A few pics of current works.

Remember that you can still find me through Facebook, twitter and Instagram with both Pandula Arts Creations as well as Earth Baskets!  

Here are some pictures of what I've been doing of late…hand beaded bracelets with tree limb buttons.  Use aroma therapy oils to care for the wood and smell nice too!  All hand stitched with a needle and thread.  And of course I hand make the treelimb buttons!

A ring in Cedar!

And of course baskets!

My first micro macrame!

My second!

Don't forget there's no RSS feed anymore to make my blog posts go into Facebook, so I no longer use this blog as much as I post in Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.  

I am sooooooo bored!

November 21, 2011

WOW!  It is the week of Thanksgiving already...how did that happen?  Seems it was Easter only yesterday.

And so I thought I would try to get back into the swing of things after the Thanksgiving festivities are over.  

I intend to start my blog back up again, full time, the week after Thanksgiving.  I am going to start out posting on Wednesday's only.  Please keep in mind that the car accident is still effecting me in that my shoulder that is separated won't let me weave for very long at one time.  Actually, even typing is difficult/painful, and I am sure you know how much I love being in a sling (couldn't have been my left arm right?  Had to be the right!).  

Soooooo...I have been taking photo's on the current piece, along with some updates on my weaving station and the new surroundings since I moved; in preparation of starting the blog back up again.  It has been a very difficult time, I haven't even been able to work for two weeks.  Bored out of my skull at this point.  I think Wiggles and Lacy are going to have 'mommy withdrawals' when my schedule kicks back in.  LOL

So for those of you who are still with me,  Thanks so much for all of the well wishes and caring conversations.   Keep watching, because the first post will be on Wednesday, November 30th.  As soon as I can I will pick it back up to the Monday, Wednesday and Friday postings.  But for now I think this is a good way to go, slow and easy. 

I sincerely hope that ALL of you are going to have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday and eat tons of turkey!  Eat, drink and be merry my friends, because that is what I am going to do and that is what this holiday is for.  Being with friends and loved ones, breaking bread and giving Thanks for all that we DO have and not dwelling on what we don't.

What I've been up to!`

Well I am back in GA again.  Hated leaving FL, had so much fun.  Got to see people I love very much and tons of fiber art STUFF!

Got home yesterday to find my new 'Mini Wave' had been delivered.  Wooo Hoooo, I probably won't even come up for air for a week or so.  LOL

My friend Dana who bought the Rigid Heddle had ordered it for me as payment and had it delivered to her work place.  So when she got off work she brought it to me.

Bet you guys didn't know KraftyMax was a fiber geek as well as a jewelry / bead geek.  Basically I guess she is just an extremely talented artist and homemaker.  Anyway, she loaded, and I do mean LOADED me up with some of her surplus yarns.  It was like going to Joann's or Michael's in that closet.

Since Dana is now following in the wake of my fiber geekdom I broght her a big bag of yarns also.  I was very excited to give them to her and see her reaction.  I think my choices will serve her well as we continue to Tapestry weave and for when she learns to use her Rigid Heddle as well.  There are absolutely no yarn stores in our little one horse town.  We have to travel at least an hr for one and even then there isn't much in the way of selection.  Certainly not of the 'fine' yarns, like Merino wool and such.  It's pretty much acrylic heaven.

Now don't get me wrong, Acrylic yarns have their place.  You certainly can't beat them for wash and wear items that get put in to the dryer.  They are soft, and the colors can be mind blowing.  But for things like weaving they are too stretchy and spongy most of the time.  So I brought her some Acrylic to practice with, things like lap blankets and such on the RH, and I also brought her some fine yarns for her tapestries and such.

I was delighted to find out that she has almost completed her first tapestry while I was away.  She even ran out of a certain color and we will be going over to the Art Center to retrieve a small ball of it today at lunch as she is striving to complete her piece by tomorrow nights class so that we can take it off of the loom, and hopefully start another!  I have so many kewl things I can't wait to show her.

As for me I have tons of yarns and such to go through myself in the next couple of days.  I find from my experiments of late that tapestry and Inkle/warpface weaves require very different kinds of yarns and I definitely need to do some organizing.  I probably need to bring down my sewing machine as well. Lots to do to catch up so I can play with my new toy.  I even have some t shirts to stash away for a future rag rug!  I will be a busy beaver for a little while!

