this arrived in the mail on Thursday
it is the sample swatch of the fabric I designed for my kitchen, and I have to say it is pretty cool to see my work transformed into cloth!
yesterday I ordered 4 yards of the fabric to use for the planned projects
and shortly I will make the fabric available for purchase through SpoonFlower -- pretty cool!
I have been working on this piece with a little more urgency this week -- I think I might actually be able to get it finished for the Art Walk show I'm doing on July 18th
the four bracelets I had planned for that show are already finished, so this one is a "bonus"!
and that is not the only thing I've been working on
this is the background layer progress made this week on the quilted piece
coming along
meantime, this photo that I took this week has become the focus of a design idea for another art quilt for a competition that has a deadline of October 1
hmmmm --- can I do this? two big projects with deadlines within 30 days of each other?
time will tell
just because I'm working on those big projects doesn't mean I haven't been doing anything else
these two pictures are actually one hat -- totally reversible -- that I made for Mr Cute this week
he was pretty amazed by it when I gave it to him yesterday when they returned from their trip to see his other grandparents
while they were away, we had their two little dogs for "sleep over camp" at grandma's
and since I still have contractors in an out working on my studio, it made for some interesting days!
these pictures don't look like much but what they mean is that all of the drywall is up, taped and textured
tomorrow the work on finishing begins -- painting, flooring, plumbing, lighting -- and the goal here is to be all done by the end of July
whooo hoooo!
and there was a bit of outdoor work done this week too
the pots were a free find from a neighbor lady that wanted to get them out of her garage -- I'm thrilled to have them
each pot has some big rocks in the bottom then some pea gravel on top to hold the wood flowers
I need to get another bag of pea gravel to finish them up, but I love this on my back deck!
it looks like I will need to repaint them before next summer, but for now I'm just going to enjoy
a lot of things actually got done during the week
this piece is finished
all four of the bracelets that I wanted to have done for the art show I'm doing on July 18 are now complete
so I decided to start work on a new necklace!
actually, I did the design work and "kitting" for two necklaces -- we'll see if I can actually get at least one of them done for that show
and every summer about this time I do some sewing for Mr Cute
this week's offerings included a new pillow case --- with Ninja Turtles on it
a pencil bag with tractors and barns on it -- his wise mommy says "no crayons in the car in the summer!" -- so he needed something to keep the colored pencils contained
a then there are the very spiffy (if I do say so myself) board shorts that were made from a remnant of Cars fabric that feature very carefully cut pockets
I have a few more of these "easy sewing" projects to work on in the next week or so, which should be fun
progress on the studio is happening
this week the walls went up and the spaces that will be the bathroom and the closets are much clearer
and the newest piece of the kitchen remodel arrived
we had not originally planned to replace all of the appliances in the kitchen -- just the refrigerator (which we knew from the day we first looked at the house would have to be replaced)
along the way though the revolt of the appliances in response to the replacement of the refrigerator has continued --- the dishwasher made a hasty exit after it proved to be untrustworthy (that final day of spewing water on the floor just did it in!) and apparently the stove decided to throw in the towel shortly after it got wind of our plan to replace it in the future by having a gas line installed
okay -- so now there is only the microwave to be replaced -- but we're limping along with what is here on that score for now
at some point in the future I want to have the counter tops and the sink replaced, but that is a while out -- the money from the sale of the other house will only stretch so far
and even though the studio is not done yet, deadlines for shows do not change, so I have begun working on this piece which has a deadline of October 31
it is bigger than the last two pieces I've done, and doesn't look like much yet, but so far I'm on track to what the vision in my head is
moving along!
oh look!
