Christmas Colds

Hah! That got you, huh?

No typo here. Not only was the house 59 degrees this AM, but I have a cold as well. My week of vacation has thus developed slight bruises, but it’s not completely rotten.

In fact, we had a great Christmas in San Francisco. Visited the post impressionist exhibit at the de Young and a couple exhibits at the SFMOMA. Shopped for yarn, fabric and buttons. Finally found the buttons at Britex for my Noro sweater. Art Yarns is a fantastic new place on Sutter. Even The Artist had a good time!

I think the most impressionable thing was Christmas day. Although it rained, we were out tromping around Chinatown and North Beach. Grant Street and Stockton were full of life and extremely busy, (need a haircut on Christmas day?) whereas Broadway and Columbus were barely waking up. We did get to see the wild parrots swooping around on their way back to Telegraph Hill.

On our way back, we spotted a French Brasserie, Cafe de la Presse, at the corner of Grant across from the gate to Chinatown and had a late lunch. Jam packed. Wonderful food. Best latte I’ve ever had.

Day after Christmas was just packed with shoppers around Union Square. Even so, it was nice to get away to a big city for a holiday.

By the way, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

‘’Twas a Week Before Christmas…

 

… and I bought myself an embellisher.

So instead of showing what it looks like, I’m showing what it does.

That’s black raw silk and gold paint with wool roving embellished on top. The machine has 12 needles with little hooks on the ends to push the wool fibers into the silk. It should be a lot of fun to work with. I look forward to combining my yarn scraps with my fabric scraps to make gorgeous new fabric.

I’m finishing up my Christmas cards, so it’s back to work.

By the way, thanks to all who voted for me. Flying Carpet was far from winning. I think you really have to be into social networking and your designs must be very literal, rather than imaginative and cerebral to win the Spoonflower contests, but it’s still fun.

And the Artist? He’s working on the pipe organ and just finished two autoharps.

Vote for Me This Week!

 

Flying Carpet

Vote for me this week! My fabric is in the Time Travel contest at Spoonflower December 9-16.

The Flying Carpet takes you wherever you want to go - the past, the future or just up the street. The process is fused wool fibers done in the wet felting process. When I first made this in my fiber art group, I was very disappointed with it. Then, I stood back to look at it and decided to upload it to Spoonflower as a fabric design. It became something entirely new, with a completely new feeling! It looks like an Oriental carpet!

As one very thoughtful admirer commented: This design has a marvelous fuzzy felted feeling about it. It makes you want to stroke its soft surface as you close your eyes and make a wish to be transported to another Time and Place!

Thank you in advance for voting.

 

And as a follow up on another fiber project, my quilt, Body and Soul, has taken on a new name for the month, Temporarily Santa Cruz, and is in the This is Santa Cruz show at the Santa Cruz Art League.

And The Artist? He’s in the show, too.