I wasn’t sure I would have some stuff for today, as I’m not planning on showing much else of the two major pieces I’m working on, beyond talking about the process. I did have some moments of panic yesterday, as I finally gave in to taking the sewing machine to Cathey’s Sew and Vac here in Tucson – just couldn’t figure out what was going on with the tension. And I was thinking – two weeks without the machine…..

Turns out it was bobbin tension – they very nicely  did “triage” and Mary Sara showed me exactly what was wrong and helped me fix the bobbin case. I am definitely planning some private lessons with her after the first of the year. I brought my machine home 30 minutes later, good as new, with specific instructions to OIL MY MACHINE. Will do.

Then it was back to work on the “winter” piece, as I wanted to take a break from the major sewing. I wasn’t sure the marbled FQ and the gray I bought would work, but they do. The only thing I would do differently, should I make another one, is to get a much lighter gray. Once the log cabin blocks were done, we made the mistake of trying to choose border fabrics in a yellowed light at night. We literally went through every blue in the stash; the blue organza seemed like neon when up against the piece – even though the shade was exactly what we needed. We settled on a piece of black we’ve been saving – won’t need much to finish borders and binding.

In the light of day, everything seemed to work pretty well together. Here’s a peek. It definitely looks icy. And I was pleased with what I was able to do with directionality.

Now, here comes the weird part…..I have been saving the “vine” from the strong of autumn leaves we bought, thinking I could maybe use it. I read the blogs of a lot of mixed media collage artists, and I am amazed at what they put in their work. My friend Anne was delighted to get left-over slide casings – just because she thought of something she could maybe do with them….so I’m guessing this habit is catching….

I thought about trying for a wintery twig effect. It looks like I will have to take the wire off from around the pieces and then carefully attach them where I want them…..should be interesting to see what happens.

Hopefully it will be done for a “reveal” next Wednesday….yup….too much HGTV…..

  It’s Tuesday and time to show you what I’ve found on line this week. Interesting assortment of goodies, not to mention I’ve spent what seems like hours on YouTube, as a result of some postings on Facebook. I didn’t realize episodes of Whose Line Is It Anyway? was available, and there is some really funny stuff there. So here goes….

From  Cool Hunting, yet another reason to go back to Maui – the local art show weekly at the Sheraton.

Also from Cool Hunting (can yout ell I love this site? Check it out!) comes a projected new art installation that reminds me of the work of Christo – a light project for the Bay Bridge. Also reminds me of the Sydney Bridge during the Olympics in Australia.

And again from Cool hunting comes quick pics of opening art shows in Miami, part of Art+Miami.

Anish Kapoor

The Best Article Every Day sums up the year in 45 awesome photos.

zeitlosimagery

From across the Pond comes this delightful set of paper sculptures.

From a former student of mine, Maryann, comes Star Wars Light Saber cello duel. Very cool!

From The Best Article Every Day comes the top video shares for the year. Some I’ve seen, plus a couple of weird ones, and some really unusual ones…..love the David Beckham vid – going to use it to show quadratics……..

Of importance is this website of the National Aphasia Association. While all of us are cheering on the recovery of Gabby Giffords, the new media are not mentioning this valuable resource. Take a look to better your own understanding.

Window to Art I discovered when I had to do lesson plans for some middle school art classes. I really enjoyed exploring these, and I set myself a task to complete a group of them on my own. Some very good basic art element instruction here. Just as an example, here’s a screens hot of some of the offerings:

And finally, Brilliantly Sarcastic Responses…with a little art assist…..

Have a great week!

To follow up on last week’s Cyber Monday post, here’s an interesting article from The Future Buzz. Here’s an excerpt:

Holiday gifts

At my last company, my group had a slew of vendors and we received all sorts of gifts during the holidays – wine, branded shirts, “towers” of goodies, and so on. We gave most of it out around the office and some went to the landfill. The only gift I remember from those years was from a small agency, Swirl, that gave us the opportunity to donate, on their dime, to one of a few charities — it’s 10 years later and I’m still talking about them.  No doubt, some of the gifts and incentives companies are giving away this year are really cool (feel free to send that extra iPad my way), but we all know far too much of it goes to waste – literally. And the recipient probably won’t tell his friends about the fruit basket.

