If you have read my blog in the past, you know I am in love with the public library. I thought it would be fun to start a new occasional series on the tierneycreates blog called “Library Adventures”, where I would share a photo of the stack of books, of my latest borrowings from my local library.
I love to browse the crafting, quilting, cooking, gardening and home decor sections. I will also take a run through the entire non-fiction section just for fun and to see if anything catches my eye.
I recently started following a blog, Dewey Hop, in which the blogger is documenting their journey of reading through their entire local library! I secretly dreamed of doing this someday; and even tried to do it as a kid, attempting to make it through the entire Children’s section! However, I am going to stick my my favorite dewey decimal section of 700 – “Arts & Recreation”!
Every time I think I have borrowed all the books that are worth borrowing – POW – there is a fresh new group of books to borrow! Additionally my local library has a Non-Fiction New Release section, which I love to browse every time I visit it (it is the first place to head when I enter the library!).
So here is my current stack:
One of my great pleasures in life is to sit with a pot of tea and my library stack!
Postscript
More library related stuff – this is a follow up to the post Good Listens (and other stuff). In this post I shared I was currently listening to an audiobook I borrowed from the library – SuperBetter by Jane McGonigal.
This audiobook is fantastic and I had to renew it to finish it up (it is rather long, but packed with great information and inspiration). This audiobook is about using gaming concepts to improve things that challenge you in life, and to achieve goals. The author has a TED talk and it is fantastic – Jane McGonigal: The game that can give you 10 extra years of life. (Thanks to my friend Torben suggesting the TED Talk!).
Here book goes WAY beyond the TED Talk. One of my favorite concepts in the book is “Cognitive Reframing”, which is defined in Wikipedia as “…a psychological technique that consists of identifying and then disputing irrational or maladaptive thoughts. Reframing is a way of viewing and experiencing events, ideas, concepts and emotions to find more positive alternatives…”. I have already started applying the concepts I picked up from this audiobook and I am very pleased!
I am enjoying this book so much I might go buy the hardcover version to keep as a reference!
Also debuting in this show will be the piece that Betty Anne created from my abandoned recycled silk Ohio Star project she rescued (see post Surrendering My Piece to “Rescue”).The piece is amazing – she used all my original piecing and reworked it, with additional recycled silks and linens, into a completely new and deliciously intuitive design. I will post a photo after it debuts at the show. We were so inspired by this “handing off of the start of a piece” to another person to reimagine the piece, that Betty Anne gave me her start of another piece based on the same group of recycled silk and linens scraps. This will be a new challenge – I will create a piece based on her leftovers from her work on my piece that I abandoned …but that is another post…
Well, I have started on the piece inspired by the scraps my friend Betty Anne gave me (from her reworking of a piece I had started and then abandoned). She also gave me a small “square within a square log cabin style block” she had made from the scraps. I used this block as the starting point for my challenge.
It is now in progress on the Design Wall.
Here is the story of it’s evolution to date, in photos:
The stash of recycled silk and linen scraps that Betty Anne gave me from her silk piece (which was a reworking of a piece I started, then abandoned)
I made approximately 56 – 58, 2 x 2 inch and 2.5 x 2.5 inch free form “log cabin” style blocks. (I do not remember exactly which one of the blocks is the one Betty Anne originally gave me to start the challenge; but I know it is one of the black silk blocks with a bright center.)
I played around with potential layouts (like floating them in a solid silk like you see above photo) and I am leaning towards grouping them all together. I love the intensity of all the colors together.
Here is a close up of one of my favorite 2.5 x 2.5 inch blocks – I am having so much fun coming up with combinations from the limited fabric options I was given. I enjoyed the tiny piecing challenge and many of the silks had to be backed with interfacing to stabilize their delicate weaves.
Now the blocks are on the Design Wall.
Now I can decide, from the remaining fabrics, what additional blocks I need to add and their color combinations.
This past weekend I witnessed the ultimate in “home studio fabric organization”!
I visited the home of a quilter friend of mine for the first time and she showed me her quilting studio. As I turned the corner to enter her studio, my jaw dropped when I saw her extremely well organized fabric stash: It looked like I had stepped into a quilt shop!
How She Did It
My friend collected empty cardboard fabric bolts from quilt shops and cut them in half. She wrapped her fabric stash fabrics around the half bolts and then organized the fabrics by theme/category in a large wide bookcase.
If she had more than a certain yardage of fabric (I forgot her threshold), she would organize the fabric on a full size cardboard bolt (bottom left of the bookcase).
