Wasting time

I spent an hour this morning looking for the pattern pieces I had made a few weeks back to start a new project. By the time I found them, I lost interest. In the meantime, there has been a discussion on the Quilt Art list of printers. Mine seems not to be working properly, but one of the suggestions from a friend is to reinstall the drivers. The printer is not pulling up the photo paper from the photo tray even though the tray is traveling to the back. It will pull up anything in the main tray. The other discussion is about dye based versus pigment based inks. My printer is an HP that uses Vivera 02 cartridges. According to HP they are dye based however some have said that the new ones perform more like pigment based. The pigment based HP inks are the # 38's and the printer they use is $600+. For that price I am not interested. I will play with what I have.

For a good laugh, here is the original fabric that I used for Fish Story.

Quilted

I did a simple quilting job even I couldn't screw up. I echo quilted around the fish and channel quilted the seams. I may or may not add some hand stitches but it is going on hold since I am going to go look for play fish to embellish with.
Susan will no longer be horrified!

Fish story

I did more work on my resurrected piece today. I finally listened to it and caved in about it being an underwater scene. Being lazy and also not wanting to invest a whole bunch of time in this, I cheated and used some mylar fish stickers I found in a drawer. I also added more paint to the piece. I had several options of adhering the fish to the fabric but I took the easy way out... it was also an experiment. I added a layer of netting over the entire piece fused down with Misty Fuse. I was concerned about the mylar melting but a low setting on the iron did the trick. I like the added texture the netting gives the piece. I tossed some more paint on top of the netting and I declare it done..... now I just have to figure out how to quilt it without ruining it. Yes, some of the fish blend in and you need to be close to see them.... it is intentional. My objection to the piece is that there is not enough value contrasts to the colors. It is what it is. The mylar is shiney and no matter what I do, I get some reflection spots. When I get it done, I will set it up properly and photograph again.

Good news and sneak peak

After some frustrations, my recalcitrant piece is finally coming along. I like how it has turned out. Here is a sneak peek.

On the good news front... usually my mail consists of junk and bills but today I was pleasantly surprised to find 2 very nice pieces. One was a wedding invitation to my hubby's niece's wedding next month (not a surprise) and the other was my "honorarium" check for my piece Through Rose Colored Glasses which will be featured as part of an article on landscape quilts in the July/August issue of Fons and Porters "Love of Quilting" magazine. This is pretty heady for a nobody in the art quilt world. This has been a good year for me so far. I hate drinking alone, but I think I will imbibe in a glass of wine.

Named

My latest wonky piece has a name thanks to some help from online buddies. I have decided to call it "In the Eyes of Chaos". Very fitting for this piece.
I have started work on another something or other. I was playing around with using paint on fabric in November and was not terribly happy with any of the results. Maybe it was timing, but I did not have the patience to really focus on it. The results were 2 pieces of crap with color on them. One has some potential down the road, the other was slated for the rag pile but it got a reprieve. I decided to slice it up and sew it back together again. It has some possibilities but I have already nixed 3 ideas. It has been screaming at me that it wants to be an underwater scene but it isn't what I wanted to do. Of course nothing else I come up with is working.... so we all know what it eventually will be. Now I just have to figure out a way to go with it.

Yummy dinner last night... my hubby hates mushrooms but he is in China on a biz trip. I bought some Portobello mushrooms and some arugula at the store the other day and last night I marinated the mushrooms with oil, garlic, and hot pepper flakes then grilled it. Set it over a bed of arugula and poured the rest of the marinade over it. mmmmm mmmmm good.

Yesterday...

....was an interesting day. We woke up in the morning to find out we had no electricity and no water. Some doohickey on the power pole outside our house had a meltdown. I will say that the folks from the utility company responded promptly and by noon we had power back. We need power to run our well. The good part is that we got stuff done around the house that we had been putting off and the weather cooperated. We had a lovely breeze so the heat was not stifling. I am not sure which one of us hit the shower first!
Tuesday evening was the reception at the Shemer Gallery in Phoenix. SAQA members were given the entire gallery to fill. I have 4 pieces hanging. They did an outstanding job of hanging and lighting and each piece was given enough space to view properly but not strung out as to look sparse. The gallery is in an old house and the rooms are smallish with narrow hallways. Unfortunately, I did not take any photos. The show runs till the end of June.

I did some more work on my wonky piece.... I added some color washes to the light colored areas, quilted it, and sewed on some Turkish beads I had. This piece needs a name. The beads are from an inexpensive bracelet I bought in Istanbul a few years back. I think these are the evil eye protection beads. I am not sure if more work is needed on this piece or not. I tend to the less is more theory. I may add more color.

Sigh, Ned left for a biz trip to China this morning. Maybe I will get back to some serious work. It has been staring me in the face for the past month.

Today is not a total loss

I haven't felt like starting the project I really should be working on but I decided to work on something I started many months ago. This piece was screened, rolled over stencils, etc using dye paste. It was pretty blah and sitting on my design wall waiting for some inspiration. I decided to play with some paint sticks and a new stencil. I think I have improved it. I will let it dry and see if I still like it tomorrow! It has no name so if anyone has something brilliant, please make suggestions.

It's spring

... and the lizards have been scurrying around. We love the lizards because they eat the ants, spiders, scorpions, etc. This is a spiny lizard.. not sure which one because it is not likely it will let me pick it up and check its belly. We usually have the more common lizards and gecko's in residence but this one I have not seen on our patio before. It is quite large.. the male is about 8" and the female about 6". They stand on legs that look to be 2" and have chubby bodies. I am sure it is mating season. I think we must have some resident lizards... I do not know what their lifespans are but most of them don't run away anymore when we are out there. We were moving some furniture yesterday and one came running out of the flowers and almost ran over my foot... it knew I was there as it had to come about 8 feet to do that. It just stopped and looked at me and then went on its way. OK, so I am nuts... I talk to them!