Fiber and Pulp

What Have I Been Doing?

Mostly sleeping and yukking. :P Still, I'm on my feet and at the store today.

Took me, off an on, most of June to tinker with these postcards for the color swap -- the theme was Violet & Lime. These are painted with Twinkling H2O's, scribbled on with gold and white Copic markers, heat transfers for images, stickers, framed with copper tape and then inked with StazOn. Sometimes the process is as much fun as the product (mostly it's more fun:).

First, let me share the two postcards I have received from this swap. From Carolyn A:

From Janet P: "Hope abides; therefore I abide. Countless frustrations have not cowed me. I am still alive, vibrant with life. The black cloud will disappear, the morning sun will appear once again in all its supernal glory."

Now, these are extra postcards that I made for this swap -- I'm sending them out to art-y friends as a surprise (um, Random Act of Kindness, eh?:) Each one has a quotation on the back.

"I will ... assert that nature without culture can do more to deserve praise than culture without nature." (Cicero)

"Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious." (Brendan Gill)

"The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct. The creative mind plays with the objects it loves." (Carl Jung)

"Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought." (Albert Gyorygi)

"...teach each one that Life is the most important, precious and valuable thing." (Amwarsah)

"Real freedom lies in wilderness, not in civilization." (Charles Lindberg)

"Nut (noot) -- goddess of night, protector of innocents. Go girl!"

"Live that your memories will be part of your happiness." (Anon.)

"The supreme accomplishment is to blur the line between work and play." (Arnold Toynbee)

"The art of mothering is to teach the art of living to children." (Elain Hefner)

"In the end, we decide if we're remembered for what happened to us or for what we did with it." (Randy Millholland)

"Humanity has advanced ... not because it has been sober, responsible and cautious but because it has been playful, rebellious and immature." (Telyn Robbins)

Virus? :P

Have been home sick for three days now. :P Fever, head aches, joint aches, nausea, intestinal problems. Major :P

Bored to tears of doing nothing and feeling rotten. :P As I think I might have mentioned before, I am a lousy patient. :P

I _did_ manage to finish thirteen more violet and lime postcards -- these were hand drawn pictures with heat transfer images, embellishing scribbles, words, quotations, etc. Put copper tape frames and then over dyed with StaZon dark green ink. I'm really liking the results. I hope to take photos when I get back to work. I think I'm going to RAK some folks I haven't heard from in a while. :)

Hot, hot today with intermittent thunderstorms. Glad I wasn't out in it! I guess there is always a silver lining if you look for it -- gotta look pretty hard right now. :

Caught up on my blog reading (was very, very pleased to be mentioned in Sharon Bogg's list of 'F' blogs:). Reminds me of the years ago when we were playing Napoleonic miniatures (15mm, I think) and it was a very big deal to be MENTIONED IN DISPATCHES to the army's higher-ups. (grin)

Violet and Lime

I got my postcards for the exchange online finished today. I packaged them up in clear envelopes for mailing because they have hand beading on them (I don't want that snail to munch the beads off:).

Of course, _after_ I packed them up I remembered that I wanted to take photos. :P :) So, I photo'd the two that I chose not to mail:

I don't quite understand what is going on with my camera -- one of these cards is not in focus, the other one is. (sigh) As far as I know I'm doing the same thing with each picture. (shrug) I hope the camera is not losing it's little chip-brain! :P

I've been going in circles today at the store, trying to catch up on the paperwork I left before vacation (three different vendors were here and I had about 15 pages of fabric orders to type into the computer:). Still have a little left to do, but it can wait for tomorrow!~ :)

Home Again

I had a nice trip to the NearMidWest -- got back late Monday evening. The weather was lovely for the most part while I was in Ohio and KY ... it did rain/thunderstorm some, but generally at night. Berea was as lovely as ever. Sadly I left my camera at home -- but let me share some more of my photos from last year with you (sticking to things I saw again this year:)

This is the Ohio River where we crossed last year. I don't remember whether it was the same crossing as I took this year -- I followed Google's instructions going out to Ohio and the Rand McNally Atlas coming back. (grin) I think I crossed the river at Parkersburg, WV both times. I don't know what it is about crossing big rivers that I enjoy so much -- but I do!

