This blog is my fave new toy, and I love playing with all the cool things it can do, like change its color and layout. I changed it because I CAN.
Stitchy told me how to add more than one picture at a time, which worked perfectly and I learned how to make any word a link.
Folks from all over have managed to find me here, including Felicity from Kuwait, and Thomas from Denmark. Of course I have friends here in the states too, Deborah from Maine, and Diane in California.
I hope that I will be able to have the time to post daily when work begins again.
Today it is so cold that I got out the sweatpants, shirt and turtleneck to try and keep limber while I quilt. Brrrr
The other night driving home from O'Hare, I had the radio on and was listening to the Detroit Symphony Orchestra broadcast and thought the announcer sounded like Dick Cavett. I began to reminisce about the old great Dick Cavett show and how there really isn't anything of that caliber on TV anymore. The concert ended and the announcer turned out to be Dick! Wow! What a sad discovery. He couldn't be farther from the spotlight than on the radio on the classical station. Gee.
I went to Google him and there appears to be a reason for his invisibility. He has been battling depression for years and has bi-polar syndrome. What a pity. I'd love to see him on tv again, or at least hosting a radio show.
I wish I could click on something and make that happen.
Monday, December 20, 2004
A New Look
Sunday, December 19, 2004
How to Start a Quilt
1. Plug in the iron to prepare the precious fabrics chosen yesterday for the quilt project finally being launched today.
2. Put away the chosen fabrics. Check email, feed cats, eat almonds, make tea. Pull out box of the fabrics just dyed for workshop students. Select eight possibilities.
3. Plug in the space heater, since it is 12 degrees farenheit outside and the studio is also freezing.
4. Have a cup of tea and rummage through sketchbook, art magazines and Quilt National catalogs, looking for answers, layouts, clues, permission.
5. Recognize the sound of the circuit breaker blowing from iron and space heater being on the same line. Unplug both and try to open circuit breaker box to restart circuit.
6. Use screwdriver attempting to pry open circuit breaker box. Move several pieces of furniture, and sewing machine to get closer to circuit breaker box.
7. Spill tea.
8. Get larger screwdriver to try and pry open circuit breaker box. Curse Wally the electrician, while bending door to said box, remove bent latch, flip switch and cover bent door with framed poster of my AQS Best Wall of 1995.
9. Move space heater and plug in again.
10. Have another cup of tea.
11. Decide to just iron all the fabric pieces and then apply fusible.
12. Decide to use old fabric sketch as the layout.
13. Beseech the Almighty, again, for creative help .
14. Make the first cuts.
15. Breathe sigh of relief.
The Fabric Sketch
The Background is begun
The Studio Dance part B
Saturday December 18.
I knit until noon, then showered and got dressed. I entered the inner sanctum and turned on the boombox to listen to NPR, and my favorite Saturday entertainment, Ira Glass’s This America Life. It was a rerun, which is just as enjoyable and comforting as a new program.
The studio is pretty clean, just a few things on the worktable to remove, which I do, since the priority of the day is to find the fabric for the next matchstick piece.
Then emptying my fabric drawer onto the table, I begin to sort. (I do have more than one fabric drawer, but this is the un-fused stuff, the good stuff, and the pieces that I hope will help me make the best work.)
Since I am a dyer, I only use my own hand dyed fabrics for my quilts. I put aside particular pieces that interest me and save them for years and years until they lose their preciousness and become usable. There is no gauge of how long a piece must age, and it will look as new as the day it was dyed, since I keep it all under wraps during this aging process.
In recent years I have switched from working on a gorgeous background fabric, and applying fused bits, to fuse-piecing my designs, and leaving off the fused bits entirely. With the advent of the matchstick design, I realized that I must resurrect those wonderful background fabrics and put away the others. I can tell the difference, even if no one else can.
The task of finding all that old fabric begins to materialize. I have boxes of fabric that I must wade through. This will take several hours, and is fraught with many decisions, which since the idea for the quilt has yet to emerge, means that every choice is more difficult.
