lasting monotonic antiseptize

because I am a 'compromised' person on several fronts...

one can hope

Hedda Sterne:  "In our time, artists are inclined to believe that art is like honey, the product of their own subconsciouses, their own minds, and I do not. I see myself as a well-working lens, a perceiver of something that exists independently of me: don’t look at me, look at what I've found!"

Unaffected by it all

Life has really changed this week, hasn't it?  We have had our whole family scheduled in to visit in April- 3 different groups, I am teaching a collage class at the Mendal Library in West Palm, we are having an opening of our crit group show out in Colorado that the five of us were traveling to, and Ty's golf friends coming this weekend, both 'compromised' cancelled too.  Frankly I didn't know how I could handle all that bed-changing and cooking but somehow I was slammed from the end of March through the first week in May.  No more.  TY and I are huddled in the house waiting for the next shoe to drop.  All that has dropped so far are plans-  you know the old saying,

 "Man plans and god laughs."

Too true.  

So many friends here are now even scared to fly back to their homes up north yet want to get there to be near family and their regular medical services.  Our Canadian friends are especially worried about waiting too long and not being able to fly at all.

Schools here are still open but around Boston they are all closed, at least until the end of the regular spring break.  And amazingly, they are even going to cancel the Boston Marathon which has never happened before-  there is talk about doing it in the fall-  listen to god laughing again!

But back to the Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum, out there in Golden Colorado.  I am sending six quilts out and I think I can manage with just two big Sono tubes.  Of course that means I will lose 3 quilts  instead of 1 (or 6 quilts instead of 2!) when Fed Ex messes up, but losing quilts at this point is not an issue- maybe they will end up somewhere better than rolled up in the bathroom of my studio!  I keep them in the bathroom because it's a low ceiling room and hopefully won't overflow with water when and if the sprinklers go off, at least partially protected from a small disaster.  The designated quilts aren't my choice, just the things that were presented in the original package since I had destroyed most of them for the last show.  Too late to switch horses, would have liked to finish the wedding dress quilt of my Colorado grandmother but it wasn't to be.  I have 4 female cousins on that grandmother's side-  one is in PA and elderly, the other is younger and in DC, but the two sisters are in Colorado Springs and I was hoping to entice them to Golden to meet them AND their grandmother's dress.  

(There he goes laughing again.)

Yesterday I scooted over to the local kitting shop to grab another project and some long needles for the throw I started on too short needles.  So last night I ripped and ripped and restarted the 'right' way-  I KNEW there were mistakes and it was all I could see when I spread it out.  New chance for fewer mistakes!  And I got some gorgeous variegated hand dyed stuff that I have no idea what to do with-  probably just put it somewhere I can just look at it and not mess it up into a ball...  sick, I know.  But I am set for home-isolation.  Today I'm making chicken soup and a beef broth for ramen.  Will freeze some for *just-in-case* coming up.  

And you've read this like you care, thanks.  I got Ollie through his temperament test at the boarding facility and also signed him on for playgroup once a week.  The dog place is right next to my studio and easy to drop off and pick up-  I paid up front through June to keep him busy, and giving me a dog day off IF things reopen and there is somewhere to go! 

Hope that next post is sunnier, but it will probably be worse until it gets any better at all.

BUT I have been getting ads like crazy on the inter tubes-  all the big stores are pushing hard to sell because no one is shopping any more in the stores.  Here's why:

Cute shirt, eh?  Grab it now because it's been MARKED DOWN from $769 from $2045.

Well, maybe if you're into fairies you'll like this- $489 marked down from $1760.

These are pants, shiny slippery baggy pants, suitable for putting out fires and eating giant meals.  You can order them for $405 because they are marked down from $1495-  a deal, but I bet they are hot as all get out.  Oh!  HOTPANTS!   I get it now., no I am NOT gonna get it, I 'GET IT'.

I'll have something more exciting next time-  plenty of time to research a few things!  Meanwhile, stay isolated, scrub your hands, and don't talk to people up close.

                                                    Not-Much-Sewing Sandy, thankful for her internets

overthrows diminutivizes amazonite

There's a WORM out tonight,
Da dada daa
Let's go strollin'!
Tonight's full moon is called the Worm Moon, don't miss it
The “worm moon”  derives from the signs of worms that typically appear in the ground this time of year, according to The Farmers' Almanac. The March full moon actually happens at 1:47 p.m. Monday, but it should appear large and bright, weather permitting, at moonrise that evening at 7:07.

Corita Kent, “I just make things I like bigger.”

