This past weekend was the end of another fantastic online class from Pamela Allen and the month sped by so quickly. We really had a great group with lots of camaraderie and sharing. There was lots to be learned along the way. I hope some of it sunk in. Pamela, as usual shared her knowledge and expertise unstintingly. She is a treasure trove of experience. While this class was a lot of work, it was worth all the blood, sweat and almost tears of frustration. I have tons of finishing work to be done over the next 2 months as I will not have much time to do it for a while. The final assignment was an independent study. Mine was a hair tearing, teeth gnashing, many times frustrating journey. My original vision for this piece just was not working out no matter what I did with it.... so most of it finally got scrapped and I borrowed from myself. I guess I just created my first series. It is only pinned together at this point.

On a more up beat note, I finished a small piece that will be a gift. This one I had lots of fun with and also did a lot of hand stitching. I experimented with some techniques that were all new to me. I made "lace" from a piece of organza and did some funky applique. It's called Lets Party.

Nice week

Last week was spent with a visit from my step-son who is on leave from Iraq... his 2nd tour. He got to spend some quality time with his dad and they went to see the Indians in their winter training home here. Ned even managed to get Evan to eat Mexican and Indian food....neither of which I am fond of. Friday night we went to see a performance of Cavalia which is an offshoot of Cirque Du Soleil but with horses. It was wonderful. Evan left on Saturday morning to go back to Ohio to spend time with his mom and other family members. He has one more week of leave before he has to go back to Iraq.
Saturday night we had a small dinner party and our guests slept over. We all drank too much, but it was so much fun! For those who are interested, the menu was Spanikopita (my special recipe) and guacamole as hors d'oeuvres with Proseco. The meal started with melon and proscuito, then sweet and sour sauteed shrimp over rice with grilled vegetables and a Traminer Riesling. Dessert was brought by our guests... an old fashioned bundt cake (laced with something) and a lovely Cabernet to go with it. I washed a lot of wine glasses! We had pancakes for breakfast.... I cannot recall the last time I had pancakes. It was a lovely, relaxing evening.

This week it is back to work for my Pamela Allen class. The latest assignment has been a tough one for me and I mostly have a dog to show for it. I am working to salvage it.


OOOPS: My hubby just told me I got the wines out of order... the cab was with the meal, the Riesling with dessert.... I told you I had too much to drink!

Almost blown away

I like the quilts I make but I do not think they are in any way spectacular or cutting edge. My skills are still developing and sometimes I have ideas that I cannot execute. That said, consider my shock when I opened this month's American Style magazine to find the picture of the quilt I donated to the SAQA auction as the quilt someone chose as THE example of the 230 quilts that were received! Yeah, you could have blown me over. The quilt is called Ginkgoes in the Wind and I posted here about it June 17th. I am a little jazzed.

Busy week

Last week flew by. I signed up for another online class with Pamela Allen. This one is called Still Life is Boring NOT. I figured there was still a lot I could learn from Pamela. I am not disappointed. I am learning basic art principles and that will always help me. We started with the requisite black and white piece. I am happy with the way it is turning out. I have most of the stitching still left to do. This weeks assignment is to use muted, grayed out colors that had stripes and such on them. HA... like I owned any! I had to make a run down to my local quilt shop (OK, so I am contributing to the local economy) and pick up a selection of fat quarters.

This one I am not as happy with. It looks like a bad take off of a Matisse. Now of course if this had been a signed Matisse and it was hanging in my house, I would be in love with it. Go figure. None of the stitching is done on this. I plan on doing mostly machine stitching except for the hanging plant that will be in the bowl on the shelf.... what shelf you ask? Yep, this is a bit more abstract than I would like. Pamela likes it.... so maybe I will send it to her when it is done.


Next week my stepson arrives for a visit. He will be on leave from his 2nd tour of duty in Iraq. The 2 weeks total he will be home will be the only 2 weeks we sleep well till he gets out.

Back to stitching my black and white still life.

What's For Dinner?

I was feeling in a funky mood this weekend... my sewing machine is on the fritz again and giving me agita. It is going to be sent back to the corporate headquarters to see if they can fix it. I decided I needed to do something upbeat so I made a charity piece for Fiberart For A Cause.
I have called it What's For Dinner?

It looks like I am finally succumbing and joining Facebook. I will probably up and running this evening. Off to my bridge game now.