Eventually I accumulate several possibilities, all in large yardage pieces. Three yards by 42” or 54” squares. No wonder they never got used. Cutting into these pristine fabrics requires confidence and determination. They were dyed in a process that is no longer available to me, and once I use them I will not have them again.
Pinning them all to my wall, I return the rest of the fabrics to boxes, in some sort of an organized fashion. I did arrange them by color, which I thought would be helpful next time I went through this process. And I left the fabric drawer a little less full than it was when I started.
Recently in my teaching experience. I have provided kits for the students to use in the class. This eliminates the need to decide what to bring, and then they can leap right into the project. Too many choices postpone the work.
So somehow I must limit my choices too. I will eliminate some of these fabrics, putting them in the drawer, and working with only the one piece for the new quilt.
The new piece is multicolored so that is why this works. All the pieces are multicolored. And whatever I make will have multicolored bits fused to it. Therefore, it almost makes no difference where I start, as the result is always “All Color All the Time”.
OK. The fabrics have been chosen. Now what will the layout for the quilt be like? I have my sketchbook at the ready and I doodle for a while, but nothing good happens.
I am cold and wish it were time to leave the studio and drive Frieda to the airport for her Christmas trip to Florida. This is my last ‘obligation’ before all my friends become engrossed in their family holidays. When she has left, there will be no one to call, and that large space of solitude will envelope me and help me focus. Our holiday festivities are few until the day actually arrives. I get my best work done this week, in the subdued environment of my studio.
I return upstairs to the site of my morning’s knitting. I knit a while, constructively using the last remaining minutes before driving Frieda. Looking up I glance at the two wonderful piece of felted artwork made by Karen Hampton and her daughter. I recently moved these pieces into the library/TV room and happily they inspire me anew. The motifs are tie-dyed circles, which are so like what is going on with the matchsticks designs. I am finally able to see new possibilities and feel that tomorrow I will be able to begin.
Saturday, December 18, 2004
Trying to Work
Just getting up the courage to go into the studio is my task this morning. I avoided it yesterday very well. Instead of making art, I cleaned up the library/TV room, including vacuuming and tossing tons of accumulated papers. Not like me. Desperate for distraction.
It's that familiar Studio Dance...fritzing around til something happens.
Why does it take courage some days to enter that room, that mindset, that creative space?
Sometimes after having a row of successes, an artist then has to live up to the last good piece she has made. Is this a problem for me? YES.
This year I have been in search of the elusive series concept. Intellectually I know that this would have to be an idea that would be expandable into many variations on the original theme. In order to accomplish this, the idea must be simple and enjoyable for me to construct.
The variables would be layout, color and something else. I have no idea what that something else is. Perhaps it is an idea that works as a catalyst to get me into the creative state.
I am not usually a hesitant artist. I have maintained that the way to make art is not to wait for the muse but instead to get into the studio and just play. This is how I have managed to make a great deal of work this year. I have monthly deadlines of the PAQA meeting, or the next teaching job, which gave me an allotment of time to make new work. I very busily attacked fabric, using my "formula" of strip fused constructed fabrics, plus a simple repeated block, combined with large chunks of plain color. I can make a top a day, and by the fourth or fifth day I am ready to quilt them all. This isn't a boast, but actually the way I worked most of this year. The result was quantity over quality. Accidentally several nice works were created and the rest, well, they are just the rest.
When that was all over and the really nice Quilt National piece ( unrelated to that series work) was rejected (A Triumph of Tulips), I let go of the push, push, push of the year and just relaxed for a while.
Then we watched the Andy Goldsworthy DVD and I got inspired to make Matchstick Moons. Surprisingly good work and it was also fun to construct. I could have finally discovered something that would work as series potential.
I could be feeling satisfied. But no, that isn't the deal. I should be wanting to build on that new good foundation.
Should.
Icky word. Connotes obligation. Eeoooww.