SQUIRREL TIME : finger puppets, a whole set!

                                                                                           Gotta Love Archie McPhee


Did you like the Bosch Pinatas yesterday?  I have had a 'thing' for Bosch since 1974 when I found a Bosch wallpaper mural and ordered it immediately for a big blank wall in our apartment.  Wish I could find it again because I cannot begin to tell you how many hours we spent laughing at all the figures going about their daily business back in their Medieval village.  Wish it was still available. ANYway, I don't have a wall for it any more-  years of living has filled up my spaces and in fact I only have 1 little quilt hanging in my house.  Seems like I am not the most popular artist living here.  Oh well, at least I am 'retired' now so have an excuse for no work hanging. My SO ain't my biggest fan, yet he is always promoting me to a fault.  Nobody walking in the door expects or wants the curators hard sell. I keep quiet and know he's banking on my income for our old age.  HAAAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAAHAHAHAH

I'm not finished with Bosch yet (are you surprised?).  And so the

(ALMOST) AHHHT LESSON continues:

A floating parade dedicated to painter Hieronymus Bosch honors the artist’s fascination with the fantastical and absurd in an annual event that embodies his philosophy and aesthetic. The 2019 occurrence of the Bosch Parade included a musical performance played on a partially submerged piano and a scene with two people straddling enormous horns, just two of fourteen vignettes devoted to an evolving story about “power and counterforce, battle and rapprochement, chaos and hope.”

Bosch is known for his symbolic paintings often tying in gruesome representations of the afterlife and human desire and fear. He is also regarded as one of the earliest genre painters, depicting common people and their everyday experiences. The annual Bosch Parade is described by organizers as “a theatrical and musical art spectacle on water,” drawing thousands of visitors to the southern city of Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands, where Bosch was born and eventually got his name from.

Now that is yet another reason to get to the Netherlands!

Pulsating Particular Parting Thoughts

Cartoonist Hugh MacLeod is as well-known for his irreverent doodles as he is for his opinionated musings on creativity, culture, and the meaning of life. In Ignore Everybody: and 39 Other Keys to Creativity, he gathers his most astute advice on the creative life. Particularly resonant with my own beliefs about the importance of choices is this insight about setting boundaries:

16. The most important thing a creative per­son can learn professionally is where to draw the red line that separates what you are willing to do, and what you are not. 

Art suffers the moment other people start paying for it. The more you need the money, the more people will tell you what to do. The less control you will have. The more bullshit you will have to swallow. The less joy it will bring. Know this and plan accordingly.

                                                                                 Sandy Sewing

yablonovy kerygma fastening

My sewing machine is better than your sewing machine...
Sew and Sew Sandy
Note to you all, it seems that Blogger has found me and is again trying to subvert all my political and religious rants, or something.  They won't let me add anything to the BOTTOM of the post, just in the middle, so pretend for me this was the close!   
Sew what.

In keeping with his character, Salvador Dalí’s daily routine featured a healthy dose of self-importance. “Every morning upon awakening,” he wrote in 1953, “I experience a supreme pleasure: that of being Salvador Dalí, and I ask myself, wonderstruck, what prodigious thing will he do today, this Salvador Dalí.”

Glass Squirrel du Jour, suitable for your March indoor 

Tree Celebrations.  Please only use invisible plastic fishing line for hanging to  keep the mechanics of squirrel suspension an ongoing mystery.  

Bosch-o-Rama

sort of an ahhhht lesson

  
Yup, Bosch Pinatas!  This has nothing to do with the Bosch Netflix series which I have blasted through

Artist Roberto Benavidez focuses on the art of piñata making in much of his sculptural practice, producing birds, sugar skulls, and paintings out of the same technique used to create the iconic candy-filled party object. His latest series of piñatas focuses on the work of the 15th century Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch, reimagining Bosch’s 2D figures as life-size sculptures.

Although most of the pieces focus on the various bird figures in Bosch’s work, Benavidez has also sculpted a blue, armless frog and a winged boy from his famous work, The Garden of Earthly Delights, above. Study this when you have a lot of time and good glasses.

   

barque decolourized demimonde

“Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit but the highest form of intelligence,”  Oscar Wilde

 

YUM, I had mushrooms for dinner too!

Truth be told, I am home sick in bed with a cold, JUST a cold, not the current virus going around!  Had the kids here last week and one was snuffy and probably caught it from him.  I never get sick, and knew something was up when I just couldn't get out of bed yesterday morning and walk Ollie at the usual 6:30 am.  So I snoozed and sniffed and shuffled around all day.  Finally took some decongestants that had been lying around forever and was able to move myself to the tv where I again fell asleep.  

