whew!

Well, I have made an enormous dent in the basement! I was expecting my stepdaughter and her boyfriend this weekend, but because of some circumstances beyond our control, they won't be able to visit. On the one hand, darn it, we were looking forward to the visit (not to mention they'd be taking the rest of her crap back home with them) on the other, I don't have to be in quite such a rush. It was pretty overwhelming. 

I've also been working on the play I'm in, a stage adaptation of Terry Pratchett's fantasy novel, "Guards! Guards!" I'm playing the Librarian of the Wizard's University. There had been a magical explosion at the U one day and it turned him into an orangutan. He decided he liked being an ape, and has never been turned back into a human. It's a very physically demanding role, but one that has been more fun than I could have predicted. I've also gone down a size since we started rehearsals at the end of July. When you spend most of your evening squatting, your thighs get nice and trim!

Unfortunately, this particular theatre company has no budget. I'm making my own orangutan costume, which is fun, but it's a lot of work. They tried to find some costume feet and hands for me, but my latex allergy reared its ugly head within moments of me trying them on. I do have some pictures which I will post soon. I'm just not on my regular computer at this moment to get them. Hmmm... There's that costuming thing again...

I went to my niece's baby shower and they really liked my gift. What I did was wrap the completed hexagon flowers and made her give them back to me at the end of the day. I've finished one more flower and started another. Once the show opens, I'll be able to get back to work on it in earnest. 

One thing I plan on doing as part of getting back to work on the Grandma's Flower Garden quilt is to show how I prepare the hexagons. I'm hoping to film this so I can add video to this blog. We shall see what we shall see... 

I've also been looking at how my basement is currently laid out and what doesn't work (most of it) and what does (hardly anything) for a design studio. I've been sketching and measuring and plotting and stewing. It's got my head spinning most of the time, lately. I'm a glutton for punishment. I'd really like to not spend a bunch of money to set this up. I already spent almost $500 having the old furniture and some other crap removed. It was totally worth it, though. I had to call 1-800-Got-Junk, but it was so worth every penny. I've also made several trips to the thrift store - to drop off stuff, not buy anything- and I now have room to organize the things I do want to keep. I'm really no where near done, but the progress that has been made is huge. My mom is coming to visit next week for the opening night of the play and she's going to be so surprised! I've been telling her what I'm doing, but she hasn't been able to come up to actually see with her own eyes. I'm pretty excited! I'm getting closer to having a home business!

Big changes behind, big plans ahead!

Hey, I really like camping!

I feel kind of bad for having not wanted to go camping last weekend, but it was really relaxing and refreshing. 

I was really inspired by all the colors around me. Vivid greens and blues of the trees and the lake, sun-bleached stones and wood. Everything has a special sparkle in the woods. 

I went fishing with my guys and actually caught the first "keeper" of the weekend. The iridescence of the fish is amazing, the sun glittering on the water is, dare I say it, thrilling. Also sunburn-inducing. Note to self: Even thought it's early in the day and you think you'll be back before you're too exposed, put the dang SPF on.

For the first time in ages, and I do mean AGES, I felt relaxed. Calm. Serene. I discovered I'm pretty good at making a campfire. I can bait my own hook (I'm still working on the removal of fish from said hook). I can drive a boat. Last weekend was full of discovery. I did things I've never done before. I even removed a clam from its shell and caught a beautiful Sunfish using it as bait. Of course, the shell is beautiful inside. 

I took photos of textures you don't always see or notice in the city. I've been using them as the basis for some fabric designs. One I'm especially proud of is of some lichens. I played around in photoshop and the effect is one of watercolor impressionism. Like a Monet. I began playing around with pixelation, color fades, adding and subtracting elements. 

I also began to think that the campsite (on Lake Peavey) would be a really beautiful place to photograph my products. We're going back up this weekend, so I'll have a talk with the owners and see if they're cool with that (and I don't know why they wouldn't be). 

I also designed a line of star fabrics for next summer. I normally hate the star shape. It has become trite, in my humble opinion. But I'm hoping my designs will have enough of a spin on the oft misused geometric shape to make it seem exciting. I also based the different color-ways on different American cities. So it's still "All-American" <eye roll>. That part makes me cringe. Not that I'm not patriotic. I'm very much so. I just don't like how some people use that term. 

Anyway...