On the other hand, I do have a sketch that I could use as a jumping off point. If I sketched for an hour or so, there might appear several more possibilities. The thing about sketching, is that the mind brings forth stuff almost automatically. I could do that. In the warmth of an upstairs room, listening to good Saturday radio.
There is a good block of time for me now. Dave has to work Sunday, everyone else is off doing
Christmas stuff or leaving town, so there will be no distractions, no social life to speak of, and it's not like I have to think about any deadlines...nothing to say I can't have a few false starts before something good happens. It's only fabric for heaven's sake...
Friday, December 17, 2004
The Second Annual Girlfriends Christmas Party
This space reserved for Gretl Kramer who arrived, handed out Christmas poems she wrote and departed in less than five minutes. We are going to her house, she promises, in January for a yarn party. The task will be to organize YEARS worth of accumulated yarns, BY COLOR. I am bringing a shopping bag for any oddments she may want to discard.
Emily last year, was not able to make the party this year, since she is now the mother of three kids, 5 and under! HOWEVER, she is the youngest of us all by far, so she has years to go before any discussion of age.
Thursday, December 16, 2004
The Cardigan is Finished!
I had Dave take these pictures and they turned out just great. Again, please click for larger view.
This yarn is from Linda MacMillan at http://www.oakgroveyarns.com/
We met at the Pennsylvania National Quilt Extravaganza in September. I was teaching there and visited her booth everyday at lunch to oogle and fondle her hand dyed wool and silk yarns. This one is a 50%kid 50%merino blend and is the ultimate in luxuriousness on the needles. I took my time knitting it since it is patch by patch with no side seams and grew quite large. I worked on it only at home and confined my on the road knitting to more managable projects.
Linda also makes dichroic glass beads and that is another of my weaknesses, so if you look closely you can see that I am wearing those in a necklace and earrings set.
This is my largest project to date and I have determined that now I will make a bunch of pullover vests since I end up wearing those the most.
Now that I am done knitting this project my finger are free to blog again on a daily basis.
In one hour I am meeting the girlfriends at Laura Wasilowski's house for our annual Girlfriends Christmas Lunch. There will be a full report.
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
Back to Knitting Patchwork Style
Click on this picture and you will see that the sections are made as individual units, using two colors in a slip stitch pattern. One knits a 'shell' in this case, and then stitches are picked up and cast on to form the next shell. This way the motif is the accumulation that leads to the shape.
I particularly like working in the diamond pattern as shown in
http://photos1.blogger.com/img/50/2437/640/3.jpg
way back when I first started this blog. I have sweaters made with the diamond patch (from www.justonemorerow.com) and two made with the square patch http://photos1.blogger.com/img/50/2437/640/VESTFRONT.jpg
Today I just finished a diamond patch cardigan and will have this picture up soon.
The vest is from the book Dazzling Knits and I finished it in September but thought you would like to see it now since I am wearing it often. It uses a slip stitch pattern and dk wool, size 8 dpns. Fun and fast.
I also finished the scarf from my midnight knit fest after our anniversary party at home. It is a verrrrryyyy long scarf.
Tuesday, December 14, 2004
Replies to Comments
I am delighted to find that a few people have actually found my blog and have commented on it.
This has gone to my head ( lots of empty room up there) and I feel like a famous author.
I want to repond personally to the comments, but find there is not a direct link to the commentor's email. This is not good. Am I missing something? I clicked on their names but it doesn't take me to an email address.
One person wants more diet info and that is available on the blog that I wrote November 23, so please search the archives.
And then, Stitchy McYarnpants wrote me!! Imagine my delight. I Am SUCH A BIG FAN. It was Stitchy that got me interested in blogging. Yipes I am goony.
And she likes my quilts. Omigod.
Tripping all over myself, I will direct Stitchy to my website which has other things to see. www.wowmelody.com
I will post a few more food themed quilts...
Monday, December 13, 2004
Two recent quilt sales
Arc Block 9 and Onions, pictured below, are two of my quilts that sold recently at our annual Christmas sale of the Professional Art Quilt Alliance. Both are small works, which just underscores the fact that fiber art is more likely to sell if it is of a realistic size. We art quilters discussed the size issue at lunch last Wednesday, and admitted that quilts are more likely to win an award if they are huge, and more likely to remain at home, in storage, after they have been exhibited.