Charitable gift cards have meaning for the recipient, change lives for the better, strengthen a company’s image, and won’t fill up landfills.  Some of the best alternatives:

• The Glue Network: recipient chooses among humanitarian projects in nine categories.  Uniqueness: offers broad choices for the recipient and inherently generates strong branding and PR for the company.
• Kiva: recipient chooses among global micro-lending opportunities.  Uniqueness: micro-finance is powerful in addressing global poverty and Kiva is a respected pioneer.
• Donors Choose: recipient can support a specific need for a teacher and classroom.  Uniqueness: projects are crowd-sourced, specific and support education which is the cause category of most concern to Americans today.

Every year during the holidays I try to focus on meaningful gifts for those close to us. And every year I am appalled at the commercialism. This year it just seems over the top, almost desperate, and not necessarily the retailers. A lot of people seem desperate.

I’ve made a decision for next year: for all the family members I will be donating the same amount for gifts to a nonprofit of their choice, preferably one they already support. This seems to be in the true sense of the season. I haven’t decided just what I’ll do in terms of company marketing, but I am certain that whatever is decided, a portion will go to a nonprofit of my choice.

This has been an interesting week of introspection. I have some interesting marketing opportunities, but I am hesitant to take them. The positivity I’m feeling is more of a home-bred sense of being at home and sewing/quilting/trying new art projects, along with some earning of additional travel money. Maybe it’s age catching up. Even ten years ago I would have probably been gung-ho to get the business up and making lots of additional money. The energy just isn’t there right now. With hubby not well, we need to make good decisions about our time together, and that means getting on the road as much as possible. We’re marbling now for the fun of it; hubby really enjoys what he has been doing and what opportunities we can have with some traveling – like going to Seattle the end of March.

I guess it means taking a long, serious look at what is really important at this stage of our lives.

  I am really fortunate to have a couple of good friends who can help me with a critique when I am working on a new piece. Sometimes the piece flows, and sometimes I’m blocked in making decisions and moving ahead. It is made more complicated by the fact that I am trying to use our marbled fabrics to create unique art pieces. In surfing the web on a regular basis, I don’t see anyone else doing what I’m attempting to do with marbled fabric in the art quilt movement.

There are a lot of things to consider in developing these pieces of fiber art. Are my sewing skills strong enough? Are my quilting skills advanced enough? Does the fabric speak to us? Can the design tell an interesting story? Can I work with the principles of design?

In looking at all these questions, there are two that I am the weakest in, and this is where my group of friends can really help. Quilting skills and design principles.

Momcat is my first voice. She is a digital artist in her own right, and a self-taught expert in Greek pottery, among all the other skills in being a Renaissance woman. Suzan is my overall digital partner and a superb, published quilter and designer in her own right. Karin is a water color artist with a very strong sense of color and overall design organization. Hubby is the marbler and can see things in the designs that the rest of us miss.

I am at a point in this new piece where I needed advice. Which way should the piece hang, for one – vertical or horizontal. Usually that’s one of the last questions for me, because by the time I’m done, the piece has usually told me what it wants. With this piece, I need to decide this now, as I will need to work on the shading with a light source from the “northwest,” which is how scientific illustration is done. I was leaning in one way, and my group confirmed that. They pointed out that I already had a lot of the “shadows” developing on their own from the new orientation.

The second was size and pattern. I am fine with all the quilting on half of the piece, but the other half seems naked of color and looks like it would require some serious thread work that wouldn’t necessarily add to the overall effect. I had been thinking about potentially cutting away half of the piece. We looked at that possibility, and once we folded back some of the fabric (which had never occurred to me), we knew it needed to be tall and narrow, not wide and thick.

Now, Momcat had sent me some of her photos of rocks and lichen that Dali had painted, and I LOVED the lichen. I was initially thinking of marbling some very small silk flowers and then attaching them with some thread painting. The group didn’t like that idea – felt they were not “tough” enough for the texture of lichen. Momcat disappeared, only to come back with a small vial of green stuff that she proceeded to spread on the one or two rocks that are already green. Perfect! Upon closer look – they are very fine chopped-up pieces of old money from the Denver Mint. Who knew? I guess now this is a “mixed media” piece…..We are also thinking about using some coconut Husk or actual moss from a pet store – need to think that through.

