Such a Regal profile

Meet my new studio buddy and constant companion. We named her Shadow, as in sewn to my heels like a…

We adopted a Rescue Shelter dog; a Husky mix that is probably about 2-1/2 years old. She is sweet, lovable, and pretty well behaved. We’ve had her two weeks today and I’m sooo smitten with my new buddy. I will confess that the first few days had it’s ups and downs as the whole Alpha Dog thing was sorted out (I won), but it was fairly minor.

Besides being a great companion, she has proven to be a good studio partner. She sleeps at my feet and makes a natural obstacle course.   She is a good listener and thinks all my ideas are brilliant! She does not freak out when I use the ban saw or the shop vac.

Such a sweet face!

And isn’t this the most beautiful face?

Deb H

Being married to an engineer has it’s benefits and it’s entertaining moments. This is totally not fiber related but I felt compelled to share.

“So”, says I, “we need a way to protect the small willow tree from the wild bunnies (we have hoards of them) and the snow this winter, can you think of something, Honey?” DH decides a wire fence and a plastic garbage bag will do the job. It sounds simple and I let him go to it.

T-pee for a willow tree

This is what I got. The wood framework is to keep the weight of the snow from smooshing the tree down. A good idea, but did it really need to be so fancy? It’s even been sanded smooth, I guess the bunnies won’t get splinters when they find their way in. I love it, don’t get me wrong. It will do the job very well, but it still makes me chuckle.

On the other hand, I thought the overhang at the end of the kitchen counter and the breakfast bar was an ideal place for cookbook shelves. I figured he could cut up some plywood, paint it to match the cabinets and viola!

Well utilized space!

White maple and rosewood – they are soooo beautiful that I won’t want to leave them behind when we eventually sell the house!

Even a drawer for my stamps and such!

I’m not poking fun at him for these – I love them!

matches the tile nicely

Don’t they look nice with the tile trim on the counter?

fully loaded

And almost all of my cookbooks fit – well… three quarters.

But when we needed a solution to the sun coming in the sliding glass door ruining the flooring, he solved the problem very well with a bit of slate tile.

slate tile to stand up to the sun damage

This also has become a favorite photo backdrop for many of my Etsy product shots!

On the other hand, when I make and Art Quilt – comments about my lines “aren’t straight” or my angles “aren’t square” will not be warmly received 

I love you , Honey!

Deb H

Me, most of the time!

This has been a busy week. I finally made the decision to change my Blog/business name. You will find the full explanation on my About Me page. For the short version – it boils down to a conflict in name usage; there is another SZ! I have set up a new Etsy shop (still empty) and a new Ravelry ID (still bare). I have (with the new name) joined Twitter, Facebook and MySpace. I’m not sure how much I will use all of these, they may be just ways to point people to my Blog and Etsy — we’ll see.

Meanwhile, watch the changes slowly come and don’t worry – my SZ URL, my old Etsy and my old Ravelry (see links in side bar) will still work for quite some time.

Speedy, I’m not 

Deb H

I also worked on some more fabric and mark making techniques. Adding to existing ones and two new pieces on black silk noil; discharged, painted, silk screened, and (believe it or not) expandable paint. I was very happy with these. Much stronger contrast brings me back into my comfort zone even though I rarely use black in anything. I love the drama in these two fabrics (click to biggy size).

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And while the rest of the class went on the tours in the afternoon a few of us dye-hards (pun and spelling intended), stayed to play a bit more.

Finally, my board at the end of Day 3.

All this creativity is exhausting and I could hear the Siren Song of a glass of wine and my bed, so I found a Bell Hop and a luggage cart and had myself rolled up to my room for the night. Thursday we started to put it all together, just give me time to process all my photos.

Deb H

BTW, have you any idea what all of this does to your finger nails?

Ack!

Meanwhile, this round of sock classes (I’m teaching “Toe-Up, Two at a Time on One Needle Socks!” at Heritage Spinning and Weaving) is going pretty dang well. I’ve been very lucky with this last two classes as they have been “up to the challenge” and becoming sock knitting fiends. Here is my current class (from left to right); Linda, Carol, Suzanne, Diane, Pat, and Sue.

Don’t they just look like they are going to be producing mass quantities of hand knit socks in the very near future? BTW, Jane of my class that graduated in April has already brought in to show me her finished pair and they are beautiful, go Jane!

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I received a wonderful surprise in today’s mail. I have an art quilt in a traveling exhibit; Michigan Quilt Artist Invitational 2008, The Art of Music. I got a post card advertising the current exhibit and my quilt was one of the two quilts gracing the front. This is my first time to make it in print so I had to share.

