Staying Connected

It's a rainy Monday morning.  Perfect time to sit down at the computer and fill you in on the last month.  As Sonja wrote last month, it's been challenging for her--working full time at home with a 5-year-old in the house.  I've been helping out a little, going over for an hour or two each day to play with Tyler. 

It brightens my day and certainly keeps me on my toes.  I never know what to expect when I walk in the door.  I've been to the hot pepper planet, saved him from hot lava and a sea of slime, been the queen of electrocution one day and the queen of comfy another.  He's always in charge, I just go along for the ride.  And what a ride! 

On this day we were spies.  He built our headquarters, complete with a one-way glass window and a key-pad entry system (using a little cash register to let you put in your pass-code). 

As of today, I'm off duty again.  Nick's school year is over so he's got Tyler duty for the summer.  Then we'll see what the fall brings.  Tyler is due to start kindergarten, but there's no definite plan yet for how or when the school year will start.

While I've been home, I've continued to work on that king-size quilt I've written about before.  I am making good progress.  I have 8 (of 24) "squares" already quilted and the first 5 squares stitched together for the left side of the quilt.  The quilt as you go method is working out well for me.  Each section presents new decisions for what to do in terms of embroidery/quilting and gives me a sense of completion when it is finished.  Here are a couple of the most recently completed squares.  (The number tags indicate the upper right-hand corner and the order for putting them together.)

In addition to this project, which is purely personal, I've also started a collaborative project with my sister, Sue Gilleland, and my daughter, Sonja.  This project arose from an article I saw in the most recent journal from the Surface Design Association.  The theme of the issue was collaboration and one of the articles was about The Wondermakers Collective.   Everything about their work resonated with me.  The two women, Mindy Sue Wittock and Jenna Freimuth, are from Minnesota and Wisconsin.  (I grew up in Minnesota and my husband in Wisconsin.) They create these vibrant embroideries by sending the works back and forth in the mail, with each one adding to what the other has done.  When I read about it, I immediately thought that it would be fun for Sonja and I to do something like that.  And then a couple seconds after that I thought it would be fun to include my artist sister, who is currently living in Anchorage.

Sonja and I talked about it in one of our art nights and figured out some parameters which we proposed to Sue.  She approved and we got started.  Here are our "rules," such as they are:

• 6" x 8" in size
  
•  2 or 3 layers thick (the front fabric; flannel, very thin batting or felt behind it to give body for stitching; a backing fabric if desired)
• the edges can be finished at the start or left unfinished (The unfinished edges could be finished somewhere along the way or just left as is.)
  
• Any kind of surface design is fine--embroidery, painting, stenciling, beading, whatever you want to add to a piece.
  

We started with a set of six, so we'd each have a turn as Step 1, 2, and 3.  Here are a few that are in progress:

Ann - Step 1

Sue - Step 1

Ann - Step 1

Sonja - Step 2

Ann - Step 2

Sonja - Step 1, Ann - Step 2 (tree)

There will be more to come on this project.  We haven't finished with the first set of six, but we've already decided to keep going.  No decisions yet on how long we'll do this or what we'll do with the finished ones.  Main point right now is to have fun; staying connected by making art together.  Both become more important with each passing day.

I hope you are also making time for fun and social connection too.
All my best,
Ann