By sion, on June 29th, 2008%
 the rest of the universe is apparently on a stash-reduction kick this year, whereas I’m still enjoying the ex-smoker luxury of money to blow on STUFF. Connie’s moving to a smaller shop (22 Clyde St, between IGA & the cafe) so she’s been selling off stock she doesn’t want to carry any more. Dress fabrics have been 30-50% off, so one of the things I picked up was some of this pretty chiffon. It’s shot with a very pale grey-mauve/blue, which is most visible when it’s all bunched up & doesn’t show terribly well in the pic. Trust me, it’s gawj. Kind of reminds me of the dress from one of the Disney animated movies – Cinderella? Must have been; I think the fairy godmothers argued about what colour it should be or something, so it kept flashing from blue to pink. I don’t know that I ever saw the actual movie, but we had this set of Disney storybooks, and I was entranced by the idea of a dress that changed colours. Perfect for princesses, anyway, whether I end up using it for one of the fairytale pieces or to make a dress for the small person. Or both, I guess :)
 Fur fabric was also on sale. I’d been eyeing the cow print off for years, thinking about covering grandma’s old daybed in it (which everybody else BUT Connie thought was a terrible idea. Connie gets me). It’s more like velvet than fur, and plenty sturdy. Maybe I’ll reupholster the daybed in plain black & make the cowhide into a washable cover, given the 2- & 4-legged animals my furniture has to deal with. The zigzaggy not-quite-zebra stuff (also more velvety than furrish)? Can’t tell you what I was thinking, really. Except that I like it almost in spite of myself, at least partly because it’s like a cartoon adaptation of zebra print. I do kind of have a bit of a thing about animal prints, but I’ve always refused to wear them because being a blue-eyed blonde with big boobs got me more than enough unwarranted attention thankyouverymuch; hoochiewear would have just encouraged the world’s grotty little gropers. So I don’t wear it, but I do have a growing collection of fabrics with snakeskin, tiger, leopard, zebra, giraffe, etc prints. Oh, and fish/dragon scales. This though, this dumb not-really-zebra print, I am somewhat tempted to make a coat from. If I were about 10 years younger & mumblemumble thinner, I would be REALLY tempted, but as it is it’s likely to end up as either a fleece-backed lap-rug/throw/cover, cushions, or upholstery for the chairs that match the daybed. There’s quite a bit of it there, so it may end up as two out of three.
 Now this stuff I’ve had on layby for a while, and the gods only know what I’m going to do with it. Some of it’s mum’s, but I can’t remember which she wanted. I vaguely remember thinking some of it might be fun for fairytale works (the wallhangings, not the more 3d things), given that various kinds of fruit & veg make a regular appearance in folk & fairy tales – pumpkins, peas, apples, potatoes, pears, plums, strawberries, just off the top of my head. Other than that, no idea really … I guess they’d be kind of fun for kids, and several of them work just as colour. Meanwhile, they just make me smile a little. Potatoes! Lettuce! Too funny.
 This stuff, now. I fell in love with the paisley when it came into the shop, but I couldn’t quite figure out what I wanted it for. It’s kind of bright. Verging on lairy, in fact. Then on Thursday I happened to walk past it sitting on the shelf with the stripe nearby, and thought hrm. Hrm. I rather like that combo. So then I wandered around the shop looking for other things to go with. Bought the last of the leafy tone-on-tone in that particularly delicious rich raw sienna. The dark red with the goldish scrolly bits is actually a Christmas print (I suspect the stripe is too, actually) that had just been delivered. The ochre-umber-sienna-etc weird abstracty rock print appeals to me purely because of the colours; the print itself does nothing much for me, but it should work well as a peeper or tiny strip.
 Here’s a few fabrics I pulled out of the stash as potential partners. I really like the deep amethyst down the front, and the dark pink snakeskin, and for that matter the multicoloured scales. The yellow tone-on-tone might work. The mustard with the little red berries & the green iwll probably work if required. There are a few other interesting bits & pieces in the right colours that could be roped in if necessary, just depends what I want to do. Which brings me to the question of what I want to do. What do I want to do? There’s an Indian flavour to the colours & prints I’m gravitating towards, the sumptuous spicy richly ornamental thang. I would like to make a quilt for my very own self, maybe a topper or oversized lap quilt, but I can’t see me persevering with a full queen-size quilt. No, topper. With pieced blocks of some description which manage to capture something of that Indian flavour. Hrm. Maybe I need to dig out all those photos of ornate windows I took in Nepal for pattern ideas … I knew they’d come in handy one day!
