Saturday, July 5, 2025

creatively speaking this week, awaken to the possibilities

 

July is a new month, and a new color of scraps to use....Purple! 

for a while purple was my favorite color. I got a purple camera, purple phone, wore purple clothes

Above is an image of my prep for another hexie spiral block, to work on at night 

First choose fabrics to use, cut 2.5" squares, next baste fabrics to the shapes

I wonder if you feel like I do when you finally finish a quilt... like you finished a term paper... relief! 

and a slight let down in the push to create...

so I took out my purple scrap bin and the smallest scraps and some parts from prior sessions

and sorted them into some order


 

 

sewing a tiny improv strip of rectangles to get into the process again

 


pulling out a runner made over a year ago


and thinking, what a fun/clever use of scraps, machine quilting and hand stitching/beading! Oh it's my work!  so I brought it down and put it on the credenza for July

the sun is making it look washed out
pulled out one of the coasters I made years ago in MD. a fabric collage
and pulled out this painting on fabric I did 2 years ago now, it's prepped for machine quilting

love the use of stencils paint and inks... just need to finish it
I stitched some rows of this one together, and have a few rows pinned to decide if I like it...


a couple of videos I found interesting

This video of reorganizing a craft space kept my interest and I like some of the ideas

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bduTHFsJXmM 


jigsaw puzzle online of a sewing machine quilt

 https://www.jigsawplanet.com/?rc=play&pid=30ad4c057051

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Thursday, July 3, 2025

I Like Thursday # 458 picnics, reading, lawn ornaments, robins


 welcome to this week's list of likes, summer edition! Brought to you on a heat wave!

I started with another neighborhood lawn ornament... cute red truck with strong sun lighting it

I like the view out of our sliding glass door to the patio, Milo's toys are still here, I miss him so

On a walk this week I startled a robin ahead of us,
I said, don't mind us we'll be walking straight ahead on this sidewalk
Robin: what? I don't speak human!! I need to catch a worm so stay back!
so she stayed 6 feet in front of us down the sidewalk, just walking ahead and stopping til we almost catch up
Robin: ARE you kidding me? still coming this way
Me: well we don't want to walk in the road Missus
Robin: (hopping forward another 6 feet) Yikes! why are you chasing me? 
Me: hop in the grass so we can go by then! We don't plan to hurt you, and we had breakfast already
Robin: FINE! I'll have to fly to the fence, and don't chase me again

Then we come around a corner and see this
BWAaahahahaha, a herd of dachshunds dragging a man. They were adorable and all went a different way around the light pole on the corner, causing the guy to do a lot of maneuvering to get them untangled. They were a happy group and made me gleeful

loved these roses in full bloom along the way!
we baked last weekend, 
lemon blondies, chocolate chip/oatmeal/pecan cookies, and croissants

Recipe for cookies is in Gasparilla Cookbook, lemon blondies (jenny can cook) whole foods for croissant dough
I much prefer our own baked goods to store bought full of corn syrup and soybean oil

created a summer mantel scape with a pretty silk garland, a pathos cutting in water in a vase, some glittery butterflies, and little white lights
garland from Lowes 
I love to paint....

one of my index card paintings 
REALLY enjoying this book on audio
beautifully read, wonderful plot and characters, mystery of a friend group, and the family figuring it out 

LOVE these wall stickers 

Flower stickers at amazon  

Love to finish art quilts  this one is done and lovely to see... Spring Green Leaves 

Our conversation starter this week



do you like picnics? Are you a sit on a blanket on the ground person, or a table outside? Tell us about some picnic that stands out in your memory ( who was there, foods, time and place, etc)
I remember many beach picnics where my food was coated in sand,  and a couple as an adult where you put your blanket on the ground, to listen to a concert while you ate. 



as a child, we had some birthday parties at Lowry Park in Tampa in the pavilions on concrete picnic tables. 
Then there were   

I remember a lot of pot luck picnics growing up, such as family reunions, church groups, and always a great variety of food to share. 


We loved taking car road trips where we would often grab a lunch to have along the way at roadside tables, with our dog. I like eating outside but roadside picnic tables can be dirty, people being what they are, leaving trash. 

I am not one for sitting on the ground now.... but have some fond memories especially sitting under the stars, drinking wine, and listening to an orchestra while having fancy snacks

Please enjoy these fine folk's list of likes this week and let me know if you also wrote a post to include

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Saturday, June 28, 2025

creatively speaking, this week there was color, a start and a finish, drawings, Index card paintings

Spring Green Leaves  26" X 26"

 I will start this week with quilt making...

I've been working steadily on the Spring Leaf piece and it's now finished (needs a hanging sleeve tho) 

I will show some detail shots in a minute,

I got out my orange scrap bin, the bag of really small bits in a bin of small scraps, and saw tiny half square triangle blocks someone gave me a while back.... I began playing with them, now appreciating the more subtle colors.... and ended up making this

I had to make a few more from my stash that blended in well, and dithered over the arrangement of what I had to work with. 
I fell in love with the background fabric,  I liked how the lines of color extend with your view and that a simple block becomes more if you repeat the background uniformly. 

I like the interplay of paler orange and red orange against the tan background (that has flashes of blue) and that the top and bottom border doesn't have to match exactly in a seam to keep the eyes moving
But oh my, what next? I quite love it, and want to build it up but how??

