February 22, 2010

The Hunt Continues . . .

I've looked at a lot of computers in the past couple of weeks - laptops, desktops, all in ones, both PC and Mac. It appears that I'm falling in love with a 20.5 all in one iMac (hope that is right). There are a couple of software issues holding me back . . . some of the programs won't work on a Mac, ad the other is the price of Creative Suite. I may get an emulator, so if you have any experience with an emulator, I would love to hear from you. It's difficult sharing a computer, having to use a card reader and an external hard drive all the time, but I'm getting by. My husband told the Mac salesperson that I was switching to the Dark Side, you can imagine how that went over!
My friend, Andi, spent a couple of days lecturing and teaching in Camarillo and Santa Barbara. She spent a couple of nights with us and we had a great time. Mike made a delicious beef sate for us, we drank some wine, and printed fabric the following day. Then 10 or so Fibervision members met for dinner at the Beachside Restaurant. It was a lot of fun and I should have sleep overs more often. Here is some of the fabric I printed and painted, some during her visit, some after she went home.
This was printed using a thermofax screen. After it dried, I painted it with Setacolor.
This base of this piece used deconstructed screenprinting methods with thickened dye. I really didn't like the white background and decided to jazz it up by painting the background with Setacolor. A huge improvement and now I love it.
This is screenprinted using a thermofax made of bubble wrap. I painted it with setacolor and let the sun do its magic.
This was an experiment. I machine basted lines of stitching, gathered them up and tied them off. I sprayed the fabric with water, drizzled Dye-na-flow all over and let it dry. And this is what it looks like once the stitches were removed and ironed. You can see the lines of stitches. It's interesting the way paint gathers in the hills and valleys.

February 19, 2010

HP Laptop DIED!

I'll start with an apology because I'm going to vent just a bit. My HP laptop died and I experienced the worse customer service ever. After 30 minutes of customer dissatisfaction on two different occasions with two different tech support reps in India, and numerous requests to speak to a supervisor . . . I give up!
My laptop experienced a major problem that HP knew about but failed to tell me. If HP knows of a problem, they post it on their website, but don't tell the customer. If you happen to find the problem while your laptop is still under warranty, they will replace the motherboard. If your warranty runs out before the issue arises, Tough Luck! The fact that they built a BAD product doesn't seem to faze them. Well, after thousands of dollars invested in the company, I'm done with HP for good. Let the buyer beware . . . they don't care about you at all.
Well, on to a more pleasant and colorful subject . . . this quilt top was just completed. I showed it on my design board a couple of posts ago. It has some hand painted fabric, sunprinted fabric, a thermofax screened print and some fabric that I ran through my inkjet printer. I think I'll make the quilting pretty simple because of all the seams.
You may recall this fabric that I screenprinted a while ago. I finally made into a tote bag that I use for grocery shopping. I didn't quite have enough, so I painted and stamped the yellow stripe to add in on each side. I love it - it makes me smile.