SpiderWebs in the Redwood Forest

Can you see the spiderweb? What a beautiful day hike this was, with Alex's 4th grade class just up the road in Big Basin State park. Luckily between rainstorms, so it was soggy slogging, only a few kids fell down. Getting the excited pack of 9 year olds I was shepherding to slow down and look was accomplished by taking a lot of pictures. Technology helps them to appreciate being in nature (instead of stuck in school as usual.) 

Treasure Trove Plus Furry Critters

rexie and alex try out the christmas treasure trove swamp quilt top 

Eggs Emerge Everywhere, Enough for Everyone!!

Eggs! We finally have eggs! Now that winter is here, and there isn't anything else to do, the chickens began laying, and show no signs of stopping. We get blue, brown and white eggs, and very cool feathers too. They (the eggs) taste soooo good. I think that I will make a series of quilts featuring each chicken, they have such individual quirky personalities. Oh and we have decided as a family that these are *pets* and will not be eaten if they pass on into that henhouse in the sky. Colour me squeamish, I don't care. But I couldn't eat my dog or cat either, they are pets, that happen to produce something useful and edible (unlike cat or dog hair, ahem) 

Jizos for Peace

This is how my Jizos for Peace panel turned out, I like all the colours and of course SPIRALS ended up in the design, and all of the smiling Jizos.. 

Jizos for Peace

Aerial view of Jizos for Peace, Marc, Alex, Zach, note the number of pens and colours available  

Jizos for Peace

Jizos for Peace being made by Mom, Dad, Zach, Marc and Alex Thanksgiving Day 2004 

Jizos for Peace

On Thanksgiving, my family agreed to participate in a project that June Underwood posted about on the Alternative Quilt list. http://www.jizosforpeace.org all the information on how to participate can be found at that site. So here are some pictures showing us working on our jizos, and our final work products. I still have to print out photos of each of us, sew them on and then send them to the Great Vow Zen Monastery in Oregon.
While we were doing this project, the turkey was cooking, the house was quiet except for some quiet Bob Marley playing in the background, and everyone became very focused and quiet (even the kids!). We kept at it, and as more people arrived we handed them the instructions and some fabric I'd ironed to freezer paper (so that it would be easy to draw on.) I got out all of the markers and crayons, etc. that I've been collecting over the years for working on fabric and they all got used.
Some of the discussions about war, peace, nuclear bombs, etc. were amazing, and they made a big impression on my children for which I am most eternally grateful.
So thanks June for telling me about this project, it was a great experience!

The chuppah blowing in the wind 

The Look 

A Picture, Perhaps?

Just trying this out to see if I can post a picture, does it work???
In case it does: This is the look I give my family when they give me a hard time about quilting alllllll the time.
"are you still quilting?"
"are you ever going to be done?"
"you like quilting more than me!"
and so on and so forth...ad naseum, so I give them this look.

I love listening to Air America radio on the web. So funny, I needed funny as I was getting too depressed listening to NPR where they give the news straight up with no satire. Guess satire and irony are how I like to cope with the depressing news of the day. http://www.airamericaradio.com

This past weekend I did get to go to my guild meeting, CQFA, which is at http://www.cqfa.org
Where we brought UFO's (UnFinished Objects) and asked for advice on finishing them. It was very informal and informative. We have a salad bar lunch which is fun, everyone brings something to throw on a salad. One of the women brings this awesome selection of imported cheese and olives,(her husband is an importer). This time there was a hard cheese almost like a Reggiano which was crusted in a rind of wine pressings (the leftover after making wine), YUM!

I also had the pleasure of attending a family party with the Zaccone side of the family, fun wonderful people. Amazingly enough I'd chose them as friends even if they weren't family, so that makes it all the better to spend time as a group. We're noisy and boisterous and we all were lamenting the election results. Nice to commiserate with people who PAY ATTENTION to what is happening in the world. They also made me show off my quilty stuff, like the triptych I made for my parent's living room wall and the chuppah that I made for Karen and Nir's wedding. That is getting quilted this week, I swear.

Time to go work on my Novel that I am writing for Nanowrimo this month. Set underground, in the post-nuclear-apocalyptic future that I have nightmares about.

Workshop on the Web

I was looking at my Workshop on the Web binder today. The range of ideas presented is really dizzying and almost overwhelming, where to start? What to try first? So many new tools are discussed also, like chiffon scarves, bondaweb, shrink plastic, Angelina fibres,etc. And design articles, using photography to help design a new piece. Reports of various art exhibitions with accompanying photos are really interesting, the fiber artwork is so different in other countries. The interviews with artists are well done and bring up a lot of good questions for me to consider.

***On the whole Really Inspiring and Highly Recommended!***

Maggie Grey creates this workshop on a quarterly basis and you can subscribe (for a fee) the website is: http://www.workshopontheweb.com It is based in the UK, and you are able to pay online.

Infinite Cats

Just found a link to this hilarious website Infinite Cat Project
http://www.infinitecat.com
Might be worth sending in some cat pictures, if I can get them to do what I want.
Hah! Fat chance of that.

Today was spent: Battling flu and finishing Halloween costumes. Oh, and starting a quilt inspired by a batik panel of the Hindu god - Indra. I found some really interesting stuff out about Indra, I think I am particularily enamoured of his title "Sahasra Chakshu or the Thousand Eyed". What an image that creates in my mind. Hmmmm, I've been wanting to do a many eyed quilt lately, perhaps this is it! The 1,000 eyes came from being cursed by a sage whose wife he tried to seduce to have 1,000 wounds that resembling the "female organ". These were later changed into 1,000 eyes. Wow, now there is some imagery to work with. Also he is god of wars, of the heavenly abode, of the weather.
Anyways here is the site I was looking at, pretty cool, huh?
http://www.webonautics.com/mythology/indra.html

Oh, and I also lazed about reading magazines, all of which came yesterday and today. Quilter's Newsletter Magazine, Bead Style and Art Doll Quarterly. And the deluge of catalogs has begun, (open the floodgates). I flipped through them while watching the World Series and marked stuff to get my holiday shopping going.
Tomorrow, I will work on hopefully not feeling nauseous (puhleeze!), and figuring out how to stick a picture in this BLOG.

First Taste

Setting out on a new diversion here.
Launching my ship into the "blogosphere".
I should say at the outset that I've been inspired to do this by
many others in the fiber arts, such as

Dierdre Abbotts, http://www.deirdreabbotts.com/journal.htm

Dijanne Cevaal http://origidij.blogspot.com/

Serena Fenton http://layersofmeaning.org/blog/

and many others that I have lost track of!