By sion, on June 26th, 2008%
I had some interest a while back in prints of some of my work, and I’ve now got a very brief window of opportunity to get some made up at a price that makes selling them feasible. Possibly; I guess anyone wanting them will decide that *G*. We’re talking high-end prints, “giclee” type I guess.
I’ll be able to do 20″ x 30″ for $80 AUD + postage (this means that Spring in the Valley would be very close to actual size) or 16″ x 24″ for $60 AUD + postage. I’d be able to offer Spring in the Valley, Tamborine Moonlight, Sentinel or Firestorm. Signed & dated, of course. Postage will be between $7 (oz) & $18 (USA).
 
 
By sion, on June 23rd, 2008%
 I’ve been trying to get the little thingies I’ve been working on finished so I could (for once!) stomp in with a big TADA and show a thingummywhatsit from conception to completion in one post, but it’s taking rather longer than expected to finish even one and I’m suffering blogblather withdrawal so buggrit. My slowness is obviously not solely a function of my incessant photo-op breaks (does that make it multi-cessant photo-opping?) with the consequent editing, uploading, and blathering. I’M JUST SLOW. In all honesty I fully expected to be displaying a pic of Laughably Horrible Failed Concept #1 by the end of the first making session, but it came together rather better than expected so I’m still plugging away at it. My scanner’s attached to the printer which is sitting at the folks’ place because Dad was fixing it, so I can’t even scan the sketches. So there it is –> a bit of stitching and shaping ago.
I’m about to go play with this embellishment maker gizmo that Mum picked up in Melbourne at the AQS, because it may be just what I need to make the fringey stuff I want for the VISP (Vessel In Slow Progress). I’m hoping it will be, because I don’t really fancy handstitching a metric buttload of yarn to the form only to find out I don’t like the colour or texture or whatever. I want to tread carefully here, because I do have a tendency to belabour a point. Subtlety not my strongest point, like, and sometimes when I go with the flow and follow the trail of inspiration it leads me up the garden path when I really wanted to go play in the forest. Or something like that. It’s very easy, basically, for me to end up with whatever subtlety I was toying with being totally overwhelmed by some hairy big bovver-boots-wearing punk symbology. I do love symbols, but they can be a bit like the bad boys you shouldn’t fall in love with, too easy to slip into one-dimensionality and vulgarity and crassness. IOW, I have a vessel, and I want to be putting fringey stuff on this vessel, and I do NOT want it to look like a big hairy conceptual twat. Because that’s not what it is.
What else have I been doing? Um. Today we got the girlchild’s immunisations up to date, which sucked about as much as expected. Stupid nurse thought I was exaggerating, but after the first one took her by surprise it did indeed take 3 of us to hold her somewhat still while the nurse put the second shot in. We adopted a dog, by proxy (she’s living with my folks for the time being) on Thursday. What else? Oh yeah: trialling different shopping cart systems. Ugh. I really hate trying to wade through other people’s coding & markup, and I’ve yet to find a cart that isn’t pretty horrible. I can’t believe I used to do webdev for fun. I don’t even enjoy the graphics side of it as much as I used to, and I’m resistant to spending the time that would be required to brush up on my scripting so I could customise something. I suspect I don’t have the brainpower any more anyway, to be honest. Just trying to figure out how to template VirtueMart on a Joomla install is giving me hives. Stingy as I am, I would actually pay for something customised, but finding someone trustworthy & knowledgeable to do it is as timeconsuming as DIY. Especially if you’re as cheap as you are fussy :D
I am a bit curious re the concept of open houses, largely due to being the daughter of a man who thinks having a garage sale is an invitation for every thief in creation to case the joint. Carloads of people drive around looking for garage sales so they know who to rob, doncha know. I think if I was a burglar I might be following the people who buy stuff at grudge sales home, because they’re obviously the ones with a) money and b) stuff, whereas the people who just had the garage sales are likely to be the ones who are either a) going bankrupt or b) moving c) dead or d) indulging in a spot of For God’s Sake Get Rid Of All That Junk In The Shed Or I’m Leaving. And let’s face it, if their shit’s worth having it got sold – why would you want to nick the crap nobody wanted even at 4 on Sunday when the guys with a uteful of rusty ironing boards, grasscatchers and used baling wire are taking the OK Look Final Offer You Can Have It For $10, But Only If You Also Take The Couch Uncle Fred Died On And The Three Broken TVs stuff? The really funny thing, from my pov, is that we’re the people sellers say that to. And by we I mean him & me; we’re as bad as each other. Poor old mum’s the one in the background with more hair in her hands than left on her head, trying not to cry. IOW, most of the stuff we need to get rid of is the stuff – the But It’s Perfectly Good stuff, as well as the What The Hell Did You Bring That Home For?? stuff – that some other bugger was desperate to get rid of a few months/years ago (now even rustier and more outdated and MORE Vintage!). Come to think of it, much of the stuff we would be keeping is from the same source (there are after all treasures among the trash heh). BUT ANYHOW. So me, I’m all about us paring down by having a few grudge sales to pass the Useless To Us crap on to some treasurehunting souls, so we can clean the place(s) up so Mum doesn’t go completely stark, but my dad’s all paranoid that the house will get done over. If he’s worried that it’ll get done over when the Driveby Burglar Scouts get all excited by his dead lawnmowers, old wardrobes and boxes of utter crap vintage bric-a-brac, I can’t see him thinking any kind of open house is a good idea. So I guess we’ll never get doing anything like Textile Goddess’s Open Day. Which kind of sucks, because wouldn’t it be cool if deciding to have an open day would magically make your house look like hers? I can’t even work up a good head of envy, it’s so perfectly lovely and so very obviously born of the same creativity that shines in her artwork.
