Curvy As The Learning Process

It's called a learning curve.  We're in one.  First, I'm on my third try at a tank top ala Alabama Chanin (but my size).  Somehow it's not quite perfect but I'm getting there.  

I have gained a huge appreciation for wax paper.  I copied the pattern onto wax paper and altering it is as easy as taping on more or cutting it up. Which is, in case you didn't know, really easy.  

I don't have a picture of the first try because it has already joined the rag pile.  It was a bit small in the bust so I added a little triangle of wax paper to the front of the pattern.  It also had too large of an arm opening.  The side of my bra showed.  That  happens for me a lot with tank tops,  It's so awesome just to be able to add a little wax paper to the pattern and voila:  A shirt that's fit just for me!

2nd try, pretty good, but the little triangle I added in the front made it a little low cut for me.  

Number 3, much better.

What I need to figure out now is how to place a couple of darts - because I'm as curvy as the learning process.  

I think I can figure it out.

Then there's taking pictures for our Etsy Shop opening which is speeding towards us at an alarming rate.  I made a light box using some online tutorials (I love you, on-line tutorials - How did we ever know things before the internet?).  But the pictures taken using it are dim.  I think the bedside lamps didn't quite cut it and we'll need to buy some bright lights with reflectors.  But I did take a little time and f try to edit the picture online.

Can you tell which is which?  I realize that these are very shadowy..learning process, remember?

So we took some pictures outside.  It worked well but somehow books don't belong in the grass.  

Also, what do we do in the winter?  We talked and planned as we snapped pictures and the process of doing it all at the same time was very helpful.  Kind of like doodling while talking on the phone.  

We've come up with some ideas for how we want our pictures to look and what we want our aesthetic to be.  That makes it easier to make choices - kind of like a mission statement.  It's a process and it's really inspiring and enjoyable to be able to dig in and work to make everything come to life. It's a good learning curve, I really enjoy the process of learning now that I'm a grownup and get to pick what I learn and how I learn it.

OOoOoooh The Guilt

I had some free time on Saturday since the craft fair was blown off the planet.  I decided to take on some guilt that I had been sitting on for a while.  About two years ago we had our house on the market.  It didn't sell but we dusted and cleaned it relentlessly all that time.  That was when we started using Swiffer Dusters.  I am not a fan of disposable cleaning supplies but the Swiffers work really well.  We kept on using them even after we took the house off the market.  OOoOoooh the guilt.

For two years I've put this project off.  I found a tutorial to make Swiffer dusters out of flannel on line a looong time ago so it's not like I didn't have the necessary information.

I would have had to dig back through old blog posts but thankfully now there's Pinterest so I could just grab it off of one of my boards.   

 I'm just posting some random pictures of my project for you since her tutorial is very clear if you want to make one.

Also I found my old camera, which I thought was dead, in my son's room and used it for all but one of these pictures.

I may need to steal it back from him.  My camera phone picture really stinks.  So, I've overcome my guilt on one front, only to pick more guilt up on another as I steal my camera back from my son.  I shouldn't feel guilty, it's mine, not his but I remember having that teen logic of touching something and it becomes yours.  

Blown Out

Well, I had hoped to share pictures of our awesome both set up at Elver Park for the Fresh Air Craft Fair today.  But we got blown out.  Literally.  The vendor agreement said that the fair would go ahead rain or shine; it did not say that it would go ahead with crazy, gusty winds.

So here's our booth part way through being taken down.  That's when I remembered to take a picture.  It looked great and we actually held out longer than the people around us before the big wind came through.  The secret:  Attach the canopy to cinder blocks.  We were helping someone else keep her canopy from blowing away when the wind knocked everything off our table.

Look at the poor gourd lady.  This is when they cancelled the fair.  It was a bummer to do all that prep work and then have it cancelled but, ya know, shit happens and we met some nice people there.  Also, the wind distributed many of our new business cards far and wide.  

So on to planning our Etsy Shop opening.  It's May 21st  and I'm too superstitious to make a crack about the weather not being able to affect that opening.  

Time For A Little Goofing Off

No, I'm not showing off my neon pedicure....actually, I am.  Isn't it cute?

Also, I'm showing off these tee-shirt bracelets.  I'm hoping to sell some on Saturday at the Open Air Craft Fair in Elver Park.  I've been pricing and inventory-ing all morning so it's time for a little goofing off.

They're mixey matchy, cute and cheap.  

I hope people like them.  Who could say no to someone with such cute toes?

Getting My Act Together and Taking It On The Road!!!!!!!!

So, this will seem pretty random but when I was in college, I had to bring in a song to learn for Musical Theatre class.  I knew nothing about sheet music or what to pick so I asked the guy at the shop to pick for me.  I don't remember which song he picked but it was from the musical "I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking it on the Road".  I think the reason I don't remember the name of the song is that I never sang it.  My teacher said he didn't want to spend the semester hearing it over and over again so we picked an old standard from the '40's for me to sing.  It was actually pretty funny.