Next question: facing vs. binding vs. frame. How do I want to finish this? I don’t see a basic binding. We talked about fabric as an inner mat and as a frame. We looked at serging the edges – which I have done with pieces in the past, much to one gallery owner’s chagrin – “wasn’t finished properly” was her verdict. But I always let the piece tell me what it wants. I am thinking this piece is telling me it doesn’t want anything more to constrain it beyond a facing that wraps to the back.

The final discussion revolved around light, medium, and dark. I know if I were to take a picture of this and turn it to black and white, everything would pretty much be medium values. I know it needs more dark, so I need to think through how to do that with thread…..or moss…..or coconut husk…..or…….actual small stones…….

I left energized, ready to complete the piece. Amazing how being with a great group of like-minded visual people can  make a difference!

Wow, I’ve written 60o blog posts! This from someone who could never keep a diary. I guess I just didn’t have the technology waaaayyyy back when. I have new work for this Photoshop Friday, but I thought it would be fun to view some of the first posts.

My first entry:

I finally did it! I set up a blog so I can write about our marbling and related art thoughts. I’ll be posting photos of the new Photoshop class I am starting. Be kind – I am learning how to take criticism!! This has been something I have been meaning to do as a way of recording process and product, and at the same time motivate me to do more fiber work. And…I can tell my students I am finally “almost” as technologically savvy as they are! (January 26, 2007…..)

I probably wasn’t convinced this would go beyond the Photoshop classes I was starting at the time. You can see my very first Photoshop drawing here. I have since changed blogging platforms, and I don’t have my backup close at hand, so the link will have to do.

Today my work is based either on photographic images I have taken or some of the marbled fabrics we have created. The piece I’m working on today is from fabric. Hubby was downloading pictures for ebay this week, and I saw this picture of fabric from a distance, and I said, hmmmm……

So here’s the original fabric.

Then I started working with some shapes from each section of the fabric.

Then I felt I needed to change the background for more ocntrast.

I’m not sure this background color is going to stay…I have also been playing around with gradients, and I think one of those might work.

Yup, definitely like this one the best.

Comments? What do you think? What else does it need?

I think Tara Reed is pretty amazing. I bought two of her ebooks as I prepare my collections and look for a licensing agent. Yes, I’m an affiliate, and if you sign up or buy something, I will make a small commission. But as I have stated before, I only present to you  materials and people I have done business with and am completely satisfied with the product. You can’t go wrong with Tara.

Number 1, she has an extensive library of articles to read, free. Free. LOADS of information, and with the caveats that licensing is hard work and you need to do your homework.

Number 2, she’s got a great blog with lots of ideas in each. Again, free.

Number 3, her work is quality, all the way. Tara makes her living licensing her art. She’s learned the hard way, and she has a wealth of information.

Number 4, great products available. Her Repeat Patterns in Photoshop answered a lot of questions for me, as I stumbled through teaching myself a very complex program. My first repeat pattern as I worked through the ebook:

Browsing her site is well worth the time. And…if you are further along in developing your collections and ready to “get out there,” Tara, along with Maria Brophy (another master at licensing) has a new book out on understanding licensing contracts.   I have a different book that is pretty convoluted in understanding; not Tara and Maria.

Now, if you need help setting goals – and accomplishing them – something I’ve had trouble with in the past……check out her Goal Setting wheel. There is also a blog to go along with this – free – with Tara’s current goals. It’s always nice to go along with someone as they work through the same problems we artists have! It’s December 8, and I know while many of us are finishing up commitments for the year, a lot of us are thinking about next year’s goals. I just wanted to put a few things out there for you to think about…..

I’m thinking NOT another gimmick.

Insights from SewCalGal has an article on tools that scrapbookers use that we quilters might want to adopt….interesting thoughts. I was pretty impressed with what I was seeing as I went through this article. My nieces are in to scrapbooking, and both of them use digital software to maintain scrapbooks on line. Carie has made some amazing pages in the past, and while I was envious – and bought the supplies, it seemed too much like work.

However, I have been know to spend a lot of time with VistaPrint and Shutterfly to prepare marketing materials. So why not another source for creating goodies? Here’s some of the reasons from the article for using scrapbook software.

1. Create an album of all your quilts using a variety of formats, embellishments, text opportunities, and more. Could be yet another way of presenting your materials to potential customers, especially if you don’t have a website.

2. Maybe you want to create a greeting card for a friend. You control everything you want, and it looks to be easier than some of the other online programs I have been using.

