Get In Line

 

I was lucky enough to get to take a class with South African quilt artist and teacher, Rosalie Dace. It was all done online through the Mancuso Brothers Quiltfest Virtual Schoolhouse. On a tech level it worked really well, she was presenting from her home studio so I had to get up quite early (for me) to attend, but that was fine as I didn't have to drive anywhere. Title of this post will end up being an upcoming quilt title.

This was Rosalie's class called, "Line Dance - play with Line and make it work in your quilts". It was more of a presentation/lecture than an interactive project sewing class which was just fine with me. Some of the other students asked some good questions. I just really enjoy her style of teaching. She's so very thought-provoking and inspiring. There were many new ways of thinking about Lines that still have me pondering several days later. Great stuff.

She suggested that we make a grid page with various lines as she talked through all the options. This is mine up above. I loved the ideas that were generated and the real world technical options to get them into your own quilt that she showed us. It was very fun to get see super closeup pictures of her beautiful work. It's very layered and complicated, to me that's one of the best things about art quilts.

If you ever have a chance to take a class or listen to a lecture from Rosalie Dace, I say go for it. You will at the very least be entertained, and she always shows beautiful, amazing pictures from her travels and her local area. 

Here's a complaint having nothing to do with this class in particular. After all these years of using Zoom and other platforms, there are still inevitably several people who don't mute themselves, it's very frustrating. I really don't need to have the instructor interrupted to hear someone complaining to someone in the room with them about how hard it was to login to the class. Honestly, just pay a little attention please. Are these the same folks who are interrupting in live audiences? Probably maybe? I think I'd be a terrible online teacher because I'd be mean or exasperated with people who did this during my class. It's disrespectful to the teacher, and to your fellow students. 

One of the things we did make during the class was to try out her Skinny Strips technique. This is the one that I had previously learned in the class that  I took with Friend Jaye at the Sisters Quilt Show back in 2018. It was good to re-visit the technique, and a reminder to use something that I've already learned. I had kind of forgotten the secret method that she uses (go take one of her classes!) because it really works.

Quantity Issues

 

I've been trying very hard lately to cut back on buying excess office supplies. It's been a thing for me for many years. Usually it's pens that I tend to "oversupply" but sometimes it's other stuff. When we had the Metro Twist presentation at Sew Day, the idea of using the tag style post-it notes to mark on your ruler was raised. So I ordered some on Amazon, a "24 Pack" which I pictured as 24 of the 1"x3" tags. Seemed like a lot, but it was the smallest quantity that I could find.

Upon receipt I realized my error, this wasn't 24 of the tag sized post-its. It is basically 24 pads of normal 3x3" post-its that have been cut up into thirds. I now have more than a lifetime's worth of these things. They're useful, for sure absolutely. But am I ever going to use them all up? Not a chance. Good thing they were cheap. My DH is thrilled, apparently he loves this size of post-it, so maybe together we will use up some reasonable percentage of these things. 

The other two things I ordered were for the dyeing class I'm taking in October with Jane Dunnewold. We're going to be labeling the samples that we dye, she suggested little tags and safety pins. Got them! But OY the quantities involved. Luckily they don't take up much room to store.

I think they'll work really well. I can write this small if I really need/want to.

The bigger safety pin is one of the ones I use for quilt basting, this is for size comparison. They really are quite petite these safety pins. And now I have 500 of them. Sigh. Again, this was the smallest quantity I could find. Same with the labels, also 500, so at least that matches up right? I probably needed at most 50, but instead I now have 10X as many. 

Obviously this is all a 100% silly 1st world problems kind of complaint. Not earth-shaking or really all that important of course. I'm calling this the Old Lady Complaint Department now. Still it's annoying to realize that the massive consumer culture I'm participating in has no end of options, except as to quantity. More and more and more is always better or expected. This means all this excess has to get stored somehow, in containers or furniture, which ends up meaning a bigger living space is needed, and on and on. Unless I just throw away the ones I don't use. It's all so wasteful. That's what gets to me the most I guess. At least the containers I'm using for the dyeing class are all recycled glass or plastic containers from food.