Comfort sewing

We are now over 2 weeks post-vandalism and I am still dealing with it on a daily basis. We now have living room windows again (instead of plywood boards) but we are waiting on screens. We have ordered new couches (the fabric is called "passion chocolate!") and next week I'll deal with the rug. My car is drivable with new windows, but next week it goes back to the shop for a new mirror and repair of other body damage. I'm sure that the young fellows who did this had no idea of the amount of damage they were inflicting.

Meanwhile, though, life goes on. I've gotten back to work and have gotten a few big projects done, which has felt satisfying. Roger and Caroline are happily back at school. Things are feeling pretty normal again.

When I've had time, I've even managed some sewing time. I'm working on my art group's "muslin challenge" with fun results -- no pictures yet, so as not so spoil the end surprise. And when I've been overwhelmed by the fall-out from the vandalism, I've retreated to my office for some comfort sewing.

This week, I've hauled out my scraps and am putting together another quilt to donate to the Valley of the Moon Children's Shelter. With the vague sense of unease we've had here, I've been thinking of kids uprooted from their homes as the result of tragedy, which is the population served by this shelter. The VOM shelter is an emergency custody shelter, where kids are brought when they're taken out of dire circumstances or on their way to foster homes. I love that each child coming into the shelter gets to choose a quilt from the quilt cupboard (many of which are made by my guild members). The quilts stay on their beds while they're at the shelter, and then they get to take them with them when they leave. For many of the kids, it's the only possession that is absolutely "theirs" which follows them into their new lives.

This time, I've been using scraps that I've cut into strips for various strippy projects. They're sorted into lights and darks and stored in these handy bags. (Don't you love these new humongous ziploc bags?)



I'm using paper foundations (about 7 x 11") to make diagonally striped scrappy blocks. Very fun, mindless sewing.



And here's how it's looking so far.



I'm aiming for something like this wonderful Tiramisu quilt by the Pie in the Sky folks.

Sound the trumpet!

Caroline came bouncing out of her classroom this afternoon. Today was the first band lesson and she has elected to learn the trumpet. She is thrilled.

As luck would have it, I bought the giant sized bottle of Advil at Costco yesterday, so we are prepared.

Show time

Today brought good mail. You'll be seeing "Above Healdsburg" and "Coming Home" at PIQF in October!


Above Healdsburg


Coming Home

Really good reading

Tommy is compiling a list of people's favorite books so that she can create a "must read" list for herself and others. Being a voracious reader, as well as a keeper of lists of what I've read, I turned to my trusty notebook and started to list my favorites.

Well, it became apparent that my list is pretty long. So, I'll post it here and Tommy -- and you -- can pick and choose if you're looking for something good to read.

When my sister and I were kids, we developed funny rules about the books we'd get from the library. (Why, I don't know, but we did.) We'd stack our books in the order we intended to read them as we rode home from the library, and we'd HAVE to read them in that order. No switching. (See? What difference could that have made?) Then, we kept journals in which we rated the books on a scale of 1 to 10. We both still do this. It's weird, but it's useful for looking back to see if I actually did read something before.

So, here's my list of what I've given ratings of 9 or 10 to within the last few years. (I'm including the Amazon.com link so you can go see what it's about... but try your local library for it first!)

Simply great fiction

Blue Diary - Alice Hoffman
Empire Falls - Richard Russo
The Last Days of Summer by Steve Kluger
Perfect Match, Plain Truth, Keeping Faith, Vanishing Acts -- and anything else by Jodi Picoult
The Deptford Trilogy - Robertson Davies
The Dive from Clauson's Pier - Ann Packer
The Seduction of Water - Carol Goodman
The Sabbathday River - Jean Korelitz
The Secret Life of Bees - Sue Monk Kidd
The Emporer of Ocean Park - Steven Carter
Midwives, The Law of Similars - Chris Bohjalian
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
gods in Alabama - Joshilyn Jackson
Three Junes - Julia Glass
Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingsolver
Beachcombing for a Shipwrecked God, Pocketful of Names - Joe Coomer

Fun chick lit

Lucy Sullivan is Getting Married, Angels and anything else by Marian Keyes
Eat Cake - Jeanne Ray
Sleeping with Shubert - Bonnie Marson
The Wilder Sisters - Joann Mapson

Well-written relationship themes

Bread Alone by Judith Hendricks
Almost by Elizabeth Benedict
Never Change, True to Form, The Art of Mending, and anything else by Elizabeth Berg
I Wish I had a Red Dress and What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day - Pearl Cleage
High Water - Lynn Hightower
Sweetwater Creek, Islands, others by Anne Rivers Siddons

