Meditation in the Color of Orange

I am not an orange kind of person. I am not outrageous. I am not vivacious. I am not exciting, stimulating, aggressive, dramatic, impulsive, challenging, or dynamic. I do not have a hot temper. I am not an orange kind of person.

I am a careful, thoughtful, reflective, calm, reasonable person. Mostly. Not an orange kind of person.

My experience with orange is limited. Once I had an orange shirt. It was an oxford cloth, button-down collar, long sleeved shirt. Think deranged Brooks Brothers. My mother bought it for me on sale. I wore it when I worked as a camp counselor while I was in college. That was 40+ years ago, in the pre-psychedelic days. It was the summer we were told the counselors couldn't wear t-shirts or other knit shirts because they were too revealing. (Revealing, huh? Anyone looked at a department store ad recently?) We couldn't wear sweatshirts or jeans, either. (Too sloppy.) I saved my orange shirt for special occasions. Occasions when I felt especially cranky, like when we'd had several days of rain in a row. Everyone was cranky then. I declared an "Orange Blouse Day," and I fought back. I have never owned any other orange clothing. Not even socks. Not even underwear.

I've been picking up orange beads now and then, thinking I should challenge myself and use them. I really should. And I will. I will use orange beads for my May BJP.

I spread out my orange beads and looked at them. Then I decided to use aqua.

"Chicken!" I shouted at myself. I got out the orange beads and looked them over again.

Then I did the only thing a reasonable person could do. I went online and ordered more orange beads for my May BJP.

Choosing To Grow--April BJP

"Grandma Marty, you're not growing any more," he said.

I replied with the usual evidence of grown-ups growing one gives to a five-year-old. Fingernails, toenails, and hair.

He thought. "But your hair isn't really growing because it's curly," he asserted.

I'm sure there's some logic there, but I'm equally sure that my hairdresser (the person responsible for the curls) and I do not share that logic.

I may have missed a teachable moment here, but I decided against a discussion of neuroplasticity in older adults.

He got me thinking, and so my April Bead Journal is "Choosing to Grow."



Technical Details:

I used Lacy's Stiff Stuff as the foundation, sprayed with green and yellow Memories Mist.

The beads are 11/0s, 8/0s, 6/0s, cubes, bugles, triangles, and a few special shapes. All the beads are green. The ones that look silver are a greenish silver.

The backstitch again dominates.

The page is 2.75 inches by 2.75 inches.

I used taupe C-lon thread.

What I Was Thinking:

With "Choosing to Grow," I focused on how we can choose to grow in our responses to difficult situations. For me, the difficult situation is the Scary Medical Tests. This year they were scheduled for late April. (Note: I passed the tests.) As I worked on this page, I repeated to myself, "I'm choosing to grow." My idea was to train my mind, change my brain and transform myself, as stated on the cover of Sharon Begley's book. Did my strategy work? Sort of. I made it through the time before the tests, the tests, and the waiting for the results without turning into a mass of quivering gelatin dessert. OK, so I may have been gelatin dessert, but at least I didn't quiver! I'll keep trying the "I'm choosing to grow" mantra. This page is a partner with "Not Quite Pink."

I selected a new green color to represent new growth. The vertical columns of beads are growing from the horizontal foundation. While they look like new plants growing, they are intended to represent personal growth.

Issues that Came Up:

I still like Nymo better than C-lon, but I wanted to use up the C-lon I had. Of course, all the time I was using it I was wondering why I didn't at least buy some in chartreuse.

The first background for the vertical columns didn't work at all. It offended my artistic sensibilities, such as they are. So I ripped it out yesterday. That was April 30. The plain background worked for this page, but it isn't my favorite technique.

This is the most representational page I have made, except for maybe the September page. I prefer making more abstract pages.


Now on to May. I'm thinking flowers. Oops! That's representational.

Good Thing It's Not Combustible!

The Girls* were talking about dyeing wool. The tall (5"5") one was considering wool on wool applique.

No need to buy wool to dye. I have plenty of wool scraps in the basement. As promised, I descended into the fabric storage cave and came up with a basket full of wool and wool blend scraps. Most of the pieces are dark because the non-scrap parts of them were or are slacks, skirts, jackets and coats. There was a fairly large piece of light beige wool melton whose other part was made into a very nice coat in 1978.

