A Riddle....

What do you get when you have someone who is...

 (messy)

and...

 (moody... and how!?)

and...

 (sassy... or just plain rude sometimes!)

 (sneaky...yup)

and 

 (lazy)

and can be...

 (cuddly... sometimes)

and loves a good...

(selfy=selfie, artistic license you know!)

who has you going ...

every which way...

or going in circles...

who might be found using a hair dryer...

or a laptop...

You guessed it!!!

A...

Someone once said...

And so, 

the parent...

"Life II: I Have A Teenager!"

is finally finished!

This is the back of the piece...

with my little "angel"

at a time when she wore fairy wings..

Ah those were the days!

These days, I sometimes think she is wearing horns!!!

I actually have three kids, 

2 who are still "teens" but it is the youngest who has

clearly been the source of aggravation and amusement

and has served as fodder for my art. 

The final stitches went into the sleeve early this morning

and it will be packed off and shipped 

with the other art quilts from our fiber art group, 

Adirondack Regional Textile Artists Alliance

(also on Facebook)

...headed to Savannah Georgia

to be exhibited

at several Mancuso Quilt Shows. 

The fire in the belly....

I know not all my readers are fond of rock music,
but
I am a product of the age of rock and roll...
born in the early 1960s,
teenager in the 70s,
college kid in the early 80s.

Mr. U is a heavy (heavy!) metal guy, Nature Boy loves old rock too,
 and Teenager with lots of stuff likes that nasty rap/hip hop stuff
so I have heard a lot of music in my time on earth.

As I thought about all the forms of art that I still want to try,

somehow, this song started playing in my head...

Yes, friends....

I want it all!!!!

In the past couple of years,

I have really spread out my wings 

from my early days of sewing clothes and quilting.

I have dabbled in a few new art forms including...

hand dyeing

fabric painting

image transfer

rubber stamp making

art journaling

But I have a list in my head...

a list of sooooo many forms of expression, of art, 

that I still want to learn....

Yes, friends....

the more I see... the more I want to do!!!!

I want it all!!!!!

My preliminary list:

*screen printing
*calligraphy, funky hand lettering
*gelatin printing
*fabric art journaling
*fabric designing
*watercolor painting
(and maybe someone to clean my house?)

Is that too much to ask?!!!!

I've been challenged...

Over the years since the U family settled in upstate NY
I have belonged to a lot (I mean, a lot!) of quilting groups online.
I have made many cyber friends
and have even met a few!

We've exchanged advice about quilting, art, homeschooling, motherhood and a whole lot more.
Some days, it seems these are the only adults that I 'talk' to, LOL.

The latest group I was invited to join is Tangled Textiles

"an international cyber fiber journey"

Our first challenge,

selected by Beverly

was "games"...
 and I created .... Alphabet Soup....

see more here

while I'm here!

YIKES, I'm late!!!

I always seem to fly by the seat of my pants!

 While following the creations of Twelve by Twelve,  Diane, the founder, 

was able to facilitate the creation of a new group of textile artists (oooo, can I call myself that?)..

And so now, I am proud to be a part of Tangled Textiles...

and 'international cyber fiber journey'....

with a deadline for our first reveal 8 days from now!!!!

So it's back on the floor for me!!!!

(P.S. I am still planning to highlight the quilt show when I get a chance... stay tuned!)

Reflecting on small miracles...

A little less than couple of months ago (that is, late March), 

our quilt guild show registration applications were already out

and I decided I had better enter some of my quilts.
Well, how about  6 quilts/pieces?!

Of course, I find that it's always best
 to have some pre-finished quilts on hand to enter in a show
that is happening two months later...
 
including 1quilt completed in 2009!

1 quilt finished in early 2010...



and 1 quilt finished in late 2010...



but
that doesn't mean
you won't enter quilts that are not yet finished 
(I repeat not yet finished!)

like this..

1 quilt finished up at the end of April
(including finishing the hand quilting which I started in January!)


(though I still have to baste on a temporary sleeve for the show)

1 quilt made from start to finish in a month (phew!)...

1 quilt block for the guild block challenge
conceived one day and finished in two days (double phew!) this week...

and
1piece that is actually 5 separate panels that I made last spring
during my Workbook Wednesday series
which I decided to attach (completed this week.. better late than never!)



Of course,
I also volunteered (what was I thinking?!)
to make 3 1/2 ballet skirts (for a mid May performance)

from slippery material and chiffon (yippee!),


(and I also ended up doing a lot of hand sewing too on Saturday at rehearsal!)

rented out two vacant apartments,
attended a family celebration out of the country last weekend,

homeschooled 2 children and took care of other mother duties.

And yet, I survived and miraculously got it all done!

Around the same time that the quilt show registration applications were sent in,

I ran my first race!

It is kind of unreal to me....

After baby #3 , it took time before I began regular exercise.

When she was 3, I began early morning walks in the summer.

When she was 5, I joined a gym again.

When she was 8 or 9, I began running a bit on the treadmill at the gym.

Now she is 12 (and I'm 49!), I can say that I run!

I started  running outside early  this spring and now I am hooked!

Running gives me time to think...

like dreaming up new quilty ideas!!!
or just letting my mind go blank (for a change!)

Since March 5th, I have run...

Yes! that is 192.5 miles!!!

Who'd of thunk it possible????!!!

Certainly not me!

Things are only impossible until they're not.  

~Jean-Luc Picard, Star Trek: The Next Generation

Cooking up something in my "lab"......

This week, my sewing room has felt a little bit like a lab

and I feel a little bit like Beaker...

I didn't set anything on fire or blow anything up...

(well.... not really!)

but I still managed to make a colossal mess...

Almost every surface in my sewing room was used for something!!!



Like Beaker, I had a lot of trial and error...

 Pebeo Setacolor paint, Jacquard Lumiere paint,
and Caran D'Ache Neocolor artist crayons on Lutradur


and some experiments didn't go quite as planned...

...I decided that after spending a lot of time transferring an image with TAP

onto polymer clay (on the right) and baking it.... it didn't look so great,

so I went with the image transferred with TAP onto painted Lutradur (on the left)!

And then I got sidetracked....

and spent an evening just painting on Lutradur and not finishing the quilt!!!!

In the end,
I sandwiched the transferred image onto some Peltex
and backed with fabric, zigzagged around the edges,
added an eyelet and then secured it to the quilt right where you might find the park on the map!!!

You can also see the french knots that I added for trees...

and the added quilted lines that I had traced from the enlarged map onto tracing paper
and quilted the roads onto the quilt.

We were also required to make a facing-type binding
and I found a great tutorial here...

Finally, the label was sewn on last night!!!!

And so....

my experiment is done!!!!

"Along the River"

(featuring the Hudson River as it passes by our hometown)

If you happen to be passing through upstate NY on June 4th or 5th,
you can see my quilt (and 5 others) along with many other quilts
from our guild members and visit the great vendors too at our quilt show!!!!

Now who wants to clean up my 'lab'????