At our quilt show earlier this month, I bought some antique Japanese textile scraps. today I made 3 collaged postcards using these yummy scraps. Here they are. I used muslin on the back instead of card stock. It is more difficult to do the zigzagged edges. Think I will go back to paper.

Day Nine of Twenty Days of Virtue I’m reaching the half way point and feeling as if I am plateauing. So I must steel myself against the temptation to give it all up. I’ve been so busy this week, I have hardly had time to think about eating anyway and fitting in exercise is a challenge. I got in a half hour of aerobics this morning before I went to work in the SDA office. I didn’t stay to do weights because of my wrist which is feeling so much better. I may try sleeping without the brace tonight. Tomorrow is a big day at the guild. We are having Phil Beaver as our guest speaker and he is doing a two day workshop Friday and Saturday. So I have to get in there early to make sure we have enough chairs for all of our guests.

You know that email petition that keeps circulating about how Congress is slashing funding for NPR and PBS? Well, now it’s actually true. (Really. Check the footnotes if you don’t believe me.)

Sign the petition telling Congress to save NPR and PBS:

www.moveon.org/publicbroadcasting

A House panel has voted to eliminate all funding for NPR and PBS, starting with “Sesame Street,” “Reading Rainbow,” and other commercial-free children’s shows. If approved, this would be the most severe cut in the history of public broadcasting, threatening to pull the plug on Big Bird, Cookie Monster, and Oscar the Grouch.

The cuts would slash 25% of the federal funding this year?¢‚Ǩ‚Äù$100 million?¢‚Ǩ‚Äùand end funding altogether within two years. The loss could kill beloved children’s shows like “Clifford the Big Red Dog,” “Arthur,” and “Postcards from Buster.” Rural stations and those serving low-income communities might not survive. Other stations would have to increase corporate sponsorships.

If we can reach 250,000 signatures by the end of the week, we’ll put Congress on notice.

www.moveon.org/publicbroadcasting

Thanks!

P.S. Read the Washington Post report on the threat to NPR and PBS at:

www.moveon.org/r?r=745

As my faithful readers know, I recently had my third breast cancer diagnosis and a mastectomy – my second – the obvious bonus is never having to get squooshed by a mammogram machine again! My sister Carole, who is 7 years younger than me, has had the exact same type of cancer and a mastectomy a few years ago. So she and her oncologist decided that her fate was probably going to be the same as mine – cancer in the other breast. Last week she had an elective mastectomy to prevent having to worry about cancer and not catching it in time. I hope she has a sense of humor (she is my sister, of course she does) because I made her this postcard.

My wrist is having a miraculous healing. I am working without the brace tonight – but very carefully!

Day 8 of Twenty Days of Virtue Last night I made a virtuous pizza – whole wheat dough crust, no mozzarella, just sauce, peppers, basil, chicken sausage, sundried tomatoes and some goat cheese. Of course, Stevie and I ate the whole thing – how virtuous is that? I had my first weigh-in and have lost 3 pounds – yippee!! Except for the wrist, I am feeling great.

Apparently when I was rearranging my studio yesterday, I sprained my wrist. Last night I was in excruciating pain. You should have seen me at 3 am trying to open a new bottle of Aleve – teeth can be very handy! The Aleve didn’t help much so today I went to the Urgent Care Clinic. I was told to ice it, take prescription dose of Aleve twice a day and wear this brace. Wouldn’t it be nice if they made these in lime green?

Here are two postcards I managed to get done this week-end. The top one has Mrs. Mel scraps and the bottom is dupioni silk and with Japanese textiles.

The Quilt National 2005 catalog arrived in the mail yesterday. I have been spending way too much time perusing and ogling and analyzing the quilts. One observation that I have made is that many of them use images printed on fabric. I was quite surprised to see how many have digitally manipulated photos, photo transfers or photos printed on fabric. I think I counted about 12. Fusing seems to be making inroads, but piecing still reigns supreme. The machine quilting on most is extremely simple and rarely takes center stage. And some are hand quilted.

So with that in mind, I am happy with my E-bay purchase of an Epson Stylus Photo 2200 wide format printer. It uses pigment inks instead of dye and is more light and water fast than the HP inks. Some people don’t even pretreat the fabric with Bubble Jet set or wash it afterwards (for art quilts). So I am anxious to try some samples. It has 7 ink cartridges. I plan to use it only for fabric printing and important photos. I have a wide format HP for my other printing.

Today, I finally got my act together and rearranged the studio and found lost stuff and made my work space more functional. I feel better prepared to start creating again!!

Day Six of Twenty Days of Virtue Still doing well. I succumbed to a tablespoon of Port over my strawberries tonight. Yesterday I did a half hour of aerobics and then we worked with the large Fit Ball for another half hour. I love doing that. I have one in the studio and when I have been sitting too long, I like to sit on it and massage my butt! I am doing my first weigh-in tomorrow to see how I’m doing, but the pants feel slightly looser.