Thank You Pamela Allen

I saw Pamela Allen's faces that were produced in her wonderful Fantastic Faces Workshops (http://pamed.homestead.com/home.html ). With her permission my small art quilter group decided to do our own face challenge using some of her techniques. We all had a great time and really enjoyed the freedom that her techniques allowed. I did a face that I called Marriage 39. (Can you guess how many years I have been married?) One of our members got our faces into a library and also in a local bank...so not only did we have fun but we were in two shows! Even got a little press coverage!!!!

Because of the freedom Pamela's techniques gave me, I decided to go a little further and try to capture my mother in fabric. As I worked on "The Bobbie Pin Queen," I had wonderful memories that surrounded me and I could almost hear her voice speaking to me. It was really rewarding.



My mother Elizabeth was a one of a kind person, she loved her food, her cigarettes, and her coffee. Her "candy" of choice were hot peppers. Every morning she got up and rolled her hair with bobby pins, in the evening she would remove them so she could get a good night's sleep. She loved her diamonds and wore them daily...even while doing housework. She believed that Vaseline could solve any and all ailments. She had a turban type hat that she nicknamed her"Peter Rabbit Hat," and she would pop it on when she ran to the store to cover up her pin curls. At Christmas time, we all had to be careful that she didn't sew sequins on our clothes...because she believed the more glitter the better. She loved to cook, she would spend hours cutting up vegetables to make her special soup. She loved her family and spent her whole life taking care of them. When she died she left a big hole in our family. When family members get together they still tell Elizabeth stories, even her great grandkids who never got to meet her know "Elizabeth stories," so my Mama still does live on.

ATC Card Exchange

Here they are...so small they don't take very good pictures...perhaps too much flash...am still learning the ins and outs of my camera menu. The first ATC uses a ribbon weaving technique ( I used fabric instead of ribbon) for some reason the pink fabric decided to turn gray when photographed. The second card has a turtle on it..I tried to make it look like it was swimming in deep water...the camera really doesn't do it justice, t he third card is a ladybug, and the fourth needs no introduction...a Florida Flamingo.

November 29, 2005

My little Art Quilters group is having an ATC exchange on the first of December. My goal was to make lots of cards so that they would have a choice as to what they wanted to choose...I found that these little "works of art" are very hard to do. They are very small and in order to make them "SHINE", you need to go to extra lengths. I was amazed at how many beads they could absorb being as small as they were. Trying to put a binding on them by machine was impossible so I actually pulled out a needle and thread to accomplish that task. It was very labor intensive! I have now decided to make one card per person and let them fight it out! (Maybe I am getting ahead of myself, maybe they won't fight it out for my little art works, after all yesterday my art work was rejected!). But then on the other hand the meeting is being held at my house and I am serving lunch so they will be on their good supportive behavior...that's how quilt artists are, especially if they are hungry and you have chocolate!

November 28, 2005

I finally got up enough courage to enter the Quilting Arts Face Challenge contest and today I got the dreaded brown envelope back with my face and my first rejection letter. The letter was very nice but my inner hurt was still there no matter how nice the words...after all I had put myself out there and there were people who had viewed it and not only didn't like it but they were in turn not liking me. I decided to frame it...and pasted the rejection note on the back...it was my way of saying I don't care if YOU didn't like it...or me, but it really doesn't matter because I like myself.

This was the text that accompanied my face entry:

When I look in the mirror every morning I see an aging woman with wrinkles, blotchy yellowish/ reddish skin, thinning hair that hasn’t had a good hair day in years. I see someone who has lots of things they want to accomplish but is being pulled in all directions by other demands throughout her day. I see someone who hates to throw away scraps and likes to recycle failed projects. But best of all I see someone content and happy with her life in retirement.