Creative Life Sampler

 Happy Thanksgiving! The textured fruit of the Arbutus Unedo- the Strawberry Tree 2020 has been filled with challenges for all of us and may leave people wondering why we should set aside a day for thanksgiving, especially this year.  We are being called to pare down our plans, curtail celebrations, and put our grand gatherings on hold. In essence, we've been asked to simplify and at this point we can view circumstances as an imposition or an opportunity. The hidden gift of simplifying our Thanksgiving plans, (and possibly all our plans for the traditionally busy, festive holidays between now and January 1), is the quiet space it gives us. It's not always a comfortable or familiar space in our hectic world, but it is a gift to ourselves, a place to really think about past, present, and future blessings and to be at peace.   This year will pass into the history books; normal activities will eventually resume. A positive side effect of this year of deprivation may be an affirmati

Creative Problem Solving Bosch Laser Square GTL2 Anyone in a position to observe a creative person in their natural habitat gradually becomes acquainted with the tools they employ, the terms they use, their work habits and their joy in creating. It would be natural to assume that, if an artist is continuously creating, they have "all the bases covered," and it's better to steer clear of this area when it comes to gift giving. But the gift giver has an opportunity to use their own creativity to think outside the confines of what is comfortable and familiar to the artist, to bring a fresh perspective, and find something special for the artisan in their life. Start with asking two simple questions:                   1) What is your favorite part of your creative process?                        and                   2) What is your least favorite part of creating? With that information in hand, you can begin to think about either enhancing their creative experience and workpl

 The Color Experiment Continued Rainbow Hexagons II This summer I created a series of  blocks by using strips of batik fabric in the color progression of a rainbow, building up from a small hexagon center. This was an interesting experiment in color placement because there are so many possible variations.  But once again I ended up with a bunch of blocks and no real plan to join them together. My first attempt at placement resulted in the spontaneous decision to go with a more organic form and lots of open space. (See:  https://creativelifesampler.blogspot.com/2020/07/newly-completed-just-quilted-this-baby.html  ) For this second version I've used up the remainder of my blocks and placed them on a grid. I've allowed for some "breathing room" between the blocks by placing triangles of the border color between them so they float on the background. The overall color progression is still apparent and, if you look carefully, you can see a star pattern emerge.  I did photog

Shades of Purple, Simple Pattern Purple Snowballs I'm very close to working through all the polka dot fabric I've accumulated over time. In October I created this large crib quilt, revisiting the simple block pattern called Snowballs .  Instead of using the block to fill the whole top, open spaces have been incorporated so the pattern does not extent to all the edges. Originally I was interested in how the pattern would look using only a white/purple combination for all the blocks. My thought was to have them progress from light at the top to dark at the bottom. But it evolved. As I was working with the fabrics, appealing parings of the various purples presented themselves and I decided to introduce solid blocks of color to contrast with the white/purple theme. It is quilted in a rambling, loopy design which gives the quilt a cohesive texture and pulls it all together.  You may recall seeing this block back in June when I challenged myself to work in shades of brown. This was s