Dancing Crow

February begins

February is Pink!

February is also making more use of the embellisher machine, also called a needle felting machine. A set of felting needles is powered by a (small cheap plastic) sewing machine with the bobbin case removed. The resulting fabric has a distinct texture and character. There are some people who can make lovely art with them, using wool roving and other fibers for color and texture. Several Flickr groups exist, including Made with the Embellisher Machine  - that gives you a feel for the kind of whispy, dreamy things you can do. 

Timna pointed out that while she uses a lot of pink, her quilts don't tend to read as PINK!!! because she combines it with other colors. In fact, this one of hers is a study of Pink&___ (fill in the blank). 

In other news, the drawing class is mixed. The teacher knows whereof he speaks, but he tells long stories with no discernable moral. The teaching is what I'm there for. I'll show some drawings at some point. 

that was fun!

My friend Sarah Buttenweiser has the best ideas. This time her idea was a craft fair in her living room. Which, I might add, is a really lovely space, along with the dining room and the kitchen and the sunroom off it and the study at the end of the hall. The whole space was wall to wall creative people with amazingly beautiful things, and really charming people coming to look at those things.

 I was sharing the front room with Crispina ffrench and Caitlin Bosco, both working with recycled clothing in really different ways. Caitlin makes skirts from t-shirts that I yearned after (and I never wear skirts!) they were so humorous and so chic. Crispina makes astonishing sweaters out of other sweaters, as well as other things out of sweaters like, say, baby blankets. The description does not do the end result justice - these are works of art. Warm, soft works of art. I have a sweater of hers now, and she has one of my chickens - we are deligthed with ourselves. 

My new sweater is made of pieces of other cashmere sweaters: there is a center panel, and side panels, and a soft, mushroom brown hood, and two colors of sleeve. I'll try to get a reasonable picture of it soon. I love it. Alice loves it too: when I got home she hugged me and then started rubbing her face over me like a cat, humming about softness. 

distance, not speed

I have always joked that I'm built for comfort not speed. The bikes I ride, the boats I prefer, the horses I like best, all better over the long haul than the short sprint. Imagine my pleasure at discovering that I have precedent in the art world: this article by Malcolm Gladwell points out what I knew in a dim kind of fashion, but maybe hadn't quite been able to articulate.

To wit - Some start fast, some start slow. Lack of skill at the beginning does not preclude acquiring the skill through practice. It takes patience on the part of the practitioner, and a good deal more patience on the part of her supporters, and frequently a steady allowance or other form of patronage. I have to say I am delighted to read this. I always swore I wouldn't be the person who peaked in high school, and I was frankly aiming for improvement every year. This says I have a shot at that - it isn't posturing on my part.

Go, read. Be encouraged.

what the big kid did on her summer vacation

She went to circus camp for a week. This was one of the two pieces she was in for the end of camp spectacular:

front of July TIF

IMG_3780
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

just a quick peek at the a piece of the front - a layer of painted white cotton jacuqard stitched to a plain white cotton twill.

I've been inspired by jude's efforts to try this month all by hand. Go see her stuff now - it is always inspirational.

Aside from my fingers hurting (my thread is too fat) and my impatience showing, it has been educational. Plus it is rather more portable than previous efforts, making it possible to transport and work on in VT for my third and final week of assorted camps.

week 2 leaves tucked in

week 2 leaves tucked in
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I have  a lot of fabrics that have TIF Challenge colors all over them trying to get the colors etter, or seeing how hard and long to press, or just to see what the next one looks like. So I used some of these to make this weeks object. I realized I like it better in this orientation - I made it horizontally. I was thinking about this postcard from last year:

May 26
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Alice finished a hat for a doll.

dolly hat

I made the doll before she was born, but couldn't find hair I liked. Alice carried her around a lot when she was one and two years old, and has revisited her since. She persuaded me to put some tibetan lamb on her head for hair, and captured her back to her room. Later that week, Alice insisted on learning to sew doll clothes, so I set her up with some stretchy stuff and she made leggings/pants and shirts, stole some socks from another doll, and started on this hat last week.

Note the band of purling as decoration, the pointy top, the i-cord finish and tassel. oop - I have to take another picture to properly show off all the details.

What comes next

SharonB over at In a minute ago is taking Take a Stitch Tuesday on to the next thing. During 2007 she demonstrated a hand embroidery stitch each Tuesday, and people who were playing along took that stitch and made a small sampler or piece from it. While I don't do much hand embroidery, I really enjoyed seeing what others did while beating a stitch to death each week.

For 2008, she'll be organizing the Take it Further Challenge.  For Take it Further she is planning on issuing a challenge and a set of colors each month, and we can do with those what we will. Media and materials are up to the participants. I am guessing many people will be interested in some of the alternatives she mentions (paper, collage, quilting as well as hand and machine embroidery) or will incorporate several different things. Interim reports and final photos will be posted on Flickr and in our blogs. She will keep a list so you can see how (and what) others are doing with the challenge.

I am looking forward to working larger and for longer. The Journal pages this year felt really huge after postcards, but I am thinking of going (gasp) even bigger - possibly up to 12x18" or even 18x24" to give me enough room to explore these things. I have thoughts for several series that I might use as starting points for the challenges Sharon posts.

leaves that were green

Nov 6
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Like I said before, I think of fall containing leaves with bright colors, while brown is for later, or trees that aren't really trying. But, once the leaves drop, they turn brown, frequently a nice color and with a lovely crunch and smell. I can't quite quilt the smell, or the crunch, but I think I did get the color.

Alice is working on turning a lump of rock into a bear shaped lump of rock. This entails a fair amount of sanding and rasping and results in a pretty good pile of dust.

amorphous bear

I think she's been imbibing Andy Goldsworthy as well, because this is what showed up on the camera:

Alice's spirals

In family circus, Al and I both managed a (painful and not really graceful, but a milestone) move called a Hip Key in fabric. We have documentation:

Al was so cute: he kept his toes pointed through the whole thing...

last thoughts from September's faces

I was thinking about something like a page of faces, when I checked Mimi Kirchner's site, and behold!  This is what I was thinking . 

silver eyed woman

Sept 18
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I should listen to my own childrearing advice. I routinely tell people that kids should be allowed to become bored so that they have experience of getting themselves un-bored, developing skills in getting interested in things.

I have been home, bored, waiting for Alice and me to get better, and I've had this amazing surge of productivity even with feeling logy and dim. Maybe it is because of feeling logy and dim? I'm harder to distract, and can only think in a very slow and linear fashion... or something. So I have postcards lined up waiting to be made, work accomplished on two months of quilt journal pages and (ahem) two backgrounds for a group I am only vicariously involved with.

I waver between feeling like a poseur and an overachiever with these two backgrounds. The group is Twelve by Twelve, and they are making 12"x12" art quilt squares on a theme every two months. The first theme is Dandelion. I love dandelions. I love picking them and making big, fat braids with the stems. I have a picture I adore of Aerin and some neighbors peeking around the corner of the house with dandelion crowns on. Really I am delighted with the theme, and at the moment I am secretly delighted with my two backgrounds. I am thinking they will be up close looks at the fly away part,  (thinking originally about how to make a dandelion that was not yellow and green) although I may use the second background for the yellow part after all. But - it isn't my group. I'm just playing along on the sidelines...

And yet, I am loving the size and the shape, and the new ideas that keep popping up.

I am also thinking I need to form my own group.

Anyone want to join? I think I am looking for creative, artistic people willing to form a group to inspire each other to take their work to the next level. Must be open to new ideas, critiques, and collaboration. If you fit the bill, or even better, if you are interested, drop me a note.