Slow going

Not much has happened on the studio these last 10 days. Another round of cinder block was added and the outside of the building was covered with cement. The plumber and electrician will come next week, they say. And the frames are being constructed off site, partially assembled. So we are in a holding pattern and getting a little tired of only seeing cinder blocks. I have found a considerable number of good sized rocks for my future rock garden. I imagine that there are quite a few more buried under all the dirt. I have this vision of a huge mesh screen, piled with the rock filled dirt. And then washed with bucket loads of water until all the dirt is washed away. And I have a ton or more of rocks.

Meanwhile, in my art world...I was invited to be a part of this exhibit in Marietta, Pennsylvania. Contemporary Threads, with 13 fiber artists, is at the Marietta Art House and runs through December 16. Midway in the show, the current pieces will be swapped out and new work will be on display. And in November there will be a Fiber Bazaar, with all sorts of small items for sale, just in time for the holidays.

The show is in an old house with a beautiful wrap around on three sides porch. The floors are intricate inlaid wood patterns, something you would never see today. The show is open Wednesday to Saturday, 12 to 5, and Sunday, 1 to 5.

And this is the view in my back yard. The workmen made a nice swirly pattern in the cement. I think they were killing time.

The view from the bedroom window. Not much has changed. Let's hope something happens this week.

Lull in the Action

Nothing happening on the studio construction yesterday. The contractor came by to see what had been done and said one of the walls needed to be another round higher, so they will have to bring back the cement mixer and add a few more cinder blocks. Meanwhile, we heard that the sunflower fields were in bloom, and off we went. The farmer only plants the sunflowers every other year, crop rotation I assume, so we didn't get to see these last year. It was foggy when we first got there. As the sun rose higher in the sky, the fog burned off and oh! the beautiful colors.

Twining up the sunflower stalks are blue morning glories, the perfect complement to the yellow sunflowers.

The seed pattern is a perfect example of the Fibonacci series. To read a short explanation of why this is the most efficient way to fill a space, read this. Because I sure can't explain it.

There will need to a lot of bees and insects to help fertilize these millions, and maybe billions, of possible seeds. Busy bees, indeed.

The fog has burned off and it's sunflowers as far as we can see.

I'm growing sunflowers in my garden. It's been a real struggle. I planted seeds, some came up, and then the birds or bunnies ate the seedlings. I planted more seeds, some came up, and the birds and bunnies ate them again. I planted more seeds, and protected them from the birds and bunnies. Some came up. They grew to about 2 feet tall, and the deer ate the tops. I planted more seeds, protected them from the birds and the bunnies and the deer. Some came up. But I didn't protect them well enough, because the deer ate the tops again. Luckily, the plants sent off replacement shoots, and now they are about 6 feet high with incipient buds. Unfortunately, they seem to be right in the path of the future driveway. So it will be a race to see if they bloom and go to seed before the new driveway has to be excavated. 

Cinder Blocks

Yesterday the guys left earlier than usual and it is apparent that they have pretty much finished with the cinder block foundation. Today they were here briefly to set a few more blocks and take away the cement mixer. They've cleaned up the area a bit and it's ready for the next phase.

This is where the covered walkway is going to be, with the entry way to the garage and the entry way to the stairway up to my studio.

In the process of digging up the yard, lots of big rocks were uncovered. I'm gathering some of them with the intention of putting them in a future rock garden. Granddaughter Zoe informed me that "rocks do not grow in gardens." I don't know, there seem to be an awful lot of them in those piles of dirt.

The Fortress

There is definitely progress. It's beginning to look like a fortress. The engineers and architects had to do some re-planning in order to compensate for the water drainage problem. They are going to build the grade up higher around the back of the garage so that all the water will drain into a swale. In order to support the increased amount of soil, there has to be more cinder block. Looks like lots more cinder block. It's not all that clear to me, but then I'm sure they wouldn't understand how to do surface design on fabric.

Over the weekend it rained. Lots and lots. This space here, which still hasn't drained totally, had water covering the first course of cinder block, about 8 inches. Would have been more if we hadn't move the pipe attached to the downspout so that that water drained down the driveway instead of into this area. 

I'm beginning to think that this would be a whole lot less stressful if I could go away and come back to a finished project. But then I would still want to know what was happening, so staying around is better. 

Slowly but Surely

Making progress. The walls are a little higher and more of the outline is in place.