So I binged on 'Gotta Call Saul' which I've not seen since season 1.  Just started on season 4, all that Netflix has, and then I have to start looking for the current season buried somewhere in tv land.  Ollie apparently feels fine peeing in his Onesie because every time I go near him it's wet.  I think its the fabric rubbing on him that has him going at inappropriate times.  His Onesie is in the dryer now for the THIRD time today, cannot go to bed without it or he'll chew his way through the little incision.  Tried the blow-up collar yesterday and today but I tuned my back and he put his new big teeth through it and it was just hanging there all deflated and sorry.  Dammit.  It was used on two previous dogs with no ill effects and this one wrecks it at 6 months old.  So the Onesie is our only defense now, we wait for it to be dry again.

So today I actually got dressed but still did as close to nothing as humanly possible-  like  reading two days of inane email.  One thing I want is a new pair of jeans so I went looking on different sites and found a few ridiculous models-  so absurd I had to steal the images and note the designers and prices.  My search was for straight legs or 'Boyfriend style, medium rise, dark wash, preferably black.  Basic everyday jeans.  Here's what the cat dragged in:

     OffWhite $625                                    R13 (SEQUINS!) $565                                                                       

Vetements  $1590, now on sale for $795      Balenciaga   $1150




Gavinchy   $850                                          Escada   $650


Brunello Cucinelli   $$1545                      Brunello Cucinelli AGAIN  $1845

First of all, I don't buy pre-torn jeans, I don't buy baggy jeans or pre-rolled or pre-belted jeans.  I don't buy sequined jeans or already patched jeans or jeans made from other jeans.  Add to that list I don't buy jeans that cost twice (or in two cases, three times!) as much as my wedding dress.  There were others but these really made my jaw drop-  WHO does this?  I can see spending money on clothes, but on special clothes, not these rags.  I admit I am old and out of touch but geesh.  Give me Levis or Madewell or NYDJ any day---IF you can find something that doesn't;t have SKINNY in the title.  I have a bad habit of moving my legs when I walk and 'skinny' won't let me bend at the knee.  It says in the description, "Our model Geanelleia is 5'11" tall and wears a size 2".  Well THIS model is 5'5" and wears a size 10! So, no jeans for Sandy.  Never mind I won't pay $1845 for anything I can't live in, like a garden shed.

Well the Onesie must be dry again by now.  Ollie has been stoking up on extra water so I know he's saving up that Reserve Tank in there to let go as soon as he gets in the crate.  Took him out today working on 'heel' command and he made it about a block before *I* got frustrated.  Gotta get this done and reliable before our last training session next week.  Also working on less biting.  This one is a tough cookie all around.

Sorry, no Ahhhh Lesson tonight, too much going on.  Maybe I will be able to see to sew tomorrow!                                                                                    Sew Not Sandy

nutritive umpired vaporish

(me, at the movies)

 Austin Kleon-  “how good it feels, when life’s problems seem unsolvable, to work on solvable problems with your hands.”

Your Daily Squirrel, before we go any further:

EAT DESSERT FIRST

posted to put things in perspective

OK, that daily bizniz is out o the way so now is my time to kvetch.  We had Ollie in for his neutering the other day, all went well and instead of a cone on his l'il head they gave him a Onsie and he looks so skinny with all his hair squashed into it.

  

But it keeps him from picking at his incision.  Like a baby Onesie, it has crotch snaps so I can roll it up to take him outside.  Except he then accidentally pees on it and I have to peel it off of him, plunk on his rubber tire inflatable neckpiece which renders him catatonic so I have to use a leash to guide him.  

I wash the Onesie but it's made of some super absorbent stuff that doesn't dry in a normal cycle that handles two giant towels easily.  So now he is running naked through the house and the cool breeze is ...umm...ACTIVATING those natural processes.

So, it looks like that's my lot in life the next 10 days.  The vet did give me a sedative to help keep him quiet and it worked a bit too well.  Today he is bounding around and it's all I can do to keep him confined, poor guy.

I brought home the quilt I am 'big stitching' on and have set up shop in the dining room so I can use the lights in there.  It's coming along pretty well, but I haven't gotten to the real tiny stuff yet, mostly concentrating on the larger leaves so far.  I really need to get this one further along so I can lock myself into the studio to finish the one with my grandmother's wedding dress.  I've promised it for the Rocky Mountain show in April and need LOTS more work on it before I can happily send her back to Colorado full circle!  Anyway, all of a sudden I am under the gun again.  This retirement shit ain't for sissies.

