Lee Thomson

Aug 7
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Something completely different.

Well, not really.

The metal shim fell on me when I was getting something else out, and then I realized I could iron a strip of organza onto freezer paper for printing instead of a whole sheet, and then this seemed like a stronger idea than what I had before.

I feel like it has taken me a couple weeks to get back in the groove of making these. I didn’t like many of the end-of-July ones, and I was thinking the early sunflowers are not very strong either. But I like this one, and I am remembering some ideas for things to do when I get wedged. Plus I bought two books full of eye candy. I can work my way through those for a while.

Stay tuned.

Aug 6
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I did finish this one yesterday (Aug 6) at my mum’s house.

Aug 5
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I saved a handful of petals from yesterday to make this one. I was trying for the Fibonacci spiral in the center. I think I got a spiral but it isn’t Mr. Fibonacci’s.

My word today is Balance. I managed to accomplish a yoga class today. While I was creaky and achy (and cranky) for many of the twists and hip openers, I nailed all the balance poses, which was nice. And different. It was an odd feeling, as though I could settle into them and keep breathing. I don’t get that much. Later when I went to take the river pictures, my feet slipped and I slithered down a steep hill not spilling my bike and not landing on my butt – breathing hard and rattled but upright. Balance. Then there is the whole mental balance issue. And life balance issue. And balancing different people’s wants against each other.

The girls and I are headed to my mother’s for a couple days. Aerin stays and goes to sailing camp and Grandma Camp for two weeks, Alice and I return after a couple days.

Aug 4
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

The petals fell off onto the counter, so I swept them up and took them upstairs.

Here I sandwiched them between two sheets of fusible web, and ironed it hard. Then I peeled it apart, and sandwiched the result between silk organza and the purple batik. A little embroidery around the outsides of the petals and it looked done.

The petals smelled like pumpkin pie when I pressed them. Or something else golden.

My head is spinning with fabric things. I am working on three different journal pages, more or less simultaneously, in a desperate bid to accomplish them before Journal Class next Saturday. I still have some finishing to do on Alice’s May page – adding some of her drawings to the background. I decided to make June a page full of things that make me irrationally happy. And July is nothing but a fabric scrapbook page of Our Summer Vacation. It looks cool, and it is fabric. But really? It is scrapbooking.

Aug 3
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

Thunderstorm coming, gotta run close things down.

This one is more like I had in mind for yesterday, but still not quite there.

Aug 2
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

And sometimes the postcard of the day just feels like a rough draft.

I taught a class on Fabric Postcards tonight. Four cheerful students, including two I think of as much stronger quilters than I am. But people had good questions, and I had some answers. They all produced one postcard this evening and think they might be able to make a few more over the next week. I love seeing how different they all are.

Aug 1
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I had thought to make August the month of stuff from the farm stand, because it is the perfect month for fruit and veg here in New England. Except I found this glorious object at one of my favorite farms:

I am smitten.

It may be an entire month of sunflower(s).

Brace yourselves.

Oh – I met a fellow blogger (Simmy from England), we had a fine fiber crawl through Northampton, stopping at Valley Fabrics and Webs. She’s traveling with her family – charming husband and three kids. They are staying with her friends from the blogosphere all around the Eastern states. It is a very cool trip. Her husband calls it the Blog Tour.

In the Small World Dept; it turns out her husband did a degree with the woman who was later my boss at New England Science Center.

I am very much liking this meeting friends from the ether in the real world.   

So if any of my faithful readers would like a place to crash in Massachusetts, give me a holler.

Jul 31
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

I’m glad to be home. I’m glad to be home from other countries, and I’m glad to be home from the last round of visits and family and friends. I almost did my own bed again because really, falling into your own bed, with your own pillow and familiar sounds outside the window and all that? Really nothing like it. But this covers all the July postcards in one fell swoop, and now I get to think about the next thing.

Actually I got to think about something completely different today. Red Kate is making fish for juggling. It’s an SCA thing. Don’t ask.

Anyhow, after talking about it a good deal, we decided we should felt them, either felt a flat piece of goods and sew together fish shapes, or felt around something roughly fish shaped and juggleable.

We attempted the second path this afternoon. To start, we made little examples around little bottles. Hers came out mouse shaped, so she put more tail on it and swore she’d done it on purpose. Mine came out bottle shaped but can (and will) be manipulated into a fish shape, except I temporarily lost it.

Having (mostly) succeeded at a small size, we went straight for life size. We decided a juggling pin was roughly the correct shape and (inherently) juggleable, so we used those, and layered on the roving around and around and around, and wetted it out and soaped it up and started felting. We got tired. The pieces came apart, (on mine) or were too thin, (on hers) and we got discouraged.  Then we looked at a book, and somehow became inflamed. At least I did. I found all my old roving from a pre-school project with Aerin’s class, and re-wrapped the pin and tied it all down with yards of fluffy and extremely feltable mohair, and then I got fancy, with fins and resists and even a dorsal fin. Then I put a knee-sock over it, tied it up tight, and tossed it in the washer with some jeans.

That didn’t make as much noise as when I put it in the dryer with the same jeans.

When it was done, the fins had felted through the sock, some of the mohair wasn’t, and therefore hadn’t felted, and it all looks like this:

which could be worse. It is fusiform, it seems to be pin sized, and it seems to be holding together well enough. It even looks kind of catfishy with the bad string hanging off its head end. I’ll cut it off the pin tomorrow, and see if it will hold polyester beads, and if it can be washed again. It still needs hardening up some, but I think I am encouraged.

Jul 30
Originally uploaded by Dancing Crow.

For the postcard, a reprise of the day’s work.

I’m exhausted.

May I be excused please?

I signed up for a hand-printed fat quarter swap. Only a day or two late, I have finished my fabric and dropped it in the (priority) mail this afternoon.

They came out well, finally.

I started with a handful of hand dyed fabrics that weren’t quite… done yet. I printed potato masher prints all over them, BUT the black was not deep enough. So this morning I bought better black paint, plus Red Kate gave me a jar of black dye that I didn’t wind up using. I over printed all the masher prints I’d made last night and got them good and Black. But they still weren’t done. I found a lovely pot of copper glaze I had, and printed jar-lid circles over the mashers in a decorative pattern. Now they seem to be done.

I wanted the black to give little windows into the hand dyes, but it looks more floaty instead. The copper floats over that. It all looks profoundly lumpy, but on the whole, better than I expected. I hope the others like it…

I may have to name the potato mashers. The one with lots of holes is definitely Bubbles, and the one that is quite black has both an X and lots of  Os and could be XO (or Xoooooo), although there is probably a better name, and the flower shaped print could be Flower. Possibly Felicity. But I can’t think of a name for the one I like the best – with little oval holes around the edge. In the bottom right-hand picture. I’m open to suggestions…