Creative Life Sampler

  Honestly, interaction with social media is a relatively new phenomenon for me. Ten years ago I scoffed at the idea, for so many reasons, not the least of which was what I perceived as the pitfalls of being so attached to technology. I had no interest in any of it, until I decided I had something to share: my work and perspective on creating. So I started this blog, then branched out with an Instagram account in the same name.  Predictably, I've had to learn to balance activity on these forums with actually creating work, not to mention a personal life. Sometimes I'm more successful than others. Lately I've been focusing on short posts to Insta, using it to direct viewers to the blog for detailed information on a new project, an experience, etc. There's still a tension between working on what I love and telling people about it, but things have been going pretty smoothly, . . . Until last weekend, when an issue I had quietly dreaded presented itself. I woke up to the me...

Appliqué Improv. #3 Just finished another improvisational quilt, the third piece created with cut away shapes from earlier appliqué and reverse appliqué projects. In this case the khaki shapes were arranged on this lovely batik fabric of greens, golds, and purples and a matching purple was chosen to extend the design horizontally. The batik shapes have become the focus here and echo hand quilting has been used to emphasize the motion of the shapes. In contrast, the solid purple on the right has been simply treated with straight lines. Extensive seed stitching has been done in the khaki background and it continues to the left over a strip of the same purple.  It's interesting to see how this heavy stitching has changed that purple stripe. Seems like something to explore further: how can the visual impact of a color be altered by hand stitching alone?