Advantages
I think the advantages of this type of fabric stash organization are as follows:
Her fabric organization and display feels like she is shopping directly from a quilt shop every time she goes to select a fabric in her stash – AMAZING!
She can clearly see what is in her stash.
This may reduce her need to actually go to a quilt shop, and spend money on fabric that she does not actually need.
(I know, I know, right now all quilters reading this are rolling their eyes. Buying fabric is not about needing it – it is about wanting it!)
Last month in the post What’s on the Design Wall: “We Will Not Be Discarded!” I shared a piece in progress made from discards (destined for the trash) from another quilter’s quilt. It was a fun challenge. I used nearly every trimmed section/discard in this piece, setting them in a solid copper cotton fabric.
The long arm quilter, Guadalupe Designs, has finished quilting the piece and it is awaiting facing (a type of finishing/binding for art quilts where the binding does not show on the front).
Here is a sneak peek of the piece (to follow up on the post from last month):
Detail: We Will Not Be Discarded! (2016). Designed & pieced by Tierney Davis Hogan; quilted by Guadalupe Designs.
The piece measures 51″ x 17″ and will debut in March 2016 at the show at Twigs Gallery in Sisters, OR. The show opens on the Sisters 4th Friday Art Walk on 3/25/16 (After it debuts at the show I will post a photo of We Will Not Be Discarded!).
I will have 4 pieces in the show and all my pieces will feature “Recycled” Blocks, rescued from either discards of other quilters or donated abandoned projects. I love the idea of working to create something of beauty from something that was once abandoned. I love the idea of shared creative energy (see my post What’s on the Design Wall: “Ohio Star” (a taste of “Big Magic”) – “When an Idea is ready to be born, it will visit numerous people to find someone who going to bring it into existence” – Elizabeth Gilbert).
I am working on the hanging sleeves and labels for some of the piece which are unlabeled. I am feeling honored and excited about being in the show – more later!
As part of my ongoing journey towards living with less and keeping only those things that are useful and bring me joy, I am working on dealing with mementos and keepsakes. I had three boxes of keepsakes – old postcards, cards from old friends and co-workers, newspaper clippings, holiday photo cards, etc. I now have one small box. I have let go of that which does not bring me a deep sense of joy.
During the process of working through my keepsakes, I re-discovered a quilt that my staff had made me when I was a manager at a health plan in Seattle in the late 1990s to early 2000s. I do not remember if I was a quilter yet, so it likely was not a “Quilt for the Quilter” but it is something very special that was just sitting around in a box put away.
My friend Judy, who originally got me into quilting and was a member of my work team in the late 1990s, organized a team quilt project as a holiday gift for me. Each team member made a block and Judy assembled the blocks into a wallhanging quilt. I was deeply touched and surprised with the gift, which I believe was given to me around 1998 or 1999.
This wonderful gift is no longer tucked away, I have placed it on the wall to remind me that I was that loved (because QUILT ARE LOVE, and do not let anyone tell you otherwise!) so much as a leader that a team took the time to make me a quilt!
Below is a photo of the quilt. The center of the quilt features a photo of the entire team, so I have taken a low resolution photo at a bad angle to respect the privacy of former team members who I have lost touch with and may not want their photo published on the web. (And you likely thought it was just another one of my bad photos!)
I have included a couple close ups of some of the blocks. The “Chocolate Chip Cookies” block, by one of my former team members, was made to honor the fact that I brought the team homemade chocolate chip cookies when I interviewed with them! After I was hired I continued to make the team homemade cookies.
It is wonderful to have such a special memory visible to enjoy everyday, rather tucked away, only to look at every couple of years (or longer, when you remember it is there).
As far as the other keepsakes, as I mentioned earlier I took them down from 3 boxes to 1 small box. I love what Marie Kondo, author of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing (2014), states in her wonderful book:
“The space in which we live should be for the person we are becoming now, not for the person we were in the past.”
I realize many memories can be held inside my heart rather than my hand. I do not need to hold onto all those physical items to honor those memories (like all postcards I ever received – I have downsized them only a small stack of very special postcards).
And as far as the person I am becoming, I hope it is someone who is filled with gratitude for all the special moments in her life. This quilt reminds me to continue my feelings of gratitude each day.
Let’s just say it is a person’s prerogative to be able to change their minds…
If you never change your mind, why have one? – Edward de Bono
A couple weeks ago, one of my wonderful tierneycreates Etsy shop customers, who has been very supportive of my miniature kimonos, asked for some new kimono color and fabric options. She was so enthusiastic about my miniature kimonos, I got enthusiastic about them again and made a fresh new batch:
They’re Baaaack!
