Joyce Makes Art

In The Studio :: Terrie's Book

The first book, other than my own, that I've worked in for the In The Studio Round Robin is Terrie Lightfoot's beautiful house-shaped book.  Since the whole idea behind this book is to explore source's of inspiration, I decided to explore how whim and whimsy could take the same idea and go different directions with it.

I started with three pages that I prepared identically.  Using pages from an old book, I cut out three blocks of old text and glued them onto each page.  From there, I left the pages out on my table, with no intentions about what to do or how to work on them.

As it happened, I worked on the pages serially, completing one, then moving on to the others.  I seemed to have a bit of trouble getting started with the first one.  It sat out for quite some time, with just the image of the girl on it.  I starred at it a lot, before it came together one Saturday morning.



It's an unusual division of visual space on a page for me, but I was happy with the colors and using the dry brush technique to create a little house for the girl to live in.  Best of all were these words from some of the text I had glued to the page that jumped out at me.



The next page happened one afternoon, when I was playing around with using rubber stamps to create a tone on tone background.  I could hear Ellie, fussing at her Dad and her brothers in the next room -- some imagined breach of etiquette.  I wasn't sure whether to laugh or be embarassed.  She sounded just like me.  The phrase popped into my head and the page followed.  The tags are mica over bits of old paper, and they are tied onto the page with fragments of vintage lace.



The final page was actually started before the preceeding one, but only in the sense that I had dropped a piece of startling copper patina blue silk ribbon onto the page and knew it would be a blue and brown page.  I worked on it last.

For some reason I had difficulty scanning the full page, but I liked the scan of the bottom a lot.

Why I haven't been knitting.

Happy Thanksgiving (a day late). We seem to be celebrating by going from starbucks to starbucks.

And, Another Hat

Two days in a seminar equals one more Noro Hat. Ellie loved the one I did for my cousin so much that she begged for one for herself. I love the colors and I think she is really happy with it.

Copper Patina

If you've been reading my blog for much time at all, you know that one of my obsessions is replicating the rich colors of aged patinas in my yarns.  I love weathered woods and old bits of metal that have take on the patina of time.  My favorite of all is copper, as it takes on a patina with age.  One of my original colorways was based on an old copper mailbox.

Recently, I've been doing the Copper Patina colorway again.  I decided to try it on a new yarn, the seacell/merino blend called Sea Wool, a sock yarn.  The result made me very happy.



I've kept most of it for myself, but have added a few skeins at Etsy, a few on Elliebelly, and the last two will be available here on Thursday at noon.

Another Noro Hat

Does anyone else have a pattern they just love knitting?  Something simple?  Something you can make three or four, or perhaps more of, without getting in the least bored?

For me, that pattern is Saartje's hat.  It's a delightfully simple pattern.  Knit eight rows, then purl four, knit four throughout, including in the decreases.  Saartje makes her patterns available for free, as an added bonus.  The rich texture of this pattern -- the purl rows poof out -- makes it look like an incredible feat of knitting.

This hat



is the second one I've made using this pattern.  It is for a favorite cousin who is fortunately not a blog reader (it gets so hard to blog at this time of year without giving it all away!)  I love how it looks like a beehive viewed from the top.



And the colorway is sufficiently rough and tumble to insure no loss of mancards (if you don't watch Scrubs, you should, my teenagers put me onto this show), which is apparently an important thing if you want to get guys to wear things you knit for them.  I'm hoping to finish this one tonight and it's going to be a struggle to wrap it up, as I would really love to keep it.

My Artwork and Knitting are still largely limited to projects that are portable enough to go along to Ellie's ballet rehearsals.  Although this constraint has been difficult in someways -- I have a growing pile of knitted items that need to be blocked/seams sewn/finished, it has also lead me to take on some smaller interesting projects, like the soldered oranaments I've done for the kids' teachers, that might have not come into being otherwise.  Next up are some presents for some of my closest girlfriends.  I don't want to give away much of the surprise, so I'll just leave you with one little picture of the start of the projects, and you will have to guess, until they are unveiled.

Getting Ready for Christmas

When you have four children, and lots of wonderful teachers, finding Christmas presents can be something of an ordeal, especially when you wait for the last minute.  This year, I decided to try and make them all.  To get an early headstart, I've been doing some collaging while waiting at ballet rehearsals  I decided to do little mini-Christmas themed collages and solder the edges to make ornaments.

