The Studio is alive

The spring cleaning bug is practically chewing my face off. I've cleaned the studio (twice) and my bedroom and part of the pile of the junk in the basement that I moved home after the store closed and I'm planning a ninja sneak attack on my storage unit soon. (I find it best to take that mess by surprise, its far too intelligent to reason with.)

I've also gotten my projects in order and its a stark contrast from where my mindset was last year. (Hell, let's be honest, I was lucky to peel myself out of bed each morning and remember to change out of my pajamas before leaving the house. It was not a good year.)

So I have several baskets lined up like proper little soldiers, waiting to be attacked in order of their due date. The first one on my list was getting my pages together for a fabric journal round robin I'm doing with the fiber art group I belong to, Running with Scissors. I picked "Pet Portraits" as my theme and I finished up Dooley dog's page this evening:

I went for a vintage type feeling for the background fabric of the pages. I'm disturbed that I had that pink tablecloth-like fabric in my stash. But it worked well. (I think the pink is starting to wear me down.)

I went to Joann's today to pick up some stuffing for some plushies and it was insane in that store. Sales had women bouncing off the aisles and sprinting about. It was crazy. I ended up picking this up:

That's my quilt for the Michigan Quilt Artist Invitational due in July. (Can't you tell???) The theme this year is 'Adventures in Italy' and I have to say, I enjoy it when they pick countries as the topic. Everyone ends up doing something different but its still tied together.

I know what I have so far is horribly impressive. I'm hoping to start it tomorrow. There is some weird voodoo magic going on whenever I do a quilt for that exhibit. I always paint them. And that's not something I generally do. And yeah, I know those aren't fabric paints. Trust me, they work just fine since my quilts never see the inside of a washer.

I'd tell you the topic but I'm not sure it will work out so in case it turns into a train wreck, I can say it was supposed to be something else and show you that instead and you won't be any wiser. (Ah the wonders of the Internet.)

I also took these knitted misshapen things:


Briefly drowned them:
(Looks disgusting doesn't it? Smelled like wet dog, too. I love wool but not when its wet. Ick.)

And subjected them to pinning torture:

Yes, leaves. I plan to make a brilliant quilt-like fiber art type thingie for the upcoming botany art quilt exhibit RWS is doing. I seem to have an issue with my botany quilts. The two that I've started have turned against me. I'm not sure why they have such attitudes but they have me considering using them for cleaning rags. No worries, I'll work something out but I learned a long time ago that when a project fights me so hard, I move on. I have to bicker with enough humans during the course of the day, I don't need to do it with fabric as well.

There is also The-Project-Which-Will-Not-Be-Named. I'm not willing to fess up to this one yet. Just know that if I do decide to pursue it, it will most likely break my will and send me away to a place where knitting needles are considered sharp objects and prohibited. Still...I'm considering it.

All in all its been a good day. It started out with meeting up for coffee with Jackie and catching up. The Coffee Bean has seriously good caffeine and Jackie makes seriously good art. Doesn't get much better then that.