Embroidery While Blindfolded

Katherine Loomis and Terry Jarrard-Dimond had an interesting collaboration awhile ago about creating embroidery while blindfolded. This idea intrigued me and I decided to give it a try. Katherine and Terry spent 12 hours each stitching, while I spent around 6 hours on my piece. I may continue with it, you just never know.

I was taught that my stitching should look good from the front as well as the back. I had to let go of that thought, and I did. For me, the most difficult part was being blindfolded. I don't like things covering my head or face, so being completely submerged into darkness was difficult. Once I adjusted to my situation, I actually became very peaceful. Without sight, the rest of my senses heightened. Muscle memory kicked in and supplied me with the details that I needed. I couldn't see what the stitching looked like, and I didn't care, I liked the way it felt. Creating art, even while blindfolded, made me feel good, and I'm happy to know that I can enjoy creating no matter what happens to me.

Now I'm curious to try my hand at blindfolded painting. You never know, it could be fun!

More Tangled Threads

Here are the newest additions to the Tangled Threads series.

Each piece is hand stitched to a painted canvas. The top piece has french knots embroidered in the center circle. The bottom piece has many stitches radiating from inner circle. I really like the idea of adding subtle texture that will only be noticed once you get up close to the piece.Don't you love the way the threads blend together to make these beautiful colors?

These are are so much fun to make . . . I'm sure I'll be making some more soon.

Have you ever used your leftover tangled threads in a project? If you have, I would love to hear about it.

Colored Concrete

Wow, what a process this patio turned out to be. I didn't realize how labor intensive it was going to be.

The guys arrived at 7:00am to make sure everything was ready, and the concrete began pumping at 8:00. It took them about 2 hours to pump, and level the concrete; then the fun began.

The finisher drew the shapes of the stone with this high tech tool.

Yep, it's a twig tied onto a an aluminum pole. I love the ragged lines it made, but the guys following behind him made the lines deep and regular. They are going to chip some of the edges for me before they grout. Even though it is concrete, I want it to look as natural as possible.

I asked him to make stones of all sizes. A couple of times, I wanted smaller stones in a certain area; he would erase the existing lines and redraw them. What a nice guy!

The base color is sandstone, and on top, there are 5 different colors. At first, I was worried that this was going to be over the top, but they assured me that it would look natural. After color was sprinkled all over an area, it was covered with yellow sand. The final step was to take a texture stamp and tamp it into the wet concrete to make it look like stone.

By the time they left, all I could see was yellow sand with some ridges. They told me I could sweep an area away this morning to see what the color looked like. This is what I found.

It looks fabulous. Can you see the stone texture? On Wednesday, all the sand will be removed, and Saturday the joints will be grouted. So far, I'm thrilled . . . I just can't wait to see it all finished!

Progress

This Tangled Threads piece was made for my friend Kathy. She celebrated a significant birthday, and I felt she needed something special. She seemed to like it even though it was a month late. Unfortunately, that seems to be the story of my life lately . . . I'm always playing catch up. This back yard renovation is probably a good excuse for being late with everything. As you can see the patio is very close to being done. It curves along the full length of the house and wraps around one corner. I did 15 different designs in Illustrator before we settled on this patio shape. I think the curves are more interesting than straight lines, and it just felt right. Once I had a shape that I liked on paper, I tested the shape in real life. I drew it onto the ground with flour. Once I had it perfect. I marked the line with flags, and the contractor placed the bender board on the marked line.The concrete will be poured this coming Saturday. The base color will be sandstone and there will be flagstone shapes drawn into it. They will sprinkle 3 different colors on top. When it's dry, the cracks will get grouted and the whole thing will be sealed.

Yippee!

Art Exchange

Lucky me! I'm the proud owner of this wonderful felted masterpiece that Sandy made.

I fell in love with it when I saw it on her blog, and as it turns out she was willing to trade work with me. She didn't want to chose something, she wanted to be surprised. Well, the biggest surprise turned out to be that the package didn't want to be delivered. The first time I mailed it, I left one number out of the address, and it took a week to come back to me. I mailed it again using Priority Mail, which was supposed to take 2-3 days, but 1-1/2 weeks passed and neither of us received it. Just when I thought I would have to replace it, the mailman delivered it to Sandy. Yeah!!!

Here's the adventurous piece that survived the journey . . .twice.

And this is what it's made from, tangled threads that come off washed fabric ends. I added 4 or 5 saturated strips of fabric for some extra zing, and a backing fabric, other than that it's tangled threads.

Rain in June?