A recent bit of good news however is floating around from Emily Parson, who was contacted by a reputable gallery in OH, asking for two of her massive works to be sent on approval to a client in New York. We are holding our breath in anticipation to see if they will sell. Then I guarantee we'll all get our hopes up again and begin planning giganto humungo quilts.
Today I made a 5"x5.5" quilt. Then I had to leave the studio and meet Cary who was delivering my refurbished desktop computer. I now have two computers that are running Windows XP. I am so happy and smug.
Back to knitting.
Sunday, December 12, 2004
What is this thing?
Tamale Party--Ole!
Cary mixes the masa for the tamales while I supervise.
Tamales are fun to make with a crowd and the combination of homemade beer and tamales is unbelievable. WE really know how to have a good time.
A week before Thanksgiving I cooked a turkey in my big canning pressure cooker and deboned it, saving the highly flavored rich broth. The Sunday before Thanksgiving Dave and I took this meat and broth to Cary's house where he and his girlfriend Rose had the prepared masa, ojas or corn husks, and the ancho chiles. Rose has a teeny bit of Mexican blood (100%) and her dad had purchased the masa (ground corn mixed with spices and LARD) in Pilsen, an area near Chicago where many Mexican families live. The ancho chiles were purchased near Cary's house and coincidently many Mexican families live near him too. O what the heck, we're EVERYWHERE!
The dried chiles were simmered on the stove and steeped for an hour to soften them and then whirled in the blender to make a paste. I had previously ground up the turkey meat in the food processor, so the chiles and warmed broth were mixed with the turkey to form the delicious tamale filling. More broth and chili paste were whipped into the masa and the ojas were soaked in a large bucket of warm water to soften.
Cary and Rose surprised us with their new dining room table, a counter-height square of 54". It came with 8 bar stool/chairs, and it was the perfect space to use as an assembly point to make the tamales. Click the link below to see the exact set they got. You know I must include pictures!
http://www.harlemfurniture.com/productdetail.cfm?SR=1&prodID=743&groupID=40&sort=0
Cary lives in a large house that is constantly under construction, of his own doing. His fantasy is to live in a saloon. I swear everything is designed with Tavern Decor. The living room has a big screen TV and a huge fire place. Since we make beer the kitchen counter has brewing carboys filled with wort, at work bubbling and aging.He always has multiple cats, and makes pets of the squirrels in his yard by feeding them peanuts in a bowl. Even the Blue Jays are hand fed peanuts. Stray cats show up at his door and are fed and eventually become boarders. Yesterday a stray was huddled at the door and the male squirrel, whose name escapes me at the moment, arrived to have a few peanuts. The squirrel practically stepped on the cat and got his peanuts and strolled away. The cat never blinked an eye. He was so intent on being the next diner.
Back to the tamales. Dave was the camera man and folder of the finished tamale husks. Rose and I slathered the husks with the masa and Cary made little rolls of meat for the filling. Dave took a few movie shorts (with his digital camera) of the process and I am embarrassed to say that I was caught telling Rose how much more masa we wanted than she was giving us. Bossy broad that I am!
The homebrew was potent and the first batch of tamales were cooked while we continued to assemble the rest of the ingredients. As soon as the pressure cooker was opened we stopped and ate a bunch of the fresh hot fragrant delicious contents. These soft morsels look unlike anything we had in Mexico, but are exactly what we think of as homemade perfection. Topped with salsa, sour cream, salt and perhaps guacamole, it is food of the gods. Oink.
Saturday, December 11, 2004
Our Lavish Guest Accomodations
Accomodations at Chez Johnson
Friday, December 10, 2004
Bigger Pictures Appear
Just click on any of the pictures below and another page pops up with a much bigger and of course better picture. Hurray for Blogspot.com/ What a good IDEA.