I really used this weekend to soak in the beauty of nature and my family and to meet new people. I accomplished that and much more. I even got a couple of flowers done for the baby quilt. Then I went off on my design tangent in my journal. Well, that, and I didn't want them to smell like campfire. I love to sit on the smokey side and get the smell in my clothes, but I don't think I should present a gift that smells like campfire. Though nothing would make me prouder than to have my great-niece wrapped up in the blankie I made for her while she's sitting at the fire pit in my sister's backyard.

On the road again...

I could really wait a few days to get on the road again...

But we're supposed to go up to one of my husband's customers lake property with the RV and camp out while he does some work on their A/C. This was sort of a last minute thing I wasn't really prepared for. I was all set for that trip to the Oshkosh Air Show last weekend, but I'm not quite ready to take off a second weekend in a row. I've made so much progress downstairs and I don't want to lose momentum. It literally took me years to get this far, I don't want to fall back now.

On the other hand, I have my medication, so perhaps I don't have to worry about losing momentum while I'm gone. Hmmm... I guess that'll be my experiment. I didn't lose any even though we were gone last weekend. Wow. That's pretty cool. I have focus! Holy crap! Who knew?

I went through some more pictures taken from magazines (2006) and tossed what I didn't like any more. Some of it was still really me, though. I only have one grocery bag of recycling out of it, and, frankly, I could pack it down a bit and make room for more. 

I've added to the bin of fabric I'm going to sell on etsy. I have some lovely fabric, but I've had it for a while and still haven't done anything with it. I had such plans for it. But I really want to make clothes out of my own fabric designs now. For some things I'll have to buy other fabric. For example, wool, leather, suede. Trims. Denim. Although Spoonflower does have cotton twill, which is denim, basically. It's just that theirs is solid white. And I did order a swatch book of the different fabrics they carry so I can see how heavy it is. It's supposed to be suitable for upholstery, so it should work for jeans. That was one of my rewards for doing all the cleaning. That and a color chart that shows how the various colors look printed on the fabric. Since my Harriet Pink was absolutely not the right color, I can look at the chart and use the Pantone color that is closest to the look for which I was going.

I found some forest green silk I had purchased when I lived in New York. It's gorgeous, but when I hold it up to my skin, I look like I was out partying for an entire month. Which is odd. That's "supposed to be" one of my "Autumn" colors. Yeah, that Color Me Beautiful stuff is so out of date any more. It's so.... 80s. So Last Century. Technically, according to my Autumn coloring, I'm never to wear fuchsia, but I do, and I love it, so, meh. 

I have another storage bin ready for charity. I got rid of some of my crafting supplies that I don't use. Rubber stamps, mostly. I kept a few of my favorites, but I don't really make cards or collage art (though collage art does inspire quite a lot of my design work). It's not as painful as I kept imagining it would be. I mean, I would really go into a panicky despair whenever I thought of getting rid of some of that stuff. But I'm filling up the truck repeatedly to go to charity and keeping the things that really speak to me. I've even gotten rid of some things to which I had, for whatever reason, thought I had some special sentimental connection. Man, I held on to some weird shit. No lie. I kept the wood we took up when we replaced the flooring in the front of the house because I was sure I could make something with it. Yeeeah-no. 

So, for this weekend, I'll take along my Grandma's Flower Garden pieces to keep going on that. The baby shower is in three weeks. I won't be anywhere near done by then, but I can take along pictures of what I've done thus far and show my niece. 

That's another thing; it used to be that if I discovered I couldn't finish a project that I had started in time for whatever deadline, I'd quit. I'd just scrap the whole project and turn it into a UFO (Un-Finished Object). This is, presumably, something that happens quite a lot with creative people, because they came up with that term for it. On the one hand, it's nice to know I'm not the only one. On the other, what does that say about artists? I mean, people actually organize UFO parties, where they can exchange their unfinished projects for someone else's they think they might like to complete or use for parts. There's a whole UFO culture out there that doesn't go out to look at the night sky, but stays indoors and hunkers down with someone else's incomplete art. Like an adopted child or something. I find that both weird and refreshing. It's creepy to me, in a way. But I like creepy things, so I guess that's alright.

Well, time to get ready for this weekend. Gotta hit the credit union, the grocery store, the showers. Have a fantastic weekend and may you find the motivation to get done that which you have been avoiding.

Getting personal...

I can't believe how much I've gotten done. Unfortunately, by the end of the day yesterday I had managed to give myself a migraine and went to bed rather early. I had intended on working until late, but that just wasn't happening. 