3. Maybe you need to create a flyer to increase awareness of a quilting event. I can think of two local arts/crafts group that should have taken advantage of this software……

4. You want to create cool headers, badges, clip art and more for your blog. I’m liking this one….

5. You want to share multiple photos. This appeals to me, because sometimes the blogging platform software just doesn’t do what you want it to for photos.

SewCalGal uses My Memories, which has some free pages available, and the program seems to have a reasonable price. I’m not sure I want to learn another program, and I don’t know how much actual photo editing you can do in this program. A Google search revealed a lot of sites, some completely free, and some with hidden costs. Lots of contests, galleries of pages, and blogs. If it’s your thing, you have a lot out there to look at.

PS – no compensation for me – I just found the whole thing interesting.

What an interesting week on the web!

From JPG Magazine – shots of toys….how can you not smile?

I'm a Mac by Kristin Repsher

From Oceana, a new idea in gift giving.

From the TED blog comes a conversation with Adam Savage of the Mythbusters….love that show! The science and math is amazing. Here’s an earlier video:

An interesting video from Vimeo – have to start exploring that site some more. 29 Ways to Stay Creative……I do a lot of these already.

29 WAYS TO STAY CREATIVE from TO-FU on Vimeo.

Yes, I am a grammar freak/geek – love all things grammer, thanks to my amazing Latin teacher, Joan Daniels. So this article from The Best Article Every Day is right up my alley.

A GREAT video from the TED folks, this one on using dance instead of power point to teach “big idea” concepts. Got me thinking about using Photoshop and Illustrator to teach algebra…….

Now read this about how he created this.

Thinking about making a video showing your art processes? I am, and this article from SDA – Surface Design Association – was perfect timing. Very detailed and lots of advice.

And…Tristan is Back!!!!!! Tristan’s blog, Enchanted Revelries, is a delight of photos. Here’s one of a dress at the V&A Museum….a mourning gown. Read the story here. Tristan – I like the font……

And in the continuing spirit of sarcasm and bad taste comes this blog post of bad Nativity scenes….coffee alert here……With apologies, I give you the Meat Nativity…..

Wish we had something like this in Tucson! Fashion, Food and more from Chicago’s River East Art Center’s monthly artisanal pop-up.

Send me cool stuff you find!! Enjoy your week!

   Yeah, I know….Cyber Monday was last week….and therein lies my problem.

Getting ready/surviving/marketing the holiday shopping season.

For the last four years or so, we have hardly had anything on line for  November and December, and thus have totally missed the holiday shopping season. This year we have been consistent all year, with hardly missing a week on Ebay and getting the Etsy store up and functioning. We’ve sold gift baskets so far leading up to Thanksgiving, which more than tripled what we’ve brought in for the shopping season in the past. But we have a long way to go……

I am not a big shopper, but I will confess to seeing a deal on Cyber Monday and buying – a real deal on a couple of ebooks on machine quilting designs, which I’ve been drooling over for a while. But I still can’t get excited about revving up holiday shopping.

Is it the commercialism of the holidays, and I subconsciously don’t want to take part? Probably a good chunk. Is it ’cause I’m getting older and want to spend my time on things I really like to do? Again, probably. I am trying to get pieces of passive income going on the website, so I don’t have to do so much work during certain times of the year.

This year it became Cyber Week, much to my dismay. I feel like I should have had something going, but I haven’t had the time – well, to be honest I didn’t make the time. Perhaps next year when we have consciously worked on the newsletter…..but it still is a  cunundrum an issue. Within it are questions about lack of product/pictures on the website; selling from the blog; hyping in the newsletter. It’s interesting in that I do a weekly blog post on marketing, and here is an area I can’t seem to get my head around.

Oh, well, a full year to be thinking about it…I’ll be happy just to get the newsletter up and going……..and make art.

Really? Photoshop Friday? How many Fridays has it been? Too many to count, but I have been back doing some work beyond getting pictures sized for blog entries. I thought I would share how I created my holiday cards this year, of which I am extremely proud…..and obviously not at all humble….oh, well….

Here’s the original marbled paper I used to start.

Here it is transformed into holiday colors.

Now for the ornaments, which were added a layer at a time, and the opacity was taken down so they wouldn’t overwhelm the marbled paper background.

THen I just kept adding ornaments until I was happy with the final product.

It was a fun couple of hours, and it reminds me how much I enjoy playing around with Photoshop…..I need to start doing more.