I am settling back down to earth

I have stopped hyperventilating, I think..... My quilt Through Rose colored Glasses is being used as part of an article on Landscape quilting to be published in the July/August edition of Fons and Porter's magazine Love of Quilting. I just got the contract yesterday. To say I am ecstatic would probably be an understatement! I even get an honorarium for this. Breath.

Now I need to get back to work. I am finishing up a piece for FFAC. I just have to bind it and I am done.

My sewing machine is on the fritz again but this time they are sending it back to corporate to see if they can get it to work correctly.

Under the Ginkgo Tree

I have noticed that unintentionally, most of my pieces have orange in them....I am neither a lover nor hater of orange but the use was not planned. So with that in mind, I decided to do a small piece with the intention of using orange. Under the Ginkgo tree is the result. This piece measures 12" x 12" and I have decided I will donate it to the SAQA auction.

Out with the old, in with the new

.... well not quite. I finished a piece that I have been working on and started a new one. I have been working on a still life that is a challenge from my art quilters guild. It had to be 24"sq and at least 50% black fabric. I wasn't a real happy camper when I signed up for this (actually, I signed up for it before I knew it had to be black) since I had just finished working on the black and white piece that was driving me nuts. It has no name..... I can't think of one so I am just calling it Still Life 2. The background fabrics are my shibori pieces and one I dyed black. The 2 vases on the left are African fabrics and the squat vase is one of my hand dyes that has been painted over. The flowers are silk from the craft store. I lost my marbles and hand beaded the left side. I would like to enter this somewhere but I am not sure where. This is the old.

The new is more of my shibori and hand dyes that is going to be the background for something oriental in flavor. I think I got carried away and made it larger than I wanted.... Oh well... this is what the fabric was telling me to do.


I had a frightening experience this afternoon. All of a sudden my mouse stopped working as did all 4 of my USB ports. I forced shut down my laptop and opened it up expecting to find it filled with cat hair (occupational hazard in this house). Surprisingly, it was clean ( I clean it out fairly regularly or the fans shut down and overheat. The cat hair gets caught behind the fans). Now I have no idea what might have caused this but I turned the computer back on and everything is working fine.... gremlins.

I had ordered some silk scraps by Jane Steinberg through Artistic Artifacts and my package arrived yesterday....... they are gorgeous and I plan on using them in the piece I am working on.

My poor hubby is on a business trip in Pennsylvania and Ohio and freezing his buns off... it has been a balmy 72 here. I do not miss the northeast one bit. This is what I call winter!

Sneak preview

I have been working on this piece for awhile now in between trips and bridge games. It is almost done. I am going to do some beading on the left side ( I must be losing my marbles) to balance the piece out. I am almost happy with it. I think that the stitching I have done for the stems of the flowers does not show up very well so I may paint over them. I should have this done by the end of next week and will post a photo of it then. What you see here is my shibori pieces and silk flowers stitched on with a swipe of silver metallic paint on them. They have black crystals in the centers. This is just a detail shot.

Our adventures in California

We spent the past week visiting friends in Irvine, California. We are sort of extended family and what is really nice is that we are really part of the woodwork. They do not need to entertain us and we do not impose on them other than for a bed. We have been friends for 51 years. I love to cook so when I have been visiting lately, I treat them to meals they would never make for themselves.

On our agenda was to go down the the San Diego Zoo and the Long Beach Aquarium. Ned and I both love to spend time with the fishies and walk the zoo. As an added bonus this time I got to see the exhibit "Kimono as Art, The Landscapes of Itchiku Kubota". I wish I could have spent more time looking at these absolutely fantastic works of art. They did not allow pictures but if you Google it, you can find some videos with his work. Amazon sells the book for $30. Treat yourselves.... buy it. You will drool over it. It closes tomorrow in San Diego but will be in Canton, Ohio from Feb 8- April 26, 2009. If you are anywhere in the area, do yourselves a favor and go see it.
For those who are into food the menu included: Quesadilla's with goat cheese and roasted pepper sauce, 7 types of onion soup, risotto with asparagus, oven steamed snapper with black bean sauce, Spanikopita (with my special cheese combo), brisket, guacamole, and chocolate mousse. I love having people to cook for. Lots of good wines went with these meals.

I even got to sew the sleeve on my Black and White piece (see old post) and hand delivered it to Annie Copeland who went out of her way to meet us one morning.