23 new kimonos in total. Currently I am busy adding buttons and finishing details, eventually they will get posted to my tierneycreates Etsy shop.
I have been negligent with my Etsy shop for a couple months now due to work and other life related things. I am working on new offerings and refreshing current offerings.
I do not expect my tierneycreates Etsy shop to ever become a “quit your day job” kind of thing (it is more of a fun hobby) but I really enjoy connecting with people across North America (I have Canadian customers too!) and adding a little “fusion of textiles & smiles” to peoples’ lives!
As I continue on my journey to scale back my material possessions and focus on the important things in life, I realize I have donated a lot of stuff I no longer need to charity organizations but I have not given any of my handmade items.
It feels like I have not been really giving, as I have only given purchased items I no longer want in my life.
Giving seems more like truegiving, if you give something that is not as easy to part with – like a quilt (or two)!
So I decided to donate a couple small flannel quilts/baby quilts to Project Linus. I had them listed on my tierneycreates Etsy shop and I am taking down their listings and giving them away instead.
Ready for donation
If you are not familiar with Project Linus is a non-profit organization that provides homemade “blankets” to children in need. I am getting together with a couple of friends at the end of this month that have worked with Project Linus in the past and they are going to help me donate my quilts.
It feels like this donation is more meaningful donation than a load of unused kitchen gadgets to Goodwill.
(Be sure to check out Sassy the Highly Opinionated Miniature Schnauzer’s Schnauzer Snips page for her latest adventures and musing)
But First, More on “Trees of Winter”
Before I continue my series on sources of creative inspiration, let’s talk about winter trees a little more. I am still musing over the Winter Trees I discussed in yesterday’s blog post by the same name.
This morning, during our daily 2 mile am dog walk, I was struck again by the beauty of winter trees against an impossibly clear blue winter sky. Living in the “High Desert” of Central Oregon our winters have many days of clear blue skies. Compared, say to when we lived in Seattle, WA. (A fun town to live in, but blue skies were not that common; grey skies were considerably more popular there!)
So here is one more winter tree that captured my attention this morning, and then I will stop with the “Winter Trees” for a while (perhaps):
Creative Inspiration: Public Library Books
Since I was a child, I have been in love with the public library.
I remember a summer in my 10th or 11th year that I spent many days of my summer vacation at my small town’s public library. Books are magical. To have free access to all those magical books is even more magical.
For a time in my life I wanted to become a librarian, so I could spend a career among the books. I did not pursue a career in library science as an adult, but I kept my intense love of public libraries and of books.
I frequently patronize our local public library and I find their shelves filled with sources of creative inspiration. It would be very expense to buy all the books I would love to have in my personal library, and if you have read my post Craft Book Hoarder?!?!? it appears that I once tried to do that!
Embracing the minimalist, “scale back your life”, “living with less” movement, I borrow from the library, books that inspire me creatively. If the book turns out to be a “must, must, must have” then I will purchase it, but rarely.
Here is a recent stack of public library books filled with inspiration:
I have e-mailed our public library’s material purchasing department and thanked them for the wonderful selection of crafting, gardening, and home decorating books. I think it is important to let them know a patron really appreciates their well curated collection!
Postscript
In future posts I will share an update on “craft book hoarding” (yes, I actually let go of a large amount of craft books); and discuss one of the recent crafting books I borrowed from the public library that I absolutely had to own (The Improv Handbook for Modern Quilters: A Guide to Creating, Quilting, and Living Courageously by Sherri L. Wood).
After my recent post on the completion of the quilt Tree Outside My Window (see Update on “The Tree Outside My Window”), I started noticing the beauty of “Winter Trees”.
These bare (or nearly bare) trees are such a thing of understated beauty. I do not think I fully appreciated their austere structure and simple elegance.
There they stand, naked, and exposed to the winter sky.
Last week and today on my walk with the dogs (or “the fur kids” as we like to call them) I photographed several “Winter Trees” whose beauty made me pause.
Below are my photos to share with you:
Of winter’s lifeless world each tree
Now seems a perfect part;
Yet each one holds summer’s secret
Deep down within its heart.
~Charles G. Stater
These photos were taken with my iPhone camera and are not copyrighted. Please feel free to download them if you find them inspirational in your artistic endeavors!
I have been working on assembling the blocks designed from discards, from another quilter’s block piecing, and a solid coppery-rust fabric, into a piece called “We Will Not Be Discarded”.
