Thanks for a great framer

With the preparations for the up-coming sales, we've been into my framer three times in the past two weeks. He sure is great! Yesterday he helped us finish the backs of four little frames I had found at a garage sale. I had made four small pictures using a combination of needlefelting, hand embroidery and adding my hand-made beads. They look really great, especially with the lovely little frames. But putting the backs on was beyond our capacity.

I was pleased to actually get to use some hand-made beads that had a more "ethnic" appearance. These were started with rolled Tyvek that had been painted with metallic paint. I rolled two layers together with the painted side out. I wrapped them haphazardly with Kreinic metallic threads, and then zapped them with the heat gun, which melted the Tyvek, but not under the areas that had been tightly wrapped. The final appearance and texture worked very well with the needlefelting that had been done with wool and yarn. When I used silk roving and Throwsters silk waste, the UTEE based beads worked well. So overall, I ended up with a good variety in the pictures. I sure want to try this again, but it means haunting garage sales for small frames.

It never rains etc..

My sewing machine broke! I just had it recently serviced, but back we went to day for help. Thank Goodness they were to fix it. I just have to accept that this machine hates monofilament thread and will go on strike if I try to use it.

So I tried to print off some pictures of my work for greeting cards. Out of ink!

However, I found time to play today. Last weekend I bought four small picture frames at a garage sale. Today I made up four pictures to put in them. I needlefelted the background on three of them--actually got to use the Throwsters silk I had bought. Then I hand sewed on three hand-made beads on each of them. I glued each of them to matt board and they look quite fine! Of course, now I'm just about out of hand-made beads, and will have to have bead-making session. Yesterday I found small boxes on sale for $1.50. With a small embroidered insert--including a hand-made bead--I can sell them for $15.00. And they do sell--right now I have an order for a couple of them.

While trying to solve the puzzle of the meaning of life etc. I started working on a piece that has been in my mind for a couple of years. I bought the Japanese fabrics in Ottawa in 2006, and then added a couple of oriental-type fabrics from my stash. I was worried about value and added some plain ecru cotton that I had stamped with some of my hand-carved stamps. The center "river" is extensively FMQ'd, but this is a bigger piece than I usually do and I had a terrible time getting the thing through my domestic sewing machine, both for the FMQ'g and to sew down the various pieces of fabric in the background. As a result, you can see in the picture, that some of the pieces of fabric were skewed off angle--not a lot, but enough that you can see it. Now I'm faced with quilting the background areas. How?? I tried a couple of lines using a dark monofilament. It was really difficult to see the previous line and to try to push the quilt through with any degree of accuracy in trying to create pleasing line.

So I decided to relegate this to my crap quota, and move on. However--my support group has suggested that it could be re-purposed--after all there is a lot of $$ tied up in the fabric, if nothing else. Any suggestions?

Here is a close-up. I hope you can see all of the FMQ'g within

the red area. I used Sulky Blendables thread, and

would sure hate to try picking it out!

Whe-e-e-w!!

Have been working full out for the past few weeks. I had set a July first deadline to have finished all of my show stock for all of the summer shows. Did the last little bit of beading Wednesday evening. I just have three collages to mount and matt, but have to wait for the matts to actually finish them. I've ordered and paid for the matts, but they're getting awful expensive. I had bought some from a different dealer and was disappointed in the poor quality, although the price was right. Since I rely so heavily on presentation to sell mycollages, I guess I'll have to stay with the better framer, and maybe have to raise my prices.

Despite having stuff in three high profile shows and a gallery show, lately, I've not sold any of my serious work. This, of course, feeds my self doubt, so I'm wrestling with what I want to do with myself. My obsession with planning and preparing for the classes next spring, makes it difficult to focus on the things I really want to do. So I think the first decision I have to make is how important it is to me to make money with my craft/art. This will help me decided whether I want to pursue teaching. If I'm not making money by selling my craft/art andthe money is important then the teaching becomes a priority, whether that is where I want to be or not.

I know that the money is how I validate my work to myself. But how often on this blog have I ranted about, and wrestled with my own self-doubts?

Matts

Took all of the sunprints and collages into the framer to get matts. They appear to sell so much better when they're properly presented. We chose coloured matts to suit each individual piece. Ca-ching! Ca-ching! $$$ But, hopefully, I'll get the money back when they sell. When I went in, all of the machine work was done but not the beading. The framer kept all of the pieces so that he could match each matt and piece, and make sure the right one went with each. I feel bereft! So now I have to find something to work on until I get them back in about a week. I had imposed a July 1st deadline on myself to have all of my show stock finished, but I guess I just have to be more flexible.

Sunprints

Boy, am I ever on a roll! The sunprints are almost all FMQ'd. The first two just weren't right, so I cut off as much of the hand painted fabric as I could salvage. I'll turn that into a collage, but the parts that were actually FMQ'd were garbage. Then, when I was looking for thread to FMQ the rest of them, I stumbled on my Sulky Blendables. WOW! Does it ever work well in the sunprints! They are much more subtle than before and, IMHO, much more pleasing. So today I embellish them. I think I'm going to try strategies other than beads on a couple of them.

Today on the internet, a lady was talking about how to wash painted fabric so that you don't lose colour. The secret is to minimize the agitation--wash on a gentle cycle and avoid the dryer. Well, gosh, I wish I'ld thought of that! Do I ever feel like a dummy!

Well, I've set a deadline of July first to have all of my summer sale stock ready to go. I may make it, although a stumbling block will be finding the $$$ to buy matts for all of the collages and sunprints. Making the bigger pieces first lets me use leftovers for the smaller pieces like the coffee cuffs and small purses--the best sellers. Then I have to spend time dealing with other aspects of my life, such as preparing for teaching--first class is in early October--and show entries. I'm very comfortable working with sunprints and collages, but, if I'm going to grow as an artist, I have to try more challenging things.

What a week.

Monday turned out to be my only day at home. Tuesday I suddenly had to go to Pinawa for a meeting about the formation of a regional arts council. While this would have no impact on me as an individual, as Chair or the Eastern Manitoba Artists' Co-0p,(EMAC) I needed to be there as a representative. Wednesday we helped hang the EMAC show at Cre8ery Gallery. Thursday ws the opening recpetion for the show, and I had to be there most of the evening. Then yesterday was a showing of the documentary film "Handmade Nation". I had volunteered to sell admissions. The film was about the DIY Movement in the USA. I had no idea that this weekend there was a "Do ItYourself" (DIY)festival in the city. The fact that attending Solstice celebrations was part of the festival made me a little uncomfortable. In none of the literature was there any indication of a spiritual component to the movement.

So today was to be my quiet day. Garage sale down the street and we found a little table that is just perfect to use with my needlefelter. This would allow me to leave the needlefelter up and ready to use all the time. So this afternoon was spent re-organizing my entire studio to accomodate the little table. It's been awhile since I worked as hard as I did today! But, it was probably time for a general clean-up in any case.

All of this activity has psyched me up, so once the needlefelter was in place I started working on the latest set of matted collages. They should be pretty well finished inthe next day or so, but then I'll have to buy matts for them--$$$. Then it will be on to the sunprints I made last week.