However, I managed to get the tables switched around and I've begun sorting some more of the fabric and supplies I intend to keep. I've also started going through one of my downstairs cupboards and sorting the books and magazines that were in there. Which ones are true to my vision, which ones will make some thrift store shopper squeal with delight... that style of thing.

I think I've managed to get something stuck in each of my two vacuum cleaners and will have to have my husband bring in some of the tools from his work truck to dissect them and remove the offending chunks of whatever it is. I'm not looking forward to that. I know for a fact I sucked up some spider egg sacks. <erp> Stupid arachnophobia!

I had some things sitting in my basement for ages waiting to be laundered, but since they aren't things I use frequently, I always did the more necessary items first. I got all of it done! The only thing left is the current laundry and a sleeping bag that had been packed away in my cupboard. I even wore a pair of silk pajamas I purchased months ago to bed last night. I got them at a thrift store in the Halloween department, and they've just been sitting down there waiting for the delicate cycle. Thrifty hint: Always wash thrift store clothes before wearing. I may wash my stuff before it goes to charity, but not everyone does. <shudder>

I now have four more boxes of stuff for charity and one that's about half-way full. I can't begin to tell you how awesome it feels to get rid of this stuff. I guess I'll have to admit that I am some sort of hoarder. Luckily, I found a doctor who finally gave me a proper diagnosis (ADD) and the right medication. I had to do an awful lot of calling around and our insurance blows when it comes to mental health treatment. Not to get on a soapbox, but if we would spend more time and money on mental health issues, we wouldn't have things like the Colorado Theater shooting. That's my humble opinion.

But back to the studio...

I am nervous about really digging into my stuff. Partially because of the spiders, but mostly because I look at some of the stuff and wonder what I was thinking. Then I get upset with myself for spending the money on something I never used, am never going to use, and will be getting rid of momentarily. Then I get upset at myself for wasting so much time and energy on the stuff I never did/will never do. Then I get all sentimental about things. It's no wonder people who hoard don't want to get rid of their stuff. It's emotional. It's depressing. At times it's even gut-wrenching (and I'm not just talking about the spiders). It's not a very comfortable place to be. Well, not while you're doing it. I have to remind myself that I'm finding my authenticity. I go downstairs and look at how far I've come, and I'm really proud of what I've accomplished already. If I took a picture of it the way it is now, I'm sure there are those of you who would say, "Um, that's the before picture, right?" Hey, I had a lot of crap. I didn't take any before pictures. But I have posted the pics of my loads of stuff going to charity and that should give you a pretty good idea of what the "before" was like. Some of that came from the garage, but still. Lots o' stuff! That way, when I get around to posting the after pics, you can be all impressed. 

I sometimes have to stop going through everything to catch my breath. I sometimes feel like I'm on the verge of crying. I haven't broken down, yet. I'm sure at some point I will. I've gotten very sad about a few things, but haven't been brought to tears over them. A couple of things I found in the garage were close. Like the bio in the program I found from the last show I did in my hometown before leaving for New York City "to make it on Broadway." Or the pictures of little girls in my "Someday" folder. Yeah, that tripped up my depression for a couple of days. I didn't do anything for fear of finding more so-called "failures". On the other hand, I found things like this:

Yep, that's me in the middle with the stellar horns!

It's one of the things that I found that remind me of who I really am. A performer who's also really good at costuming. Not only did I portray Titania, but I also designed and single-handedly built all of the costumes for this production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. The director had originally called me to just do the costumes but at the time, I really wanted to focus on my acting. When the actress playing Titania couldn't do the show, he called me back and asked if I'd do both. Obviously, I did. I'm really proud of that head piece and all the costumes I did for that show. The kids in the show (there were only 3 adults in the cast, 4 if you could the 18 year old high schooler) were really great, even if they did underestimate themselves and their ability to do Shakespeare. I made sure they got over that in a hurry.

I do love theatre. I love spectacle. I love history and fashion. I love fabric. I love designing. I love fantasy. Now, I'm trying to make that fantasy a reality. I'm not sure how that's going to happen, but I know it will.

Kiss my tuchas, spiders!

In yesterday's post I mentioned vacuuming up the spider webs in the basement as I clean up and make room for my new sewing studio. This is not a pleasant thing for most people, but I'm arachnophobic, so it was kind of a big deal. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to empty the canister when it got full. Well, I managed to get the vacuum canister emptied all by my big self without vomiting or so much as a dry heave. I got a little lump in my throat, but I did it. For those of you who understand the psychology of phobias, you should be very proud of me. Just sayin'.