Looking down from the second story at what will be the covered walkway.

Still a big step down from the back door.

On Thursday afternoon we noticed a big orange X painted in the grass. It didn't seem to line up with anything or even be on any plans. But on Friday morning we saw a big truck delivering this delightful addition to our construction zone. I had been wondering how the workers were answering the call of nature (and hoping it wasn't in the bushes), so I'm glad they now have a designated pot. But I wish it weren't smack dab in the front yard. It's the first thing anybody sees when they crest the hill and drive by our house.

Non-construction related news: My profile is now up on the Art In Embassies website. My piece is in the American Embassy in Dhaka, Bangladesh. I received a very nice thank you letter from the Ambassador, telling me how much they liked the piece. Always pleased to receive compliments.

Almost a foundation

On Tuesday, two flatbed trucks parked out front. They were loaded with cinder blocks, huge bags of sand, and cement mix. It took most of the day to unload it all and distribute around the foundation hole.

Nobody worked yesterday, but the guys arrived bright and early at 6:30am this morning. At least a dozen men moved the cinder blocks around the area and closer to their final destination. The main contractor and the architect were also in attendance to solve the drainage problem. All the rain that falls onto our patio creates a waterfall at the head of the driveway. It's been a nuisance, especially in winter when it freezes, because it runs right by the back door. They had to do some redesigning to divert the water around to the far side of the garage where it will disperse onto the grass (and hopefully not into the neighbor's yard next door). This is going to involve more stair steps going from the walkway to the patio than we had originally planned.

The high wall on the left is the back wall of the garage. Due to the elevation change, it will be about 3 feet below grade.

They covered the outside of the cinder blocks with cement, all nicely smoothed out. I didn't realize they had done this until it was too hard to put my initials in it. But I will have more chances, I'm sure.

This is my new kitten Buster. He is 4 1/2 months old and most of the time is a real dynamo. But he does know how to relax. This is his "What, me worry?" pose.

Back from Vacation

We spent a fabulous week in the Canadian Rockies - Jasper and Lake Louise. Saw elk, big horn sheep, a coyote, black bears, pikas, ground squirrels, and fantastic scenery. We flew United Airlines and the only reason I mention that is that they screwed us royally on both ends of the trip. I will not choose United again unless there is no other way to get there.

While we were gone construction began on the new garage/studio. This is what we saw yesterday afternoon when we returned. The footers have been dug and concrete poured. Iit rained after that and it looks like the trenches are filled with mud. Not so, it's just a thin layer of mud on top of the concrete.

Guess we won't be using this door for a while.

The dogwood tree is a casualty of the construction. It was just too big to justify the expense of moving it.

The remains of the driveway that used to be by the back door.

The root system of a white pine tree that we had taken down 20 years ago. Persistent little buggers.

The larger hole on the left of this picture is where the corner of the garage and the entrance to the stairs up to the studio will be.

And this is the view from above. They haven't arrived yet to work, so I don't know what's going to happen today. My husband is mourning the damage done to the lawn. He was hoping the dirt would be contained in a nice area around the construction hole. Not likely.

Such a mess. And since it's rained several times since this began, we have mud rivulets running down the hill through the grass. There are sediment controls set up, but I don't know if that was done before or after the rain. I think I'm glad I wasn't here to witness the digging; it's sort of like the loss of an old familiar friend.

Rain

I was hoping to have pictures of the momentous ground breaking, but, alas, it poured rain all morning and the groundbreaking was delayed until next week. But there is bright spot today and I don't mean the sun, which is shining now. The local online newspaper published an article about me and my work. It's a nice little article with several pictures. The writer is sort of young so I guess he can be forgiven for the reference to my age. Here's the link

Preparation

When the excavation for the studio starts, we are going to lose a lot of garden. An entire bed of hosta and ferns, a boxwood bush, a dogwood tree, and tons of pachysandra. The boxwood can go and it would be too expensive to try and move the dogwood, but the hosta and pachysandra can be saved. This past weekend we dug up all the hosta and moved them to a temporary location at the edge of the yard. This puts them in a prime area for munching by the deer, who have already snacked on other hosta in the yard. In order to prevent these from becoming deer lettuce we erected a fence made of spikes and fishing line. The deer don't see the fishing line and so don't like to go through it. At least that's the theory. Let's hope we still have hosta when this is all done.

