Archive for August, 2015

odds and other things…

Wednesday, August 26th, 2015

vintage postage stamp birthday block

 

This month other than the collaboration it has been a bit of odds n’ ends…

I have finished #8, which I have yet to photograph, in the 25 pc collaboration and am in process of designing #9. I am loving this series so much as it continually challenges me in how to express each particular idea. I don’t draw or sketch well, but Google images can often give me a profile or shape from which to start. And I have a spreadsheet of ideas to incorporate in each one which helps with flow and continuity.

This spring I contributed a 12″ square piece titled Keeping Up Appearances #8 to an annual fundraiser for SAQA. As part of their marketing for the benefit auction different artists choose ‘dream collections’ and mine came up today in the fourth grouping. This piece was designed from a vintage embroidered cotton hand towel.

Keeping Up Appearances #8

Also this week I made a 6″ x 6″ stitched block for a colleague who is turning 70 in October. She wants a collection of blocks from friends that reflect her interests. She plans to stitch the blocks together for a big quilt. On her long list of interests was postage stamps. Ironically in the big pile of stuff I amassed from my mother’s things to use in the collaboration were some vintage postage stamps! So I scanned the stamps, collaged in PhotoShop, printed to fabric, made a sandwich, stitched, cut and mailed it off. Voila…the image is above.

painted canvas bags for fundraiser

And I painted canvas tote bags for an October fundraiser at the Arts Guild of Sonoma. I painted the bags with Dyna-flow and then screen-printed text with Lumiere. They came out fine although not 100% clarity but then I was screening through several layers of folded cloth so I am satisfied. And I am just thrilled to have them finished as I was running out of time. The bags will be on exhibit October 6-26.

 

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on old dawgs and new rugs…

Wednesday, August 5th, 2015

Last week we bade farewell to our aged pooch. Millie came to live with us 13 years ago when it was estimated she was about a year old, maybe two. She was a rescue which I believe affected her personality to being one of the sweetest and most grateful creatures ever.

We started with her sleeping in a crate at night but then she became too big to fit so her accommodations became more casual. Her behavior 95% of the time was on point yet that remaining portion she was whack-a-doodle! In her last 2 years she would frequently tear through the bathroom garbage, claw at the toilet roll unwinding several feet at a time, and nest at the foot of the stairs, shredding whatever rug was there. Then she would go back to being normal for some months and we would forget that her whack-a-doodle days might be approaching. We went through two area rugs in the family room and last winter I just decided to keep the floor bare there and replace the rug when she was no more. After all she was an old dawg!

So imagine my surprise when about a month ago, in the night, she took to destroying the last vestige of area rugs…an exquisite red bamboo area rug in the living room. The first evidence showed up as a bald spot. Apparently she pulled the tuft and ingested it in the night. I was annoyed and perplexed but the damage had been done so I left the rug in place to discourage her further pillaging the upholstery. A couple nights later she woke me when she actually tore strips from the base of the rug. How could I scold her? She could barely walk!

Fast forward ten days and now I am spending hours online looking at area rugs to replace the two most recent victims of Millie. I have spent considerable hours looking at rugs and at this point I am thinking…wha? we will likely rescue another pooch in due time. Is anything pooch proof really?!

And then suddenly I realize how my ideals and standards have changed. I used to believe that one day I would have nice things, things not destroyed by kids or animals. And now I believe that it is the kids and animals that are the nice things which fulfill us and make for a wonderful life. The rest is just decoration.

That said…the search continues…

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