I washed the wool in my front-loader machine. There has been some discussion about whether wool will felt in a front-loader with no agitator. Due to the fact that I have only this particular washing machine available, I was unable to do a truly scientific experiment. I ran it through the express cycle twice, both times with hot wash and cold rinse and the highest spin speed.

This is the basket of wool.



Then I put it in the dryer on hot. I had a fleeting thought that I should clean the lint filter part way through the drying cycle, but, as is common with fleeting thoughts, the thought flit. When the dryer buzzed, I went down to the basement, and this is what I found in the lint filter.



Thank goodness wool isn't very combustible! One would not want to start the house on fire for ayrt or even for art!

*The Girls are in the last photo in the previous post. They are the ones on the far left (the tall one) and on the far right (the not tall one). The two in the middle (along with another person) used to be The Girls. The two in the middle have ascended to become The Mothers of the Girls. The one who is not pictured has ascended to become The Grandmother of The Little Girls.

Girls Gone Wild!

Last weekend my sister-in-law, my daughter, my niece and I all went to the International Quilt Festival in Chicago. We had an absolute blast! It was GIRLS GONE WILD!

On Thursday I took a Fabric Painting class with Cindy Walter. It was too much fun. There were only six of us in the class, and we were able to play with all the toys shown above.

Messes were acceptable, and you can see my mess in progress below.


My masterpieces drying are shown below. We painted on wet fabric and dry fabric and noted the differences. Then we experimented with five colors of paint on a single piece of fabric. It's hard to make that look good. We scrunched and we salted and we painted silk scarves.

Here's Cindy holding one of the quilts she made with hand painted fabric. She's a super teacher--relaxed, upbeat, and encouraging. Everyone had a great time.


On Friday my sister-in-law and I took Organic Beading with Nancy Eha. This was a fun class, too. I learned some new stitches and enjoyed looking at Nancy's work. The samples she showed us are below.


My sister-in-law's practice sampler is below. Hers is much neater than mine.


And here at last are the Girls Gone Wild! We saw all the quilts, all the vendors, all the food on the restaurant buffet, and all the furniture in the Ikea store. We also had lots of laughs. Plans are underway for another adventure at the Quilt Festival next year.

The Purple Doll Is Finished!

I finished the Purple Doll today. It will go to the auction to earn money for scholarships for the Florida Library Association. She is five inches tall and three-and-a-half inches across from fingertip to fingertip. Not shown in the photo is a ribbon so she can be hung up. The back is not beaded.

At the bottom part of her skirt are iridescent sequins. The beads are 15/0s, 11/0s, 8/0s, bugles, cubes, and triangles. Her heart started out white, but I colored it with magenta and purple alcohol ink. That turned out pretty well, at least on the third try. I found out that it was possible to erase alcohol ink with rubbing alcohol.

I'd read about stuffing forks. I didn't want to order one so I decided to make my own. My stuffing fork is made from two bamboo skewers and masking tape. The directions for making one are simple: Place the skewers side by side. Tape them together. I consider this fork an amazing success. I found it much easier to stuff the little doll with my fork than with a chopstick or a single skewer.



Good-bye, Little Purple Doll! Find a good home and enjoy your new family.

The Purple Doll

I'm working on a new spirit doll. This one is for an auction to raise money for scholarships for the Florida Library Association. You can see the underside of the doll's front above. She is about five inches tall.

The front of the doll is below. I wanted a spring color so I chose lilac. I've made purple pieces before, but none with this more reddish purple. That was an interesting challenge since I gravitate toward bluish purple. But I'm happy with the way it's turning out. There's not much more beading to do. The back will be fabric lightly decorated with paints or ink. After the front and back are sewn together and it's edged with beads, I'll send it down to Florida. My plan is to do this before Wednesday, when I go to the International Quilt Festival in Chicago.


One question remains: What caused her heart to leap like that? She must be in love!

Here Be Monster!

Not too scary, I hope.

Last month our fiber arts group had a monster making workshop, and here is my result. At present, she doesn't have a name so suggestions are welcome.

Her defining characteristic is a unique form of synesthesia. Because her eyes are jingle bells, everything she sees is interpreted as a sound. To her, everything visual is musical. Imagine what that is like!

Her bright colors indicate that she likes peppy, cheerful music best. But she also has a tolerance for avant guard music. She also has a bit of a rebellious streak. She has repeatedly ignored her mother when told to cut her hair and trim her eyelashes. She is a warm, loving monster, with cozy, fuzzy skin and arms reaching out to hug.