coffee break

I'm frantically working on my piece for Off the Grid, SDA's exhibit at the conference this spring. I wasn't going to submit a piece because I thought didn't have time to make one - but I realized this morning at the Studio Six meeting that I had a piece in process that just needed to be cut to the right size. So, I'm cutting and stitching tonight in the hope I can make the postmark deadline. That's why I am drinking coffee. And taking a break, aka procrastinating sitting at the sewing machine. As usual, getting together for critique is a motivator -- especially when I see what other people in the group are doing. Today was a mixed bag: some serious art, some much-needed therapy sewing, some experiments and explorations. I didn't get pictures of everything, but here is a sampling. Randy is a book artist par excellence, but taking a picture of one of her amazing handmade books would not do it justice. Instead, here she is with one of her quilts, asking for advice about the border. "This one's for the couch," says Randy. Functional art! Not an oxymoron when it's Randy's. Here is Susan with one of the baby quilts she has just finished, in an effort to use up some of her commercial fabrics. Therapy sewing while the serious art takes a breather. There must be something about February that makes some of us take a detour while we are in transition to the next phase, whatever that turns out to be. Now Susan is helping to hold up some experimental pieces that one of the other artists has done, while we give our input. Can you identify whose work this is? Kerr is working on some new ideas, too. Rachel is concentrating while she explains what she is thinking about and where she's going with it. Makes me think it's time for me to start drawing again. Rachel showed a new piece which she is sending off to SDA, and then shared some wonderful fabrics her daughter Blair(who is in the Peace Corps) brought home from the Gambia and one other country my brain is too foggy to remember. Hollie is working on something exciting that I didn't photograph, and here is Diane's almost-finished piece that she showed us a few weeks ago when it was just getting started. Incredible! That's about it for this morning's meeting. I have to admit that the coffee has not helped to keep me awake enough to sew a proper stitch. I think it is time to go to bed - especially since I have to be out early tomorrow morning to stay with my grandson Jake, who is 5 and is home from school with a strep throat.