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Archive for July, 2008

Some Bathroom Talk

Wednesday, July 16th, 2008

After a lull in the work on our bathroom renovation, there is finally some action and some visual progress. Most of the tile is up. The shampoo caddy needs some final touches and the shower floor needs some work. Here are some photos of the tile, sans grout and with little pieces of tape which must mean something to Vladamir, the tile man.

Thia is the end of the shower where the shower head will be. The little alcove is for shampoo.

This is the other end of the shower where there is a half wall. The Toto toilet is on the other side of the half wall. I think the paint color we selected is perfect.

Look at this little hole in the floor of the entry into the bathroom/closet area. It was where the old closet door was removed. The photo is dark because there is not light there right now.

The original plan was to use some of the flooring from the old closet and weave it in with a new threshold across the entry from the bedroom to mitigate the work that would be done. But, the floor guy is a fanatic. He wants it to look seamless with the bedroom. So, we have to move all the furniture out and after the repair is made, all of the floor will be sanded down to the wood and refinished. Happily, this will happen next week when I am gone.

Where am I going, you wonder? I am going to the Coupeville Arts Center on Whidby Island to take a workshop: Beyond Kimonos-Color Rice Paste Resist on Silk with Akemi Cohn. The best part is that I am taking the class with Judy of Judy in the Dyes from Georgia. I will drive to the Seattle airport and pick her up on Sunday and then off to Whidby Island for a week of creative fun.

After a 3 week absence, I checked back into WW’s today. I am so on a plateau, but at least I have not gained. I have not been able to do much walking with the leg problem and the workshops, but, I am sure that Judy will keep me on the straight and narrow next week. Right, Judy?

Tuesday Trivia (Drivel)

Tuesday, July 15th, 2008

I didn’t accomplish much on Sunday at the screen printing workshop. It was hot. I was tired. Here are the pieces that I did do and Saturday’s pieces after washing. Here are the bubbly scarves. I may have to cut up at least one of these for something else. All photos are clickable.

I used the same freezer paper screen for this deconstructed print. Most of the dye washed out. I used some that was sitting on the shelf, per Judilee’s suggestion. I still like it as a background for something.

Same problem with the deconstructed screen on organza. The last print I did was pretty good, I did that the second day and maybe my print paste had more soda ash.

On Sunday, I made a photo emulsion screen of a closeup of birch tree trunks from a photo that my daughter Lisa took. I did two different sizes. Here I have printed it on white cotton with dark gray and brown dye.

I also did the aspens with the same dyes.

I wanted to use Bordeaux dye on red silk for the pomegranates. I used it to print the trees on gold and it came out brown – I like it.

On the organza, it is winy in color, but pretty.

Here are the red silks with the Bordeaux. They are very subtle because the silk does not take a second or more dye like cotton can. It has fewer dye sites.

I came home early on Sunday night with the anticipation of going to Terry’s house to have dinner with Jane Davila, who was teaching at Sisters last week and in Portland, on her way home. I made a dessert of fresh peaches, vanilla ice cream, balsamic vinegar syrup and toasted almonds. We arrived at Terry’s to find out that Jane and her husband were not there as he was not feeling well and they were going to try to get an earlier flight home. I was disappointed, but happy that Terry had prepared a delicious meal which we enjoyed immensely. It was nice to have a home-cooked meal, by some one else. We sat on her lovely patio and enjoyed the evening.

Monday was a very busy day. We had to be downtown at the planning commission at 9 am for a hearing on the property across the street from us. It is a beautiful arts and crafts mansion that Reed College purchased and renovated as a home for their president. He didn’t want to live there, so they set it up to be a small conference center and overnight guest house. Wait a minute, we all said. This is a quiet residential lane. We can not have that kind of traffic on our street. If you would like to read more about it, there is an article in the Oregonian. We will not know until September whether we will win this one or not. I had to leave the hearing early to go over to Trinity and help the web gurus work on the new navigation layout for our updated website. that was fun!

In the afternoon, I had my annual oncology doctor’s visit – well it is supposed to be annual. I didn’t go last year because I consider myself cured!! I was pronounced fine and I promised to come back on time next year. Mr C was so sweet. While he was waiting for me, he was sitting across from a patient a little older than me, with cancer, and her 2 daughters, probably in their 50’s. He said they looked so old and tired and sad and when I came bounding out of the doctor’s office, I looked 39 years old to him. Wish I felt 39!!

Look at what our friends from Schenectady, NY, sent us!!!! Yum!!

