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Archive for December, 2012

Grieving

Friday, December 14th, 2012

 

yellow-green 14

 

“Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o-er wrought heart and bids it break.” 
― William Shakespeare, Macbeth

It has been a difficult week, hasn’t it? Grief mixed in with the celebration of this special season. The shooting here in Oregon was at the mall where I do most of my shopping. It was shattering to think of the unspeakable happening in a spot that I have often walked through. Then, today. I can barely fathom the enormous sadness for the little hamlet in Connecticut. Mental illness and semi-automatic guns are a lethal mixture. I wish that I could wake up in the morning and find it was all a bad dream.

There must be something we can do to ameliorate the gun violence in this country. It is way out of control. Will the deaths of 20 innocent young children finally wake up the politicians.? I pray so.

I thought I would share the back of my jazz quilt. I love the backs of quilts that show the quilting.

jazzback

 

And here are the two things I garnered at the CFG silent auction. Hand-dyed fabric.

silentauctionfabric

 

A beautiful felted purse.

 

feltedpurse

 

Hold your loved ones close and pray for the grieving.

Party On

Thursday, December 13th, 2012


yellow-green 12

My week of partying and hobnobbing is coming to an end. I need to settle down and finish my plans for the upcoming holidays and the arrival of the family!

Yesterday, I attended Columbia FiberArts Guild with a lecture by Janice Arnold who does mind boggling enormous felted installations. It was very inspiring to hear how she got started and her path to creating these installations. It was also our annual silent auction and I scored some hand-dyed fabric and a lovely black felted purse. Then, it was out to lunch with some friends. I spent the rest of the day getting Kelp Dance shipped to North Carolina for the PAQA South ArtQuiltsWater exhibit.

Today, was the annual STASH outing. We had lunch at a Peruvian restaurant, Andina. Very delicious food and an exchange of gifts.  Here are Terry, Reva and Suzy having a good laugh – there was lots of that.

andinalunch1

Then we did some roaming around the Pearl district. I found a new nativity from India in the Cargo Import store.

indianativity

Tonight, my friend, Kimberly, picked me up and we drove over the river to Vancouver to see a presentation by Bonnie Bucknam at the Clark County Quilter’s meeting. I love her quilts and so it was very inspiring to hear how she creates her beautiful quilts.

Tomorrow, I start physical therapy for my hip pain, which has been better, but I still have days when it is very bothersome and I need to use the cane.

I have made some progress on Paige’s Christmas stocking. I am worried about when I get to the heel. I haven’t done one in so long, but I only have about 10 days left to get this done.

paigestocking

 

Here is today’s 3 x 3.

yellow-green 13

 

 

All That Jazz

Wednesday, December 12th, 2012

 

Today must be 12/12/2012 because it is reveal day for the latest Twelve by 12 theme, sweet. You can check out the blog and see what sweet things await you. When Terri announced the theme, I went to the dictionary and found the last definition was:

pleasing to the ear; making a delicate, pleasant, or agreeable sound; musical.

So, I knew back then that I wanted to interpret the sweet theme as jazz music. I stayed with the batik theme, too and didn’t have to buy any new fabric. The trumpet auditioned several fabrics before I settled on this one. I had a lot of fun cutting the music notes and placing them. Click on photo to see a larger version.

I found a beautiful hand-dyed thread that I bought 3 or 4 years ago that was a perfect blend for this.

I did simple straight line stitching in a diagonal pattern. The size of the quilt made it a bit awkward to arrange the instruments. This was a fun, no brainer piece to do. I enjoyed it.

Here is a detail:

Here is Tuesday’s 3 x 3.

Today, I am going to the Columbia Fiberarts Guild meeting and then out to lunch with some friends. Janice Arnold who does gigantic felted installations is our guest speaker. It should be a great day.

A Festive Week-end

Monday, December 10th, 2012

The week-end flew by as we busied ourselves with decorating, cleaning, partying and entertaining. On Saturday night, we attended a party in the neighborhood. We were greeted at the door by our host in a tux and top hat. Our coats were whisked away and we were handed a glass of champagne. We looked around and didn’t see anyone that we knew. We were invited to this annual shindig because Mr C is on the Eastmoreland Homeowners Board.

Many people were dressed to the nines and others, very casual. I suddenly saw someone that I recognized, but I had never met him. He is a Facebook friend and the newly elected mayor of Portland, Charlie Hales. We got a chance to chat with him for awhile and it was nice to know that he was such a down to earth guy.  His wife is so cute and really sweet. One of our senators, Ron Wyden, lives in our neighborhood, and was invited, but didn’t come because they have a brand new baby.

We met some people who come down from Seattle every year for the party. The champagne flowed and the food was great, but even though a small tent was set up in the backyard, it was very crowded and difficult to get around and meet people. I got into a bit of an argument about architecture with an architect who is on the board. He is an old curmudgeon and does not like modern architecture.

On Sunday, I hosted the first every Oregon SDA meeting. There were 25 people in attendance. Every one brought some food to share. We shared our work and our frustrations with marketing work. Mr C was surprised to see so many young women. I said SDA is not old quilting ladies, and it is one reason that I love it so much. Many of the younger women are in to clothing design and production. One person, from Eugene, brought several of her felted garments to show. Other members got to model them. I wasn’t fast enough with the camera to get pics of all the garments.

The woman modeling the scarf came with her husband. They have a business making floor cloths that are painted and finished with polyurethane and wax. They had a catalog of their work – really beautiful.

Marci McDade, who is the SDA Journal editor, asked to see my articles in the Art Quilting Studio magazine. She was very impressed with the quality of the publication, the photography and how most of the ads are in the back. I was really happy to hear her positive critique!

Today, I have been working on the sweet themed 12 x 20 piece which will be revealed on Wednesday. Here is a sneak peek at the back.

I had fun showing the SDA members my studio and my 3 x 3 pieces. Here are two more from the past couple of days.

O’ Tannenbaum

Friday, December 7th, 2012

Today was the day for the annual excursion out to the countryside of Oregon where they grow Christmas trees.  Oregon is the leading producer of Christmas trees in the US so we don’t have to wonder where we will get a tree — they are everywhere!

We go to the same farm every year as they have beautiful Noble Firs, our favorite tree. This is the one we picked out.

It is up and has lights. I will post a photo when we get it decorated.

I also worked on the Sweet piece some more.  Here is a sneak peek of what I did today.

Tonight, we had dinner with friends who wanted us to meet another couple who has recently moved to our neighborhood and shares our very liberal political leanings. It was fun and delicious food.