The only bad news is that we picked up my kitty from the vet ( we thought he just had a respiratory infection) to find out he might have either a kidney stone or a malfunctioning kidney. He is 15 years old and really my baby. The next week or so should give us a better idea of where he is. He is in great health otherwise. The respiratory infection crops up every 5 years or so and is treatable.

I am in the process of working on a piece that includes some of the black shibori dyed pieces I had done. No photo yet.

Here's to a great new year. I tend not to do resolutions because I never keep them but I do have goals for myself this year. The first is to try to focus more on my work and not get so distracted. The second would be to try to both sell and show more of it as well.

Happy Holidays

I just wanted to wish everyone a happy and healthy holiday season . May 2009 be a better year for everyone.
I would also like to take this opportunity to thank those of you who read my blog and comment both here and privately. You have given me more gifts than you can imagine. I will try to keep you interested.

Overall, this year had more pluses than minuses and I have lots to be grateful for. The two most important events this year were the marriages of my daughter to a wonderful man and my own marriage to a gem of a man. I made many new friends at classes this year and new friends online. For the first time I started putting my art "out there" in the universe and have been pleased with the results. I had the first piece ever submitted to PIQF accepted and 3 other pieces juried into a show at a local gallery. The 2 pieces I donated for auction fetched more than I ever anticipated. I even sold some. I learned many new techniques and even learned what I do not like doing..... even my FMQ is getting better. I am hoping to stay more focused in 2009 and produce more works. Most important to me is that all of this remains fun. Creating is the best therapy in the world.

Peace and joy.

Sherryl

.... and finally, blogger decided my posts were not spam and I no longer have to twist myself into a pretzel to post them.

Our week in Hawaii

The weather was lousy but we had fun anyway. It was chilly and rainy and we did not get to do what we had hoped.... oh well.
Day 1... travel day. We had a connecting flight through San Francisco. Our flight from Phoenix was delayed so we missed our connection. Because Ned travels so much, he is considered a top tier traveler... it has its perks. We had a 4 hour layover in SF but we got to enjoy the Red Carpet club... this was the view out the window.
We finally arrived in Honolulu and found the rental car place. Things were starting to look up! We were told we were entitled to an upgrade and half jokingly I said I wanted a convertible! DONE!!!
Little did we know we would not get to enjoy it much. Such is life.
Day 2
Weather was overcast so we decided to take a drive around the Island.
It is really very pretty and would have been more so if the sun had been shining. We did get to see whales.















We stopped for lunch at one of the local fishing holes.... yep, they farm shrimp and prawns.
Day 3
The weather has not improved much.... we decided to do the zoo and the aquarium. I was impressed with both.


Day 4. The sun came out!!! We decided to go snorkeling. Turns out this was not to be. Because of the recent storms, there were Man O War jelly fish. Almost 200 of them and 25 people had already been stung that morning..... even through wetsuits. I decided I was not going in the water. We explored the other side of the island and saw more whales. I love whale watching. I could sit and do it all day. We had a wonderful dinner at a restaurant called Orchids.

Day 5. We flew to Kauai. The weather was not any better! In fact it was worse. We spent the rest of the afternoon hanging around the pool. The ocean was too rough. It was not warm enough for me to go in the water but Ned made use of the pool. The mango rum smoothie was delicious.

Day 6. The chickens own this island. Everywhere you go there are chickens running around.
We tried to drive up to Waimea canyon but it was so foggy we never made it. We picnicked in the car and tried for some whale watching. They did not cooperate.

Day 7. Another crappy day but the highlight was the feeding of the koi at the hotel. There were hundreds of them! I fed them just like the other kids and Ned took the photos with the iphone (we got locked out of our room... don't ask, and couldn't get the camera on time) The other photos from this video are also from my iphone. I am pretty impressed. I am not really into rocks and stuff but I have lots of pictures. If anyone wants some, please email me and I will be happy to send you the jpgs to use.
We drove the other side of the island. The wettest spot on earth is here...Mt. Wai'ale but we couldn't find it in the mist... so we went to see the falls instead.








There was so much silt in the water from the storms.

And of course the requisite rooster.

















We drove up to Hanelei but Puff must have been on vacation. It is a very pretty area and would have been more so if the weather cooperated a bit more. On the way back to the airport for the trip home we stopped by the Kilauea lighthouse. It was closed when we got there.
When we arrived at the airport for the trip home via Honolulu we found out that the flights were all delayed. President-elect Obama and his family were flying in. I hope they have better weather than we had.

