Embroidery in process

I have spent the entire morning putting directions for sewing a dress onto my other blog, With Needle and Stick.  Wow, I hate waiting for the photos to upload.  In anycase, I decided to update this blog too.  I decided to show my new embroidery piece in process.  It will be a bright pink cosmos in the end, but here I am working on the center and on the shadows along the edges of the petals.  I seem to be stuck representing only a quarter of the flowers that I sew or paint.  I am fascinated by their intricate structure.  The cosmos along with zinnias are some of my  favorites.  I will keep further progress updated.

 In the meantime, before my kids get home on the bus, I need to get at least a little bit of weaving done.  Maybe I will show you my new weaving piece next...

Times they are a changing....

Looking back over what I have posted in the last few month, I have decided to split off my blog.  I will post my tapestry and art work here, but I will post my clothing and knitting to a new blog:  With needle and stick.  I felt this blog was turning into a mish mash.  I am working on art pieces and as I finish them I will post them here.  I have two tapestries in the works, and I am mulling over a new embroidery piece to complement my sunflower embroidery.  I have hung that piece in our house but the opposite wall is empty and crying out for a companion piece.  I have selected the subject:  another flower, this time a cosmos, another one of my favorite flowers.  It will be an orangey pink and close up like the sunflower embroidery.  I have selected  the background fabric, it will be the same as the sunflower piece, now to get to work on it.  It is just that I am determined to finish my coat sweater that I started last year.  I have now finished the front and back and started on the sleeves and I want to finish it before it gets cold, although after this summer and the fact that we are having no fall, I might never get to wear it, another day in the low 90's with no rain in sight....

I will keep you informed of my new art, but check the new blog Withneedleandstick.blogspot.com

Summer of "REST" Or How I Spent My Summer "Vacation"

I haven't posted in a really long while, all summer really.  I do have a good excuse.... I have had back problems all summer and spent five weeks of my summer in bed.  Crawling from the bed to the bath is really a bummer, but it certainly beats getting carried, or rather dragged there.  I herniated a disc this summer in addition to some problems with my iliac joint, so I spent five weeks of my life in bed and crawling.  Looking on the bright side, I did get a lot of knitting done.  I started a coat last fall and had only gotten the front done.  I am now 2/3 of the way up the back, I got to watch almost every World Cup game, I learned to stitch on my back in between reading books, that is when I was concious and not swooning from narcotics.  (Nasty stuff that I don't recommend at all, doesn't agree well with the digestive system, don't ask).  Here is my Alabama Chanin shirt that I stitched while lying in bed.

In between my bouts in bed (I had three separate bed ridden periods (one iliac joint displacement and two herniated discs), I attended an art composition class.  I did sneak some fiber arts into the class, but the first main project was a pen and ink portrait that used the idea of value.  We had to scribble symbols to make different values to give the portrait depth.  I decided to make a portrait of my nine year old son.  Instead of symbols I used words that had meaning for him in his life.  Here are the results of that exercise. 

Our final project in the class was to make a "book" of the Jack and Jill rhyme:

Jack and Jill

Went up a hill

To fetch a pail of water

Jack fell down

And broke his crown

And Jill came tumbling after.

Each line was to be represented by an illustration which had to be at least 8"x11" and we had to have at least 6 images, but could have more.  Students came in with all kinds of projects.  One was a wood sculpture, another were 6 pots with plants in them, another was a power point presentation of water problems in Africa, two were anime boards of a cartoon Jack and Jill.  In the end I chose two dandelions to represent Jack and Jill and made a quilt showing the life cycle of the dandelions. 

The class was a fun learning experience that I am glad that I took part in.  The quilt is now hanging in my studio.  Now I need to get to work on my other projects.

I did do a little experiment during this summer.  I am thinking of doing a large scale color field.  I have so many scraps laying around.  I had seen the work of the artist Barbara Winoski on Lotta Helleberg's site that I thought looked interesting.  I decided to use the scraps I had laying around to see what happened.  Here is my little journal scrap quilt.

I want to try something on a large scale to see what happens, but I want to dye the scraps that I have, or rather overdye them to shades of blue and grey. 

I guess the last project that I did, which I have been trying to do for some time was to make some big chair napkins.  Having two young children, our chairs in our kitchen take a beating.  White upholstered chairs are so beautiful when you are young and single.  My husband had these chairs, but after a few years of kids sitting in them they became really disgusting.  I recovered them, but the fabric didn't stay clean but a couple of months.  I had the idea to make washable covers that I could use everyday and just take off for entertaining but never got around to making them.  I finally did, and here are the results.  I made them our of scraps of organic cotton that I had left from covering a sofa.  I then took and sewed a double layer so we could use either side.  I love Lotta Helleberg's work and decided to try my hand a leaf printing.  I used oak leaves from around our farm and then also used fig leaves.  Here is a photo of the results. 

So now you know how I spent my summer "vacation"!

The perils of a home studio and the philosophy of tapestry and the secret to life....

After weeks of no rain, we had three lovely days of rain.  It was perfect, no hard down pours, no major flooding thunderstorms, just nice soft rain.  Now the grass I planted is really beginning to grow, the yard no longer looks like a mud pit, but has the nice soft fuzz of new grass.  After a few weeks of hard labor in the garden, I got to return to my studio, what a nice break.  I have missed making art.  I have scattered pieces throughout the studio in various stages of assembly, but I try to push them all along as I can.  I have never been a linear thinking, singleminded person who can abandon all else for one thing.  I seem to flutter from one thing to another, unless of course I have a DEADLINE! 

