On Saturday I gave a workshop for the quilt guild on marbling fabric. I’m no expert, but I’ve done it a few times for myself and for other quilty friends, so i figured “why not?” The guild was hosting a retreat at a “camp,” so we had a cafeteria, a large lanai, and all day in which to work. Great conditions.

I pre-prepared 20 yards of fabric, about 15 colors of paint, and 9 gallons of “goo” on which to float the paint. That was a lot of stuff to carry with me, but a few 5-gallon buckets did he trick. Four trays to work in was just about right for the 14 students we had. There was just the right amount of waiting and watching each other (good for inspiration) without feeling like you were standing around bored. Though, with six pieces of fabric each to marble, we exhausted the goo in a few hours. Unless one has a very light hand and paints that float perfectly, there can be a lot that sinks to the bottom. As the goo is depleted with each “print,” you can dredge up more and more sunken paint. I made 6 more gallons of goo at our lunch break which kept everyone going until we had used up our fabric, but if I were to do another workshop I’d mix two rounds worth of goo beforehand or limit the class size or number of prints each person could make. Six opportunities each is good though because there were lots of chances to try different patterns and color combos.

Unfortunately, I did not remember to bring my camera to the workshop. It’s too bad too because we had a great time and color was flying everywhere! We had a great group of ladies who were willing to “go with the flow,” and just play. I took home the leftovers and did a little more marbling this morning. I realized that marbling could be just the right technique for the 12×12 theme I came up with: Kilauea. My results above are not as deep and rich in color as I wanted so I’m going to try some over dyeing with Procion dyes this week. We’ll see what happens.

Oh nevermind.

I have blogger’s remorse. This post was awkwardly written and pretty much an example of me contemplating something and then thinking “Oh I haven’t blogged in a while. Perhaps I should blog what’s mulling around in my head.” Yet, sometimes what is rattling around in my head needs to stay in my head and not be said out loud. Not because it’s inappropriate — just because it’s not well thought out. I liked Emily’s comment though. What I hadn’t really considered, and what I’m lacking personally, is that confidence in my vision that worst case scenario, it will turn out just fine, but best case scenario, it will be fantastic.

This little house is for the SAQA benefit auction this fall. I meant to donate something last year, but I didn’t think what I had made was up to par and then didn’t get a chance to do another piece. This time around, I was running with an idea and really liked how it turned out. That’s what I entered into Tactile Architecture. This is a smaller variation, which I like too. It’s wrapped around a stretched canvas, so it’s a nice little textile painting for the wall.

I’m trying some new-ish things. I have an idea for a series of art quilts and I need to experiment a bit with some techniques before committing to one of the pieces. I am also teaching a workshop for our quilt guild on marbling fabric. I’ve only done this a few times, but everyone loved my scraps and convinced me we needed to do this at the guild retreat next weekend.

So, a dry run was in order. When I saw Judy’s colorful felted soaps a while ago, I figured they’d be the perfect size project to experiment making felted rock. On Saturday, while coming down from our tsunami high and realizing that we didn’t need to stockpile water in case of disaster after all, the kids and I made soap rocks. Well, I made rocks, theirs were far more colorful. I highly recommend this easy peasy lemon squeezy family friendly activity. Great results! And now I have a better idea of where I’m going in my larger project.

On Sunday I prepared my paints for marbling. I use textile paints formulated for marbling and/or airbrush. Each paint behaves a bit differently on the thickened water so I wanted to do all my mixing and thinning before class. I also wanted to test the “size,” or thickened water, I made the night before (with some of the water reserved in case of an island wide shut down). I was worried that the formula I used last time I did this in Germany might not be the appropriate one for warmer, more humid, Hawai’i. I was right. Not tragic, but I’ll mix up the rest of the batch a bit thicker.

Anyhoo, my Jr. Redhead was really curious about what I was making, so I enlisted her help in floating each color on the size as I mixed it and let her be in charge of swirling and combing to make patterns. She had a ball and my new airbrush colors are intense! We made the pebbly background above by swirling some cool colors and then flicking the whole thing with a bit of dispersant which made all the paint run away, leaving “blank” spaces. I’m feeling much more confident about the class and the kid-friendly projects were a great way to kill two birds with one stone (ha, that pun just snuck up on me).