Some great Photoshop brushes for download. These are the brushes I downloaded for this card. It is amazing how quickly you can increase your brushes just by surfing the web!

  I chose my “Explosion” piece for today because that’s the kind of excitement I feel starting this new season three. Seasons one and two of Cocreating Our Reality were eye-opening and exciting, and for the last few days I have been building up to starting a new journey today. First, I am so blessed to be retired and able to work on art when and where I want to, for as long as I want to. I get to spend every day with my hubby, and life is pretty much wonderful. Health problems – of course, who doesn’t have them at our age. But – that’s not stopping me from living a great life.

I discovered over the last two seasons when it was time to evaluate my goals, that I hadn’t really stretched myself – or thought big enough. So I have been pondering that for the last week or so. What is it I actually want to do?

First and foremost, kind of came to me last night in the moments before sleep, is probably the one most on my mind. I need to take this season and concentrate on me. It sounds selfish, but it isn’t. I have health issues that really need to be addressed, and for so many years they went to the side as other things – students, work, hubby – took their place. If I expect to be as creative for as long as I want, and get out and be politically active, and write – do all the things I want to – than I need to focus on my health. So that is goal number one for this season: take the cholesterol medicine, take my vitamins, watch what I eat, get out regularly and exercise, track my food intake, get some yoga teachings, get my blood readings where they need to be. I actually started thinking this way a few days ago, and I’m pleased to say the exercise has already increased, as well as having a bit more control over appetite.

A second goal is tied in to all this. I am getting a second opinion on my vision issues and will work to find strategies to help with the depth perception and balance issues. A new doctor’s appointment is scheduled for next week Thursday, and I have a teacher friend to talk to about some basic yoga stretches. I always knew this day was coming, and now that it’s here, I need to learn to work with the new limitations.

Overall, for the first time, these two goals seem very positive. One hundred days from now, March 10, I expect that I will have been enormously successful at these first two. That statement alone is a major change for me. It’s very positive, rather than using the word “try.”

Business-wise I have some very specific goals.

Number three in my list is to solve the newsletter/collectors’ information issue. I am, as was said to a friend of mine, “leaving money on the table.” This has to be a regular business goal. I am considering taking Alyson Stanfield’s “Cultivating Your Collectors” class in February. That will depend on a number of things, primarily finances. I am good at reading and implementing, and since I accomplished four of Alyson’s goals in I’d Rather Be in the Studio!, I should be able to accomplish at least three this new season. So: newsletter, portfolio (which we will need for a major event the end of March), and I will look through the list for at least one other. Newsletter once a month should be definitely do-able. A collectors’ newsletter once a quarter should be reasonable. I’m sure there will be others to add here.

Number four is searching out wholesale suppliers for cutting back basic costs of making marbled fabric. As of yesterday I have a new wholesale account with Kona Bay fabrics, as we use their colored cotton quite successfully. We are looking for wholesale sources for premium white cotton, silk/satin ribbon (like Offray), and probably some other materials.

Number five is ramping up our Etsy shop, our Fine Art America galleries, Cafe Press, and looking in to Red Bubble, Three Sisters, and at least one other online selling site. My overall goal in all this is to be able to update these sites once a week, as well as include items from these sites in our soon-to-happen newsletters. I’ve tried setting monetary goals for Etsy and Ebay, and they are very fickle, depending on the economy. I do tweet my Etsy and Ebay offerings once a week, which certainly drives traffic to the site, but I don’t see it converting. However, I know that it is only a matter of time, as is the case with this blog. I am about to hit 1500 viewers per month, so I know it is consistency. (Concerning the blog…when Facebook changed its latest set of operating, my blog numbers dropped. Turns out, on exploration, Networked Blogs was a casualty and needed to be reactivated. Once that happened, I saw numbers increase again…..I am amazed at how net-savvy we need to be these days!)

Art-wise I also have some very specific goals.

Number six is to enter a major show with new work. The deadline for this is mid-February, and I am already hard at work on the first of two pieces. The fabric has been created, and the ideas are flowing. Here’s just some of the fabric…..

Unpolished red satin

If I get accepted, great. If not, I will have two new lovely large art pieces for our body of work. But I am putting out to the Universe that this will be show-worthy art.

