Pleasurable passtimes

 My friend Melissa flew up a couple of weeks ago for a quick visit, taking advantage of the promotional prices from Alero, a new airlines that has just begun serving Redmond and several other secondary markets, like Burbank which is her airport.  We only had two full days and made the most of them.  This photo is from our visit to the High Desert Museum.  Our favorite thing was the outdoor wild raptor show.  Highly recommended!

She's been painting every day and has started moving into mixed media and collage.  I showed her how relief printing with lino works and she loved it.  We ended up doing this on two of our afternoons.

We printed a couple dozen of these Christmas ornaments which she'll assemble when she gets home.  They wouldn't travel well otherwise.  She's coming up again the end of August and by then I will have completed a two-day woodblock class so will have more to show her.

I finished this sweater for Delaney which she loves.

The buttons are perfect, from Skacel.

I started another sweater for her using the variegated yarn that a friend gave me.  I bought the muted peach to go with it as the single ball wouldn't be enough.  My friend messaged me last night that she found a second ball of the variegated and though I don't need it, I have accept it for a different project.  I sampled for over an hour trying to find a pleasing way to blend the two yarns.

I realized when I turned the work over to purl that the wrong side is the answer.  The wrong is the right!! 

Our-soon-to-be-17-year-old granddaughter Alexia is with us again this summer.  She has stepped up her knitting game and enjoys knitting with the Knitterbugs when we get together in a park.  She knitted this shell from linen, not quite a beginner project, and she nailed it.

It fits her perfectly and she is going to wear it this Wednesday when we meet up to knit.

I've done very little weaving in the past few months, other than a workshop.  I decided to return to Turned Taquete again and experiment with squares of different combinations of the same hue.  I'd like to finish in time to have something to enter into the fair this year.

It's too hot to weave in the afternoons but instead of using the morning time, I've chosen to sit outside and enjoy the fresh cool air.  I've worked hard on the yard and like to sit out with my coffee and either knit or read.  The summers are short here and I'll have the rest of the year to weave.  That's what is going on here.

Staying Home, Staying Safe

I lost interest in hand spinning after we moved here.  The first meeting I attended was a spinning meeting but somewhere along the line weaving took up all my time and I put my folding wheel into it's bag and stashed it in a closet.  The guild's spinning study group is doing such interesting things that I've put my wheel back up and given myself a spinning station. 

I used to have close to a dozen bobbins but now can only find four.  I had to clean off a couple so I chose two that I don't remember what the fiber was and I'm back at it.  I know what's all on three of these and in order to keep it that way, I've slipped a piece of paper in each with the name of the fiber.  We're going to be doing some natural dyeing and I'm making yarn in preparation.

The wheel is upstairs and I'd left the area to get something, don't remember what.  When I came back I found my cat snuggled in the plastic bag of roving - scared me to death.  I left the roving attached to the wheel, feeling the area was safe from Delaney but never stopping to think that it's not safe for Maddie.  It's in a Maddie-safe place now.

A couple of years ago someone in the Linocut Friends Facebook group posted a template for a hand printed Christmas ornament.  I'm sure I have the photocopy somewhere and I know it's in a file somewhere here on my laptop, but it's a good thing I carved the block way back when.  I forgot all about it until yesterday and decided it was time to finally make some prints.

What got me started was finding a some scraps of Hosho paper from an earlier project.  I only bought inks in primary colors so it was easy for me to decide on red.

I printed eight yesterday and let them dry overnight.  I ruined two trying to figure out how to assemble them.  Good thing I have PVA glue because it dries really fast and is made for paper.

I hung the ornaments on the Thanksgiving cactus using sewing thread.  That's how light they are.  I think it looks like the plant is still blooming.

I think they're absolutely charming and wish I had printed more.

I mixed up what I hope looks like Delft blue and printed all the leftover paper.  Tomorrow I'll cut and glue them and hang them on our tree.

Maddie brought a ball of yarn downstairs and when she got bored with it I gave it to Delaney.  She has been entertaining herself with it for the past week, even pretends that she's knitting with it.  And so it begins :-)

 

Unexpected opportunity

This magic handmade box holds the prints of 41 artists.  Last September I received an email inviting me to participate in a print exchange in May 2020 to celebrate Pat Clark's 85th birthday.  Pat has mentored many of us in her retirement, but during her working years she was dean of the art department at Long Beach State, also executive director at the Idlywild School of Music and the Arts, and graduate of the Cranbrook Academy of Art.  I give that background to make it clear how fortunate I am to have stumbled into printmaking with Pat the year after we moved to Bend. 