I am playing with the block arrangements and looking at two different arrangement options for the 15 blocks in progress:
OPTION #1 – All blocks pointing the same way:
OPTION #2 – Blocks pointing opposite ways:
I am leaning towards Option #2 as it makes the piece appear to have more “movement”. Once I finish all 15 blocks, I will play again with the final arrangement.
We Still Will Not Be Discarded!
I am playing with the idea of making a second piece (“We Still Will Not Be Discarded!”) from the discards/trimming of the original discards! (And the scraps from the solid fabric they are set in)
That would be taking recycling to the extreme, right? The challenge does seems interesting…
Trimmed discards from the “trimmed discards” in my little trash basket – tempting!
This continues my series of posts on my sources of creative inspiration…
Two Journals, Two Different Purposes
I keep two journals. One journal for art quilting ideas and inspirations; and another journal for tierneycreates business, blogging and life in general ideas and inspirations.
The journal on the left, used for art quilting ideas and inspiration, has a handmade cover that I made during an intuitive design piecing class homework assignment. The lime green “sketchbook” on the right is what I use for tierneycreates, blogging ideas and life inspiration.
I got the idea of keep an art quilt ideas/inspiration journal from Jean Wells Keenan‘s brilliant books Intuitive Color and Design: Adventures in Art Quilting and Journey to Inspired Art Quilting. I was also fortunate enough to take her series of classes, Journey to Art Inspired Quilting, twice and see in person her wonderful inspirational art quilting journal.
In my art quilting journal I keep clippings from magazines and photos from my travels and nature that are future inspirations for art quilts. At first I had planned to use my art quilting journal for blogging ideas and tierneycreates business ideas. I discovered I wanted to keep the art quilting journal for quilt ideas and development. So I started a second journal.
I love both my journals, but I use the second journal (which I will refer to as the “tierneycreates journal”) more frequently.
The “tierneycreates journal” is where I write down ideas I get from listening to home-based business related audiobooks; books from the library on small business development and growth; quotes I find in magazines, books or hear on the media (radio, TED Talks, television, etc.); and any notes from searches on the internet (for example: What are the standard sizes for table runners that I should use for my tierneycreates Etsy shop table runners?).
I also use the”tierneycreates journal” to map out my future blog posts or blog post ideas. Sometimes I will spontaneously write a blog post, and sometimes I will write a post about a topic I have been thinking about for a couple of weeks and already fleshed out in my journal what I want to write about that topic.
I find it challenging to keep sudden ideas and inspiration stored in my mind. It seems that inspiration and ideas can come to you at any time. My journals provide a way to record them, even if they are only a skeleton of an idea that will need its internal organs and flesh added at a later date!
Postscript
As mentioned in my series of posts on Nonfiction Audiobooks, I continue to enjoy listening to audiobooks while I work on quilting projects.
I recently finished a wonderful and inspirational audiobook by Anne Lamott – Small Victories: Spotting Improbable Moment of Grace (Riverhead Books, 2014). The audiobook was read by the author which is always a treat for me – you get to experience what the author feels should be emphasized in the reading of a book based on their vocal inflections.
This book is basically a collection of personal biographical essays on the author’s experiences. Anne Lamott tells these stories with raw, relatable, and passionate language from a deeply spiritual yet deeply irreverent perspective! So far one of my favorite nonfiction audiobooks of all time.
In the post The “Basted” Quilt, Dilemma, and Temptation I bemoaned about my dilemma of wanting to just let the large basting stitches on a quilt suffice as the quilting. Well I put on my “big girl panties” and made it through quilting it myself, using just straight stitches, 1/4 inch apart. So glad it is done! (BTW the whole I time I quilted it I was groaning “why didn’t I just let the long-arm quilter quilt this for me?!?!)
NEW “FURNITURE” ADDED TO THE STUDIO
In my recent post Inside the Studio I shared photos of my tierneycreates studio layout. This weekend I added another item to the studio – I pulled the sad ironing board out of the room and added a workbench table from Harbor Freight Tools. This table was on sale this past weekend for an excellent price. One of my Quilt Sisters gave me a heads up on this wonderful find. Terry “The Quilting Husband” got it assembled and we made a removable wide ironing board top for the table. I love it!
My younger brother surprised me with a new cutting mat for Christmas and I discovered the cutting mat fits nicely on top of the removable ironing board. I can cut and press small pieces on the same surface area. My brother has been very supportive of my quilting adventure (and he and his family has benefited from various quilts I have made them!) Past Christmases he has surprised me with quilting books I do not have! (I suspect he has a secret inside quilting connection, ha!)