Number seven is to create the kit for Marbled Seasons. Yesterday’s blog post showed the first of the four small quilts/table runners. I used to have several patterns, all of which I sold the rights to. So I just need to make more. For this goal I want this set of kits completed, and two new ideas for pattern kits, plus a rewrite of my Polynomial Quilt pattern – which I used the quilts for that very successfully in an adult algebra class to teach multiplying, and it was highly successful.

Number eight is to be completely prepared – except for minor loose ends – by March 10, for StashFest at the La Conner Quilt Museum in La Conner, Washington. We have been invited to participate, and it means marbling about 400 fat quarters in the next three months…..another reason for looking carefully at wholesale outlets! This is an interesting goal, because after our last guild presentation, I put out to the universe that it would be fun to travel and do demos in the Southern Arizona, southern New Mexico area. Well, two days later I had this email…..as Dale Anne Potter, my muse with Law of Attraction said, I was open to the possibilities.

Number nine will build on the previous. Develop a letter/sample to go to local guilds for demos and classes. I think just the development at this stage, because we will be focused on making fabric for Washington.

Number ten, under the category of Miscellaneous, comes continuing to work on Art From the Heart, a site devoted to spreading peace and nonviolence in the aftermath of the Gabrielle Giffords shooting. We had two new entries this last month, and I am hopeful for more.

Now that I have these written, I have to chuckle in that I was concerned about trying to get my goals coherent for this season. These are more detailed than the past two seasons, and they will certainly stretch me.

So Day One – I’m going to sew, work on some lists, and get ready for a small craft event on Saturday. Plus, it’s the holidays, and I want to “do more good” this year on a daily basis. May you have a really awesome day!

If you remember last week, I was about finished with my little autumn quilt/table runner. You can see the process here. I finished it this weekend, and today we marbled a piece for the winter piece. “Marbled Seasons” will shortly be available as a kit – all the seasons, or just one of them. I am writing the pattern now, and by the end of December should have all the quilts completed. They would also work as table runners. So here it is….

There are plenty of variations in this pattern. “Autumn Marbles” will have hand-marbled silk leaves in the kit, as well as directions for the “windy” free motion quilting. There is enough marbled fabric to add another set of log cabin blocks to make the quilt a little longer. The strips in this block all start out at one inch. the two different browns in this, as well as the backing, were from my stash, so you can “shop” at home for extra fabric.

I have started my next major art piece, from a piece of fabric we marbled over ten years ago. It’s time to do something with it. Here you see the marbled unpolished satin with its backing. I was auditioning threads.

The piece itself looks very flat and pretty uninteresting. It will be a challenge of my new skills to make this do what my mind wants.

This piece is a little over 18 inches by 54 inches. We did it when we still worked in the big tray. The additional years make it very difficult for us to work longer hours and do larger pieces of fabric. So I am hoarding those pieces I still have.

A closeup showing some very interesting veining within the piece. That needs to become a focus point.

I have started the basic “first level” quilting. All the stones are getting outlines. Already a lot more interest.  Those two upper right beige ovals have been taken out, requilted, and lay a whole lot flatter.  And, you won’t see more pictures until finished and entered……..

We hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, if you celebrate it. We were around lots of friends and had a wonderful time. It was so nice to know I didn’t have to face a 5:30 AM alarm on Monday! Been catching up – here’s a few cool things this week from the web.

From the Philbrook Museum of Art….LOVE. THIS.

Now I will admit, I am not a car enthusiast, but I can understand…when we gave up our Rav4 I gave it one last hug, and I still miss it. That said, on Cool Hunting comes some really wild cars. By far my favorite….

A new blog by Vivian Swift has a great water color tutorial on doing leaves – on my list for this coming year is a water color class.

From The Best Article Every Day comes this little bonus clip…..The article is also quite funny – Ten Things 90s Kids Will Have to Explain to Their Children.

From NASA comes a look at the new Mars rover, curtesy of The Best Article Every Day. Pretty amazing the steps it’ll take to land on Mars.

From Joan Wolfrom comes a look at a color challenge, with four really interesting quilts. Each is based on one specific color, and the techniques in them can’t help but spark creativity.

It’s always a joy to discover new math videos…thanks to Kathy Nida for this one…..Pythagorasaurus……

If you’re not following The Free Motion Quilting Project, you really should. I just bought two embooks on quilting designs, and I am SO looking forward to expanding my repertoire. Here’s a snap of Leah’s latest – OMG, amazing……

From Kate Harper’s blog was a link to Joan Beiriger’s blog on Advantages in Using Google Reverse Image Search. Who knew? I tried using it – pretty simple, and it should be interesting to see if any of our images are showing up on the web – beyond my blog and website.

