every-single-day

So many shoulds, time enough to follow through.

There are many things I should blog about, like the ten yards of fabric that came to my door on winning the Nature's Best contest, THANKS to you! Or the fabulous review of my book in Machine Quilting Unlimited, or the fantastic blog I found this week.

But instead I want to talk about the Recycled Journals I am now in love with. Have I talked about this too much already? I used some original pages from the book, Dreams their Meaning and Significance and layered them into signatures of 140 pound cold press Fabriano watercolor paper. See the texture? I could bite my tongue.

I already, sort of, messed the book up. I have to learn about end paper. I think they need to be stiffer than the paper I chose. And because I chose a paper that was floppy, I tried to substantiate it by painting the wrong side with white, panicked, glued something on top, panicked and well, you get the gist of it. Now the end paper in the front of the book is glued to the first page. Covered that one right up. It isn't that bad, a little odd, but. So am I (I was giggling through the writing of that last paragraph- it is good not to take self too srsly).

Have I said how much I love 140 pound watercolor paper? I learned to love it in school, Fabriano in particular. The brushes, the paint, the way the water lays atop the page ready to be reworked until it isn't anymore? Totally different than painting on cloth, but still such satisfaction.

And we all know how much I love to draw and wish that every person who had an inkling of even wanting to draw would start now. Right now. It is so graceful, paper and pencil, that it all you need. Painting is just an extension of drawing. And every artist, even if they don't use every tool in the box should have an understanding of the basics. It is so meditative.

I wish my first journals were available to me now, (they are in storage). I would show you. I sucked. We all suck when we start out, that is the way it is. I still have a ways to go, I want to learn to have ease with hands and feet, for instance. But when you are new, just tell yourself to turn the page and don't look back. Not right away, anyway. Now I can look back as some of my early journals and see the raw beauty and the gems among the mundane. See where I was stretching to see myself further, trying. For the most part, I love the progress I have made. But I do see it as a journey, not a destination.

Arrow, beautiful, white and black Arrow. Head tucked, smiling. He knew I was looking at him and kept murping and coming to attention and asking me to pet him.

I am actively seeking friends!

Sometimes you just have to say it like it is. The statement comes out and then resonates.
I spoke about this a bit in my last post, I told you of Shirley, who approached me at Open Studios and whose name tag indicated that she was from New York City. Without thinking I reiterated where she was from and told her I was actively seeking friends.
So this post is about friends, both old and new.

Last week, I returned home from my new friend Shirley's house with a sense of excitement, vim and vigor. I was a bit busy and although I wanted to drop everything and purchase some watercolor paper, linen thread and glue, I stayed focused. More on that later.
But today there was nice crisp fall weather and I was able to complete some jobs prior to hopping on the train and heading over to the art store to purchase the needed supplies. Photos will come later, the pages I am cutting in this photograph are being flattened over night.

A good friend of mine had to attend to some important business and was unable to teach a class. Somehow my name came up and I am filling in. This is a three week class where we print, create a quilt, and embellish.Week one we made found object stamps using cardboard, string and plastic.
I am now prepping for week 2; quilting, or perhaps embroidering is the right word. This is my sample and is as far as I have gotten.
Not too shabby! The sample makes me happy because it is not my normal style.

Then there was my retreat. This is a dream scenario, food is cooked three times a day on a strict schedule, wine and beer can be had if there is interest, a large room is provided where 8 to 10 talented, creative and supportive women gather twice a year to work on our own projects. The leaves outside rustled and fell, the view of the lake... gorgeous.
I decided not to go to lunch on Saturday and was left in a quiet room with piles of cloth, a spill of thread and echoes of friends voices. It was awesome. You might remember that I used to organize this group and that this is not the first retreat I have been to with these fabulous women (I went into my personal wayback machine and got lost in my own archives! Suffice it to say, I have been going to this retreat since 2005 safe for my brief love affair with Flagstaff.

Eye candy...

Brienne quilts like the devil and uses yummy threads to boot.

Carol embraces the whirlwind effect of creativity, if your stash overflows you will find the right cloth for the purpose. And heck! Look at her stash.

Dana is a wearable art artist and her work is amazing. She can handle the most delicate of cloth with mastery.

She helped me to break down and recreate the skirt pattern!
...Dharma, why is your Hemp/Silk Charmeuse so darned expensive (or perhaps I should say, when was the last time you made a skirt that calls for 5 yards of cloth?)

And here we are minus one member, sorry Jutta. From left to right, myself, Carol, Dana, Jane, Judy, Elizabeth and Brienne.

Gone Fishin'

A few Houston recap items...

Carol came to at least my monoprinting demo and then showed up at Open Studios wearing a name tag purse using my pattern from this years Quilting Arts Gifts magazine. It is such fun seeing my designs in the wild, I had to feature it here.

But then...

Carol is a member of my very first guild. The one who gave me a scholarship to go to the Fashion Institute of Technology a little more than 10 years ago. And it was funny because I kept looking at her sitting and listening to me talk. I knew I KNEW her. I even stopped mid-sentence to ask where I knew her from.
Good stuff.