Our Anniversary Party at Home
Let's get this party started.
Dave pours the bubbly while I make the dinner.
Yes, this is another post about FOOD.
I have a couple of wonderful ribeye steaks marinating and have already baked a pair of sweet potatoes before Dave got home from work. I whipped them up with the leftover whipping cream from Thanksgiving and added a pat of butter and few grinds of sea salt. Simple ORANGE and elegant. The GREEN BEANS were fresh and waiting to be steamed, and finished with sauteed pecans. Even though it's December 9th I am still going to use the gas grill on the deck to cook the steaks. Luckily the rainy week is over.
You know that look...
You know that look, and there's no argument from me...
Yup, it's time for dessert! I have two pints of Godiva ice cream ready. Chocolate Raspberry Trifle and White Chocolate Raspberry. The diet is shot to blazes! Two scoops each and Nirvana is reached.
We left the dishes sitting on the table and made our way upstairs to the fresh sheets and Yo Yo Ma on the bedroom boombox. The time was all of 7:15 and the party was going into high gear. We will now have a pause for intermission. Lights out.
I have no memory of the events that transpired. Champagne will do that to one.
At 12:20 am I awoke with an urgent need for a haircut, mostly on my tongue. I got up and drank a big glass of water to ward off the impending hangover and let out the cats. No point in returning to bed since I would just have to let the meow machines back in shortly, so my mind drifted to thoughts of knitting. Obviously.
Previously...
On Wednesday I tried on an interesting scarf at the Fine Line Christmas sale. It was shaped like a V and the V part covered the back of my neck in such a nice way, while the scarf ends could be tied or flung about the shoulders, without bunching up around my very short neck. It's not so much that my neck is really short, it's that my face dissolves into it without much of a line of demarcation. This scarf seemed to feel and fit like no other, but I was not about to BUY myself a scarf when I have all the yarn in the WORLD in my stash just waiting to make something like this as soon as I finish my other WIP. Ha!
On Thursday afternoon after I fiinished cleaning the house in prep for our dinner, I decided to run an errand for my brother Cary's girlfriend, Rose. She has a friend in NY who was in need of some interesting knitting books and Rose asked me to shop for her. Delighted! I went over to the yarn shop in Crystal Lake, Sunflower Samplings, after picking up some Christmas CD's at the Algonquin Library, and before rushing off to the Jewel to get some chilled champagne and dessert for our dinner.
The gals at the SS shop have so many scarves on display and surely they must have a pattern for this V shaped scarf that I saw. We discussed it, looked at several books and then decided I could do one of my fave Diamond patches as the neck part, and then pick up stitches on either side and make the scarf. I was delighted, again! Since I was there for a book, I found one I liked and saw in another room, some sale yarn! Woowoo. Half price! Double woowoo. Perhaps there was something Christmasy to be had??
Yes! I found some Uxbridge Tweed by Berrocco. Two in red and two in green, a nice dark green. These would be great for the scarf I have planned and perhaps enough for two, one for a manly man on my list.
I wonder what size needles this yarn uses? The label says 9. I have nines right downstairs here, and the cats are still outside, perhaps I will just do a quick swatch while I wait for the meowing.
It occurs to me that I could try doing a triangle as my swatch, not that diamond patch that I planned to use for the scarf. This would be just to test gauge and to see how these two colors would look as a stripe. I cast on three stitches in the green and attached the red and knit in seed stitch pattern across and back. Nice. Then I used the green again and increased at the beginning and end of that row continuing in pattern and seed st back. Alternating and increasing with each change of color. Hmm. Nice yarn, soft and warm, a mix of wool, acrylic, cotton, poly and nylon, the kitchen sink!
The swatch started to grow and I noticed that the stripe wasn't very obvious due to the seed stitch and the tweediness of the yarn itself. This looked very nice, very subtle and manly. But it would work for me and my red coat too. Luckily I have enough for two scarves. Yes, I think this will be the way I make the V shape.