MISC UPDATES
Handmade at Amazon
I shared in several prior posts how I was looking at listing items on Amazon’s new platform for crafters to sell their handmade items –Handmade at Amazon. I was accepted to become an “artisan” on this platform but I have decided to just stick with Etsy. I love the experience of working with Etsy customers and I think I would be stretching myself too thin with my full-time healthcare job, my tierneycreates Etsy shop, and the Amazon shop.
Terry the Quilting Husband’s Future Exhibit
Terry, the Quilting Husband, is going to submit 5 quilts to the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show for consideration to be in the show. They will be having a special Male Quilter Exhibit. More details later this year!
Also Terry is looking at working on Quilts of Valor quilts to be donated to local Veterans, in the future. A Veteran himself and a military history hobbyist, this would be a wonderful was to combine quilting and his deep respect/wanting to honor those who served. There is currently a local project trying to get red, white and blue quilts to the oldest of the local Veterans, primarily WWII Veterans.
Upcoming Show
My The Wardrobe Meets the Wall collaborator and beloved long-arm quilter and friend, Betty Anne, and I are having an upcoming show at Twigs Gallery in Sisters, Oregon, opening the end of March. More details in the future.
This is technically Part II of yesterday’s post “Inside the Studio“. A friend suggested I share what is inside the closet in my studio.
Here are photos of the left and right side of the closet, which has sliding doors so I cannot fully open the closet to expose both sides at once.
The Left Side
The Right Side
I like to think I am organized. I know I am more organized than I used to be and I can find things fairly quickly. I bought a label maker a couple of years ago and have fully embraced its use!
Postscript
A friend shared a wonderful quote with me today that I have been mulling it over the entire day:
(Check out Sassy the Highly Opinionated Miniature Schnauzer’s latest musing on her Schnauzer Snips page)
The title of this post makes it sound like a thrilling exposé of what really goes on behind the scenes at tierneycreates: drama, intrigue, maybe even a little scandal…
No not that exciting – just recent photos of my studio where I do my tierney-creating!
The back wall where I keep my fabric scraps by color, and my cutting table where I hide underneath those things that-are-not-finished (that brightly colored batik quilt it meant to distract the viewer from what is beneath…).
To the lower right of the photo you will see my mini design wall. I learned from a quilting friend that it is handy to have a smaller portable design wall.
My sewing machine and ironing board (two very essential items!) I got the idea from another quilter to cover my ironing board with a towel to make ironing smoother and easier. Sometimes I also use a cotton dishtowel to iron small pieces on.
My wonderful brother gave me the sewing table for my birthday last year and the leaf folds down and the table becomes a small cabinet if I need more room).
My IKEA Billy Bookcase of fabric! This organization came out of my massive fabric purge in 2015 (see post The Fabric Purge!). The curtains in the room are made from a sari my friend Jenny brought back from her trip to India for me.
My storage closet with custom made sliding doors which I first discussed in the post Rethinking a Closet. One door has sheet metal mounted to serve as a magnetic idea board. The other has batting attached to serve as a design wall (refer to all my posts on “What’s on the Design Wall).
I am not sure why I selected the color yellow when I painted this room 8 or so years ago. Somedays I think: “I am going to paint it white or some other neutral color”. Yellow can be overstimulating, but I simply embrace the over stimulation and decorate the room with brightly colored things – like this lovely quilt my friend Judy made me and several silk screen prints from an artist friend in my youth (the other silk screen is in the first photo).
I like to watch “quilting movies” (movies you don’t really have to pay close attention to) and documentaries while I am quilting on the screen below.
Another brightly colored piece of art in my studio – a wallhanging from my friend Betty Anne.
Well back to creating in the tierneycreates Studio – I better not keep that Design Wall empty for too long!
Happy New Year to you all! I love the idea of the “New Year” being a clean and blank slate to fill with new adventures, experiences, insights, evolutions and accomplishments.
I also love quotes and thought for my first post of the New Year, I would share some of my favorite quotes I collected in 2015 in my journal of inspiration.
LAO TZU
If you are depressed, you are living in the past. If you are anxious you living in the future. If you are at peace, you are living in the present.
LILY TOMLIN
Forgiveness means giving up all hope for a better past.
JEN SICERO
Love yourself with a Kung Fu grip.
NINA SIMONE
You use up everything you got trying to to give everyone what they wanted.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
Guard well your spare moments. They are like uncut diamonds. Discard them and their value will never be known. Improve them and they will become the brightest gems in a useful life.