By sion, on June 14th, 2008%
just a little btw – if you email me or leave a comment and don’t get a response, please let me know. It’s almost certain that I HAVE responded, but my email addresses seem to be blocked by some ISPs and I have no way of knowing unless people tell me. I promise, sometimes I’m forgetful & slow, but I never ignore!
By sion, on June 13th, 2008%
pardon the radio silence, but the girl’s been crook. Started with a bit of a cold, then a few days later she developed these angry zitty spots around her mouth & nose, along with a bloodily crufty nostril (IMO primarily because she WILL INSIST on stuffing her entire fist up said nostril). Doctor visit > antibiotics for impetigo. Joyousness. Two days later, face having magically almost entirely cleared up courtesy of abx, I pick her up from preschool to find she’s developed one of her face rashes, the ones that are prompted by exposure to mango (and apparently some unknown irritant). Face rash (kind of a raised flush, really) progressed impressively, by about 7pm reaching all the way to her hairline, and man was she ever pissy & hard to get on with (not that she’s ever exactly easy, but wow). By 11 or so she was running a fever, which came down with panadol, so I waited til morning and took her to the clinic. Her usual doc was overbooked, so we got to see the one she really doesn’t like (yayfun!). Flush/rash was gone by then, but she was still running pretty high fevers. He said … um, can’t remember now. I think he said it was just a virus, nothing to worry about. Her tongue was swollen and her tonsils were up but no grossness, so just keep giving her the abx until finished (for the impetigo), manage the fever & keep her hydrated, & if I get worried over the weekend take her down to the hospital. That was Friday.
So Monday, which was a public holiday (Queen’s birthday, except not), she asked to go shopping & we went. She was seeming MUCH better & brighter, and the fever had gone. We were wandering around Big W & under the revolting lighting (seriously, what IS the lighting they use? It’s worse than regular fluoro, I swear) I could see she’d gone kind of rashy again, all over her face this time, a bit splotchier-looking than her sensitive-to-mango rash. Over the next hour or so it became more pronounced, to the point where she was looking a bit unloved-orphan-scrubbed-with-lye-soap or something. She seemed fine though, and oblivious to the rash, and once we got out from the horrible lighting I was wondering if it had been there for days but was just invisible under regular light. She fell asleep on the couch an hour or so after we got home, and after covering her over and feeling her forehead because she looked a bit flushed (no temp) I’d walked away then for some reason I thought I’d better check her chest. Oh. Spots everywhere. Blotchy pink spots, lots of them. Back too. Crap. Off to the hospital we go, where for the first time ever at Casualty we got one of those annoyingly dismissive doctors who acted like I was wasting his time. **[Side-rant: dude, figuring out whether something's wrong with people is your job. It's what you get paid for. You're the doctor & I'm just some ignorant schmo who happens to be worried about her kid: getting snotty with me because I can't diagnose & trust that you'll do your job is so annoying I'm still cranky 5 days later. Shithead.]** Anyway, so he oh-so-patiently-and-smirkily explained that it was just an opportunistic virus she’d picked up on the heels of the impetigo, and to just keep her hydrated & give her panadol if her fever came back.