Yesterday afternoon I started to panic as I looked around my would-be studio. I've nearly gotten to the point where I need to start making piles of the things I want to keep. The whole organizing thing. I start off thinking like this:

Tools

Supplies

Fabric

Reference materials.

Then my head starts spinning with all of the subcategories and subcategories of the subcategories...

Tools:

 - for cutting

 - for measuring 

 - for quilting

 - <sigh> cutting for quilting

 - cutting for garments

 - measuring for quilting

 - measuring for garments

 - for tailoring

     - for marking

but I need to mark for quilting, too, and that's a different pile of tools...

 <son of a...>

...aaaand my brain shuts down. That and I don't have a great place to set up the space I'll need for doing all this organizing.

So, I called mom. Sometimes when I'm feeling overwhelmed, I can call mom and the conversation will spin off into an idea. I had been worried about using a table we have that we take camping with us. We're heading out again this weekend and I didn't want to take over the table. Then I remembered that one of the tables I have downstairs is even smaller than the one in the camper. I could set up the camping table, transfer the stuff from the smaller table, and we could take the smaller table with us. We only use it for setting up our Foreman grill. So that's my new plan of attack. It's a start, anyway.

<sigh... of relief>

I got the big table downstairs but needed to clear off some more of the floor and do some more vacuuming. I sucked up a big brown spider. <shudder> But I found my missing yoga toes (I had lost one and had been alternating feet) and now that I'm in a show which requires me to be barefoot and agile, I'm glad I found it. Seriously, that was pretty exciting for me. I have no idea why it was down by the laundry. I must've scooped it up with some clothes I took down to be washed. 

In my paper journal yesterday, I got pretty excited about the basement. I started envisioning what it would be like to have a real work area down there with a proper table for laying out fabric and cutting patterns so I wouldn't have to do it on the floor any more. Storage that is actually organized so I can find things and it all makes sense. I'm good at envisioning organized places, but putting into reality and then keeping it there is the hard part for me (see above). However, if this is going to be a home business, perhaps it'll be easier. When I worked at the fabric store, it drove me nuts if things were put away in the wrong place. I was always reorganizing things that had been just stuck any old where. I enjoyed it, actually. I took pride in it. Then I'd come home and completely shut down. Honestly, I think it's my medication that's helping me. I know it doesn't work for everyone, and I really put it off and made excuses for myself, but I haven't been this motivated in... ever, really. Plus I have the diagnosis, so it helps knowing that I can actually do something about it and it's not entirely my fault. I'm not stupid and lazy. I've just got some farkachte synaptic signals.

I forgot to mention in yesterday's post that I did a burn test on some fabric I had gotten at the thrift store. It's a cute brown and ivory gingham and I thought perhaps I could use it for the backing to the Grandma's Flower Garden baby quilt. I just wasn't sure if it was polyester, rayon... It was hard to tell, but, since the quilt top is 100% cotton, it'd have to be a (mostly) natural fiber to use it. Turns out it's acrylic, probably Orlan. Yeah, can't use it. The cotton will continue to shrink a little for a few more washings and the acrylic isn't going to shrink at all. That will make for some unattractive bubbling in the quilting, so it's out. Oh, well.

I went on line and downloaded a fiber burn test chart.

This one is from Ditsy Prints.

I cut a small swatch from the fold line of the cut edge, held it in a tweezers over the sink and lit the bugger on fire. It was really easy to do. Since I do like to shop at thrift stores, this will be a handy skill to have. You could even do it for clothes if the tags have been removed. That is, if there's a bit of seam allowance you can clip out. Then you'll know how to wash it. There's your thrifty hint for the day!

I also forgot to mention that on our drive home from the air show, I completed 5 more hexagon flowers and started a 6th. I now have 21 complete flowers for my niece's baby's quilt. So I laid them out to see if I need/want more and to sort of figure out how many more I would need. If I but a path of single hexagons between the flowers, I would have a crib sized quilt right now. But I'd really like to make it a throw so it'll last longer as she grows. 

Well, I need to get back downstairs. If you've been feeling stuck in your own studio or organizing your stuff, I hope this will be some inspiration for you to know that you can do it. If I can do it, you can do it. Yes, folks, it can be done!