RUMI
And still, after all this time, the Sun has never said to the Earth, “you owe me”. Look what happens with love like that. It lights up the sky.
A flower from my Summer Garden to brighten your Winter (especially if you are currently living in a snow covered frozen tundra like me…)
In my early days of quilting, I was rather impatient with the last stage of completing a quilt – “sewing down binding”. In my mind I was quickly sewing down the binding to the back of the quilt. In reality I was sloppilysewing down the binding to the back of the quilt.
Recently I went to wash an old (my early days of quilting) quilt, and discovered the binding was loose and missing in some areas.
I took a good and honest look at the stitches in the back of this old quilt, and I was APPALLED. Yes that is appalled in all caps because that is how I felt.
As you can see in the image below – on the left side of the rectangle is where the thread left the binding; and on the right side is an example of my sloppy stitching. (Yes, it looks like I was under “some chemical influences” with one eye closed, while I was sewing).
Gasp.
I am going to remove the old binding and redo the entire binding. This time I will carefully sew it down.
I did not realize I had an issue with being sloppy with sewing down binding until a couple of years ago when a friend asked me to help her sew down binding on her quilt. We were at a quilt retreat and in the process of taking a break from sewing and doing the local “quilt shop hop” near the retreat center.
I was sitting in the backseat with a couple other quilters (two were up front and one of the them was driving of course, as we have yet to afford the special QUILTER AUTOMATED VEHICLE that drives you around on its own to quilt shops while you visit with your friends and sew). My friend had a lovely quilt for her son that she was trying to finish and brought along to work on in the car, as it only needed its binding sewn down. So she gave me one end of the quilt to work on while she worked on the other.
She tried to be polite, but she had to remove and redo all the stitches I had done. This is when I realized (as the truth was now starring me in the face): that I need to take sewing down binding more seriously. Binding a quilt deserve the same level of care and patience that goes into piecing a quilt.
I committed to becoming a better “quilt binder” and my quilts over the last couple of years and had high quality binding stitching.
Interesting: once you get into the habit of doing something correct, sometimes you forget what you used to do in the past. I was in shock when I saw what I had done on the old quilt!
POSTSCRIPT
Originally when writing this post I was going to title it: “Quilter’s Hall of Shame: Binding”. However ever since listening to the audiobook of Brene Brown’s book Daring Greatly (2015) I have no time for the concept or feelings of “shame”. I figure life is a learning and growing experience (for a summary of key insights I gained from reading this book, see my post Life is Nonfiction Part II) and I am not going to fill it with any feelings of shame.
This brief post continues my series on Sources of Creative Inspiration.
I do not have the best photography skills, however occasionally take a really good photo, capturing a special moment, and I am really pleased.
I admire people who have a good photographic eye and take photos with strong composition. Sometimes I am creatively inspired by someone else’s photos.
An old friend of mine in New York took this photo and included it in a recent e-mail. I am drawn to this photo and would like to create a future art quilt inspired by this photo!
Autumn Beads November Light by Stephen Mead (2015)
I would love to hear about your sources of creative inspiration!
Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time. ~Thomas Merton
I have been blogging for over two years and have experienced a learning curve on using the cool features of the my hosting platform, WordPress. If you who have followed me for awhile, you know I have experimented with various themes and formats to my tierneycreates blog. (Maybe I have left your head spinning over my frequent format changes…)
I do not have a web background (I am a RN by profession) and I appreciate all the user friendly interfaces of WordPress (as I learn them) including setting up special navigation side bar options to make a blog easier to navigate for my readers (and I appreciate each and every one of you!).
WordPress appears strongly committed to the ongoing education of its bloggers and provides great tips in its blog The Daily Post. Recently I learned how to create Categories on the tierneycreates and assign a categories to my posts from a The Daily Post article on Categorizing.
CATEGORIES are located in the left navigation pane. Assigning “Categories” to my posts will allow readers to browse my previous posts by a specific theme they are interested in.
Say for example, you only want to read about “Terry the Quilting Husband” – click on the Terry the Quilting Husband and read only those posts. If you only want to read about my sources of creative inspiration, then you can click on Creative Inspiration and see all the posts from my series on Creative Inspiration.
Setting up “Categories” was a cool exercise as it made me think about what are the general themes of posts I want to have on my blog? What themes/topics/ideas am I passionate about and want to write about?
The seven (7) categories above capture what I want to focus on as a blogger. Thanks for reading!