The invitation said we would be probably be making and edition of 30. I have never editioned!!   Pat said, I am inviting you to participate in an artist call.  After examining the environment of water for the past five years with my water table project, I am ready to transition.  In the spirit of exploring water, I would like to investigate the theme of FLOW with an invitational print exchange.  This exchange invites you to focus on the word "flow" using your own unique visual interpretation.  "Flow" has a myriad of meanings in addition to water flow.  Air flow, ice flow, electrical flow, flow state, the flow of time, blood flow, going with the flow and so many other terms can be utilized to inspire your personal vision.

Kelly Salber, a Paper and Book artist in Sisters made the handmade paper boxes for each one of us.  She also wrote a touching and embracing poem to accompany each box.

In the end there were 41 prints, 25% more than anticipated.  I was terrified to participate but I kept pecking away, figuring that I could always quict if I really couldn't do it.  I made a deal with myself that I wouldn't quit until I was truly in over my head.  I don't have a press so had to hand pull every print and I learned so much!!


In addition to the exquisite box we all received a magnetic board to display the prints on.  This is a photograph done by Alyson Belcher and its moody lighting reminds me of summer camp.


One of the very special things is that many of the printmakers are people I know and some of them are friends.  It's a treat to look at the piece and think of that person.  Barbara Kennedy did this one.

Alexia and I are very fond of this print done by Denise Rich.  She printed the leaves then embellished a single leaf, quite a process, times 41!

Before the studio closed 18 months ago Jane Quale came upon a technique of inking distressed cloth and running it through the press, an image that she has made distinctively hers.

This is Pat Clark's and as in everything I've ever seen of hers, I am blown away.  I have no idea how she embossed the paper or created the image on separate blocks so that when printed, it all goes together.


This is mine.  There are only a half dozen relief prints in the collection.  I got the beginning of the idea when washing my favorite vase and putting it away after the flowers had expired.  I realized that because it's clear you could see that there's no water in and I started thinking of "no flow" for my theme.  But wait, if we're in a drought there won't be flowers anyway, so what could one decorate with and I came up with recycled twizzlers.  I can't spread my inky stuff out in my work area just now but I'm anxious to get back to work.  I learned relief printing before I learned photography and I think that's why I am attached to it; it's an old friend.

Self-Quarantine Lethargy Blues

Ian found this at Costco, two ten-pound bags of unbleached all-purpose flour.  I'm making a single loaf each week, whether we use up the previous loaf or not.  And I'm slowly getting better and more predictable.

I made this loaf last Thursday and got distracted by the baby so that it ended up rising three times.  I'm planning to make another loaf this Thursday but not just with bread flour.  This time I'm going with a mix of white, whole wheat and oats.  Ian found a pound of whole wheat at Newport Market.  It's in a deli container and priced at $.99/pound.  I'll use it sparingly.


Yesterday I walked through the planned community next to us and was touched by this sideway art.  At the other end someone had traced children with chalk and written, "We're all in this together."  This end was all flowers and the encouragement to "Take a deep breath."  This truly is the great unknown.


Last fall I was invited to participate in a print exchange in May to celebrate Pat Clark's 85th birthday. Our agreement to participate was due October 11, 2019 and was anticipated to be an edition of 30.  We were given a statement from which to pull our inspiration and the reception/celebration was to be in May 2020.  Oh how the world has changed in those six months.  I expect I'm the only printmaker submitting hand-burnished relief prints which has been a tall order.  I learned a lot.  I still consider myself a student even if with the closing of the A6 studio I don't have a teacher.


 
I finished printing yesterday and numbered, named and signed them today.  It's actually an edition of 40 and I almost feel bad since I'm the only student who was invited, but I did my best and I hold my head up high. The best part for me was getting back into the printmaking groove.  I've fallen prey to lethargy during self-quarantine but that's over. 


Of course it helps that this sunny little girl is here every week and now we've gotten several sunny days in a row.  Gardening cannot be far behind.

Where does the time go????

As of today I've been self-quarantined for three weeks, and I consider myself fortunate to have my life pretty much as I know it.  I have several Zoom sessions each week, including my book group tomorrow.  I thought with so much time on my hands, I'd finish reading that stack of books, carve new woodblocks, warp both looms, okay, all three looms and to catch up on emails.  The only thing I can do while watching a baby is knit so here's another finished sweater.  I don't know where the rest of the time goes.



We still watch Delaney two days a week, Thursdays and Fridays, and she brings so much sunshine to our pandemic days,.  This is a new game - put all the brass candlesticks into the bowl and then take them out again.  I really don't know how I've managed to acquire so many of these things but they're baby-safe and she's welcome to play with them.