Then a blog reader named Ana stopped by to give me not just this beautifully hand carved wooden spoon but a carved hummingbird too. I tried to take a photo of the hummer but it is blurry and I shouldn't be taking the time to blog right now anyway.

But my camera was returned to me and I snuck a post in.

I feel quite blessed to be among such creative, passionate and loving people.

I am off. I am a member of a Quilt Art Retreat group that meets twice a year and while I was living in Flagstaff, I didn't participate. So I am happy to say I am making up for lost time.

The sign on my door says, 'Gone Fishin!'

Houston 2009

This is a difficult post to create because I forgot my camera in a store in Galveston Texas (it is being returned to me this week). So these photos are thanks to Jamie Fingal, Leslie Tucker Jennison and Sharon Hyll. Thanks gals!

This is a photo of me at my lecture. My first true lecture, where I created a set of slides to project and spoke for 50 minutes straight. It took a good three days to put the Powerpoint presentation together, fuss with the word prompts, read it to the empty apartment and worry it wasn't long enough.

But I counseled myself to read slowly, ad-lib and riff off topic as it felt right to do so and sip water throughout. And I did well. I had about 50 participants and spoke for about 50 minutes.

I even bought myself a new skirt, which you can't really see in this photo but which I am in love with! I plan to work on recreating the pattern for myself so I can make fabric and new renditions of the skirt. I know I feel as though too many people wear black here in the city. It is like a uniform. It is pretty but over used.

Beside I am a textile designer.

I did a couple of Open Studios at the MIU booth. Since the book has had some time to percolate, it is interesting to see what people think of it and what they say about it. All the Interweave booth's books sold out by Friday, so I went to other booths that carried my book and made sure to direct new readers there for copies. (Like Robin).

I truly hope that my focus on using thickened dyes doesn't turn folks away from my book. That is my main fear.

But Festival is full of surprises! A member of my very first guild sat in on the monoprinting presentation I gave at a Mixed Media sampler, one of the women at my lecture came up to me later that day at Open Studios and I noticed she was from NYC. I told her I was actively seeking friends and yesterday I spent a delightful afternoon at her house making hard covered books into watercolor journals! Recycled books! And tonight I will meet up with Iris Karp of Misty Fuse to go to an opening in Chelsea. I know I don't NEED to go all the way to Houston to meet New Yorkers, but it sure does help to narrow the focus and hone in on mutual interests!

I spent some great time with Leslie, and Judy, among others.

And Surviving the Runway was great fun this time around. Maybe it was the music. Maybe it was helping to make a corset out of craft foam, pipe cleaners, pom poms, fabric and duct tape. Goovy-ness like that just can't be beat and with Pokey's signature music tracks in the background to dance to?

Perfect.

The winner is?

I added the two blog comments together, 10 from my Author blog and 27 from my personal blog and used a random number generator to choose a number between 1 and 37.

Drum Roll please!

Debbie L.

I am going to Houston tomorrow at 8:15 a.m. so please excuse me for the next week. I won't have time to go to the P.O. until I return.

It is going to be fun though!

I am doing two forums, one on machine quilting and another for the mixed media miscellany- monoprinting with dyes. I will also do a couple of Open Studios for MIU.

I am giving my first full lecture. I gathered images and wrote out a 67 slide Power Point presentation for the Journaling as Inspiration for quilt artists lecture I will give on Friday morning. I have counseled myself to speak slowly and clearly and will bring a bottle of water to sip to help me pace myself. I read it out to myself this morning and think I will be fine as far as the timing goes.

So I will have a full week ahead of me.

Not to mention that I am meeting up with my friend Alice, a mighty special woman. So good times, good times.

THANKS to all who voted for me over at Nature's Best! I won! :) Thanks so much for voting for me, visiting the site and having some fun. I watched the tally with glee and a real child-like spirit of fun.

Studio Tour 2009 plus a give away.

Cate came up with the idea of a studio tour and I love seeing where people create. I couldn't pass this opportunity up.
This will be a photo intense entry and I am going to upload my latest Video Prompt too. I have put off blogging all week just for today.

This was given to me by Kristine Mays, it was intended to help me rust fabrics, but I have used it as art ever since. Kristine's work is great. She can create cloth out of wire. Just amazing.

Here is my video tour:

You can imagine that I love having doors to hide all this stuff. MESS-SY.

But you have to make a mess to create stuff.

This Inspired to Quilt Video Prompt (#6) is about color mixing. This is an exercise that I would have scoffed at early in my creative development. But I ask that you not follow my lead in this respect. Creating a color wheel will help teach very basic concepts and ideas about color, value and hue. If you follow that up with creating color gradations, you will really get a feel for each color. Here is a close up of my color wheel.

I entered a piece named Happiness in an online contest called Nature's Best. This is in the small projects category and I would love to win. Vote for me, vote Happiness, please?

I am also going to host a give away. Leave a comment telling me about where you create, if you have dedicated space or a 6x9 foot sewing closet like mine and you will be entered to win a copy of my DVD. The contest will end in one week on Saturday, *October* 10. Especially leave a comment to your blog, if you are participating. Either way, you have a chance-no worries if you do not have a blog!

I hope you win.