In any case, any time I am getting myself organized my brain shrieks: I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking it on the Road!  And that is what is ringing in my head because I am vending at a craft fair (My first in years) this coming Saturday.

I made cards.  I sewed on them a little bit.  

We're probably going to change the design eventually so I only made 40.  

It doesn't seem sustainable to always sew on our business cards but I like the way it looks.

I made a big ol' sign.  I sewed on that, too.

But you can't really see the stitching unless you're up close to it.  I need to fix that somehow.  I don't want to sew on it too much because it perforates the paper and if I do too much, it will fall apart.  

I have some stuffed animals.

Jewelry out of electronic components in muffin tins...Yes that's right, muffin tins.  They're good for storage.  

Pin cushion bonanza!

Jewelry out of tee shirts and my partner has a lot of wool crowns and balls.

And I have the ability to take credit cards which feels like a super power.  I know there's butt loads more of stuff to prepare but I feel like I'M GETTING MY ACT TOGETHER etc...  

PS - I still can't carry a tune.  That poor teacher was tortured by my singing for a whole year, 

Chaos Slowly Becoming Order

Check out that crazy mess.  I've been collecting Mail Art supplies for months.  I knew one day there would be a reckoning.  One day, I would have to organize them all.  

Yesterday was my day of reckoning.

This picture was taken at about the halfway point.  And this is only the stuff that made it to the table.  I'm not a natural organizer and often will ask my husband (who is very organized) to help me figure out where to put things.  But I got through it on my own yesterday.  (Of course, there are, like, five messy piles of paper in my studio but let's not talk about those.)

Chaos temporarily contained.  

This picture isn't of everything, It's just the stuff I'm bringing to Osh Kosh, where my friend/business partner and I are running a couple of workshops.  We so love helping people make stuff, love helping them find their creativity.    

Love it!  It's really exciting.

It's way worth spending a whole day organizing paper scraps.  

One workshop is Mail Art and the other is Making a Piano Hinge Bound book.  

They books are really cool.  You don't use any glue or any stitching.   The binding is woven with sticks.

These workshops are part of a private function. But teaching people how to make stuff and helping them to open up their creative side is something we hope to do on a larger and more public scale as Rusted Thread.  

We're still in the planning stages and it's not unlike the process of organizing my big mess.  

It's like chaos slowly becoming order as we narrow in on what we want to be and how we want to be it.  Exciting stuff!

Quilts Up!

Last night I joined my Modern Quilt Guild at the Alicia Ashman Library to help put up our first annual quilt show!  It was a blast.  I use the term "help" for what I did loosely because my feet were having a bad day, but I did offer some moral support.

Check out the picture on the ad, it's of one of mine.  :)

We first piled them up roughly by size.  There are so many beautiful quilts in the show.  At first we didn't think there would be room for all of them.

After some measuring and figgering we realized we had the room but just barely.  Which is perfect, really.  One doesn't wish for blank spaces when hanging a show.

There were two basic hanging areas, here by the magazines.

Check out the Mrs's Courageous Pantses:

They were calmly and coolly hanging stuff up so high that looking at them from the ground made me dizzy.

Up goes the denim quilt I made for the Project Quilting Challenge.

I have to say I feel like mine kinda stick out in that they are the only really heavy, not made out of quilting cotton ones there.  No judgement of either kind of quilt there (I've made lighter ones before), just an observation.

How cool is that.  Giant book quilt in a library.

Please indulge my abuse of the panoramic feature.  It's just fun to do.

This one's by the bathroom  

And so it this one.  It's my corduroy quilt.  I almost didn't get to hang it.  In my mad rush to get out the door, I drilled too wide of a hole on the hanging pole thing for one of the eyehooks.  I threw some wood glue in the hole but there was no time for it to dry and honestly, the glue wouldn't have done the job for the two months this monster is slated to hang.  It really was unhangable.  It's just heavy as hell and really needed all the support it could get.  

I brought it along anyway.  I mentioned to one woman there that I need some wire or something to secure the eyehook to the pole and she pulled a short length of wire right out of her pocket.  Quilter to the rescue!  

Who carries wire in their pocket?  I may from now on.  You never know.

The rest are all hanging in the children's room.

They put all of the most colorful ones there.

There were some improvisational hanging techniques going on since we had more quilts than they had hanging apparatuses. 

This is my favorite one there. (Am I allowed to have a favorite?)  It's so simple but colorful and I love the layout.

Love it.

How cool is that?

This one matches the wood and the wall so well, it's like it was made for that space.

Finally, another library appropriate one that fut just right under a spotlight, like it was made to be put there.  

The quilts will be up through the end of June.  I hope you can stop by and see them!