Just For Janis (but everyone else can read it too)

When I posted a note to the QuiltMavericks saying I'd started a blog, FellowMav Janis said, and I quote (but I guess the quotation marks would have told you that even if I hadn't said so, eh?), "Ok, Deb....lets see something in your blog about what you're working on these days. I just LOVE your work and I KNOW you just HAVE to have SOMETHING going on, even if you do have a bit of cruise brain!" Well, the fact is that for the past week or so I really haven't done anything more artistic than doodling a Vague Possible Future Idea for Something on a piece of scrap paper. And that's about where I expect my productivity level to remain until I'm past the Cruise Brain stage. But before CB kicked in with a vengeance I DID finish a couple of projects. So, just because Janis asked (and because she said she loves my work! :::beam:::), here's a little ramble about the last quilty thing I did. (You can click on the pic if you want to see a larger version.) The last thing I finished, about a week ago, was for an Ugly Fabric Challenge that Frank issued on the kerrismatics email list. Frank sent those who signed up a fat quarter of fabric he considered to be hideous beyond redemption. It was bright pink, verging on magenta, with various width stripes in shades of white, yellow, orange, and blue. Other than being pink (a color I touched on in the Handbag Ramble), I didn't think the fabric was all that bad. Ok, yeah...it looked a little like a cabana stripe on acid. But in DebWorld that isn't necessarily considered a Bad Thing. I'm trying to reconstruct my thought processes on how I came up with what I did....really I am. But the paths my mind follows are often too twisty for even me to follow. I need some sort of Brain Breadcrumbs to scatter as I work. If I may digress for a moment....this is why I hate writing artist's statements for exhibits. Oh, I can do it if I must, and make it sound Professional and Appropriate and all that crappola, but really...when I'm done with a piece, I'm done. I don't want to THINK about it enough to write something about it at that point. Maybe I should start writing artist's statements FIRST and then make stuff to match? Hhmmm.... But anyway, back to the Ugly Challenge. I decided I wanted to feature the fabric in all its pink stripy-ness and not try to tame or disguise it. And I started wondering how many different ways I could feature it. And that got me thinking of doing a series of "snapshots" from the life of this ugly fabric...all the different places it could be and things it could do. And then I thought "Hey!...I could do a different scene for each month, like a calendar!" At first I just pictured doing these blocks and arranging them traditionally with sashing. But then one day I huffed some Pledge or something and thought "No! That's too easy! Wouldn't it be much more FUN and INTERESTING to make 12 itty-bitty (6" x 6") individually bound quilts and then attach them to a grid of black ribbon?! Yeah, let's do THAT! 'Cause I'm not nearly insane enough already!" So that's what I did. Here's the evidence. And as I informed Marion and Dijanne, August is a clearance tank top on a headless, armless, green mannequin. It is not (unfortunately) a green hamster in a swimsuit, as they suspected. Warning: Abrupt Change of Subject! Today was my wedding anniversary. Johnny and I have been married 16 years. The cruise I keep thinking about and talking about CONSTANTLY is our gift to us, from us. Aren't we good to us? Yay Us! :-) For the day itself, we slept late. We went out for Mexican food and we bought books (at a store, not at the restaurant, although wouldn't that be a fun way to pass the time while you wait on your food to arrive?). We went for a walk in the sunshine. It was a good day.