Absorbing British novels

Picking up the Pieces - Mary Sheepshanks
The End of an Error - Mameve Medwed
Caught in the Light and anything else by Robert Goddard

Legal/political thrillers

Open and Shut, Sudden Death - David Rosenfelt
The Incumbent - Brian McGrory
The Lincoln Lawyer - Michael Connolly

Mysteries

An American Killing, Love her Madly - Mary Ann Tirone Smith
Flashpoint - Lynn Hightower
Reliable Sources, Ecstacy, and others by Beth Saulnier
Falling Off Air - Catherine Sampson

Time Travel

Time and Again - Jack Finney

Beginnings and Endings

I asked in my last post about how to begin and end quilting neatly, and got some helpful replies.

I know some folks feel that the back doesn't matter, it's all about what's on the front. I agree with that maybe 75%...which is to say that I don't worry much about how the back looks, and in fact I typically put a big splashy print on the back so the details of my quilting aren't quite so obvious.

But the 25% of disagreement comes from several thoughts. First, I make quilts. Sometimes art pieces, sometimes bed quilts, some contemporary, some more traditional. And for me, good technique is part of what I'm striving for. It's not the only thing, and it's not the biggest thing. But I'm proud to be part of a quilting tradition, and I have no quarrel with the expectation that the work be well-presented on both sides. Plus, I know that there've been plenty of times where I've seen a striking piece (whether it's an art quilt or something more traditional) at a show, where the design is really good and the color is effective...and the closer I get, the more disappointed I am at the really sloppy technique. (I'm not saying here that I don't like raw edges and wonky bits and nonpointy points.) But maybe this is for another discussion.

Anyway. I don't like the fact that my not knowing how to do this seemingly simple thing gets in my way. So, I"m trying to figure it out so I can move past being impeded by this.

Okay. On the free motion quilting, here's what I've been doing with great success. I take one stitch (really, just roll the needle down and then up again), then pull on the upper thread tail until the loop from the bobbin thread comes up, and then pull the bobbin thread to the top. Then, holding both threads out of the way, I stitch once or twice in that same place, then stitch forward a ways, stop, and cut off both thread tails.

For stopping, I do what I Ricky Timms shows on his DVD... As you slow to a stop, you end with a few teeny stitches, then raise the presser foot and needle, pull the fabric a few inches away so you can catch the upper thread, then keeping the upper thread looped around your left index finger, you bring the needle down once in the same place where it came up... Again, raise the needle and presser foot, pull the fabric away a few inches, and pull up on the loop around your finger. It pulls the bobbin thread up to the front and you can snip both off. Everything is secured by those teeny stitches you took just as you were stopping, but it's not visible because you're not stitching over other stitching.

But as for the straight stitching, not free motion? Here's where I've not perfected a method. I've tried starting, stitching a stitch or two then back stitching for a stitch and moving forward again, but my Bernina always does two back stitches when I wanted one, and I see a heavier mark where the stitches were back-stitched over. It looks clumsy to me.

I've tried just starting and going forward (thinking to tie the threads or bury them later), but what tends to happen is that I end up getting the threads tangled in or sewn in by what i'm doing, and that makes a mess that is hard to totally erase later.

So, here's what I'm trying now when I'm quilting with feeddogs up and a walking foot or other regular foot on. I pull up the bobbin thread with one needle insertion, as described above, then I set the stitch length to almost 0 and take a few really teeny stitches but still moving forward and not in the same place so as not to get a little blob on the back...then I increase the stitch length to normal and go on my way. I can cut the thread tails off and it's secured. I reverse the process for stopping.

So far, this seems to be working well but I have to think about it...it's not automatic.

And really, when I quilt on my Juki, I tend to use the thread-cutter button on the foot pedal, which cuts when you want it to and leaves a tiny 1/4" tail on the back. The only problem with that is that it's not so fun to go find all those teeny tails to snip them off, but it sure makes for quick quilting.

If anyone has any other suggestions, I'd be happy to hear them. This is one of those things I'm sorta paying attention to right now, as I'm trying to do more visible quilting, dark thread on light fabric, and fully allowing the quilting to show on back. I'll see how it goes.

Round and round

Today, while the auto glass guy was here whacking the rest of the glass out of the car windows and replacing it with nice, new windows, I was upstairs engaging in frustration-release therapy.

I put on my Hawaiian music playlist on Itunes, and engaged in some intense free-motion quilting. I had a very good time and feel much better.

My goal for this little impromptu piece was to play with a design that left a lot of space for quilting, and to make the quilting an equal design element of the whole. I think this is somewhat successful in that, not perfect (snort) but it was a fun try. I'm not sure what the final binding will be. It'll finish to about 24 x 24".

