Workin On a Groove Thing, Baaaby

I love art.

Have I mentioned that before?

Oh well...

it's because it's so true.

Nothing centers me or gives me peace in the same way that looking at, thinking about or making art does.


Especially the making part!


And that goes way beyond peace...or focus... to a tingling excitement - a gratifying joy that goes deep down into my spirit. 


Or -maybe I should say it comes up from deep inside.


No matter.


It's love...pure and simple.


And as we all know...


love makes us happy.


Now you may not love what I do - artistically speaking...and I know I have miles to go to be the artist I will become but with all that said...

I'm gonna show you what I've been up to in the last few weeks.


I know you've heard that before.

So here goes....with as little fanfare as possible...

The following is another collaboration that I've begun working on with my two Tampa Bay buddies. 

They're my soul sisters and one of my biggest regrets in leaving Tampa was the fact that I wouldn't be able to get together with them to play very often.


When I visited in October, we played around with a technique that I'd learned from Beryl Taylor - which was simply putting foil on velvet.


There is Nothing simple about the results we achieved! The following is Trish's piece:

We each did a piece, tore it in half and passed (in alphabetical order) to each other. We now have three collaborative pieces and when we see each other next, will pass the pieces to the next one of us. 


I can't WAIT to see what the girls have done and will use that as my reason to visit Tampa Bay ASAP.


All I've done...so far...to Trish's piece is burn a few holes in it with an incense stick...

The above is just a small section of the burn marks.


Oh yeah...I almost forgot - I worked on a background to attach the piece to but I'm not sure I like it yet so it may or not go with the piece when I pass it on to Davida...

We shall see.

I've been pulling projects off of my design wall and finishing them and the following "door knob quilt" was one you may have seen in a blog back in September/October before I completed it. 

It's my rendition of colorful, exciting Barranquilla and every time I walk up my stairs it makes me smile.(I have it hanging on the stairway wall)...



Jerry has asked me several times when I'm going to post his latest alligator - so here it is in all it's wonderfulness!

I L-O-V-E, love his alligator creations!!! 


This one is about 8-9 inches long and is even cuter in real life. I've taken lots of pix of it but haven't gotten one yet that shows how really cool it really is. He used screws for the teeth and it looks like it's gonna take a bit out of you - 

so be careful!


Here we go with a big mess! 

I dropped a whole box of beads while looking for just the right ones to add to my latest contact/business cards:

I'm still finding beads every day and it's been a couple weeks of sweeping.

The next group of contact cards was done at the beginning of December and they're gone out into the world already.

It is SO much fun to give these cards out because the reaction I get every time is amazing.


Here's my little punkindoodle playing with left over scraps of wrapping paper, ribbon, gift tags, markers and - most importantly - her alligator scissors...

 Love that concentration and focus!


She is a great motivator to me to play with abandon!


This is a pillow that I made a gazillion mistakes on - I simply don't do 'quilt blocks' well - probably because deep down inside - I just DON"T like to follow those damn darn directions.

I was stuck on this project until I had the idea to felt a soft curly 'real' beard and hair on him. Anywho, he turned out really cute after I covered most of my mistakes.


I WILL NOT give up.

Here are the bookmarks I made and gave away to just about everyone I ran into during Christmas (friend and family-wise). 

It's such a joy to give a little piece of my heART to those I value and love. 

And, even to strangers. 

They were made totally from scraps. And I'm talkin miniscule little bitty pieces.


What else?!?


Here is the gift we made and gave to Astrid (Pedro's mom) along with the Santa pillow above...

 

Remember my story in an earlier blog post about going to El Mercado to buy gourds? 

Welp...this is one of them...

The flowers below were made to go into the gourd vase above, but after completing the vase, it had changed so much from the original drawing I'd done - and the colors I'd first chosen - that they ended up - happily - in a vase in our bedroom...

I came up with the idea when I came across my collection of shells - and Jerry executed it - and they're perfectly beautiful...

Jerry and I worked on Astrid's gift together and it was magnificent to have my hubby in the playroom doing something besides asking me what I was gonna fix for dinner!!!


We really split the work on Pedro's gift...and again, I can't tell you how happy it makes me to have my hubby working on a project with me.


This was an idea from a book and we LOVED working on it and want to make gazillions more. The addition of the clockworks was inspired because I wanted it to be useful in hopes that Pedro would hang it in his office at Uni Norte.

Isn't he just totally cool?!?

Gourds are F-U-N!!!

So...

I will leave you with my main inspiration..

who is working on surface design on a piece of fabric she pulled out of my bin...

She then took her markers and embellished the most precious, beautiful part of my play room...

Create your life,


annie!