This is what's left - a lot of roots and some stray plants. It's a good thing we got to this because the contractor called yesterday and said they want to start excavating this Friday. Yikes - a whole month ahead of schedule. We will be out of town all next week and so won't be able to see the day by day progress, and I can't even envision what it will look like when we get back. But starting a month early means they will finish a month early and by October I should have my new studio. I can't wait!

And so it begins...

Today the contractor came and marked out the boundaries of the new studio. I can almost see it. There are stakes out in the grass marking the corners of the building. The tennis ball stuck on top is to prevent any grandchildren from impaling themselves.

On the picture below I've drawn in the line from the side of the house that will be the covered walkway. It comes out about 6 feet then takes a little jog. The garage/studio will be on a slight angle to the house.

On this picture I've drawn the side of the building. There is a door into the garage and a door into the stairwell that leads up to the studio. Unfortunately, the dogwood tree and all the pachysandra will be going. We can use the pachysandra in other spots and my neighbors will also take some. The tree is too big to be moved easily and I'm not sure it would be worth the effort (and cost).

Standing out in the yard, you can see the markers delineating the right front and right rear of the building.

I'm also going to lose, or relocate an entire garden of hosta and ferns. I'll move them to a holding area and hope that they survive the winter and that the deer don't eat them. The contractor said that it's possible they will start earlier than the September date he gave me. It will be difficult to watch them dig up the yard and destroy all the plants, but in the end I know it will be worth it. 

Exciting news!

This has been in the works, off, on, off, and finally on again. The plans are drawn, the permits received, the contract signed, and the check mailed. I have been reluctant to post anything for fear of jinxing the project. But now it's real. We are building an addition to our house. It's the highlighted section on the plat below. There will be a two car garage, whose main purpose will be to hold up my new studio! It's going to be approximately 400 square feet, with lots of storage space, a sink for painting and dyeing needs, long uninterrupted wall space for design walls, and room to move around in. I'm still pinching myself, I can't believe it's going to actually happen. Construction begins in September and is slated to be complete in November. This is the same contractor we used to remodel our kitchen, and I have confidence that they will bring this in as scheduled.

Last week was not so pleasant here. The sudden and violent thunderstorm that came through on the night of June 29 left us without power for 6 days, and this during one of the hottest weeks we have had this year. The generator that worked so well last summer refused to cooperate this time and I was left sitting in the dark. Sweating. The contents of the refrigerator and freezer all had to be trashed. Luckily, my son, who lives nearby, still had power and I could go there to do laundry and recharge my electronic devices, eat dinner, and cool off. Thank heavens for a cell phone and an iPad; without them I would have been totally isolated. We are really dependent on the power grid; it's kind of scary how easily we can be thrown into chaos.

Two Shows

I have a good excuse for not posting lately. Besides working hard at QSDS, I have been preparing for 2 upcoming shows. Both of these shows are invitationals, which I find highly flattering. The first is a solo show at the Jonal Gallery in Columbia, Pennsylvania. This is a cute little town located on Route 30 on the east side of the Susquehanna River. If you ever went to the big quilt shows in Lancaster by way of York, you drove right by Columbia just after crossing the river.

The show at Jonal begins on June 22 with an opening reception from 5 - 9 pm. I will be giving an artist talk and presentation on Thursday, July 12, from 7 - 9 pm. At this show I will have most of the 12"x12" Scribble series plus a few older works.

Scribble #5 ©2012

The other exhibit is located at the Strathmore in North Bethesda, Maryland. It is titled Inform/Reform and I will be one of several artists exhibiting. This show begins Saturday, June 30 and extends through Saturday, August 18, 2012. The opening reception is Thursday, July 12, from 7 - 9 pm and if this date and time sound familiar, it's because it is the same time as my talk at Jonal. I wish I could be in 2 places at once, but that's not going to be possible. But I will be at the Public Talk 'n' Tours on Saturday, July 14. 

Divide by Red ©2012

27" x 25.5"

Check the web sites of these galleries for times and directions. Hope to see lots of you at one or both of these exhibits!

Honors

Last night was the Reception for the Maryland State Arts Council 2012 Individual Artist Awards. I received notification last February that I had won one of these. This is the fourth time I have been honored with an award from the Arts Council. They always have a very nice reception and awards ceremony where the winners are introduced to the crowd and we have a group picture taken. The food is excellent and the musical entertainment is very nice also.