I have probably mentioned that I grew up on a farm in upstate NY. My dad made maple syrup in the spring. One of my jobs was to can the syrup. When I was doing it, we had tin cans. I still have some. Of course they are empty. My dad used to joke that he sold his less desirable syrup to Vermont. I am a maple syrup snob, and so Bill and Joy were happy to indulge me with some real maple syrup.

Enough trivia drivel for today. i may have some nice bathroom photos for you tomorrow.

Day Four of the Screen Printing Intensive

Saturday, July 12th, 2008

Today, instead of doing devore, I opted for deconstructed screen printing. I have found  a new love. This is right down my alley and so addictive.

Here are some photos of work from today. I steamed and washed the work that I discharged yesterday


This piece is better than I had imagined. I am loving all the layers that I have produced.

Today, I brought in two silk scarves which I had dyed some time ago. They were a very rich reddish orange. I felt that they needed some additional design elements. I cut out circles from freezer paper in various sizes and ironed them to a screen. I then discharged the scarves. Here are the final results after steaming and washing.

The first step of creating a screen for deconstructed printing is painting the bottom of the screen with plain dye, mixed with water — no soda ash or paste.

I decided to use the freezer paper moon screen one more time. You can see both sides of the dye painted screen.

Here is my first, not so successful, print. I discovered, too late, that you need to paint some print paste on the screen and let it sit for a few minutes to soften the dye. This is a print on silk organza. There is some very salvagable fabric here.

Here are the deconstructed moons, printed on some hand-dyed fabric.

That is all I have photos of tonight. I just slept through most of a movie so I am going to toddle off to bed.

Today’s Prints

Friday, July 11th, 2008

I was so busy and having so much fun, that I forgot to take very many photos today. Judylee fixed my stained glass window screen and I got a couple of cool prints. Here is one of them. The other one is a darker han-dye. They look like day and night versions of the same window.

I also printed some pomegranates with black ink on red hand-dyes.

I made a torn masking tape screen and did quite a few different prints.

This fabric was done in the resist class 2 weeks ago.

Today, I used the torn masking tape screen and discharge paste and wow!, look at it now.

This yellow fabric was screened with discharge paste with turquoise dye added.

Tonight we watched Lars and the Real Girl. What a charming movie. I highly recommend it. I am off to bed. Two more days of screen printing.

I Screen, You Screen, We All Screen

Thursday, July 10th, 2008

I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist. Wait a minute, resists were part of the last class!

I am having a great time. Today was day 2 of the Screen Printing Intensive. I didn’t have time to post yesterday. I had a meeting of the web site re-design committee at Trinity and then Mr C and I went out to dinner. I came home and worked on preparing some black and white images for photo emulsion screens that we made today.

Yesterday, we did freezer paper stencil screen printing. Here is my stencil in progress. Once it is cut, it is ironed to the screen.

I saved the inside pieces which I ironed to a screen today, but was not very successful so Judy, the instructor is going to help me repair it. The dye was seeping under the freezer paper.

Here are my prints that have been steamed and are waiting for the washout.

Yesterday, I also prepared a screen with photo emulsion. This has to be done quickly in a dark room. The screen is then put in a covered area to dry. Because I had a large screen, I did two images. One of aspen tree trunks and one of pomegranates. The images have to be black and white – no gray. They are then copied to acetate. Back in the dark room, the images are placed on a light table and the screen is quickly laid on top. The whole thing is weighted and covered. The lights are then turned on to expose the image – takes about 4 minutes.

Then, the images were carried in a box to the dye studio where the unexposed emulsion is washed off.

Here is the screen, after I had done my aspen prints.

Here the aspen prints on gray cotton and organza. The aspens are the white areas.

And, the pomegranates. Tomorrow, I am bringing in some red fabric so that I can print these with black or dark red dye.

I also had fun making a torn paper print. I did several offset prints in different colors. I love the layering that I got. I don’t know what it will look like when I wash it. To make the screen, I tear little rectangles in a sheet of newspaper and tape it to the screen. Once you start screening, it just stays plastered on the screen and you can use it over and over, but you can’t wash it so you have to deal with mixing colors of dye, which I love to do anyway.

The makeup of this class is very different from the last class. Reva and I and one other woman are the only really mature women in the class. The others could be my daughters. I really am enjoying them. I think they get a kick out of me and my warped sense of humor.

Tomorrow, we get to play with discharge paste. I am going to be happy again.