New creations from some of our team members

Snow Candy Wrist Cuff Hand Embroidered LIMITED EDITION from WaterROSE.

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From team member Elleellee
Pretty new green crocheted slippers.










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New from member, Jacistuff, this lovely crocheted lamb scarf from her shop.













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From team memer Clubaloha.
















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From team member Elleellee

Black Bag Terrorizes Beautiful Black Giant Chicken Chaka

Well, you might say that I just happened to be in the right place at the right time, in the southeast U.S.A., along with my trusted camera. It happened on a nice cool day in late August 2009. As I was photoing my new line of lunch bags in the FRONT yard, all hell broke loose in the BACK yard.

My six teenagers (chickens) emitted the familar loud warning sound that I hear when a suspect (dog, cat or whatever they feel unsafe around) enters their territory. Upon hearing the panicky distressed sounds, I immediately picked up a stick (I keep several in strategic places for times like this so to always be prepared to fight off the enemy, a dog or cat) and ran to the back yelling, without seeing a single thing, "get away, get away". -For I just knew that the biggest dog in town had encringed upon the territory of my precious little angels . (They do have a secure area, but when they come out to graze, I constantly monitor them.)

Well, when I finally reached the back yard (it seemed to have taken half an eternity) all that I could make of the scene was that my lovely Black Giant teenager, Chaka, as in Chaka Khan, had somehow gotten one of her legs caught in a black plastic bag, and was fluttering about, and running in every direction, with the entire team of six squaking to the top of their gizzards, and more frightened than a chicken should ever have to experience. How the bag got into the yard, I will leave for Kojak to figure out.

Now, of course, she would not stand still and allow me to remove the bag; but I did manage to capture several photos of the event. Any attempts to approach her, and she would take off again with "her" bag trailing. Upon realizing that I would not be able to rescue her, I returned to my photo session. About 5 minutes later, I returned to the back to attempt another rescue of her from the bag, and was pleased to find her just fine and grazing with her flock again. I will never know for sure exactly how she managed to remove the bag. A day or two later, I did find the bag in the lower yard, mostly shredded and caught on a small stump. My guess is that the bag somehow, during her running session, became caught on the stump and WALA, Chaka became free.

Crazy Appliqued Lunchbag Team Challenge

A lunchbag challenge was suggested for our team; with a deadline completion of August 31, 2009. Here is what two of our members came up with:
This bag was made by our StarryHomeCrafts . (click on either of the photos to be taken to Starry's Etsy shop where this lovely and very practical bag is for sale.)




























This bag was made by Quiltsalad:
(click on either of the photos to be taken to Quiltsalad's Etsy shop where this lovely bag is for sale.)

Trial and Error

Sometimes when we see something gorgeous we forget we are seeing the end result of a long process. Beautiful heirloom art is not sprung from a moment of finesse but from many moments of both success, error and skill building. It is trial and error that sparks our creativity, gives us free rein and takes us in directions we might not have immediately chosen.

One of the nicest ways I've seen to encourage this type of anything goes, just create attitude is a Journal Quilt. These are small, usually
8 x 10 quilts which can be done in a variety of mediums. I first heard about these from the Quilting Arts television show run on PBS. Patricia Bolton (Pokey) is the host of this show; a great one for sparking your imagination.

The idea of journal quilts is to encourage you to continually create and try new techniques. Because of its small size, you don't have to feel like you're committing to a large project. It's similar to a sketchbook for your various attempts and reminds me of knitting and crochet samplers. As with journal quilts, there is no reason why this same concept could not translate to other fiber arts as well.

This past Saturday, I caught another of my favorite shows: America Quilts Creativity, episode 913. This episode had Pokey on as a quest and to my great delight, she actually walked us through her method for creating one of her journal quilts. Click here for the pdf file that gives you the steps from that show.

Mistakes often take us into new areas of creativity, opening our eyes to new possibilities. Use that freedom and try some journal quilting!

Creating a Design Wall

The things I ponder over

As I'm browsing the web I sometimes come across terms I'm not really familiar with. One of them was a Quilting Design Wall. I had seen it often but as quilting is newer in my skill set and being a starving artist, I had not come across it in my earlier years.

Fortunately, I've discovered the wondrous power of Google. Where there is a need, there is a google search string that will find it for you. So, for all of you other fiber artists who would like to fix up their studio (my lovely little term for all the crap I have piled up in my livingroom), here's a very nice article to help us out.

"How to Make a Quilt Design Wall: Best Way to See Whether Fabrics Work Together Before Quilt Assembly by © Christine Mann"
-->To Read more, click here

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Have fun!