Her first birthday is this Thursday and there will be no party.  We thought about getting a cupcake for a smash cake but declined knowing that sugar will throw her off and she would be crabby on Friday.  We ordered this Fischer-Price toy for her but now it's just a new toy. A friend suggested that I wrap a box in tissue paper which will be just as fun as opening a gift, even more so since the paper tears in pieces.  She's crawling and walks by holding onto things.



I don't what it's like where you are but the shutdown is affecting paper products, primarily toilet paper.  We got this six-pack at a locally owned grocery store.  They contracted with a restaurant supplier to stock their shelves for the next four months.  The packaging is theirs.  We laugh but it's a relief to restock our supply.


Another odd thing missing from shelves is flour and yeast.  Ian called me from Costco last week and said there was some flour, a 25-pound bag of bleached white flour for $6.  I said - Buy it!!  Who knows when we'll see another bag of flour, because next week that might be another empty shelf.  Yesterday Ian found bread flour and compressed yeast at Newport Market, where he got the toilet paper.  This yeast will make 96 loaves of bread and I've already promised to share it with friends.

Two or three months ago I was invited by Pat Clark to participate in a print exchange as a celebration of her 85th birthday in May.  It was originally estimated that there would be 30 participants but that list has grown to 40.   I've allowed so many things to get in my way and now I'm down to the wire.  The deadline is fast approaching.  I finished carving my woodblock last week.



It's hard to feel creative with the gray skies and there's an international crisis in place with an unknown outcome.  It was lightly snowing on my walk this morning!  Those are all excuses.  I don't have access to a press any more so have to print using a baren.  I'm pretty sure no one in their right mind presses 40 prints with a hand baren, but who said I'm in my right mind?!!  I got a ten prints completed and had to clean up because the block was collecting ink.  I had to make me get back to work, but it sure felt good.

Another Year

Another birthday has come and gone since my last post.  I find it hard to believe that I'm now 72 years old, not that I begrudge it.  I only have to remind myself that six years ago a catastrophic injury nearly cut my life short, so hooray - I am now 72!!  I noticed on my Blogger profile this morning that I started this blog in April 2006, over 13 years ago.  I was only 59 then, still working, still healthy with no thought at all of when I might retire.  In 2011 I took a class and became a weaver which truly changed the course of my life,  but that was still five years in the future.

I'm lucky to celebrate my birthday in my favorite month of the year.  It's absolutely gorgeous right now, though three freezing nights early this month caused our beautiful red maple to lose its leaves almost overnight.  But there are still plenty of beautiful trees to love.

I was invited to join a group of ladies in the newly formed Studio 6000 in Sisters.  I thought A6 was the most glorious studio of all but this one is brilliant in every way.

I have been invited to print here but have decided to whittle down my printmaking to relief only, which is carving images in linoleum and wood, and to find a balance between weaving and printing.  My weaving suffered from lack of time and attention and I'm ready for that to change.  Being a weaver however has opened doors to me like this event.  I guess they figure if you're an artist in one area, you're an artist period, just different.  I would never have been invited into their art world had I not had a medium I was fluent in.  When I say that weaving changed the course of my life, I really do mean that.

We were instructed in the invitation to find a word of phrase to use as our inspiration for our collage.  I've never done a collage before so was completely ignorant of the glue products, and there are many.  I just started cutting and gluing, follow the phrase which I adapted from the Book of Proverbs - she who refreshes others will herself be refreshed.  These will be an installation in a Sisters shop and are all priced the same, as a fund-raiser for Saving Grace, an organization that helps underserved women.  The title of my piece is "Within." 

I have just about assembled everything I need for a home printing studio.  I'm just waiting for an order from Dick Blick with inks and an inking plate.  My light table arrived two days ago.  I purchased the wooden spoon from a woodturner at Fall Fest earlier this month to use as a baren and it is perfect.  I finished a four-week workshop on relief printing last week, the days are getting short, and I am ready to get to work.

These are the last towels I will have time to finish before our guild Holiday Sale next weekend.  I'll start hemming them today and I have sold two already through Facebook.  This is our third year but the first as a two-day sale.  I haven't signed up to help and need to find out where they need people to work.  It will be at the Environmental Center again but since we open on Friday, we will be included in the First Friday Art Walk.  Break a leg!!

And I couldn't let you get away without a picture of Delaney who will be seven months old in another week.  She's what I'll be doing for the next two days and she makes both of us very happy.