From Artsy Shark comes an article on some creative marketing – love the use of the iPad!

And some political sites that might be worthwhile to explore. This article on Facebook privacy comes from The Blog of Rights. You may agree or not, but I’m a strong proponent of civil discourse. At least we can be aware of issues as they arise.

Enjoy your week!

Get 10% off orders $100+, or 15% off $150+ AND FREE SHIPPING on orders $99+ with promo code CCXA (see details for terms)!

Disclaimer: According to FTC guidelines, I need to let you know I am an affiliate of Dick Blick and do receive a small compensation if you purchase anything from this site.

PS – at least three spelling errors I needed to correct….sheesh, too early on a Monday!

I realized that I ended Season Two of Cocreating Our Reality on November 19. I have been so busy sewing and working on projects – and being positive – that the day went by. December 1 is coming this week, and I’m planning to start Season 3 that day. One thing I have learned is to try to be more specific with my goals, and yet not limit myself within the goals. I also need more goals, both creatively and business-wise.

So how did I do?

* Enjoy life through a couple of trips and dinners/other social engagements with friends: San Diego, Austin, Houston, New Orleans. Absolutely! We went to Sedona in July, San Diego in August, Santa Fe in September, Sedona in October, and Prescott in November. We are planning to head to San Diego in two weeks. Obviously a new goal is going to be continuing to get a trip in a month – in fact, TWO are scheduled for March.

* Finish “Artists Revisited” class, complete with the new quilt. Finished the class, the quilt is probably half done, and it is now awaiting sometime in late spring to finish it – there are two major pieces I am attacking for a show deadline in mid-February.

* Help with Tikkun Olam show at the Jewish Community Center. The show was very nicely staged. Didn’t sell anything, but had a lot of really good feedback.

* Plan for additional income each month through the business; the goal is to beat the previous month (August should beat July, and so on). We are marbling more often – at least twice a month – and generally selling all the fabric. Etsy has picked up, and a few other things are working, including a commission for 31 fat quarters. We have far exceeded what we did for income in all of last year, so we should end the year in very good shape.

* Take three tutoring clients in mathematics. Instead I accepted a position teaching college algebra one afternoon a week – 4 hours, plus prep time. About the same amount of additional time, and about the same amount of money. Way easier on the travel and schedule.

* Update<a href=”http://artfromtheheart.org” target=”_blank”> Art from the Heart</a> website and make plans for entries for the first anniversary of the Tucson shootings. Three new works of art have already been added, and more people are  beginning to talk about the site.

* Sewing projects: Tikkun Olam, Wayne Art Center, Betty’s commission, small rhythm piece, fish quilt redone, deer quilt finished, three additional quilt projects to be determined. No Wayne Art Center. Most of Betty’s commission is completed, the rhythm piece done, the fish quilt completed, the deer quilt finished, and three projects have been determined, all of which have been started.

* Complete the first three action plans in <span style=”text-decoration: underline;”>I’d Rather Be In the Studio</span> by Alyson Stanfield. In fact, I did four. I need to attack the portfolio goal over these next 100 days, as well as get in gear on newsletters.

* Maintain goals through the Multiple Streams of Income class and set new 90-day goals. Did this – will set the new goals through Season 3.

* Market the gift basket through Marble-T Design and sell at least four. We’ve sold 3 so far, so good on us! We’ve got stuff for two more ready to go.

* Break 200 pounds. Did not come close. In fact, I have yet to step on the scale, which I will do tomorrow, as I really begin to attack this. What I noticed is that I spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about this, and nothing has happened that is positive. So I obviously need to rethink how I look at this. I am going on more than half my life being overweight, and something has to change. Either I accept myself as I am now, or I change into what I want to be. More meditation, a diet “sponsor,” a food diary, regular walking, and some journaling are on the list.

I do like being able to see concretely what has been happening. That’s one of the reasons I like the blogging. This is a definite way for me to keep myself accountable.

One goal so far for the new season: the Free Motion Quilting Challenge, which will begin in January. I’ve got lots of other ideas, so I need to get things finalized for the start on Thursday, December 1.