One of my ongoing challenges is how to stop and start fmq without the threads balling up and looking horrid at those stop/start points. I used the method Ricky Timms demonstrates on his Grand Finale dvd (I know, enough already, right?) and it definitely works on the FMQ parts. I still see globs where I was using a walking foot. Any good advice for stops and starts when you're using regular stitch length and feed dogs up?

Experimenting

As I tend to do every now and again, I've been pondering my tendency to wander from project to project, technique to technique, experiment to experiment. As I read blogs and see art produced by folks who have honed in on What They Do Best and who have the time and focus to actually work in a straight-ish line, I tend to get discouraged about my own rambling.

But recently I picked up the lastest issue of Teesha Moore's fun 'zine "Art and Life," and found a reference to an article on creativity that intrigued (and encouraged) me. So, I went and looked it up, and was intrigued.

The article is by Daniel Pink in an online issue of Wired Magazine, called "What Kind of Genius Are You?" In it, Pink discusses a theory developed by economist David Galenson that there are two types of creative people. The first, "the conceptual innovator," flashes out with genius work early in life. The conceptualists (under his theory) are dramatic and quick, and figure out in advance what they are doing and where they are going creativity-wise. The idea is the thing, not so much the execution. The definitive aspect of a conceptualist is certainty: they know what they want and they know when they have created it. They have a clear idea of what they want to achieve, specific goals. Into this category Galenson puts F. Scott Fitzgerald, Pablo Picasso and Orson Welles.

In contrast, the second type of creative person, the "experimental innovator," goes through years of trial and error before doing important work in his/her later years. Their work is usually not conceived fully in advance. They figure things out as they go along, and never really know when their work is finished. In this category, Galenson lists Cezanne, Mark Twain, and Alfred Hitchcock.

Interestingly, Galenson reports (in his analysis of artists based on this theory) that conceptualists always sign their work, while experimentalists rarely do.

Intriguing, yes? Maybe it's just me, but it makes me feel better about all my wanderings.

Going round in circles

I think we are all in stress-recovery mode around here. Roger has the flu, and spent the weekend in bed. Caroline just wanted to stay home to draw and play Pokemon and rearrange her horses and watch movies with her friends Lily and Selena.

Me, I retreated to my office for an afternoon of therapeutic fusing. Here's the result, as yet unsewn. It was inspired by a photo of a garden walkway I found in some gardening magazine. I'm looking forward to quilting it and may even (gasp) apply a few beads.

Check out the sidebar...

We're getting back to normalcy around here, if you ignore the huge pieces of plywood still boarded up on the outside of the house over the living room windows. From the inside, with the roman shades down, things look pretty normal. And our insurance is telling us not only that we need to replace the living room carpet but also that we either need to reupholster the furniture that got all that glass on it OR replace those pieces (whichever is cheaper, of course). So, looks like a living room make-over will come out of this mess. That's a rather nice silver lining!

Anyway. I've placed a link in my sidebar to the list of Artful Quilting Tutorials I've found, and will continue to update that entry. So, if you're looking for a quick lesson or an avenue to a new experience, explore that! I've just added PamDora's wonderful slide show of how her current piece went from fabric clumps to almost-final.

Picking up the pieces...

First of all, THANK YOU to all of you who sent sympathetic thoughts and cheering words of support about the vandalism we've suffered. It is a huge hassle, but the scariness has receded and we are being treated well by our insurance carriers. Caroline is coping really, really well, and we are spending a lot of time just hanging out together and talking about how important we are to each other and how, really, the only thing that matters is that we're all okay. The rest is just STUFF. So, I'm astonished at how far-reaching the actual consequences of this incident will be (we have to have our living room rug replaced, due to too much glass embedded in it to ever fully remove, for example) but, as I said, that's just STUFF. And I was very glad to hear from the police this morning that there have been a few other similar incidents and they are pretty certain they know who did this and they will be in touch soon to give us more info.

Anyway. On to quilting content!

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I watched Ricky Tims' DVD "Grand Finale," in which he shows various quilting and finishing techniques. I was taken with a binding technique he shows there, where you end up with a really tidy bit of piping in the binding. So, on Tuesday I decided to get my "Green Fields" quilt finished.

First, I sewed some #3 perle cotton into a strip of fabric for the piping, using a pintuck presser foot. The pin tuck foot has grooves that slide right over the cord and keep it snug while you sew it in place. Very easy.