Hmm, I'm not finding my other photos I wanted to share here on my home computer -- maybe they are at work? :) I'll look tomorrow.

Mom and I went to the KY Artisan place again this year -- saw many, many beautiful works of art/craft, all made by Ky artists. Also stopped at Fish Wisdom Beads -- love the name!:) Bought some green and lime green beads to finish my June postcards with (photos tomorrow).

It rained almost the entire way home -- thunderstorms and lightning in some places. :P Made crossing through West Virginia and western Maryland difficult and tense. :P I was glad to get home undented.

Mostly did a lot of nothing while Mom visited with her school chums -- did get together with them a couple times. Watched some tv (got to see the three Indiana Jones movies again:) and did handwork. Did not get to see my Aunt Ruby this time -- they must be away (no answer to phone calls:).

Traveling ...

... westward. I'm going off to Ohio to see my Mom and take her to her college reunion (I think this is year 50?) in Kentucky. I'm looking forward to probably seeing my Aunt Ruby as well (fingers crossed).

I'll be traveling light this time -- no sewing machine, no computer. I will have some hand work along and hope to visit the local bead shop while I'm there. Also taking a list of the various quilt shops between here and there in hopes of possibly visiting one or two. :)

Sure hope the weather improves for my driving!!

Chatting ...

.... with my son yesterday over lunch, he asked me 'Who's side are you on?' -- meaning, who did I vote for in the primary election here in MD. We talked politics for a while ... but the question itself has been bothering me ever since.

Whose side AM I on? I suppose the automatic answer is probably 'My own' ... but I don't really think that is true. :)

Increasingly I find myself coming down on the side that preserves the natural world and protects 'nature'. There are more than enough cities, mines, lumbering operations and highways in this world, in my humble. There seems to me to be a crying need for attitudes that put the preservation of the 'real' world at least even in priority with human industry.

I guess that is a common enough slogan these days, with all the fuss about global warming (which I largely agree with -- scientists have been talking about this issue for decades and I _am_ a scientist by training and nature). I think we (meaning society at large) generally do nothing but lip service to the goal of living in harmony with the great green world. (sigh)

I'm also on the side of the children. Too many of society's members want to throw out the baby with the bath water when it comes to education, foster care, child rearing issues. I discovered recently that the correct appellation for my personal political outlook is 'progressive' -- I think the function of government ought to be the protection and preservation of that society's weakest members ... and children always seem to get the shortest end of the stick in my humble. :P

Almost every political issue I really care about comes down to green or children...the others, I likely have no opinion about or don't understand. I certainly can't begin to understand the way national politics seems to work in Washington, DC these days! Since we live near DC, our 'local' news tends to include a generous helping of 'national' items -- I am frequently reminded how glad I am not to be involved with 'politics' (truth is that all human interaction involves politics, strictly speaking)! Even though I think of myself as a 'people' person, I have limits on tolerating nastiness of behavior (a certain amount I can understand on a personal level, even if I don't like it; what I see flowing in DC has dark, dark shadows in it). :P

Don't know why I"m in such an introspective mood this week. (shrug)

Playtime ...

... with my hands. :) I've been making 'sgrafitto' designs with my rubbing plates and Shiva paintsticks. (wheeee!)

I"m in a postcard swapping group online. The way they do the theme for each month is to pick a color combination -- you can make any artwork you like, but you must use that month's color combo to do it. The next month's colors are Violet and Lime.

I particularly like purple and green -- always have, far as I know. :) I'm getting a just a tad carried away with the theme. (grin) Here are some shots of purple-with-lime and lime-with-purple fabrics I just made (they are curing/drying in the back room right now):

My plans are to fuse this fabric to Fast2Fuse and then cut it into 4"x6" postcard pieces. Might do some hand or machine stitching and probably some embellishing with charms, twigs, etc.

Yesterday I printed a double leaf background with a ginko leaf in the foreground to make a class sample:

I do so enjoy stenciling and painting and playing around. :) I always make a mess, though -- can't touch paint (even in a crayon shaped stick) or glue stick or any other media without getting it all over me (I"m sort of proud when I can confine the mess to my fingers:).