And the back.

For better pictures of the quilt I have in the exhibit, I blogged about it last December.

And last but not least, it’s not just for sewing anymore… I saw this little gadget in a posh kitchen catalog and thought how it would be great for chopping up all my fresh herbs.

Then I thought, “this reminds me of something I already have”. I rummaged my sewing table and sure enough, I have 3 of these things so one could be spared.

OK, so the larger size would work better. I also have to take it all the way apart to clean it each time but, it works incredibly well and best — it was already paid for ;o)

Deb H

Oy!

Wake up people. This is very, very, very bad. For more information and how to help to let Congress know that the American voters are smarter than that, please follow this link and be heard!

http://www.gloriahansen.com/weblog/?cat=2 Thank you Gloria for helping us stay current on this issue.

Dismounting soap box to thunderous applause by ARTISTS all over the world, whom this will effect.

I’m simply referring to the fact that as I empty stuff out of my art room to paint another wall, the studio and office have become so choked I cannot navigate in them. I’ve had to be diligent about a path to the computer! But, it has to get worse before it gets better, right? I have (in my defense) filled up two large garbage bags with old disks and paperwork that is about 15 years out of date and ideas and fiber articles that had me saying – out loud – “what was I thinking!?!” Some things are just not worth keeping, I keep telling myself that as I still have several more boxes to sort through. But progress is being made, if very slowly and the light of dawn will glow again. What is my point? An over abundance of clutter can stifle creativity. Trust me on this.

I just finished teaching a sock class (Toe-Up, Two at a Time on One Needle) and I always knit a pair of socks along with the class for demo purposes and to make myself feel less guilty about not making myself do the same homework I make my students do. Since I already have a pair of Cat Bordhi socks on the needle and have started my Hanne Falkenberg “Mermaid” sweater, I was not over-eager to start another pair so they are in super chunky yarn. But then I blew the whole “quick and dirty” thing by doing them in a lace pattern. A bit odd, but dear daughter loves them! I start another class next week, dear hubby will get some slippers too as I have a bit more of this unknown chunky yarn that was given to me. I think I’ll skip the lace on his.

As to my Mermaid Sweater, the color way I ordered was Apple Green and Turquoise. A lovely color combination and I adore it. I just don’t adore the yarn, sorry Hanne! It’s a bit scratchy and breaks too easily. I have replaced it with Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool in navy, purple and bronze, I’m hoping it will look as good in real life as it does in my head. When I have it a bit further on, I’ll post a pix.

Since I can’t even get in my sewing studio, I have started to wind a warp with the merino I dyed in the Palindrome method.

It seems to be working and the color sections are (more or less) lining up. Cool!

And because this silly herb garden tickles me so much, here is a picture of my garden, three weeks after planting. And yes Mom, I harvested some last night as I grilled orange roughy with some fresh basil, chives and cilantro, among other things – very tasty!

Back to winding my warp.

Deb H

After several tries,

and not being satisfied with the lumpy edges that would fall under foot… I found the perfect solution! (Thanks Joan!)

OK, so I didn’t have any matching yarn left (I used it up in hand warmers, lesson learned) and had to get creative. On the “I did something right” side of things, I managed to save a heel before the hole appeared. It was just starting to thin so I grabbed some yarn the same weight and did duplicate stitch over the thinning area. This seams to be the best time and way to fix a hole.

My repairs will work, and knitting a new toe is easier than darning. Of course, I knit these with a 100% merino yarn. Nice and soft but not the toughest wearing choice for socks. The green repair yarn is 50% nylon. The toes will last longer than the cuffs! At least he has his house slippers/winter boot socks back and I didn’t have to knit a new pair from scratch. BTW, they were from a yarn I hand painted, they were worth saving.

So! Why have I bored you with sock repair? Mostly because I haven’t done anything “artsy” this week and it was colorful. Speaking of color, I did finish painting one wall of the art room (art store room). This looks ever so much better. The walls are light aqua, the closet doors are bright chartreuse and the trim is a medium teal. It looks great! It only took me two weeks to get one wall done but I have gotten some sorting and organizing done along the way. The other three walls will be much easier as they have no doors or windows to trim. Yes, this room was the master bedroom in the original 3-bedroom cottage that used to be this big house. Who designs a master bedroom with no windows?!?!? On the up-side, I can store my fabrics and yarns in here with no worries for sun damage!

As for the sorting and organizing; I spent three entire days sorting and organizing my beads. It was scary, now it’s functional. I may even do some beading again someday.