Aloha

We are leaving for Hawaii tomorrow... call it a honeymoon. I will try to take some good photos and post them, but no promises.
I have been working on the black piece and I like the way it is coming out. Rayna suggested I rotate it and I took her up on her suggestion. It now has much more interest. I have cut out all the applique pieces that are going on it, but alas, I cannot sew them down. I took my sewing machine in for a cleaning and fixing yesterday figuring it would be good to go when I got back.... forgetting that I wanted to use it today. Oh well. I have a busy day today anyway. Of course we haven't started packing but that is SOP for me. Tonight is the 2nd of 2 receptions at the gallery where some of my work is hanging and we have to hit the post office and send out the last of the holiday gifts.
Have a good week.

Coordinating non commercial fabrics

This evening Rayna Gillman posted an interesting problem regarding using hand dyed/printed fabrics together successfully. The post was very timely because I was having just that issue in the past 2 days. I am pretty new to most of these techniques and have a long journey ahead of me exploring all the possibilities, but I realized the problem last night when I started to put together the fabrics I wanted to use in a particular piece. This piece has rules that I cannot change so I am semi limited in what I can use to start with. Our guild is doing a challenge due in mid January of a piece that is 24"square but it has to be predominantly (at least 50%) one color. My luck, they picked black! ( I was sick of black and white this summer.) So that means mostly blacks and greys with accent colors thrown in. I did up some shibori pieces last week using black dye and was pretty happy with the results...... trick turns out to be.. how to use them together. This is what I have come up with. It took me a while to work it out. The rest of it will be applique using orange colors.
When I started putting up some of the other pieces together for another project, it occured to me that this is a mine field. It is much easier being in a quilt shop and matching up patterns and colors. It is not so easy at home with your own creations. Questions come up about how busy you want to make the piece, how to not overwhelm the senses or the other fabrics, and just plain balance questions. This is not so easy.
Thanks Rayna for bringing this up.

Sunset

I looked out my window this evening just in time to view a stunning sunset. I ran out with my camera and snapped a bunch of pictures. This one is probably the best. Yes, this is what the sky looked like.. no touch ups.

Sale on my older hand dyed fabrics

Starting in the new year, I am going to be dyeing up lots of new fabrics so I need to make room for them. I am having a sale of 40% off for 1 week on the ones I have posted (I may add to them). The fabrics are on my other blog Fields of Color. The discount will be taken off at checkout. Help me make room!

More Shibori

OK, I am hooked on shibori. I decided to play some more last night but this time I wanted to see if I could use smaller containers that I could manage rather than the big 5 gallon buckets. Yep, I was able to dye 4 fat quarters in 1 gallon of water with room to spare. This opens up a larger range of possibilities for me since I can do this with no help. I hope I find the time to do something with these pieces since I am now addicted to creating them!

Gift

I finished a small piece that is going out as a gift. I was experimenting with techniques and of course took the opportunity to add some stencils of Ginkgo leaves. I really love this leaf.

Playing with shibori

It is always less stressful when you are learning new techniques to have someone holding your hand. It is far more difficult to experiment with what you have learned in a class at home. I worry that I forgot some important detail or there was so much information that I missed some. Last night I finally got my act together and dyed and over dyed fabric using the shibori techniques I had learned in Jan Meyers-Newbury's class. I decided to only use one color to start... partly because of space constrains, partly because these buckets are heavy and I cannot lift them, and last of all because if I screwed up, I wanted to limit the damage. I twisted, folded, scrunched, and tied the fabrics. I had some fabrics I decided could be improved with some black on them so I mixed up the black using Carol Soderllund's secret recipe and tossed them all in the bucket and held my breath. After unwrapping, they got tossed into cold water and rinsed then 2 washes in very hot water with synthrapol. It is so much fun unwrapping shibori! You never know what you are going to get. I am thrilled with the results!! I am sharing the results with this slide show. Enjoy.

Chihuly

On Friday we went to see the Chihuly exhibit that was presented at the Desert Botanical Gardens. (I know, today is Tuesday and it has taken me this long to get around to blogging about it). The exhibit was a real treat. Most of the pieces were made specifically for this exhibit and this is Dale Chihuly's first exhibition in an outdoor desert environment. The glass looks like it belongs were it was placed. I think I took over 100 photos! I couldn't resist. One was more beautiful than the next. I am adding a slide show so I can share.