Then, I sewed the piping down the middle of the actual binding strip. You can see I set up a masking tape guide to make sure I was keeping the strip even. Again, using that pin tuck foot really helped to keep that piping sliding right in place.



I pressed the strip, wrong sides together, and voila! I had binding ready to go with piping inserted.



Then, I lined up the edge of the binding with the edge of the quilt, and sewed the binding on to the BACK side of the quilt.



And here was the coolest part: I used a edge stitch foot to sew the binding to the front of the quilt. This special foot has a metal rudder like thingie that slots right into the groove you want to sew into...so it guides you along and the needle follows, sewing perfectly into the groove. I'm not big on "in the ditch" stitching, but if I were gonna do it, this is the foot I'd use.



The result of this method is that the binding gets machine-sewn to the quilt, so it's very sturdy. And the stitching line is hidden between the piping and the binding, so it looks exceptionally neat. On the dvd, Timms shows how to do mitered corners so they work beautifully, too.

And here's the result:



Cool, huh? I am very impressed with myself.

I don't expect that I'll do this on many quilts, but I really like it on this one and was pleased to work through his well-demonstrated technique.

Maybe tomorrow I'll get to play with fusing, as I've been dying to do...

Shattered

I had this plan for today. I was going to get up, and post a new entry with pictures of the quilt stuff I did yesterday, then I had a pleasant day ahead of some fusing play time.

Instead, I went downstairs at 6:30 am to find glass all over the living room. Somehow, during the night someone took a huge blunt object to our two living room windows and shattered them. Weirdly, Roger and I had awakened during the night to a loud noise, but Roger saw nothing when he went downstairs to investigate (probably because the living room blinds were down and he couldn't see that the windows had broken). I looked out the bedroom window (which faces the front of the house) and didn't see anything.

What a shock. And then, when I went outside to see the damage from the front, I saw that TWO windows on my car had been shattered as well.

So, the morning has been spent with local police and insurance reps and a lot of time shop-vacking glass. Roger had to rush off to school for a class but he will be back as soon as he can.

I've taken pictures for insurance purposes but am too disheartened to post them here. You all don't want to see such ugliness, anyway.

A neighbor who opened her door when she heard noise, saw two adolescent boys running around the corner (our house is on a corner). The police thinks it may have been aimed at a school principal who lives on a corner in the same position as our house but on the next block over. All that rage, and they hit the wrong house? It's sort of a relief to think that it was kids, rather than grown-ups....but still, it has me thinking. Was this aimed at us specifically for any reason? Why hit MY car and not touch Roger's which was parked right next to it? My Ipod was in the car (although tucked out of sight) and my cell phone was clearly visible looking in...those weren' taken. So it WAS about the damage, not about theft. And if it was mistaken identify, will it happen again?

My tough, street-wise urban transplant neighbor says he will be watching all street traffic today for me, as he thinks that anyone who did that would come back to see what they accomplished by the light of day. He says he's ready to jump in his car and follow them. Great. I'm not sure I'm comforted by this.

I'm going to go take some advil, then take a shower, and then...well, wait for the restoration guys that the homeowners' insurance company is sending over.

I think this calls for chocolate. Is it too early for a margarita?

Art Quilt University, right here!

Feeling down because you can’t spend weeks with Nancy Crow in her barn, attend Art Quilt Tahoe, or cruise the Mediterranean with a boat-load of quilters?

Never mind. You have the Artful Quilters Blog Ring at your disposal! And, thanks to the talent and generosity of various ring members, we have our own workshop series right here. Through the wonder of the internet, these wonderful artists appear in your own home and show you how they do what they do. And, what’s more, you can participate while wearing your comfiest jammies, at midnight or with toddlers watching Sesame Street on the other side of the room.

I’ll try to add to this list as I learn of new tutorials posted by blog members–and I hope you’ll email me with additions as you find them. I’m sure there are others on blogs that I’ve forgotten or never found in the first place. But here’s a starting point for a lot of artistic exploration. Thanks to all of the very generous artists who continue to share their processes with all of us!

Design Process
It's Only a Leaf slideshow with Pam RuBert
The Weaver with Terry Grant
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

Fabric Coloring

Fabric Dying
with Melody Johnson ("The Lazy Dyer")
more with Melody Johnson (dye colors)
Dying Gradations
with Tommy Fitzsimmons
Fabric Painting
with Sonji Hunt
more with Sonji Hunt
with Alma Stoller
Fabric Printing
Tips from Diane Rusin Doran

Finishing Techniques

Basting a Quilt Top with Lisa Call
Escape Hatch Finish with Melody Johnson
Grommetization with Sonji Hunt

Fusing

Fusing
With Melody Johnson
more with Melody Johnson
Fusing Components
with Pam RuBert
Fusing with Liquifuse
with Terry Grant
Fusing the quilt top
with Melody Johnson

Miscellaneous

Assembly line small quilts with Deborah Boschert
Fabric Postcards with Deb Richardson
Oddball Charms and Beads with Alma Stoller
Tracing a Photograph with Electric Quilt 5 with Jan T.

