Learning Curve

I like to study; I've been a student of something-or-other most of my life.  Right now it's all about my new laptop, and Windows 8 and MS Office (Home and Student) 2013.  It's about why and how my new router doesn't work (seems something is malfunctioning with the internet port on the router and it'll have to go back to the store,  so it'll be awhile before I can go wireless).  It's about "Charms" and "Tiles" -- titles that make me think I'm playing a new game that's a cross between jewellry collecting and Scrabble.

Window from Christ Church
Cathedral, Dublin
courtesy Andreas F. Borchert,
Via Wikipedia Commons

Some of it's been a real test of my patience...and perseverance  both of which, St. Paul will tell you, are Fruit of the Holy Spirit. 

Passing this test is a slow and steady process, but pass it I will, as I am determined not to 'lose my cool' throughout.  So far I've mastered my keyboard, which has a distinctly different 'feel' than my old one.  I've also managed to get reasonably proficient with my touch-pad 'mouse'.  (I bought a wireless mouse but in light of problems with the router, I have yet to set it up.  Maybe tonight.  I do like a "real" mouse...with or without fur!  ;-)

And the studying will continue...as in June I've decided to begin a 3-month self-directed "Summer School" in the textile arts.  The curriculum will include:

• An in-person class in encaustic with Arlene Westen Evans at Olds College during the Fibre Potpourri, sponsored this year by the Edmonton Needlearts Guild - May 31-June 2;
• Three Craftsy Classes:
• Ann Petersen on FMQ;
• Jane Dunnewold on dyeing; and
• Cindy Needham on quilting/designing with vintage linens.
• Three DVDs:
• Jan Beaney on Transfer Paints and on water-soluble fabric for embroidery and creating fabric from stitch;
• Catherine Nicholls on painting/drawing on fabric; and
• Quilting Arts series 900 including the use of tsukiniko inks to paint on fabric.

I figure by September I'll have made many samples and figured out how to use the techniques I want (and most enjoy) to enhance my work and prepare for shows (juried and otherwise) into which I want to enter.  I still have in mind a solo show at a local gallery, building up to one in Edmonton in the next year or two.  

I need to have more in my tool box and more pieces ready with which to create a proper portfolio for consideration by a gallery.

And so...it looks like I'll be climbing the Learning Curve for some time to come!  

WIPs today?  Nothing to report, really.  Dharma has notified me that my ribbons have shipped.  :-)  I've been mending pants (buttons) and hemming the dress I made to wear in Santa Fe.  

And I've been a bit preoccupied with the news.

On the heels of the horror in Boston on Monday (turns out my cousin E, a distance runner, was there, but is now home, unscathed and very grateful), comes the news of the passing of yet another Canadian music icon -- Rita MacNeil of Cape Breton.

I saw her years ago in concert in Calgary, at which she sang the song for which she is perhaps best known.  Here's to you, Rita; you will be sorely missed.

Almost Summer...

And we're still having frost warnings! Nonetheless, my garden is thriving (we finally had a good rain yesterday afternoon) and I'm loving the view from my kitchen window. This is my lilac, at the end of the back yard. To the right and up the yard from it are two flowering crabapple trees -- one pink and one deep burgundy (with matching leaves), and there's another one -- white -- on the east side of the yard, too.

I've been doing some stitching outside when it's been warm enough -- and when I wasn't totally absorbed in pruning trees and planting perennials. I am also the lucky recipient of some re-cycled bark chips from my friend B, which I've been using to mulch the perennial bed. A couple more bagsful and I should be set.

I've also been busy washing fleece, finishing a project for the Heritage Park show, taking a stitching class, and knitting, knitting, knitting. No photos of the cleaned fleece -- but suffice it to say that I have enough to pick, card and spin to keep me going for a good long while!

The stitching class was "Turkish Delight", given by Gary Clarke from Australia, at the annual Fibre Potpourri at Olds College (not to be confused with Fibre Week, which is at the end of June). This year the Potpourri was organized by the Edmonton Needle Arts Guild, but

there was a good turn-out from Calgary too -- and some gals came in from Saskatchewan and others from B.C.

The weather was fabulous, the food was pretty good,

and the company was tops. I'd thought it was a canvas-work class,

but the technique used photo transfer on closely-woven fabric,

so there was no counting. Each of us chose our own colours; I went

with an autumn theme and used mainly threads from a sample pack I'd been given by Jeannette Douglas on the cruise I took with her in January. To the right is a photo of our class' work, taken near the end of the weekend. Since I got back, I've added more

satin stitch in a variegated silk from Gloriana Threads (#115 - "Topiary"), finished inserting the 'crystals' around the central motif, and have begun couching some narrow gold and rust-coloured braid around the outside edge. The cord is from a bundle of Oliver Twist 'One-offs' in the 'Chocolate' colourway that I bought somewhere some time ago -- don't ask for details! LOL!

"Where's the knitting?" you might well ask. It's been a full and inspiring month for knitting, too. I've finished one of the "Ilene Bags" (a free pattern in Ravelry, designed by Hannah Ingalls) in elann.com Esprit Print -- a gift for my BFF, P, who will be visiting later this month from Montreal; I've finished the Sierra Breeze prayer shawl from The Prayer Shawl Companion, and have started another PS in basketweave. I've also finished several dishcloths! My next goal is to finish up the four (count 'em -- four) pair of socks I've got stacked in my WIP pile, so I can move easily on to the Sweet Tee (Interweave Knits, Spring 2009) for my daughter. The photos are posted in my Ravelry FO set in my flickr photostream, here. :-) That's all the catching up I have energy for today. I need to get going on a small commission I have taken on for a local quilt shop.

More later!

No, I'm not.

Crazy, that is. It dawned on me when I got up this morning that my Word of the Year for 2009 has already started to move out of percolation in my brain, into my world.

The word is: DARE.

It's a word I put in beads on an early art quilt that I made in white, red and black, based on a process from Quilters' Playtime by Dianne S. Hire.

D A R E.

Not as in 'dare-devil' or being reckless or stupid about my safety (and/or that of others). No.

Rather, "DARE" as in 'daring', 'bold', 'audacious', 'courageous' -- particularly when it comes to creating and displaying my work, entering competitions etc.

Amazing. I hadn't even spoken the word, or declared it in writing -- even in my journal. It was just in my mind, tumbling about like a bright, beautiful glass marble. And what happens? I dared!