I was asked to jury a small local show here and they paid me way too much for my short time working.  So I have refunded half my fee and directed them to use it for shipping their works to the show they are aiming for-  some very nice quilts there and I wish them all the best in their endeavors.  Hope this gives them a tiny boost to keep on keeping on!   I sure could use a push myself.

All the guests left Sunday-  we had 6 people here for 4 days and only one of those days was warm and sunny.  TR and I were scratching our heads trying to think of INDOOR things to do that they haven't done already.  Climbing the lighthouse was voted off the island immediately.  Age range was from 3 to 75 so finding things we were all into was impossible.  Now all the leftover food is my focus.  AND the cold I contracted from splashing through the cold rain.  Probably little sewing today because I can't see past my sniffing' nose.  But perhaps a day of rest is in order-  just wish I had a guarantee it was going to be better tomorrow.

Ahht Lesson

and the 'lesson' here is that art is what you make of it!

Artist Kathleen Ryan creates a conversation between the beautiful and the grotesque in her oversized sculptures of mold-covered fruit. The New York-based artist uses precious and semi-precious stones like malachite, opal, and smoky quartz to form the simulacrum of common green rot on each fruit. Working at a larger-than-life scale, Ryan creates a foam base, rudimentarily painted to map out the fresh and rotten areas on the surface. She then individually places each gemstone, with varied shapes, sizes, and colors that emulate the shift from desirable to disgusting. Lemons are a particular favorite, but Ryan also works with oranges and pears, with each work scaling 6 to 29 inches. “The sculptures are beautiful and pleasurable, but there’s an ugliness and unease that comes with them,” Ryan told The New York Times.

 Sew Sew Sandy

explanative populously windy

You know that tingly little feeling you get when you really like someone you've just met? That's common sense leaving your body.

Yes, I have most certainly used a lot of salt and pepper this weekend.

And dish detergent, and laundry soap, and and and.  We crammed 6 additional people in for the weekend and had a great time except that we had to take 2 cars anywhere we went.  An if we did go somewhere it was the absolute height of the season and we had to wait to get in.  The other problem is that it was COLD here in South Florida the whole time.  The pool was heated so the kids got to play but my 6 AM walks with Ollie-the-Great were pretty much torture.  So, I just took the eighth load of wash out of the dryer and am declaring myself done for the day.  Stick a fork in it, I'm overdone.

Big doin's this week, tomorrow I am jurying a little show, a wonderful change from cleaning up the disaster area that used to be my house!  Both before and  after the jury, I need to be at the studio, trying desperately to finish SOMETHING instead of just starting new projects willy nilly.

Then, on Tuesday (H)Ollie(wood) is getting 'a procedure' done that hopefully will help him adapt to human world from being a bully puppy.  Yup, he's getting neutered and they will also take out some of his baby teeth since the big ones are now grown in and his mouth looks like a shark with double rows of teeth!  Poor little thing.  We will have to keep him quiet for two whole weeks, I cannot imagine how!  Oh yes I can-  Benedryl.

So, I have explained my absence  and my immediate schedule for the week, and we are all bored to death.  SO, my loyal reader (Yeah, singular 'cause I know I am yammering to myself most of the time.) so... here you go with your

AHHHTist INTRODUCTION

where we meet somebody doing something cool out there in the Big World: 

We don’t recommend getting near Kate Jenkins’s breakfast spread before you’ve had your morning coffee, or you might find yourself biting down on a bagel full of yarn. The British crochet artist creates fiber-based foods that bear a striking resemblance to their edible inspirations. Jenkins has a particular affinity for baked goods: her recent spreads include bagels and lox, whole grain bread loaves, and individual fruit tarts. The artist creates every last detail down to tiny caper berries, thinly sliced red onions, and kiwi and poppy seeds made from black beads.

Jenkins learned to knit and crochet as a child in Wales, and shares in an artist statement that she has always been fascinated and inspired by everyday objects and experiences. In addition to her culinary crochets, Jenkins trained and worked for many years as a knitwear designer in the fashion world. Keep up with Jenkins’s freshest bakes on Instagram, and purchase artwork in her online store.

I just love finding people who do creative things with everyday materials and techniques.  Who woulda ever thought one could crochet salmon and cream cheese on a bagel?

Wish me luck tomorrow, I'll tell you all about it...  oh, I can't.  Well, how about I tell you about the weather tomorrow?  Thanks for letting me vent, More soon.  Keep in touch.