Sewing Stuff

Block Construction
with Tommy Fitzsimmons
Random Sewing
with Alma Stoller
Cool Handbags
The Square Bag with Kristin LaFlamme
SuBe Sac "The Sweet Bag" with Kristin LaFlamme

Blog-related

Creating a Blog Banner
with Brenda Smith

Tutorials, anyone?

There is so much talent on this ring, and such incredible sharing.

To celebrate that, I'm making a list of the great art quilty tutorials available among the ring members which I'll post here in the next few days. I've found quite a few, but I'm sure I'm missing some and I don't want to leave anything out!

SO-- If you have a tutorial or lesson or series of posts about how you went from idea to finished quilt (with photos), or if you know of any on an AQ ring blog, email me with the links and I will add it to my COMPENDIUM of INFORMATIVE TUTORIALS for all to share.

We are SO talented.

Off to the show

In past years, Labor Day weekend has meant one fun event: the Marin quilt show. This show has traditionally been put on by a quilt guild in the city of Marin, and it's been a very high-quality, juried show. After last year's show, however, the guild opted to disband (amid a flurry of rumors as to why) and everyone feared that the traditional Labor Day weekend would be barren of quilt shows.

Well, a commercial show organization stepped in, the PCM Expo folks, and are using the time slot and Marin Convention Center venue for a Sew, Quilt and Embroidery show. They run these shows all over (all over California, anyway, and maybe in other states, too...I'm not sure) but Marin is a first for them. I've been to a bunch, as my sister Laura often has a booth to sell her needlework designs there and I usually work a day of each of her shows. She called a while ago to tell me that even though this isn't a traditional "quilt show" -- more a vender show with some quilts exhibited, it looks like it'll be quite good and there are lots of fabric vendors.

I'm going down to work in her booth tomorrow, and as she's decided to get a hotel room down there (an hour away) just to make her weekend more enjoyable, I'll probably stay over with her tomorrow night so we can go out to dinner. Should be very fun!

So, if you're in the vicinity of the Marin Convention Center, stop on by! Come by and see me at Laura J. Perin Designs. I'll be sitting and stitching, or helping customers, or if it's quiet I'll be poking through the quilt books in the booth next to her. I think she's right up front, in Slot #102. (And if you're there on Saturday or Sunday, when I won't be, stop in anyway to say hi to Laura and tell her you read about the show here!)

Where's my locker?

Caroline starts school next tuesday, at a new school.

However, I am the one who is having those weird, beginning-of-the-school-year dreams. Last night I dreamed that I was supposed to teach at that school, and on the first morning, couldn't find stockings, for some reason had to take a picture of my neighbor's baby before I left, AND had to mow another neighbor's lawn so I was definitely going to be late.

Any night now I expect I'll have that dream that I always had before school started, where I'm supposed to be in class but I can't find my locker and realize I haven't been to class in weeks and don't even remember where it is.

Do you have any recurring anxiety dreams?

In reality, I'm looking forward to next week and 4 whole days per week where I have hours at home alone to get work done. (Roger is home on Fridays, so I lose a day.) And for my first week, I plan to spend the first day home alone AT MY SEWING MACHINE working on something fun. Or maybe I'll even throw caution to the wind and do a fun fusing play time. That week, I also have a wonderful quilter friend coming for lunch and show-and-tell, which I know will be fun and inspirational.

Meanwhile, we're off to visit grandparents and shop for school supplies.

A Toontastic Day

A grand time was had by all. Remember, this was the event put on by Disney folks for fans of their game Toontown Online? And y'all wanted pictures? Well, here you go.

We drove onto the Walt Disney Studios lot at about 9:15. It was sunny and hot, which is as things should be in southern California. It's a rule. But I was beside myself with excitement about getting onto the Disney Studios lot, where common folk like me aren't usually allowed. And, being a lover of (most) Things Disney, I was primed for the experience.



It was rather like Disneyland, in that everywhere you looked there was a charming reminder that you were in the Land of Mickey. Look, up there in the sky!



And seeing this sign just thrilled me. (I know, I know...as my mother would say, "Small things amuse small minds." Still...just THINK of the famous and cinematically historical people who've been directed by this sign!!! Oh, Mr. Disney, we're ready for our close-ups!