I also added the unused strip set from Spring Greens to another strip set in the parts dept
This has potential
Back to Spring Green Leaves
I chose a simple sparkling green binding 
I was amazed that it laid flat and square, with all those tiny biased edges. I am kind of in love with it's merging of modern with scrap quilting and it's a lesson in more is better. All shades of green. 

A wide variety of color makes it richer, just like in life


using the quilting lines to continue a scrap of colorful flowers in the scraps



A mix of piecing and applique



positive and negative shapes repeated all the way through quilting in leaves
at the end I added in leafy fabric bits, raw edge and quilted over to continue the lines






I was able to paint some more ICAD (Index card a day ) prompts

I do these as my morning pages often, which means they are quick 
The prompts were hydrangea, Arrow, sorbet, midnight, twig, and yellow
Pitt pen

for some reason my Inktense pan inks wouldn't darken

sorbet was done with gouache, and I like the way the texture on the icy balls came out, not the orange slice but then these are an exercise in inspiration. Learn and move on.


attempt at impressionism with gouache paint

for yellow, I wanted to try to capture a bit of Klimt... the posture and hair were hard, and I like the dress being form fitting. I think I finally got the body proportion better. 

I was looking at old photos online, and came across Lilian Gish... lovely with those shadows that black and white studio portraits gave
I wanted to capture the tilt of her head and missed the nuances... dh came out of his office and looked and said, " her head isn't tilted down" (I know.... maybe next time)
He likes my drawings and paintings though. I learn with each attempt and though this is just a pencil sketch on copier paper I went back a couple times to erase, or tweak, or re-shade an area. I like how the blouse came out, the proportions, and the mouth looks like the actress


Thank you for visiting, and I hope you continue to encourage your own creativity


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Thursday, June 26, 2025

I Like Thursday #457 flowers, convo question, dishwashers, a vintage milo video, and an iguana

 

welcome to this week's list of likes starting with other people's flowers!

We walk a lot and I enjoy seeing lawn ornaments and pretty flower displays. Our rose bush is adjusting to life in our yard, no blooms yet but they might be these colors...

this yard had 5 of them, orange, yellow, coral, sunset, pink

what are these? red violet colored TINY bells on stalks

how pretty this porch box is! Pink/yellow, white and lush!
mighty clouds filled the brilliant blue sky this week, as a storm blew in to put a stop to over 100 F temps
It is a pure relief to see merely 80's (I do not like it that hot) 

we had a big leak from our dishwasher which meant we had to get a degree in dishwasher comparisons and fork out a LOT of money for this
Our plumber came out to install it. Midway he whistled, "are you kidding me?" 
the builder put in the island and dishwasher, then installed the wood floor around it so it was super difficult to get the old one out, and this new one in, requiring some pounding. Our plumber said Lowe's would not have done all he did to get this one in, 
having had poor quality from them before installing our Washer we automatically called our guy. 
He goes by "mad mike" and he also replaced our water pressure regulator 

When the temps dropped this week we hurried to bake a loaf of bread, a set of hamburger buns, banana muffins, a pizza, and some chicken. Oy vey. 

Our flowers are not blooming, the lettuce was nearly killed by the heat, the tomatoes are behind not even making little tomato balls in flowers yet the wildflowers are green seedlings, but the parsley is alive. 

A friend sent a pic of our old house in Maryland after the storm, condemned from tree falling damage! 
We talked about Milo, and her dog Piglet... and I went looking for a video to show you of Milo's early childhood

Missing Milo

here's a video of Milo as a puppy enjoying his magazine hobby


for anyone who lost a button


gratuitous painting

Mission Impaw-sible  with cats, hilarious to me



The conversation starter this week: 

Do you play summer sports? Tennis, or golf, or pickleball, etc? Do you have a special outfit for them, or equipment? 

I'm not sporty,  me and "ball" sports have little in common


I tried as a young university student to learn to really play tennis, my boyfriend at the time was all around sporty guy, ice hockey, tennis, marathon runs, hiking, camping, well many things. 

He would hit the ball right to me, I'd swing, hear the air rushing through the empty strings, and the thonk of the ball wedging itself into the fence. 

then I tried racquetball but again, not great. 

I tried running, even did a 5K race where I came in next to last but counted it a win since I never stopped to walk. 

walking long distances is my thing, and dance. Swing, tap, ballet, Cajun, jive, contra.... anything dance. 

Our neighborhood now has a tennis court where pickleball people take over all the time. 

I walk on by..... 




oh yes, before marriage, I met a guy when I did the Renaissance Festival, who invited me to go to the yacht races on his sail boat yacht... 
I may have been more for ballast lol but I still learned to be more of a help than a hindrance. Davis Island Yacht races I think, it was in Tampa. 
Not even good at that sport, I went where told, ducked when the beam came across, pulled on ropes, and had a great time. He had a fairly small vintage beautiful wooden sailing ship, with lots of nice people there to help move me from side to side. 
I remember it heeling over so far I missed having seat belts, and thinking, are there sharks just below my head? 
I went out with him on the yacht a few times but it wasn't meant to be forever, just one of those truly interesting experiences. 

I think that counts for a summer sport? 

now please visit these fine folks to see what they liked this week! 




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