I can't quite figure out what is happening with the weather . . . it's been raining here for two days! I know that sounds normal to some of you, but, I've never seen it rain in June in the 30+ years I've lived here. Generally, it pours between December-March, and that's it for the year. This time of the year, we have June Gloom . . . heavy fog that burns off by noon. There seems to be a lot of strange things happening worldwide . . . it really makes you stop and think, doesn't it?

Our back yard is still a work in progress but we're getting very close. After 15 drawings in Illustrator, we've finally decided on a design for the patio. It will be a free-form, L-shaped patio with and a couple of cutouts against the house for plants. It will be colored and stamped concrete, that will look like flagstone. Once dry, we'll grout the low areas so it looks even more like stone. We chose a contractor and now we just have to get the irrigation done.

We've been trying to recycle/reuse as many plants and materials as possible. These large patio pavers have a new home under my potting bench and under the trash cans. Each one weighs about 400 pounds and was very difficult to move.

The old concrete path has been removed and is ready for the new patio and path. A cutout in the patio will be made for the angel trumpet tree on the right.

I'm still exercising quite a bit, and have lost 14 pounds. At first, I was exhausted from all the exercise, and didn't have much energy left for other interests, but it's getting easier now, and I'm back in the studio making art. Yeah!

This will give you an idea of what I'm working on. These are made from the knotted ends of washed fabric. They will look different once they are stitched together and mounted onto the painted canvas.

I'll share a couple other pieces made with the same materials in next post. I'm just about ready to applique my hormones onto the background.

Progress in several areas is underway!

Shared Stories, SAQA Exhibit in Carlsbad

Yippee . . . Inside Out: Golgi Body was Accepted!

Congratulations to:
Betty Amador, Charlotte Bird, Patt Blair, Loris Bogue, Cherie Brown, Jamie Fingal, Barbara Friedman, Doria Goocher, Desiree Habicht, Gail Hansen, Ranell Hansen, Carol Henke, Rose Hughes, Sara Kelly, Pam Price Klebaum, Sherry Kleinman, Smadar Knobler, Jane LaFazio, Linda Boone Laird, Sandra Lauterbach, Jill Le Croissette, Nancy Lemke, Felisa Lyons, Kathleen McCabe, Linda Miller, Jeannie Palmer Moore, Gillian Moss, Kathy Nida, Andi Perejda, Judy Rys, Lois Sprague, Jeanne Surber, Mary Tabar, Terry Waldron, Deborah Weir, Susan West, Sally Wright, and Lisa Yoder


for having work accepted in Shared Stories~ Expressions and Stitched Memories. Read more at Front Porch Gallery's blog.

Hot Time in the Desert

The last time we were in Arizona was 30+ years ago when we drove across the country. Our son is attending grad school in Tucson, so we have a great reason to revisit the desert state once again.

First we flew to Tucson, picked up our son, drove north to Sedona to visit the breathtaking red mountains. From there, we drove to Jerome, an old copper mining town, and then back to Tucson. It's really quite surprising to see how different the vegetation is in each area.

Tucson is definitely the home of the Saguaro cactus. They are everywhere . . . thousands of them . . . standing tall. It's amazing that anything, plant or animal could live in that scorching desert, but both have found a way to survive and thrive.

This little guy was photographed at the Desert Museum, where they have exhibits of 300+ desert animals.

Sedona is as gorgeous as I hoped it would be. The mountains get their red color from a high concentration of iron. They have some wonderful hiking trails that take you to the base of the mountains. We also went on a jeep ride through the back country. It was called an "Adventure Ride" for a good reason! Fortunately, the woman driver was amazing; she knew the trails like the back of her hand.

No Saguaro cactus here . . . their main cactus is the Prickly Pear. You really need to be careful where you walked in Arizona, there are pickers everywhere.

Our hotel, Sedona Rouge, was also gorgeous. Beautiful fountains, private patio, pool, spa, handmade lemon-mint soap. I would definitely recommend it.

Jerome couldn't have been more different than Sedona. This mountain town was built because copper was discovered. There were a lot of jobs and money to be made. In its heyday, Jerome was the 4th largest city in Arizona. Once the mine closed, the population dropped from 15,000 to 100 residents, and basically became a ghost town.

Around 500 people live in Jerome now. Quite a few of the buildings remain in various stages of renovation or disrepair. Several shells remain that add an authentic flavor to the odd ghost town.

I'm not sure what is holding this facade upright, but it makes an very interesting entrance way to a glass blowers studio.

The remains of this bank building displays an odd assortment of items like an outhouse, toilet, wheel barrel, and sink. People stand above the building, and throw coins, trying to hit the various vessels. It reminded me of a carnival game, without the prizes!