Be sure to keep an eye out for tomorrow's post.  There will be pics of me warping up the Large Wave loom for KraftyMax to play with while I am away.  Don't forget to take a look at her sites and her parents' as well.  Mr. and Mrs. Allen own Gilmore Looms and you will love their products!

Update! Saturday is supposed to be Bead day!

Saturday is supposed to be bead day...all I need now is students!  However I had a great time anyway.

See my Tapestry workshop student still had to do a little tweaking to her loom and since she was in town anyway buying supplies from Home Depot I told her to stop in.

She actually came in to borrow a book from me, but I suggested that since we had the time we should put the second warp on her loom after we re-vamped it.  The first warp she did was wonderful, but we chose a not so awesome color/fiber and I really think it helps stay excited if you LOVE the yarn.  Plus practice makes perfect.

So we worked on the loom, and then as I had nothing to do but watch, she warped her own loom all by herself.  She made the sheds, wove the header, added her stabilizing half hitch row and wove about one inch of the same weft as the warp.  (This is generally done in case you want to turn it under and hem it, thus eliminating the  fringe.)

Then we sat and discussed strategy and design and fiber content to decide what her first piece will be like.  She chose red's and I suggested Acrylic yarn (I know).  Acrylic is more elastic, easy to obtain, and makes for more likelihood of even edges.  Cotton would be more likely to draw in causing a triangular weaving.  Not what we are ever after and definitely disheartening to the first time weaver.

When she left, we were both very pleased and excited.  Her because of her success and a game plan for the rest of the week.  Me because I finally have someone I can share my favorite art with in person.  I can't wait to see what she has done by Thursday's class.  I feel like I should be paying her!  LOL (Almost)

Just an update!

Things have been moving so rapidly for me.  Today is Friday.  Tuesday was my first Beginner Spindle yarn spinning class, no students yet.  Wednesday all day at the Art Center getting things cleaned and in order.  Thursday brought in my next workshop, Beginner tapestry, I had my first student in that one.  As soon as the class was over I went out to look into the Annual Quilt show that the Art center has each year.  Oh yeah, can Carol and I went to Albany yesterday before class to cruise the nearest art stores.  You basically have to travel an hour to get to any of them.  It was a very ART filled day.

I did a big display of my fiber arts items in a huge glass case so people from the Quilt show could see them. A very lot of time has just gone into getting my room ready, at least 6 hrs a day.  Keep in mind I even have to go up to the attic and look through my myriad of boxes for supplies.   I did get a ph call on my way home from a woman interested in my classes.  She found the info while she was at the Quilt show.  Potential there!

I also spent time this week scouring and cleaning up some wool for spinning.  Still lots more wool to do though.  Also looking for local cotton gins and preparing the cotton for spinning.

I have also been doing as much research as possible to make things easily accessible for my workshops.  Lots of info printed and put on my huge bulletin board in the weave room. 

Just trying really hard to be organized and productive for the students.  I am not a formally educated instructor so I have really had to think hard on things like cirriculum.  I really want to reach my fellow fiber artists in a way that effects their day to day life and more importantly their creativity.  I want them to be so enthusiastic that we keep in touch and develop other workshops....or maybe just get to know some people will interests similar to mine and make new friends in this little tine town.  It truely isn't JUST about the money.

I will be taking some pictures on Saturday when I go to the center for my Beginner Peyote Bead Weaving workshop. I will then post them so that you get to see what goes on.  I go even if there are no students, just in case someone walks in and asks.  I need to make my presence known.  It also gets me out of the house and some art time of my own.  Having been a self-employed person for years as a Nail Technicial I know that you just HAVE TO BE THERE.

Today I get to stay home and actually do some of my own art.  I am doing some cotton on the spinning wheel, weaving Wiggles (the little brown dog) a new rug, and designing a new woven bracelet in my head.

I have to keep at least one loom empty so that I can teach Dana how to warp it when the time comes.  But my next project on the large loom will be a tapestry done with a cartoon.  The cartoon is a drawing that hangs behind your warp threads (remember those are the vertical threads) and you weave by the picture/cartoon.  That means I will have a pre-determined tapestry in mind.  Kind of like when I tried to do the Gecko by the grid...only I believe this will be somewhat easier to follow and it will be MY own design.  Hope it goes better than the gecko did.

So, that is what is going on in my little corner of the art world.  What goes on with you?