It wasn't until after I had my plate of food  and had sat down to eat it that I noticed the front cover of the program. One of the pieces I had submitted for jurying is on the cover. Top row, third from the left. Out of the 100 award winners, it was really nice to find my work on display.

Here's a link to the pdf version of the program. 

Only three days until I leave for class at QSDS. I think I ought to start packing. 

The Last Three

Here are the last 3 12" squares. These are great to make because they go together so fast. I've made 17 altogether. Since I donated one to the SAQA auction, I have 16 to put into the 2 shows I have coming up in June. Not making any more for the time being, since I only bought 16 stretched canvases.

Scribble 15

©2012

Scribble 16

©2012

Scribble 17

©2012

I'm working on bigger pieces in a style similar to these scribbles, except I'm thinking of them more as graffiti.

And it's time to start thinking about what I'm going to do in my class at QSDS. It's a master class with David Hornung. He hasn't given us any pre-class assignments, at least not yet. I hope he doesn't wait until the last minute, I hate feeling rushed. I bought the book he wrote about color and it's in the pile of books on my shelf. I'm hoping I will absorb the information via osmosis but it's not working yet.

More Scribbles

Still working on 12"x12" blocks. I have been invited to show at the Jonal Gallery in Columbia, Pennsylvania this summer (June 22 through July 22) and have been working on these smaller sized pieces. The owner of the gallery told me that the top sales price is around $1,000. My big pieces come in significantly higher than that, but I will show some anyhow. Then everybody will think these smaller pieces are a real bargain and snap them up. I've mounted them on stretched canvas painted black so they are easy to hang (and don't look like place mats.)

Scribble #10

©2012

Scribble #11

©2012

Scribble #12

©2012

Scribble #13

©2012

Scribble #14

©2012

Scribble #8

©2012

Scribble #9

©2012

Destroying the Evidence

Sometimes there is just too much stuff. My studio, in particular my work table, accumulates stuff. And not all of it is related to quilting. Today I've been putting stuff in its proper place and I'm hoping I will be able to work without that claustrophobic feeling that results from too much stuff. I would like to be able to work in more than 2 square feet.

That brings up the question of what to do with pieces that just aren't quite up to standards. These are pieces that might have been experiments, trying out some new design or technique, or maybe finished pieces that should never see the light of day. I don't even want to give them away because I don't want them out in the world with my name on them. Today I took 5 small pieces that fit into this category and sliced them up with my rotary cutter.

Now some industrious people might do this and then attempt to make a silk purse out of these sows' ears by putting them back together. Maybe if I thought I could redeem these strips I would try that, but then I think why should I use up Valuable Quilting Time trying to fix something that really should just be thrown out. So out they will go. I have too many other things I would rather be doing than working with materials I already don't like.

I need to go through my closet galleries and pull out some really old work and see if it needs the same treatment. I know there are some pieces like that, but there are also some pieces that could be sold or donated. I might not like them any more, but that would be because I'm not working in that style now. 

Outside/Inside the Box

Continuing comments on the weekend in Philadelphia. The show at the Crane Building, Outside/Inside the Box, was most impressive and quite an expansion on the idea of fiber. Very few of the works would fit the definition of  "quilt". Materials used included aluminum mesh, wires, grommets, hemp, ropes, printed cloth, words written on vellum, leaves, fruit peels, ostrich shell beads, oxygen tubing, cable ties, florist card holders, plus things that immediately come to mind as fiber - linen, cotton, wool, thread, etc. I loved the knitted sock monkey suit, which you can see in the slide show, along with most of the other works. 

And I was thrilled to see my friend Linda Colsh's work hanging in this prestigious show. She is one of only a few artists who has 2 pieces in the show. Linda flew in from her home in Belgium for the conference, since she in on the SAQA Board of Directors. Since her family lives sort of near to me, we rode up together to Philly, and had a wonderful time gossiping talking about people we know, shows, her move back to the US in 2 years, and so on.

Defiant

©2011 Linda Colsh

Almost There

©2011 Linda Colsh

So now it's back home and time to get serious work done. It was truly inspiring to see all that artwork. And it was also very exciting to see 13 students from East Carolina University, where they are enrolled in the Textiles Program. It was inspiring to listen to them talk about their work and their enthusiasm was contagious. They are not the least bit constricted by the old traditions of quilts, and are pushing the boundaries in ways the rest of us haven't even thought of.

And for all the people who gave me grief about not posting, behold, 3 posts in one day.