yellow leaves
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

The first NaNoCraftMo piece was actually done on Thursday, but I completely ran out of steam to upload it and write anything about it.

I am most pleased with the leaves on the trees, and how multiple layers of stitching and fabric give the idea of things in front of and behind. I am also delighted with the lumps of leaves – I was unsure when I stuck down the blobby fabric shapes how that would work, but stitching the edges made them blurrier and gave a better feel for the wispyness of the leaves.

Onward!

thread for the weather
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

While the weather outside was the color of the first thread – cold and gray and pelting rain – my internal weather was much more like the rest of the threads and even the fabrics.

I used to care fiercely about fiber content in the threads I used, I think as a hold-over from caring about the threads I wear (small joke). I was a natural fiber snob. Except Coast and Clark have come out with some truly gorgeous polyester thread and I am smitten. And won over. They are smooth and pretty, and really that is all I care about when I'm stitching with them. So, my thread palette has grown over the last year with new reels of shiny thread. It makes me verry happy.

I must mention the hand dyes I've been using for a lot of the outdoor colors too. They come from Cindy Lioselle, who still has no online presence that I am aware of (Cindy! What gives?!) Cindy is a talented dyer whose dedication to color in general and getting a particular color is amazing. She kindly handed me a pile of scraps (they are HUGE scraps for me) I was drooling over last fall, and I have been mining the pile for lovely muted colors for a while.

Nov 2
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I am whimpering – my days suddenly filled with barn work I didn't anticipate and Hamlet production stress, but I think I have started the month's projects with a bang.

Aerin and I spent a couple hours rigging the ghost of Hamlet's father, so it can fly on and off stage, and furl to hide behind the curtain. I had started to hate it, but the director likes it, and I have two more options for when or if he decides he hates it.

Think ahead – that's my motto.

Also: A Job Well Dreaded is a Job Half Done.

November is NaNoWriMo which stands for National Novel Writing Month. People with a desire to write a book sit down and whag out 50,000 words over the course of November. The point being to just sit there and do it, whatever level of drivel or sublime results, to have accomplished this one big thing.

Sadly, I am pretty sure I do not want to write a novel. But I really like the idea of doing something big, and solid, and a real creative stretch. There is also NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) but really, I just don't have that much to say.

Enter NaNoCraftMo – National mumble Craft Month – with a Flickr group to show our results.

So here we go. I am working on a series of 8×10" pieces on the pond, the same pond in the last piece, from different directions and different angles. I prepped backgrounds for 10, I have new ideas for mounting and framing them that should be more economical, and still durable, I have sketches for 5.  I have the first piece laid out and I'll start stitching tomorrow.

Well -I'm in the middle school PTO craft fair, which with any luck will be bettter for business than the last craft fair I went to.

I really have to get a grip on getting things out the door, if I'm going to keep making them at this rate!

lumpy pots
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Alice and I have finally gotten some of our first pots home.

The process is so slow it is kind of a wonder we remember to bring them home at all. After they are partly dried they get trimmed, then finished drying, following which they get fired once, glazed (dipped into one or another, or a series of buckets of glaze) fired again, and finally finally carried carefully home.

While most of my efforts end up a squelpy mess (Alice’s words) or terminally lumpy and uneven, a couple are getting useful. Shown here is a cereal bowl, in use, a handle-less tea mug, and a micro teacup.

Using my own work for the intended purpose if pretty gratifying. Plus I owe the house some small ice cream bowls, for the ones I broke a couple years ago. I have my work cut out for me.

foot sit (Aerin on Lee)
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

This is a piece of what we do in Family Circus – Aerin goes from here on my feet to a backbend to this amazing balance (that I still can't quite believe I can hold her for).

Back to fabric next time!