another finished bracelet
for a while I have been trying to come up with a different way to attach the clasps on these
this one is the first with the new version, and I'm pleased with the way it came out
as I've been working on doing stuff in my new kitchen, I've been looking for fabric that "speaks" to me to use for some curtains and a few other things
I have not been able to find anything that is the right combination of color, scale and whimsy
so I decided to have a go at making up some of my own
I had a file of various doodles that I had done a few years ago when I was designing some paper dolls and other paper graphics, and this is a "marriage" of several of those motifs
now that the drawing and the coloring is done, I'll be loading it up to get some fabric printed
I finished pinning up all the quilt "sandwiches" for the shed door series this week
I'm hoping to actually get to start stitching on these this week
already my mind is working on trying to figure out what the next series will be
meantime, I've started working on the next individual piece that I want to complete
this is the "pattern" to create the background layer for this piece, which currently has the working title
"tsa-la-gi", the word for Cherokee in the Cherokee language
I'm doing this one to enter in a call for entries on the theme "Diaspora"
for a while I've been thinking about applying for juried artist status in a group I belong to -- on Monday I talked to someone in person about it, and I spent some time looking at the requirements
I am going to start working on part of the process that will be required -- creating my artist resume including a listing of all the exhibits I've either had a piece in or have curated
and in the meantime, I will continue to "do the work"
searching for that next series to work on!
in the last few days I've been on a real roll working on all of these pieces
each of these pairs of pictures has the "before paint" on the left side and the "after paint" on the right
because we have been organizing all of the items in the garage that will eventually go in my studio, I have located the drawer units with the spools of thread that I will need to do the stitching on these, so I'm hoping to get to the stitching of these in the next few days --- WHOO HOOO!
the beading on this is now done -- ready for the finish work
and this one is about half done
I need to finish the beading on the red, white and blue one before I can cut these two apart since the original design was one wider bracelet and I decided at the last minute before I started stitching on the beads to make it into two narrow pieces instead
I still have over a month before my next show, so I'm sure I'll have both of these done by then
now that Mr Cute is a big boy and uses a booster seat in the car instead of a car seat that has sides all the way up, when he would nap while riding, his head would "bob" -- not a good thing!
while he was visiting at "gramma's" house over the weekend, we created something that would take care of that problem
a small chunk of cotton fabric stitched into this over sized horseshoe shape, firmly stuffed with polyester fiber --- he watched while I did the cutting out and stitching (he loves watching the sewing machine work!) and then he helped me with the stuffing
and there he is modeling the finished product
now his mama has requested one of her own for when they take car trips -- I think I can make that happen
another of the Gees Bend Tribute bracelets is complete
I'm really pleased with the way the design of this one turned out
and this one is in progress
one of the fun things about these pieces is that I get to do beading that mimics the look of fabrics -- this piece includes a section that is green and white stripes and another that is orange with white polka dots
it's fun!
meantime, I have also returned to working on this series of shed door pieces
each of these picture pairs is the "before paint" on the left side and the "after paint" on the right
I'm excited to be back working on these and in a way impatient to have them finished so I can move on to the next series -- so typical of my thought processes!
and while we are discussing sheds -- we had this installed in the back yard last week
the first things we did were to paint the floor (to protect it from moisture) and install a shelf along one side to store chemicals and small tools
I'm so thankful we were able to have someone else do the hard work of the basic installation -- we've built a few sheds from scratch, and right now it just felt like our time and energy was better spent elsewhere
the studio finishing is now at the "waiting for permits and inspections" before anything else happens -- must be patient now
this week's work began with the sound of jack hammering
apparently when they put in "rough ins" for plumbing in a basement, there are exactly that -- ROUGH!
because we were okay with putting the bathroom in that corner, the breaking of concrete was minimal
the rest of the week was filled with the HVAC folks putting in new heating and cooling ducts and the electrician stringing wire and installing outlet boxes and round fixtures for can lights in the ceiling
and while that was happening, the unpacking and organizing and even "making look good" portions of moving continued
until we starting grouping these together, I didn't realize what an extensive collection of chicken and rooster pottery pieces I had (some of these had not seen the light of day for a very long time!)
work on art projects continues too
this quilt is moving right along -- it is getting close to being wide enough, and is about half as long as it needs to be
I was notified this week that I got into the ArtWalk Longmont show in July, so it's a good thing that these pieces are moving along nicely
the top one is finished, and the edge work has begun on the second one
rolling along
