Peace Be With You



Linen warp and weft with wool inlay

I just got back from mailing off my most recent transparency titled, "Peace Be With You".  This piece was a commission so I knew when weaving it I would not be keeping it.  I hung it in the window here at the house for a week or so prior to mailing.  I have a hard time letting go of a weaving that I have worked long and hard at designing.

Mary says, "Happy New Year"

Mary, a glove bunny, was made to celebrate the year of the rabbit.  Mary has a basket of carrots fresh from the growers market.  I have named her Mary after our local mountain peak.  The first bunny I owned was stuffed  and  I kept it in a cage in my bedroom.  My two sisters would insist I feed it raw carrots and during the night the bunny would eat the carrots gone.  I wish I could remember her name.   The second bunny I owned was named Shasta.  My family had just visited my grandparents for the first time in Northern California, Yreka.  We flew into Medford, Oregon from Pennsylvania and I experienced the great mountain of Shasta in her beauty and grandeur from Interstate 5.  Even in the middle of summer she still had a layer of snow on her top.    When we got home from the trip I got a live bunny with a white hump on her back and I named her Shasta.  She was beautiful but she always ran away while I was at school and I would spend the afternoons looking for her.

Sea Curtains

I visited the Rogue Gallery and Art Center in Medford, Oregon this weekend to view the installation, Sea Curtains.  This is a not to be missed show.  You walk into the gallery surrounded by the sea with floating kelp and creatures rubbing up against you.  The only thing missing was the smell of the sea and it might be a good thing to bypass.  Audrey Sochor the artist has painted sheer fabric and doubled the fabric for the 9  foot curtains to create the moire effect.  Theatrics are provided by the air-blowing fans and the dimension of light.  Audrey was present on Saturday during my visit and she is as delightful as the show.  You must find time to get to the gallery prior to February 8th for a view.   

Christmas came late for Sophie!

Sophie is our dog.  She is a mix of many types of dog and weighs about 40 pounds.  We have been told that the best dogs have spots on their tongues....hmmm not sure where that came from but Sophie is the best dog and she has lots of spots everywhere.  We picked her up at the Jackson County Friends of the Animal Shelter on New Year's Eve 5 years ago.  The first day we got her she escaped the totally fenced backyard.  She sat in the front yard waiting for us to return home.  She is settled into our family now.  At Christmas I decided she needed nothing, she had plenty of toys and treats.  Well her friends and family thought otherwise.  See photo of her special toys from Maggie, our daughter and son-in-laws dog.  Well of course Christmas bows make her look beautiful and she knows it.  Then my friend Patricia decided Sophie really needed that coat I had been talking about making for years.  Sophie hates the rain and we live in the Willamette Valley.  The pattern came on Christmas Eve and I made it for her a few weeks later out of bright rain proof fabric from the Rain Shed and cozy bright fleece.  The Rain Shed is a great store for water proof  fabrics, visit in Corvallis or on- line.  Christmas came late for Sophie.  Happy 2011 Sophie and to you all!

Amahl and the Night Visitors

Today I decided I would take a break and watch Amahl and the Night Visitors.  This was the first opera commissioned for television in 1955.  I grew up watching this on television every Christmas.  Opera you say!  Well it was in English and for children.  My sister and I still break into song, "This is my box".  You would have to have seen the opera or heard the songs to know our song.  Thanks for the traditions Mom and Dad.  While weaving this transparencies a few years back I thought about this opera while weaving. 

Coffee Cuffs

I sell felted coffee cuffs at a local coffee and tea shop here in Corvallis called Oregon Coffee and Tea.  I love making the cuffs to slip on a paper mug of a take out drink.  I weave them about 4 inches across on the loom, wash to felt and cut.  Decorating is extra fun--a button here or there(it is a cuff), maybe some needle felting and a bit of stitching.  I am taking a stack of cuffs down to the shop today.  See you there for a bit of Christmas shopping.

What is that I smell in the air?

I know it is very hard to be thinking about the next holiday before this one is over.  I got some sense of Christmas this week...I was in a long line at the post office mailing a birthday present.  I also got a call from The River Gallery in Independence, Oregon(about 30 minutes from Corvallis) where I am a contract artist to tell me they install the Holiday Show next week and are looking for new work this week.  I turned in several ornaments, handwoven scarves and kitchen towels for sale.  Many of the ornaments I finished up last year because I know how hard it is for me to be thinking of Christmas this early.  Weaving scarves and towels all year long is pure therapy.  I prefer to stick with Thanksgiving until...so I stopped at Bugerville for a Pumpkin Milkshake on the way home to get me back in the Thanksgiving mood.

Handwoven scarf for sale