Well it has been a busy week, or three, but Mom is now moved to MAINE! WOOOT! I’ll post some pics in a while, but just a bit of internet surfing for your entertainment today. To make a long story short, my dear 89-year old Mom has just made what we all hope, for her sake, will be her last major move….since she’s gone from Wyoming (birth), to West Virginia, to Japan, all over the Orient, South America, Europe, back to South America and finally to California in 1964. Anyway, now she’s here and we are all starting to de-stress. On our last day in Marin, we went to lunch at Insalata, in San Anselmo (the town I lived in from 7th through 12th grade). My beloved sister in law Joyce came up to help with the moving days… the first photo is of Mom and Joyce, the second of me with Ma.

One good way to de-stress is by surfing the internet, so here are some tidbits for you which I’ve visited in the past few days:

Alicia Merrett is an art quilter in the UK. I particularly like her Shakespeare and Sonnet 18 series–click on her Gallery tab, then scroll down and click on the link for that gallery.

Color Chart: Reinventing Color Since 1950 is on the MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) site, and I’m putting the link here in this blogpost so I don’t lose it… I want to go fritter some time away playing with it!

I also got myself on the e-mail list for Folkwear Patterns... I’ve been a fan for 25 years plus (as in from the beginning!). I’m so thrilled they still exist and have expanded their line. I must have at least a dozen of the patterns, and have made and worn most of them. They don’t have to look costume-y or outlandish… it all depends on how you select your fabric and wear them…. you can go funky, hippie, or just artsy chic! Anyway, the Photo Gallery I hadn’t seen before, and there is some real inspiration here.

More anon… it is REALLY good to be home!

Another surprise during my last trip to California was at the retirement community where my mom lives, Smith Ranch Homes in San Rafael, California. On the lower level, they have monthly art shows in the corridor from the Grill Room (a lunch cafe / restaurant) past the mail room to the lower lobby, shop and beauty parlor. In February, they had textile/fiber art, including an art quilt! Some of the pieces were quite modern and abstract, some representational, and many were interesting. Here are some of my favorites, starting with this glorious piece of art cloth (all pictures are clickable to enlarge, most include the tags with the name of the piece and the artist, but alas am not sure they can be read! I tried!):

Here is another piece I particularly liked, made of discharged fabrics fused or otherwise adhered to the black background:

The “kimono” was fun, too… made of metal I think, with glass affixed– the piece on the far left was cloth and encaustic (I think)….

All in all, it was interesting, nice to see fiber art, but a bit lacking in color! I remember one purple woven piece, and an interesting face made of denim worked punched-rug style, but as loyal readers know, I’m ALL about COLOR!

Here are some of the other pieces I liked. This one is fairly 3-D:

This one is copper foil applied to the background with thin strips of copper sheeting or copper tape wound around the piece:

The one art quilt needed a bit of help in the hanging sleeve department and the quilting was fine if uninspired, but the threadwork to make the 3-D flag was intriguing:

and a detail of the flag:

All in all, I was happy to see fiber / textile art being shown, but apart from a denim piece (a portrait, worked in hooked rug style) and a woven in purples and greens, it was rather lacking in color…. and loyal readers know, I LOVE COLOR! I’m hoping to be able to afford a major dye-fest when the weather is warm this summer to indulge that vice <GRIN!>… stay tuned!

A thousand years or more ago, when dinosaurs roamed the Earth and I was young, I attended San Domenico School. The school is not so much larger in terms of students, but my oh my the opportunities for those kids! The lower school is now co-ed, tho the high school is, for a while longer, still all girls (I think there are plans to change that in time, and I’m OK with it!). I’ve been able to donate my piddly little donation every year, while Mom was able to endow a music scholarship for the outstanding classical music program; in another time and era, mom probably would have loved to be a professional musician, but as a child of the Depression, earning a living came first and foremost. All photos in this post are clickable to view larger in a new window.

Sure wish I’d been that talented back then and then had the next 30+ years to improve on that foundation!

On my recent trip to California (by the time this publishes on the blog, I’ll be back for the last one, to get mom moved to Maine!), Mom and I were able to attend the Virtuoso Program concert. In the Faith France Lobby next to the auditorium, there is always a wonderful art display, this time by the students of the Upper School (high school). I am always so amazed…. and wish I could take the classes with them! I think the photo above, of the pomegranates, and the one below of the tree are my favorites:

Here’s a picture of mom with the two girls who currently hold her scholarship…one is a violinist and I think the other is a cellist:

Then here is more of the art:

Camden (Maine) is fortunate to have a wonderful Teen Center which is open free of charge to 5th through 12th graders here. It is mostly enjoyed by the middle school kids and younger teens (and it happens to be located a short walk from the middle school), my oldest son among them. They have had a fun fund-raiser the past year or two at least, and this year I got to be a part of it. Folks donate chairs or stools, which artists of various sorts then gussy up for sale at the auction. When I went, there weren’t a whole lot of options… I wanted to do something larger than a stepstool, so this tall stool was about it. Alas, I forgot to take a picture of it in its initial dark brown stain, which I sanded. I then painted it with the same aqua that I used on my new fabric shelves (shelving seen here — note, all photos are clickable to view larger).

Then I got out my craft paints, selected as many fun colors as I could find (bright blues were gone, and the fuchsia, alas, was solidified beyond using…sob!). The palette above is lovely, don’t you think? Here is a view of the chair while being polyurethaned (and does anyone know why my craft paints might have smeared a bit when coated????):

And a view of the front when done:

And the back:

And a close up of the seat (that light spot in the center is just that, a light / reflection):

Yes, I am alive. Yes, I have been working like a madwoman. Yes, family life happens (and means you don’t get to blog). Yes, I have been teaching. Yes, I have been quilting!

Earlier this week I came across a post on the quiltart list by Sonja Lee, and a link to her blog, Art Textilian, with her contribution to the World Beach Project. WOWIE ZOWIE! Instant inspiration! The Beach project is sponsored by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, England, and a collaboration with artist Sue Lawty. Immediately I wanted to participate, despite the bone-shattering cold this week

So on Friday at sunset when it was about 12 degrees Fahrenheit (minus temps in Celcius) with a nice breeze blowing to make it feel chillier, Eli and I went to town to buy Pigwidgeon (the pug)  a birthday present (a new bed), go to the post office, and just before dark (well, as dark was happening at 5 pm) make our piece on the beach. The photo above is of the beach below the library and amphitheatre park. You can see the schooners wrapped for winter and the ice (yes, ice) on the beach at low tide at sunset.

I guess I didn’t read the instructions too well, because the project is supposed to be made of stone, and ours is made of mussel shells, a few rocks, and tumbled, broken bits of brick (so it is totally New England!). When I asked Eli at breakfast if he wanted to do this with me, he asked if we could make the yin and yang if we could find white and black stones, so of course I said yes. Well, he didn’t remember what it was called, but I knew he meant yin-yang. When we got to the beach, he decided red and blue of brick and mussels would be better.

Anyway, I don’t know if our project will make the V&A website since it isn’t exactly mostly rock, but we had fun anyway. It got so dark in the 20 minutes or so that we were freezing our fingertips (some of the shells were frozen to the sand and we had to scrabble to pry them loose!), so I had to photoshop / lighten this last picture so you can actually see both the harbor and our project.