So, being as I didn’t trust wankerdoc’s dismissal, especially after googling and worrying about several possibilities that seemed to fit the symptoms, I took her to her usual doc in the morning. Face had mostly faded, but it was worse and spreading on her trunk & limbs. He pronounced it MEASLES. Measles for chrissakes! Fair enough, who gets the measles any more, but how the hell did that idiot doctor not even consider it as a possibility? An outbreak is too potentially dangerous to just dismiss. So, having notified daycare & the grapevine, we’ve been in quarantine. She’s only been mildly itchy, but she’s a bit worried that the spots will stop random strangers from calling her a beautiful girl (what can I say, she considers it her due). She caught an ad for that proactiv (sp?) zit stuff the other night, & said I should get some for her spots (not that kind of spots, darling; yours will be gone in a few days I promise). If this is any indication of things to come, I REALLY hope her teens are as acne-free as mine were. She’s been surprisingly cool about being stuck at home with just me & the cats, but there’s no way on earth I get anything done with the nonstop soundtrack & cheeky interruptions. I did get to spend most of yesterday praying nobody would knock on the door because she’d put cat whiskers on me with an eyebrow pencil, that was kind of fun …
By sion, on June 9th, 2008%
nabbed from Poppalina. I think it’s hilarious that I entered “happy and sane” for #9 and got a sign saying “rabid granny” …
The method:
a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. Using only the first page, pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.
1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One Word to describe you.
12. Your flickr name
For mosaic virgins (I was clueless!): you’ll need to either upload the resulting mosaic to your flickr account or save it to your computer & post it on your blog. You’ll want to copy the links it generates, too, to post into your blog.
The game
Originally uploaded by sionwynlee
1. Rain Kissed Rose of Sharon, 2. Put Chocolate Pudding on the Top Shelf !!, 3. Concert Hall at Aron Copland School of Music Queens College, 4. Saffron Trumpets, 5. Peter O’Toole, 6. moccha for auda, 7. 64227_poster2000, 8. Lemon Zest Cheesecake from My Flour Garden, 9. Untitled, 10. My Children’s Book Collection, 11. On a lazy Sunday afternoon…, 12. digital painting
By sion, on June 3rd, 2008%
against all odds & despite a certain preschooler’s best efforts, I did manage to make it down to the PO to get the quilts crammed into an express post satchel and sent off today. I’d have been more downhearted about the inelegant cramming involved if sewing the stupid velcro strips on hadn’t already undone the flatness achieved by blocking – I suspect they’ll need at the very least a jolly good steam and a week or so to hang in peace after I get them back & remove the velcro. Horrible stuff, bulgy and wobbly and stiff in ungoodly ways. I’d far rather have two narrow regular-style sleeves at top & bottom – faster, easier, less unwieldy & fugly – but I’m not in a position to volunteer to be threading wires through sleeves so I’ll shut up. I’ll just reblock Sentinel if it needs it, and meanwhile hope it doesn’t look too wonky at the show. I’d dearly love to have pics of both of them in situ, if anyone’s going down & would care to oblige.
JFTR, I did actually have a thimble or three once upon a time. In recent memory even – at least one metal, plus two odd little plastic ones that came with thread sets – but see, I also have a preschooler. One who is both inquisitive and, more importantly, acquisitive (my mother would say this is karmic justice, if she was feeling mean). Guess I either buy another one or two to put in my away-from-sticky-fingers kit, or keep a weather eye out for the ones I allegedly own when I’m packing & sorting.
Yes, that means I’m going to move. Soon as I find somewhere that fits the criteria. Even if this place wasn’t falling down around our ears thanks to idiotically miserly owners (for pity’s sake, fix the bloody roof if nothing else!), El deciding that balcony railings are merely a challenge rather than a deterrent (let alone a barrier) would suggest it’s time. Shame to give up the view, but between El’s various terrors & incomprehensibly contrary daredeviltry mandating that the door remain closed 99% of the time I don’t get to enjoy it much anyway, so eh. Not all down to her really; after I quit smoking I stopped hanging around outdoors because it brought up all those situational cravings. Blargh, I so, so, so do not want to do all the crap involved in moving. Hate sorting. Hate packing. Hate paying stupid amounts of money for switches to be flicked & 5 minutes of data entry to be done by somebody I am stone-cold certain does not get paid anywhere near what I’m being charged, harumph. Really hate doing a massive purgey clean on the house I’m vacating AND the house I’m moving into; seems massively unfair, that. Then again, I do love organising myself into a new space. And El is bizarrely eager about moving, having become all Chicken Little neurotic about this place because the newly peeling ceiling is freaking her right the hell out. She’s not really a fan of change, so it’s taken me by surprise. I’m trying to figure out whether to go my usual route (cheap rent, old house I don’t have to be precious about) or whether to go slightly more upscale as one of those fake-it-til-you-make-it things, bit of a dress-for-success sort of angle, which would involve paying enough rent that I’d be forced to do some more teaching etc if I want frittering money. Question is, am I a depressive antisocial slob because I live in embarrassingly povvo houses (in which case a spanky spiffy place might be perfectamundo and solve all manner of ills), or do I live in ramshackle hovels because I’m a lazily depressed antisocial slob? Question for the ages, I tellya. Maybe I need a povvo house but to hire a maid with the money I could be spending on a spankier house … now there’s a thought.