It’s that time again — the Twelve by Twelve reveal date. This time we were to create something based on Blue and White with a touch of Black. Head on over to see all the great interpretations.

I’m not one to go out and buy the latest gadget. I believe I can make just as wonderful things with a rotary cutter, rectangular ruler, and home sewing machine, or a needle, thread, fabric scraps and junky paper, as I could with a long arm machine, pre-cut templates, specialty cutters, and colorful pins. However, my 44 year old, hyperopic eyes aren’t so good at threading needles anymore and the lovely lady at our local stitching shop, Fiddlesticks, suggested this little goody:

It has got to be the best thing since sliced bread! It’s too big for quilting betweens, but it will thread just about anything into just about any other needle. And it doesn’t pull apart after two uses like those needle threaders with the thin wire loop. I love it, love it, love it. And how do I know I love it so much? I’ve been using it every day for the last several weeks on my 12×12 “Blue and White with a Touch of Black” challenge.

Our reveal day is on 1 March. In the mean time, this is the back before I faced it.

While most of the country is enveloped in snow, I am here to bring a little sunshine (or make readers insanely jealous). As part of my ploy to hang out with Deborah as much as possible we met her and her crew at Hanauma Bay for some snorkeling.

We had not yet been, and this snorkeling mecca was on our must-do list. The water is pretty clear and we actually saw a wider variety of fish than we had on our Molokini snorkel day last summer.

There was interesting coral and some anenomes, and the cutest little polka dotted box fish:

And what’s this we’re pointing at?

That’s our state fish, the Humuhumunukunukuapuaa! Which sounds even funnier when screamed excitedly through a snorkel. The kids were thrilled to see and instantly recognize the fish who’s name they’ve been practicing so enthusiasticly.

My big excitement was going further out into the bay with Deborah’s husband and brother in law to see even more fish on the back side of the reef. And, like all good tourists, we were really hoping to see a turtle. And we did! After a quick sighting, it reappeared a few minutes later and we floated with it, very relaxed, for a good 20 minutes. That was cool!

That was the best Furlough Friday yet!

How cool is this? Gerrie called it a trifecta of talented young artists and I can’t disagree. The serendipitous convergence of Deborah’s vacation and Robin’s island hopping for kid stuff allowed us to get together for lunch. We had a little show and tell and lots and lots of talking. Good stuff about artistic direction, current projects, future directions…. I am definitely hopped up on creative girlfriend power. Must go work on projects NOW.

Thank you thank you Deborah and Robin for your generosity of time (and books). I look forward to the next time our paths can cross.

Yet another bloggy connection has been made. Deborah and I have been following each other’s blogs for years. She’s the one who convinced me to join the Twelve by Twelve group, and we are now co-authors with the rest of the “Twelves” of a book about the project. Brenda has made a chart noting which of us have met in real life, and now we can add another line!

I often wonder when I meet someone whom I’ve gotten to know online if the real person is going to be like I imagined them, or if my imagination is way off base. Gerrie’s voice was different than the one in my head (I think I was expecting something huskier, though I don’t know why) and I had somehow expected Natalya to seem more Russian than New York even though I knew both are big influences. Deborah was exactly as I had imagined her to be — though she said I was shorter than what she imagined.

The fun part though is to find out that yes, through our blogs, we really have come to know each other and, at least from my side, we hit it off well. Lots of talking about our artwork, the book project, our Twelve by Twelve work, our kids, living in different places — all the good stuff friends talk about. I am so grateful to have met a community of like minded people online and to be able to extend that connection every now and then to my real life.

One of the members of the quilt guild I belong to was asked by a local clothing company if she could organize some sewers to make pillowcases from factory scraps which the company  could then donate to deployed troops as a taste of home. Our “payment” would be all the scraps too small for the patchwork pillows. Of course I’ll sew for troops, and extra scraps are always fun, so I agreed to participate. As I was cutting out my 6″ squares, I was daydreaming about what to do with the oddly shaped  scraps. I pulled out the few hawaiian fabrics already in my stash. And then it hit me — a pineapple block! Has anyone made a pineapple log cabin quilt using aloha shirt fabric? If not, then why? It seems so obvious to me now.

Here’s a photo from my mom showing the Ripple Afghan in it’s new home. Fits right in.