Here's a photo of a sign that made me laugh out loud. Perhaps it was originally posted in the very popular brothel.

All in all, we had a lot of fun in the desert . . . but there's no place like home!

Fabric, Fabric, and More Fabric!

Unfortunately, I haven't been very creative lately. A lot of my free time is being consumed by gardening and exercise. I've been walking several times a week with my friend Kathy. One of the perks of my job is a personal trainer that comes to our office one day a week. Sloane is young, sweet, gorgeous, and an exercise fanatic. She is helping me become more fit . . . no easy feat. I have always been the artistic, not athletic type. So far, I've lost 6 pounds but I still have a long way to go!

Kathy and I have been fabric shopping. I own a wall full of fabric and certainly don't need any more, but that doesn't seem to stop me. The Treasure Hunt is having a going out of business sale and I scored some lovely batiks.

I've already used some of the striped batik on the left. The project isn't quite finished yet, so you'll have to wait a little while to see it.

Color is probably the number one thing that attracts me, but the texture is usually the deciding factor. The fabric above on the left and below second one in from right are not colors I generally use, but the textures were so interesting, I couldn't resist. I always keep an eye out for interesting black fabrics and very light fabrics.

Here's a few more fabrics that I bought at the Seven Sisters Quilt show this past weekend. I generally buy 1 yard of each, so the stash takes up quite a bit of space. Whenever I start a new project, I find everything I need in my own stash. If I don't have the right color, I'll change it by adding paint, dye stick or ink.

Fibervision Workshops

No matter how hard I try, I keep falling behind on my blog posts. Each month, after our business meeting and lunch, one of our Fibervision members teaches a mini workshop. They highlight whatever technique they feel someone would want to learn about. I like spending time with my friends and I like learning everything I can. I can't help it, it seems to be the way I'm wired! Some people believe that all these new techniques and subject will distract them and won't be able to focus on their own style. Not me.

Jeanne taught Free motion quilting in March. She has been doing some amazing stitching and were are lucky to some pointers from her. First we did a few pencil sketches using one continuous line, then we did the same sketch with thread on fabric. It's a good way to gain confidence in your FMQ. The next thing we did was new to me.

We dropped our feed dogs, and made a sampler of decorative stitches. It was fun trying to figure out what the stitch was going to do next. After a few minutes, you began to get a feeling for what it was going to do next and went with it. On the back side, I recorded what stitch it was and the different tension settings I used.

Here's a close-up. The stitches really have a personality of their own.

Kristin led a bookmaking workshop in April. Each of us made two different small books.
The yellow one has stitched signatures and the turquoise one has accordion pages. Both came out quite well for my first books. I'm glad I leaned how to make them, but I don't think I will be making more anytime soon.

Three's a Charm

This small piece is the third in a series, hence the title, "Three's a Charm".

If you're interested, you can see the other two pieces in the Art Gallery section. If you look closely, you'll see that they share some of the same characteristics. The reason is that the fabric was stacked in five vertical layers and paint was added to different layers. Depending on the type of paint used, some of it penetrated through several layers and some didn't penetrate at all. After it was dry, additional layers were added to enhance each piece.

The painted fabric and batting were machine stitched, then the beads were added. I painted a canvas for the background and hand stitched the finished piece through the canvas. The inner piece is 8 1/2 x 11" and the canvas is 11 x 14".

FYI: That white border is the batting.

Hormones: Divide and Duplicate

My intention was to finish this quilt for the Faulkner Gallery exhibit, but I just wasn't happy with the design. It needed something, and I just couldn't quite put my finger on what the something was. It hung on my design wall for a while until I realized that the hormones should be divided. I was afraid it was a mistake, and didn't want to start from scratch. So, I decided to do the cutting in Photoshop, and see how it looked before I took scissors to fabric. Once I played with the pieces, and saw the many possibilities, the scissors came out.

The hormones were cut apart and rearranged. But it still needed something . . . More Hormones, of course.So, here I am back at the beginning, creating even more hormones. Here's a close up of the plain yellow hormone fabric before the embellishment began. If you want to see the whole process, click here. The green strip in the middle is dyed cheesecloth that will float around the hormones. There are some other surprises in store, but you're going to have to wait a while to see the final results. It will debut in a group exhibit at PIQF in Santa Clara, CA. The exhibit is called "On the Way" and it will feature 20 Journey pieces made by Fibervision members. This will be our first group exhibit at PIQF and we're all very excited about it. Hope you get a chance to see it in person.