A while back a dear friend, who is not a quilter, whom I was trying convince to follow my blog, said: “But your blog is about quilting, and I am not a quilter…”
I replied: “My blog is about a Quilter’s Life” (which is of course more than just quilting).
So on this blustery autumn Saturday afternoon I have decided to just share some random happenings in my Quilter’s Life! (Hope you are not too shocked over the wild life I lead, wink, wink).
Fabric Scraps, Well, Um, Yes Thank You
I hope I do not lose credibility with my readers, but in my very recent post A “Humane” Way to Eliminate Fabric Scraps, I pretty much vowed not to accept any more fabric scraps from friends. I have broken this vow, but if you are a quilter you will understand. I had lunch today with a couple of friends at our favorite Thai restaurant downtown and my friend Susan had beautifully packaged up some batik fabric scraps for me – how could I refuse them?
How could I turn these beautiful batik fabric scraps down?
Junk Drawer Under Control!
I am still working through the lessons learned from reading Marie Kondo’s The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing (2014) which I discussed in the post The Space in Which We Live. Recently I took on the infamous “Junk Drawer” (I know you all have one) and now have it under control. I was going to do a post just on organizing my “junk drawer” but I was pretty sure that would put you all to sleep as “organizing a junk drawer” islikely one of the most boring topics imaginable to devote an entire post. Thought I would share a photo and that is the end of talking about my “junk drawer”!
Ta Da – a semi organized “junk drawer” (I am actually able to find stuff without rifling through it too much).
Let’s Pretend this is a Culinary Blog (Just for a Moment)
Since I began blogging two years ago I have become addicted to reading other blogs. I never knew what I was missing – there are so many wonderful posts, ideas, stories, life experiences, and photos that my fellow bloggers share.
However, there is one type of blog I am completely intimidated by: Culinary/Cooking Blogs. Their photos are so beautiful, their blogs are so organized and well-written, and the recipes and cooking tips – sigh, I shudder with envy and intimidation.
For fun, I will pretend for a moment this is Culinary Blog and I will share a wonderful tip I learned from my friend Ali (who is a wonderful Home & Garden writer) who learned it from a chef she interviewed for an article:
A QUICK WAY TO DEAL WITH GARLIC CLOVES (eliminate the tedious peeling of garlic skin)
Separate the cloves
Take a medium-large stone (like one from the beach or your garden) that has been scrubbed clean, and firmly press down on the garlic to break it open.
This will make removal of the garlic skin very easy – remove the garlic and chop, grate or mince it for your recipe!
No worries, I am not going to start a blog “tierneycooks”!
Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and….
(By the way, did you notice that the photo above, from the section on a quick way to deal with garlic cloves, is not a very good photo? In culinary blogs their knives in photos are always very clean and very shiny while mine looks like it was smeared in mysterious goo. This is why you do not have to worry about a future “tierneycooks” culinary blog).
In my post Shared Bounty, I discussed how a friend had shared the “fruits of her labor” in her garden this past growing season. Today she gave me the last of her parsley, purple sage, and rosemary and suddenly I have the traditional English ballad “Scarborough Fair” (made famous by Simon & Garfunkel) stuck in my head. The only thing missing is “thyme”.
“Are you going to Scarborough Fair? Parley, sage, rosemary, and thyme; Remember me to one who lives there, For once she was a true love of mine.”
I love cooking and I am pretty excited by this last batch for the season of fresh from the garden herbs and plan to make them part of several stews and soups!
Parley, Sage, Rosemary…but no Thyme (but we could still head to the imaginary Scarborough Fair!)
Well I know you all are exhausted from reading about my wild Quilter’s Life, so I will close here, as I now need to find something else to organize or a new project to start and not finish!
If you have followed my blog for awhile, then you know about my addiction to fabric scraps. This addiction seems to be incompatible with my desire to downsize and minimize my possessions.
The fabric scrap addiction began innocently enough – friends would give me their fabric scraps at quilting retreats. I would go for a “sew day” at a fellow quilter’s house and leave with some of her fabric scraps. As if that was not enough, I began to actually BUY scraps.
Yes, BUY FABRIC SCRAPS, you read correctly. There is a wonderful quilt shop in Central Oregon called The Stitchin’ Post and occasionally they would sell scraps bags of their beautiful high-end quilting fabrics. I bought numerous bags from them.
Beautiful scraps or not, still I was buying fabric scraps.
In my post “Creative Inspiration: Organization???” I shared my new organization of my favorite fabric scraps by color. Although I had organized scraps by color I still had a GIANT box of remaining fabric scraps.