And just for grins, I have to show you pictures of my indoor herb garden. I showed you the gizmo (Aerogarden) in January. But I failed to keep you all up with this totally cool way to have fresh herbs all year round and right above the kitchen sink! The January planting grew to an over abundance (I was giving herbs away) until they all started to bolt and bloom (about 3 months). I replanted two weeks ago today. Last Thursday I took a picture for posterity.

And today is the two week mark. Pretty cool, huh?

We can’t plant outside here for another 4 weeks so this gives me a bit of spring earlier than I normally get

Deb H

It’s been a very busy week but I still managed to put another layer of color on my grape vines pieces. The first one (Cloth 1, as it’s now known), is below.

The colors are a bit intense, not the soft water color look I had originally envisioned. I did this on purpose because I’m assuming I will loose color again. Not as much this time (I hope) as I’m taking measures to avoid it. My first correction was to not dilute my paints so much. I’m sure I had them diluted to the point where I had very little binder left. The manufacturer recommends not diluting more than 50% and I know I was way past that. Here is Cloth 2, it is starting to look a lot like Cloth 1, hummmmm.

The next steps I’m taking to avoid a huge amount of wash-out this go ’round is to let it cure longer between heat setting and washing, like a week before I heat set and a week after! In case you can’t see it, I added the gel-glue resist lines back in. This project is certainly a learning experience. I’m Blogging about it too, that means if I have a dismal failure, it’s a public one. What was I thinking?!?

So, what have I been busy doing all week? I taught a class at my spinning group on printing with silk screens. Don’t ask me why spinners want to silk screen but, there you have it, at least it went well and they seemed to enjoy it. I also did a lesson for my art group that met last night on Abstracting an Image. This was a challenge as I have no formal art training, just what I could pick up in the occasional CC class, fiber workshop (a lot of those!) and through books (a lot of those too) and the Internet. After several days research, I had a pretty good presentation. It was a small showing as we had the first warm and sunny day in 6 months yesterday but, the experience of putting the lesson together taught me so much I certainly can’t complain. I was fascinated by the process and it’s so much less scary for me now. I recently finished an online class of which I have mentioned in my last two posts. This class was an excellent choice for this time in my artistic journey. The instructor had us doing this in the class and she succinctly described the process as “reduce the image to it’s simplest form” and then gave ideas on how to do that. After further investigation and practicing the techniques I picked up in several places, I found the computer and Adobe Photoshop to be the fastest way to accomplish this. I t may seem like cheating and it would feel like it if I was going to use the simplified image as it. But by the time it is interpreted into another medium by hand (fabric or paint), I simply consider it a short cut. I’m sure there are those who would disagree. Too bad, it’s my tool of choice! All I can say is it’s a darn shame I did not have, nor could I find, a photo of grape vines on a stucco wall. No short cuts on this project. Sigh. And because you need a photo after getting through all that text here is a detail shot of Cloth 1. You can clearly see the resist lines now.

Ack, it looks pink!

Deb H

It’s just a start but so far, the cuff is linen stitch and I’m using the Sky Architecture sock pattern from Cat Bordhi’s new book; New Pathways for Sock Knitters, book one. Yes, I’ve started another pair of socks – hey – I like socks!

I must be painting Spring into Existence as well. I just realized that my colors I picked for painting the art room are very spring like!Pale aqua for 3 walls, bright chartreuse for one wall and all the doors, trimmed in medium dark aqua. But, I have to say… it’s always at this point when I wonder why I thought I wanted to take this on – I really do hate painting! As I progress ( a little bit each week, I can only force myself to work on it for short periods of time), it will be worth it. The best part is getting rid of the nauseating wall paper trim (See upper far left of photo). I just can’t handle the cutesy pink flowers in blue baskets – ugh. It’s not my fault, they came with the house!

The next saga of my “Grape Vines on Stucco” has not gone excellently. Oy.

I added lots more color. I was actually kind of happy with it, even if it is a bit too yellow.

It’s still wet here but you can see the resist is working nicely. I let it cure and heat set it. BTW, I’m using Setasilk, Transparent Setacolor, and Lumiere fabric paints.

I decided to try a less “wet” painting technique and started a second painted silk cloth (both are about 22″ x 26″). This also has resist lines (much softer) and potential.

The background is hard to see but is much less yellow. I used a spray bottle and some diluted warm brown. It looks a bit like tea dyeing. After curing and heat setting, I couldn’t stand it and wanted to see how the resist was working. I washed them.

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Whoa! Where did all my color go?!? I guess I need to be a little more patient when it comes to the curing and heat setting.

OK, back to the paint table – at least the yellow washed out

Deb H