I let in the cats and out again and in again and I decided to knit just one more row. They were sure to want to go out again anyway.
The Triangle Works
About 2:15am: I think this idea will fly!
I have knit 51 stitches and think that should make about a 6 inch wide scarf, which is plenty, but not too wide. I have divided the stitches and bound off the center stitch just to provide a stable center for the V. Jet is asleep on my lap and the dishwasher and furnace noise almost drowns out the sound of snoring coming from Popeye across the room.
The scarf continues
I decide at 3:30am that I really should try and get some sleep, even though I feel perfectly awake. Jet has stopped meowing for the moment but just to be safe I open a can of cat food and leave him snarfing it down.
This has been a totalling satisfying evening.
Wednesday, December 08, 2004
The Tree is Up
December is so holiday rich for us, with our anniversary on the 9th, and Christmas on the 25th and then my birthday on the 28th. By that time who wants to celebrate anything for a long time. New Year's is usually spent quietly and asleep before 11pm. When did we become such old farts?
I am celebrating my new website today, http://www.wowmelody.com/
created by David Walker, http://davidwalker.us/ and I am going nuts over it. Another big TA DA! moment. Thanks David, you're the best!
Tuesday, December 07, 2004
Year's End Reflections
I have been reading Stitchy McYarnpants http://yarnpants.blogspot.com/ and Queer Joe, 100 things about me, http://www.queerjoe.blogspot.com/100%20Things%20About%20Me.htm and I find it irresistible to follow suit and define myself to you in similar fashion.
HOWEVER, I can't do it without listing some of my failings or regrets, which feels a little like confession, or apology. Does anyone see the connection to 12 step programs here? It's one thing to do the list as a lark, for entertainment, and if it were sunny, and June, I could easily do that. But it is raining and December, the end of the year and time to look back and honestly evaluate.
I was lying in bed last night (waiting for the cats to demand re-entry) thinking about the parts of my character that need work. 27 years ago, between husbands, I found myself feeling pretty vague about who I had become, and being in transition, made the decision to do an 'improve Melody' public works project. I made a list then too, and despite the adage that a leopard can't change his spots, decide to redesign myself.
I can recall that one of the bad habits to change was to learn to graciously accept a compliment. Another, and this is crucial, is to enter into relationships with my eyes wide open. I wanted to fall in love again, but this time with my brain intact and then let my heart in after the 'all clear' was sounded. In order to do this, I needed to set limits on my dating patterns. I would give each new beau a six weeks term to evaluate his possibilities and then scrap the bum if he didn't pass muster. This was my plan and while the fellas were none the wiser, it certainly gave me a goal and wasted very little of my precious time. I was thirty, after all!
Being a goal-oriented gal meant that I couldn't wait for the guys to do the asking. I made up my mind who was next and then I set up the dates. At the time, the late great 70's, I went to Willow Creek Church, which was filled to the brim with single men, mostly gay, but lovely and well behaved for the most part. Asking one out required something gutsy, but I did it before with my first husband and it worked, getting the relationship started at least.
As I recall, I worked my way through about four candidates, and some didn't even make the six weeks cutoff. And then a new man appeared at our store. (Did I mention that I was working at Jewel as a meat wrapper at the time, a real low point, but not as bad as cocktail waitress at a country and western dive that shall remain nameless. ) He was a butcher, a category that was definitely not on my list. Most of the guys I worked with were disgusting, foul mouthed, unfaithful husbands, with bad teeth, smoking and drinking habits, and I wanted no part of them. I had to have a church-goer, with education and good social skills. Is that asking too much?
But this new butcher...he had a walk...and hands that were so soft and clean...and his teeth were perfect and his eyes were so blue.
On the other hand, he had very thin white blond hair and I knew that he was at a disadvantage with most girls since his hair was almost gone and then he would be out of the running...except for someone with vision, like me!
There was one little problem. I was much older than him. At lunch one day I blithely asked him his age, which apparently was often asked of him. I guessed at 28, but he revealed he was 22.
O, geewhiz.