The collages have been lots of fun.  The soldering was interesting.  I hadn't soldered in months when I did the first two a couple of weeks ago.  This is the front and back of the first one.

And then, this one.

Fortunately, after soldering about a dozen more, it seemed like the solder was less lumpy and I was back in the groove.  I ended up with a nice little stack of vintage santa ornaments.

Even the bad cats liked them.

It's still too way early, but I'm in the mood for the holidays now.

Tuesday = Surprises

Today is not a typical day in our house.  It is Veterans' Day, which means everyone is home from school and work.

I got up early to photograph some yarn.  I wanted to get it up on my website before we went off to play with the kids today.  (And, it's now previewing here and will be available for sale on Thursday).

While I was taking pictures, I glanced off the porch and noticed that towards the back of the tangled cottage garden that is our frontyard, hidden beneath some foliage but now becoming visible as the summer flowers are dying back, we had.....

sweet little pear-shaped cherry tomatoes.

My wonderful friend Eva gave me a vine of them at the beginning of the summer two years ago.  Somehow, a little volunteer must have sprung up late this summer.  It was full of beautiful, ripe tomatoes.

I called the kids, who were only too happy to help pick them off the vine and pop them into their greedy little mouths.

They were absolutely delicious.  A really wonderful, early morning surprise.

We sat outside on the porch after we ate them.  The bricks were cold.  It was so cold Ollie went back inside for shoes.  We treasure cool, crisp fall weather in Alabama.  It felt wonderful.

And, sitting out there, in the quiet of the morning, we discovered another surprise.

It was beautiful.  I had first noticed the fall foliage the day after the election.  Our neighborhood was suddenly orange and red and gold and yellow.  It was spectacular against a clear blue sky -- so blue you felt like you were looking through it into something beyond.

Today, we are out in full color.

I wish you a day full of surprises too!  (and, I promise to get caught up on art and knitting posts, later on this week).

Knitting To Vote

It's a great day in America.  One of my neighbors just waited an hour and a half in line to vote -- in our teeny, tiny little Alabama neighborhood.  I couldn't be happier -- it's what participatory democracy is all about.  Seeing people engaged in and taking part in an election is one of the pinnacles of the American political process. Personally, I would be willing to wait all day.

Probably, that is because, in addition to being a devout believer in our democracy, I'm also a knitter.

This

is the start of a hat I'm knitting as a Christmas present.  I figure I can make a lot of progress on it while standing in line, chatting with friends, watching my 18 year old vote for the first time, and enjoying the beautiful weather.  I can't wait.

Go out and vote!

In The Studio

I'm sending out my book for a new round robin today, and I'm really excited about it.  It's called In The Studio, and it's an RR that is designed to explore the sources of inspiration and why we make art.  I like "why" questions, so this process appeals to me a lot.

The book is a 6x8" ring bound book.  I've taken it apart to work on it.  This is the cover, the text reads "looking into things."

The inside of the cover uses the same design motif.

I journaled about my goals for the round robin on some tags on the first page and added a little silver bauble that says "grace" at the top of the page.  The fibers are some tussah silk that I spin into a thick yarn to anchor the tags to the page.

This is one of the first pieces I did for the book, several weeks ago.

I decided to include a piece I cut out from the paper I line my studio table with.  I'm always fascinated by how great this paper looks after I've been working on top of it for several weeks, and also with the transformations it goes through.

And finally, this piece on the inside of the back cover is my favorite.  She sat out on my table for close to a month before I glued her down, and I'm still thinking about adding a tiny word on her dress.  The word that kept sticking in my mind was "foretell" which was too big, so she is wordless for the moment.

I've done some scans with her and am planning on using her in some soldered charms (I'm hoping to make one for each of the kids' teachers for the holidays).  She started life with the plan being to turn her into a fabric collage, but I ended up deciding to place her more simply.  I'm not positive I made the right choice, so I may have to work with her some more.

I have Terrie Lightfoot's beautiful house-shaped book, next up for me in this round robin, out on my studio table and can't wait to work on it later this week, probably while waiting for election results to come in Tuesday night.  Terrie's book is gorgeous and a wonderful treat to look forward to working in it!

Happy Halloween

We had a house full of wee ghouls for Halloween and lots of fun.  Although the boys were content spending a happy forty-five minutes walking up and down our street, collecting candy, before they came back to the house to count and share; the girls took their dads all over the neighborhood for hours.  I'm sorry I didn't get a picture of their pained faces when they made it home!

Here are my own two -- a ninja and a dark angel.

I hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!