Oh, yeah. We were there for Toonfest.



I can't estimate how many people were there for the event. 500? 1000? The ticket sold out, and it wasn't a huge crowd, but certainly a good number of people. Here's what we saw approaching the main entrance to Toonfest.



Attendees were primarily families. At the hotel the night before, we'd gone to the pool and Caroline met other kid Toons and they swapped Toon names and had fun talking Toony talk. But I couldn't find another parent who would admit that they played too.

However, standing in line, it was clear that there were other adult players as involved as me and, in fact, far more obsessive. Lots of people camed dressed as Toons, or wearing shirts they'd made with their Toon names and slogans and Toony pictures. Here, Caroline is talking to two Toons whose shirts advertise their Toon characters.



Basically, Toonfest turned out to be a carnival themed to the game in a very low-key but well-executed manner. There were games and small events, all suitable for kids from about 4 to, well, OLD. Here, Caroline is playing "Pin the Tail on the Doodle." (A doodle is a Toon's pet.)



They had all sorts of other things going on, too. In one area, a long-time Disney animator gave demonstrations on how to draw Disney characters. This artist, Stacia, was lovely and SO good with kids and talked a lot about being an artist and not being afraid to try new, different, messy things. We had a great time learning to draw Donald Duck and Caroline got to show Stacia her notebook of Toon drawings, which of course we'd had to bring along for the day.



Toons carry "gags," their weapons for fighting Cogs. Here's a Toon with one of her most powerful gags!



Uh oh, let's get out of here before it explodes!




Here I am, posing with a Cog. He's a Bossbot (the others are Cashbots, Lawbots, and Sellbots.)



We ate lunch at the Disney Studios commissary, where I was in heaven imagining that I getting my Diet Coke from the same spout as, say, Michael Eisner! Or Hayley Mills! Or Tim Allen! Caroline was unimpressed and just wanted to get to the food.

Some of the events were held in an area called Legends Plaza, right next to this building:



I've always wanted to see this in person, and was so charmed by the dwarves holding up the roof. I'd like some at our house!

Wouldn't Happy look great over the front door?



And Sleepy over the bedroom windows?



I think I'd have to put Grumpy over my office.



This lovely statute commemorates the creative contributions of Disney artists.



And look! I found one of my favorite Disney Legends!



...and another!



Later in the afternoon (when we were ready for a break from the heat), we went to this talk by Redmond, the main developer for Toontown and another member of his creative team whose name I don't recall. They gave a "Sneak Peeks" talk with information about what they're adding to the game next. They're about to start a new thing where as a Toon you can grow a garden on your "estate" and plant flowers (which grow when you plant a jelly bean -- different flowers from different colored jelly beans) and trees. All sorts of funny things result and you can gain points and various advantages from growing stuff.

I was especially impressed at how friendly these guys were with the kids, how open they were to new (and silly) suggestions, and how they repeatedly emphasized how the cooperative element of the game is a main theme that they always include.



I was fascinated by the mix of people at Toonfest. Mostly families, but really, all ages. Standing in line for something, we got talking to some older women behind us (finally! Adults who admitted playing!) and it turned out that one woman recognized Caroline's Toon name and vice versa, so they concluded that they had played together at times. Turned out the lady (Princess Panda, I think) was over 70. As Caroline and I talk about Internet safety a lot and I'm always reminding her that she has no idea who is on the internet, it was a useful illustration of how Caroline had NO IDEA she was playing with a 70 year old lady when she was running around Toontown with Princess Panda.

Oh...another interesting revelation for me. We saw quite a number of kids there with physical or developmental disabilities. And it struck me, from a parental perspective, that I'd be so happy for my disabled child to be able to run around and interact totally equally with others in this Toontown world. What a huge thing that must be for those kids, don't you think?

Oops! This gag fell on Caroline! (See her feet there, off to the left?)



Phew. She's okay. Good thing she's a strong Toon with a lot of "Laff Points" (your strength, which rises higher as you complete more tasks).



By 5pm, we were exhausted.



On the way out of the studio lot, we saw the Animation Studios building across the street.



It was a terrific (or, as they say in Toontown, "Toontastic") day.

We picked up take-out sushi on the way back to the hotel, then put it on ice while we refreshed ourselves in the pool...Then crashed for the evening with a sushi dinner and some Gameboy Pokemon game play. I wasn't kidding when I said this was a mother-daughter game weekend.



We were home by Sunday evening, in time to watch the Emmy Awards and think that we were glad we'd missed all that limousine traffic.

We're both eager to play Toontown and see if we can find any of our new friends there!