Now what should I do? I was dumping a church-boy that week and ending a flirtation with someone else from work, and ready to move onto the next recruit, but this not-on-the-list fella was compelling, yet vulnerable. Would it be fair to do this to a co-worker? A woman in the deli warned me not to hurt this poor defenseless boy, and she meant it.
I wouldn't. Really.
I asked him out. We met at a bar at 9 pm, after my church group left my apartment. We, no I, talked til 1 am. I gave him my whole life story, just as I would have to my church-boys, which leaves him wondering what in the world has he gotten himself into? At the good-night kiss, I got a cheek peck. Hmmm. Where did I go wrong?
He went on vacation for a week and when he returned I was already a goner. Smart play on his part, even though he may not have known he was in the game.
Second date, I asked him for a beer across the street at Mrs. Robinson's pub. Ironic, I know.
By the second pitcher, we were leaning across the table, having a real smooch.
That was August 17. By December 9 we were married.
It's all happened so fast. Twenty six years later and I'm still mad about the boy.
Monday, December 06, 2004
Matchstick Moons, the Ta Da! Moment
Matchstick Moons
This is my Andy Goldsworthy inspired design (http://cgee.hamline.edu/see/goldsworthy/gold_rowanlevs.gif) and I am delighted with its look. I feel as though I have gone back in time to the late 90's when I did lots of collage type quilts, such as Parallel Paths, Streetdance and Hot Fun. These were quilts that began with a background fabric, hand dyed in soft blends,with collaged surface elements to create the design. Somewhere along the line I decided that this route was too easy, somehow too elementary an approach. So I began constructing my backgrounds, or making designs that had a pieced look, rather than a collaged look. This was a direction that had occasional success, but seemed to have less Melodyness. Hmm.
Who can understand the way my mind works? I certainly have no explanation that makes any sense.
I seem to have come full circle with this quilt and while it was a simple design, it did require some patience and exactitude. In the finishing I found that it needed to be hand quilted. I fused the top panels together and stitched in the ditch, after I pillowcased the backing onto it all. The I spent a day and a half hand quilting through all three layers, just so the thing wouldn't look unquilted. As it stands, the quilting is almost invisible, until the back is viewed, where it looks pretty darn random.
I am having David Walker put this on my Recent Works page of the new website. A blog picture will only be so clear, so please have another look when the website is completed. Watch this space for the announcement of the premiere.
I have a couple of more ideas in my sketchbook that I would like to try out with this approach. It's odd that all of a sudden I can conceive of related works, works that could become a series, when I have been striving like a madwoman to try and do series work all year. I made a ton of work, tried to call it a series and find it just didn't fit the imagined result.
I will refer you to the following fabulous artists websites for an understanding of what I was hoping to do.
Janet Steadman http://www2.whidbey.net/jandon/Pages/Galleries.html
Sue Benner http://www.suebenner.com/
and the series champ Carol Taylor http://www.caroltaylorquilts.com
Time will tell if I can concentrate long enough to make work that looks related and cohesive like these artists.
Don't tell me that I am too hard on myself. This is a nut I simply must crack.
Friday, December 03, 2004
Knitting for Breakfast
Panera is the perfect spot to meet, since neither of us have to clean up the house.
Frieda is about to go on vacation to St. Maarten in the Caribbean, lucky duck, and needed to get a project ready to take along. The sweater was started last year, and she finally has the time to attend to finishing it. All she has left are the sleeves, which can be tricky, since they involve short row caps, with wrap and turns, plus a center decrease all the way down. I was employed to show her the techniques, since I have made this sweater in four variations (three in green?? and one in white). FYI it is the San Francisco Shirttail from www.justonemorerow.com. Her yarn is Koigu and it is so wonderful. I want this sweater so much. She will let me borrow it when she is finished.
I arrived at 8 as we planned, and Frieda arrived at 8:30 as she planned. Nevermind, I was happy to be getting my caffeine fix. The booth we take is so worn out already, with the upholstery splitting, that we really need to consider sitting someplace else, but really, this is our booth! We are miffed if it is taken when we arrive.