The perils of a home studio awaited me on these rainy days however.  My studio is directly across from the kitchen, which can be a minor distraction, but this week it has been a major distraction.  I normally don't keep many sweets in the house and potato chips are strictly forbidden.  The reason is, I confess, I have no self control.  We had a dinner party this week for my husband's students who are graduating.  He brought home several pastries from our favorite artisanal bread bakery.  He always overestimates the amount he should buy so we had two boxes of pastry, homemade chocolate gelato, and then someone brought an apple pie.  It has been too much for my limited self control so I have definitely overindulged this week.

In the meantime, I had a lovely visit with Susan Iverson...  I have been reading several essays lately on the philosophy of different tapestry weavers.  So far, my tapestries have all been renditions of my drawings and paintings.  I have been asking myself, why the extra step?  I could just stop at the painting step, except for the fact that I love the tactile element of fiber art.  I LOVE fabric and yarn and the feel of them and what they can do.  The past American Tapestry Alliance had several essays on the philosophy of several different weavers, the two that really caught my eye were Alex Friedman and Sylvia Heyden.  Both of these women have been exploring the uniqueness of tapestry as a medium.  What can you do with tapestry as a woven form that you cannot do with paint on a canvas.  I really like this idea.  To begin my exploration of this idea I contacted Susan Iverson who graciously spent a morning with me giving me a tutorial in shaping tapestries and showing me her work.  My ideas of what to weave and how have been transformed.  I soon (when the rains started) warped a loom and started weaving a small tapestry that I can sculpt into shapes by pulling warp.  I also ordered Sylvia Heyden's book from Fine Fiber Press, what a revelation that book is!   I am seeing tapestry through a whole new lens and looking forward to more interesting weaving. 

In the meantime, I unwove about 2 inches of the sand pail, the weaving that will never be finished, since it was pulling in quite a bit.  I was advised that I would be unhappy with steaming it and should just unweave it and make it right, so unweave I did.  Now I am back to weaving it once again.  I have 6 inches woven, and another 8 to go.  It doesn't sound like lot, but it seems like it is really slow going since I have been working on this tapestry for 2+ years.  In the meantime, I really want to get that tapestry off the loom so I can use it for my new ideas!

Fitting everything in

Spring is finally, truly here.  The daffodils are now gone as are the crocus.  Now is the time to seed grass.  Since our house was renovated last fall and winter, we are living with the remains of the work.  As you can see from the photos out our front door, we have much to do.  Plans are in the works for the gardens, but the back yard and fields are crying for grass seed.  I don't really like having to mow a lawn, but with kids, you definitely need some areas of grass.  I have been working slavishly to get the soil prepped for seeding.  There were a lot of rocks churned up in the grass, they took out our propane tank because we switched over to geothermal, but left the hole filled with all kinds of rocky, gravelly soil, and finally there are the remains of our old brick patio and mortal laying around in the most unexpected places.  We have been picking up and hauling these remains away, and tilling the soil, raking, and finally seeding, covering and watering.  I have two big sections done, but the biggest sections are remaining.  I keep telling myself, this too will pass, and it will be a relief to have it done.  I look forward to planting the garden sections of the house, but I am waiting to finalize plans and budgets.  I will be doing most of the planting myself, landscapers won't an obscene amount of money to seed grass and plant.  Luckily, the kids are now beginning to be a big help with it all. 

In the meantime, on the nights when I haven't fallen asleep by 9, right after getting my 9 year old son to bed, I sometimes manage to stay awake long enough to do some knitting.  I am trying to finish a couple of projects that I started last year.  I did manage to weave an hour yesterday.

I have started on a new project.  I am not sure where this will lead, but I thought I would show it and see if anyone had suggestions.  I was struck by the wonderful lines in the spring onions this year.  This year they had lovely loops and curls, I don't remember seeing them like before.  Maybe the deer always ate the lovely loops and curls off before I saw them.  (Sorry about it being sideways, it is not like this in my photo album, but keeps coming up sideways in blogspot, weird, huh!)

 In any case, I decided that I would try a new technique and embroider them onto silk organza.  I am embroidering one or two at a time.  Now, what should I do.  The original idea was to layer them in some type of mounting.  Not sure this is going to work.   I have also considered just embroidering words around them and mounting them separately.  I like them, just not sure what to do with them.  Any ideas? 

Mounted piece

I entered this piece in a show last year.  It didn't get chosen and sat around for more than a year.  I finally got it out and took it off the board it was mounted on, worked on getting it blocked.  I bought a canvas for it last week and painted the canvas and sewed it to the canvas last night.  In the photo, the dark grey above the green looks black.  It is not black, but very dark grey.  I do like the silver highlights in the canvas, they reflect the light differently as you move around the room.  Now we have to find a place for it in our house.

Cool knitting commercial

I don't usually share this kind of stuff.  But I saw this "knitted" commercial.  It is so cool, okay, WAY COOL!  Have fun!  I keep watching over and over!
Natural Gas: knitting commercial