Welcome, Noobles!

Hey, everyone--take another look at the ring list. We have a whole bunch of noobles! (That's my term for New Blogs, in case you're wondering.)

I should add that those wacky gals Nexium and Celebrex keep applying to the ring, but they don't seem to get much quilting done. Perhaps they have a drug problem?

I thought Christina Aguilera was getting on the art quilt bandwagon, but no, she is just advertising her ringtones to us. Honey, we make our OWN music here.

If you want to check out the noobles, click on "previous" from the ring box on my page (yep, right over there ----->) . Those get you to the newest on the list and keep hitting "previous" from there.

(Now, I have to go rest. Toonfest was FUNFUNFUN and yesterday was a very long day. Stay tuned for Toony pictures.)

Toddlin' off to Toontown

A little over a year ago, Caroline persuaded me to try a Disney online computer game she'd seen advertised on the Disney Channel, called Toontown Online. It's one of those "massively multiplayer roleplaying games" for kids...and grownups, too. We gave it a try, and both she and I have been addicted ever since.

It's a little like going to Disneyland. Everything is happy and bright and fun there. And the graphics are amazing. Complex and beautiful with charming and funny theme decorations.

So, here's the idea...You are a "toon," an animal-ish cartoon character whose species, color, clothes, and name you choose. Me, I'm a periwinkle rabbit named Clover Crinklejinks. Caroline is a pink cat named Ladybug Sparklezilla.



You are helping keep Toontown safe from Cogs, these sort of robotic dullards (with names like Bossbots and Sellbots and Lawbots and such) and you fight them off by using jokey "gags" against them...like throwing cream pies and squirting them with selzer water and making them slip on banana peels. You get increasingly complex tasks and run around Toontown, playing games and getting rid of cogs and earning rewards. And especially wonderful aspect of the game is that fairly early on, even as a new Toon, you can only complete your tasks by cooperating with other Toons. So you have to help each other and you can only succeed through cooperation and good teamwork.

It's extremely safe for kids, which is what sold me on it to begin with. You can only talk to other toons using a "speedchat" menu of designated phrases. The worst thing you can say is "You stink!" There is no way to share personal information (ie, real name, phone number, or any other info) with someone you don't already know outside of the game. It's won all sorts of kid game awards, too.

So, we've been playing on and off over the past year and having a grand time. We tried to enlist Roger, but he's not a game-playing sort. We did get my sister ("Dapne Featherzilla") to join up, and so sometimes we all run around together. I tell you, it's hysterical.

Then, the Toontown folks announced that they were having a one-day activity/celebration for Toontown fans, known as Toonfest. I started looking into it, thinking that these days of Caroline being thrilled to play with mommy are probably limited, and it'd be a fun way to put an exclamation point on the end of summer vacation. So, I signed us up and off we go.

And it's here! Toonfest is this Saturday, and Caroline and I are both thrilled. We leave tomorrow...



...not on the Toontown trolley, I'm afraid. We opted for Southwest Airlines, instead.

We'll stay Friday and Saturday night at a hotel.



And as for Toonfest itself? We don't really know what to expect. It's at Disney Studios (which are not generally open to the public, I understand, so that ought to be interesting) and it is reported that Big! Famous! Disney! Stars! will be on hand, like Raven and (dare we hope?) Hilary Duff.

We'll probably meet other Toons...



And play some games...



...Probably swim in the hotel pool...



And go out for dinner, or maybe have room service. Nope, we won't catch our own dinner.



It ought to be a magical, imaginative time and a fun girls' weekend together.



Oh, and if you're curious about Toontown? You can investigate here and do a free 3-day trial and play a bit. It's really worth checking out, if nothing else for the wonder of seeing the stunning graphics and marveling over how complex the programming must be to have everything work so flawlessly with all sorts of real-time people playing together. I guarantee, it's a delightful escape and it will make you smile.

Toodles!

Life is just so...DAILY.

I saw a wristwatch recently, where the face of the watch said "Life is just so...Daily." And that is how I am feeling right now. I am swimming in a sea of daily business of family and household and getting-ready-for-back-to-school and catching up on all the stuff that got deferred for vacation. And I keep feeling that I am barely treading water.

Ah, well. The shore is in sight. Roger resumed classes yesterday and Caroline returns to school on September 6, and then I will have hours every day of peace and solitude to actually get things done.

Meanwhile. I did indulge myself with the Rebecca Rorhkaste workshop last friday, and I was SO glad I did. I find that when I am feeling sort of out-of-sorts, there is nothing like a day to just play with fabric to calm me down.

