fans. 

It's a long time until spring training....

Monday, October 11, 2010

morning light




"Frontrunner"

Taking advantage of the newly cleared design wall to photograph the unphotograph-able. Guess I have to photoshop out the backdrop since I can't safely iron it. Sheesh, it never ends!I unearthed some things that have never shot properly before or correctly in the first place.


"Winds on Linen"



"Sunny Jim" (2005)