I bring my laptop, digital camera and show and tell hats, Frieda brings a basket of yarn and needles, and the Crate and Barrel Christmas catalog, and we get right to work on the laptop looking at my snow slides, my fabulous almost finished new website, her dog George pictures, and taking pictures of ourselves knitting. We are both professionals at this style of fooling around. We even get the man in the next booth to take our photos.
Eventually we get to the knitting and accomplish that almost as easily as it says in the directions. Frieda decides that since we are there for over two hours, she really should buy something else to drink so she orders a cappuchino and let's me have a few sips, informing me that it is made with espresso.
Boing Boing Boing. I am instantly wired. (This is a great way to diet, since you are so stimulated that eating seems irrelevant.)
We leave Panera at 11am and I must go home and pay bills, since it is December already. I am so agitated and happy, and full of energy to work on the additions to my website...and then it starts to wear off and I fall in a deep dark hole.
This funk coincides with accumulating the pictures for the gallery pages of the new site. I look at my portfolio of work and it all looks so hopeless and mundane. How can I call myself an artist? This is all drek. What happened to my promise? Whine whine whine. Woe is me. Move over Eyeore.
I wade through the muck of my accumulated works and make choices and send them onto David Walker, and decide to jump off a pier in the near future, ala Monologuist Spalding Gray.
Dave comes home soon and I must cook for him. What is there to eat? Tamales! Hurray, something delicious that is already made. I pour a glass of vino, open a can of refried beans, steam the last of the Thanksgiving tamales and we eat. Instantly the world looks rosey again.
Sigh. Ain't Mexican food great?
Thursday, December 02, 2004
Mystery Guest
I have been getting comments from a person named gknitter. I have tried to reply, but to no avail. Please gknitter email me directly.
Thanks. Melody
Finished Fusing Quilt Top
Hurray!
I finished the new quilt top yesterday, but you'll have to wait until it's quilted to see a picture. It's the only thing that keeps me going to completion. Then I will have the big Tada! moment. I do have to say that I dragged Dave into the studio to unveil it and he loved it. His comment: It's not so flowery.
It is not a flower quilt like my last one, so I guess that was what he meant.
Wednesday, December 01, 2004
The Meow Solution
Oh sure, Jet looks innocent enough here, Black Blob that he is, snuggling up against the dear portly Popeye. But at 2 am he insists that one of us get out of bed and do something...let him out? feed him? What else could it be? Often we thought he just wanted us to sit on the couch so he could be petted.
I am not happy about getting out of bed at 2 am, just to pet a cat. If his meow were merely a meow, that would be one thing. Jet's meow is HUGE, DEMANDING AND LOUD.
He's a deaf 17 year old and truly loved, most of the time. Yet when I am home, busy in the studio he comes in and demands SOMETHING for hours. I can't find out what he wants, even when I beg him to speak English.
Presently, we had to buy some more cat chow, and in the bag there was a small free sample of canned cat food. I gave it to the boys and they gulped it down and I had a nice afternoon, sans demands. Being somewhat dim, I missed the big clue here.
Eventually I began to think that perhaps Jet may find crunchies too crunchy on his old teeth and he may be starving for lack of enough soft food. I decided to add water to his crunchies to soften them. That worked for a short while, but he really wanted something a little more tempting.
Three nights in a row of midnight howling and I decided to go for the gold. I went to the Jewel and bought 30 cans of cat food, plastic disposable bowls, so I wouldn't have to wash the smelly bowls, and presented the boys with the goods.
Voila!! Miracle of miracles. Not one peep during the night. I woke up at 4 worried that he died in the night...but no he was pushing the empty bowl around the floor trying to get at that last little morsel. Triumphantly I opened another can. We are very happy now aren't we Jet? I am his beloved.
I worked all day without a single complaint from him, and at five thirty he came into the studio prepared to shreik, but I raced up the stairs and beat him to it.
I'm being trained to his satisfaction.