anyhow. So. While I ponder all these deep thoughts, I think I’m going to do something about the 2 PIFs and at least 1 postcard (and probably other things I can’t remember offhand) I owe. And the journals I’ve been sketching and planning but not having a chance to do lately (really, how DO all those overachievey people do it with the quilt a week and so on? I boggle, I really do!). And finish working on the sionwynlee.com shop. And figure out why the wordpress install at macleayquilters.sionwynlee.com went cactus a couple of hours after I reinstalled it :/
By sion, on June 1st, 2008%
finished, yay. I have to stop doing this to myself, my poor fingers are a mess from the handsewing, even though I ended up spacing it over 3 days. I think in future I’m going to try to restrict myself to entering things only if they’re finished or nearly so – really truly nearly so, not the kind of “nearly” that Sentinel was. Either that or buy a freakin thimble …
 
|
|
the rest of the universe is apparently on a stash-reduction kick this year, whereas I’m still enjoying the ex-smoker luxury of money to blow on STUFF. Connie’s moving to a smaller shop (22 Clyde St, between IGA & the cafe) so she’s been selling off stock she doesn’t want to carry any more. Dress fabrics have been 30-50% off, so one of the things I picked up was some of this pretty chiffon. It’s shot with a very pale grey-mauve/blue, which is most visible when it’s all bunched up & doesn’t show terribly well in the pic. Trust me, it’s gawj. Kind of reminds me of the dress from one of the Disney animated movies – Cinderella? Must have been; I think the fairy godmothers argued about what colour it should be or something, so it kept flashing from blue to pink. I don’t know that I ever saw the actual movie, but we had this set of Disney storybooks, and I was entranced by the idea of a dress that changed colours. Perfect for princesses, anyway, whether I end up using it for one of the fairytale pieces or to make a dress for the small person. Or both, I guess :)
Fur fabric was also on sale. I’d been eyeing the cow print off for years, thinking about covering grandma’s old daybed in it (which everybody else BUT Connie thought was a terrible idea. Connie gets me). It’s more like velvet than fur, and plenty sturdy. Maybe I’ll reupholster the daybed in plain black & make the cowhide into a washable cover, given the 2- & 4-legged animals my furniture has to deal with. The zigzaggy not-quite-zebra stuff (also more velvety than furrish)? Can’t tell you what I was thinking, really. Except that I like it almost in spite of myself, at least partly because it’s like a cartoon adaptation of zebra print. I do kind of have a bit of a thing about animal prints, but I’ve always refused to wear them because being a blue-eyed blonde with big boobs got me more than enough unwarranted attention thankyouverymuch; hoochiewear would have just encouraged the world’s grotty little gropers. So I don’t wear it, but I do have a growing collection of fabrics with snakeskin, tiger, leopard, zebra, giraffe, etc prints. Oh, and fish/dragon scales. This though, this dumb not-really-zebra print, I am somewhat tempted to make a coat from. If I were about 10 years younger & mumblemumble thinner, I would be REALLY tempted, but as it is it’s likely to end up as either a fleece-backed lap-rug/throw/cover, cushions, or upholstery for the chairs that match the daybed. There’s quite a bit of it there, so it may end up as two out of three.
Now this stuff I’ve had on layby for a while, and the gods only know what I’m going to do with it. Some of it’s mum’s, but I can’t remember which she wanted. I vaguely remember thinking some of it might be fun for fairytale works (the wallhangings, not the more 3d things), given that various kinds of fruit & veg make a regular appearance in folk & fairy tales – pumpkins, peas, apples, potatoes, pears, plums, strawberries, just off the top of my head. Other than that, no idea really … I guess they’d be kind of fun for kids, and several of them work just as colour. Meanwhile, they just make me smile a little. Potatoes! Lettuce! Too funny.
CHITCHAT