Having signed up for Friday's workshop on Thursday afternoon, I didn't have much time to think about what I wanted to do. Here is the assortment of fabric I took with me:



The workshop involved taking stacks of 5 or 6 inch blocks, free-cutting arcs (crazy drunkards path block things) and then swapping the pieces to make an assortment of building blocks. Rebecca's examples were, of course, breathtakingly stunning.

While we cut and sewed and cut and sewed, Rebecca talked about approaches to color. It reminded me that the "rules" about color -- or rather, the information to keep in mind -- don't change and aren't anything you haven't heard before. It's just the work with color and lots of practice and trying different combinations to achieve the look you want that makes a difference, I think. Rebecca talked about how she tends to work from a "subtractive" method, starting out with way more blocks and colors and pulling out the ones that don't work until she's pleased with the result.

By the end of the day, here's where I was, roughly:



I actually made more blocks than these, but pulled out the ones where the shade of pink was actually too pale. I added in brown at the workshop, not having brought any (thanks to Carolyn Wolf who let me take a hunk from her stash) and like the richness it adds to this combination.

But I don't know where this will go. Maybe I'll take out much of the orange so it only shows up a bit. Who knows...I don't have time right now to mess with this. But it did cause me to pull out this book to consider the color choices in a more thoughtful way.




Have you seen this book? I love how it gives examples of different color palettes, then shows examples of how they look with changes in value, hue, and proportion. So I think I want to use these ideas and change the proportions of the colors above....but how, I'm not sure yet.

Meanwhile, I am researching 4th Amendment search and seizure issues related to the police's taking of blood alcohol tests. Left brain, right brain.

No wonder I'm still longing for sand between my toes and a frosty Blue Hawaii in hand.

The Colorist

This gorgeous quilt is "Full Circle" by Rebecca Rohrkaste.

Rebecca was the speaker at my quilt guild meeting today. I was SO glad I managed to make it to the meeting. I'd not been in months, due to work and other obligations, so it was especially nice to return and see friends AND be inspired by the quilts of this amazing quilter.

Rebecca is from Berkeley, and I know her quilts as ones that inevitably draw my excited gasps at area quilt shows. Recently, a local paper did an article about her, which you can read here.

She calls herself a "colorist," and looking at her quilts shows why. She really excels at taking the simplest geometric shapes and using her amazing color and pattern choices to create exciting results. I wish I could show you more of her quilts, but she doesn't have a website. You can scroll down on this blog to see one of her pieces in progress.

She's doing a workshop for the guild tomorrow, in free-cut circles a la Keiko Goke. I'm throwing my work aside for the day (which means that's what I'm doing tonight) to take it. Should be fun, and maybe I'll absorb some of her wonderful color sense.

Everything You Always Wanted to Know...

Here it is. THE book. Note the author's name.

This is the Human Sexuality textbook that Roger has been writing for ... well, years. And now it's here, in actual hard-cover form, all ready for college professors to adopt for their classes and college students to buy. It's an actual REAL book now, finally. I think he signed the contract back when we were in the process of adopting Caroline, so that's about 10 years ago. And it has moved forward in fits and starts, due mainly to the appearance and disappearance of several co-authors along the way. So, in one way or another, it has consumed Roger's life -- and conseqently, mine -- for all of this time.

Roger's a psychology professor at Mendocino College here in Northern California. Ths isn't his first text book, actually. He wrote one just before we met, Forty Studies that Changed Psychology, which explains how 40 different ground-breaking research projects influenced what we know about psychology. (It actually made me understand in a much better way a lot of what I'd learned only briefly in my Intro Psych college course, and of course, what's what it's used for in college courses.) It's been a very steady seller and is in its 5th edition! He and a colleague also co-wrote a trade paperback called "It's My Life Now: Starting Over After an Abusive Relationship or Domestic Violence" which is also a well-respected book for survivors of domestic violence.

Can you tell that I'm very proud of my husband, the author?

That fact that it is finished is a huge accomplishment and an enormous relief. Actually, I don't know how Roger was able to keep plugging away on this thing. Me, I get paid by the hour, so I know that as I work I can tally up my time, send off an invoice, and get paid. It's pretty fast gratification for work completed. But for a textbook author (or any author, I guess), you don't know what you'll earn, if anything. You keep working and working with the hope that somewhere down the line (years away, possibly), you'll earn royalties. So the discipline required to keep going is mind-boggling to me. I really admire Roger for his persistence with this huge, seemingly never-ending project.

When we got the book in hard form, Roger said, "Wow, it's a big fat book full of stuff I know!"

Should you need a reference guide on this topic (!), it's available here.