I knew I had to do something. I needed to let go of the fabric scraps I did not completely and absolutely love. However, I did not want to throw them away or try to convince another quilter to adopt them.
So I packaged them up into 30 bags and organized them into two baskets and DONATED them to our local Humane Society Thrift Store to sell! (How do I know that the Humane Society Thrift Store sells fabric scraps? Do you want to take a guess? Yes, because I have bought fabric scraps also from several thrift stores include the Humane Society Thrift Store in the past).
The Humane Society Thrift Store Volunteer accepting my donation seemed pleased that I had packaged them up for sale. I like to imagine if they sell each bag for a couple dollars or more each that could be over $90 – $150+ profit for a wonderful local animal shelter! Some of the bags are packaged by color and some are random – so many options for the Humane Society Thrift Shops’ customers!
A “Humane” way to let go of excess fabric scraps!
When I buy fabric from quilt shops in the future, it will be actual whole fabric (fat quarters or yardage). I still have plenty of fabric scraps and my fabric scrap collection contains only scraps I truly love and plan to use…eventually.
POSTSCRIPT
I am still working through the lessons from the book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing by Marie Kondo that I discussed in the post “The Space in Which We Live“.
I was invited to speak on Blogging for Art Quilters at our October SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) meeting, as the featured presenter.
In my “pay the bills” career in the health care industry, for the past 20+ years I have done numerous training and workshops for those in staff and in leadership positions. So my first thought when accepting the invitation to speak was: “No problem, I have done like a zillion presentations and I can give any group ‘Death by PowerPoint'”.
I once even did a presentation for “the dead”. Or people I thought were dead (I mean a long time dead, they just hadn’t started to smell yet). I was the head of Medical Management for a Worker’s Compensation carrier and I had to do a presentation for the management group of a large retail organization.
When I got up to the podium and saw a sea of very blank and disengaged faces (basically they all looked “dead inside”), instead of having stage fright, I thought “Screw it, I am going to have fun”!
I removed the microphone from the podium, walked into the glassy-eyed audience and began to work the crowd with my presentation like I was a nightclub act. They suddenly came back to life and I had a blast (and maybe they did too) giving the presentation!
So I have little fear of public speaking as I have overcome some challenging audiences…that is, little fear in the health care industry…
Fear Creeps In…
So our local SAQA group contains nationally and internationally known quilters, teachers, published book authors, and some seriously talented (like mind blowing-ly talented) art quilters. This was my first time ever presenting/speaking in the art quilting industry (I am usually thinking at each SAQA meeting “so what I am doing here with these people?”).
One of my friends in the health care industry said to me when I told her about the upcoming presentation: “Well Tierney, if you lose them you during your talk on blogging for art quilters, you could always start wowing them with your knowledge of medical cost management!”
Additionally I am no expert on blogging. I started in 2013 and I have been learning as I go and continually reading tips from other bloggers. My only saving grace was I knew I could put together a nice “Death by PowerPoint” for the group!
The Actual Speaking Engagement
The SAQA group was wonderful and it was easy to engage them, I had no need to be worried.
Highlights from my presentation “Blogging for Art Quilters”:
WHY BLOG? To have an online presence; to showcase your art; to connect with other quilters & artists; to connect with potential customers.
COMMON BLOGGING PLATFORMS: WordPress.com; Blogger.com; and Typepad.com
Kristin Shields (kristinshieldsart.com) introduced the group to an incredible website and blog option for art quilters: Square Space, This platform also allows artists to directly sell their art to customers (www.squarespace.com).
WRTING BLOGGING CONTENT: Engage your readers and get them coming back with interesting posts, “cliff-hangers”, and ongoing series; learn the blog hosting platform’s tips to make navigate your site easy for readers; brainstorm on ideas for posts and keep a journal of ideas; find your own voice and be true to yourself.
BLOGGING ETIQUETTE: (adapted from Idiot’s Guide Blogging Rules & Etiquette): Respond to and appreciate your readers they took the time to read your posts and comment; stay away from “hard sales” and controversial topics (religion, politics, etc.) unless that is the purpose of your blog; respect copyright laws.
SPELL CHECKING IS IMPORTANT (okay so sometimes I fail at this…but it is still important…): A tip I use (or try to use) is to read aloud my posts before posting to see if they are close to resembling standard English usage! (So Tierney, are you actually a “native English speaker” or did you just recently learn via online instruction?)
PUBLICATIONS: Before I started blogging or starting my tierneycreates Etsy shop I did a lot of reading. Here are some of my favorites and I thank all the wonderful authors who wrote either the books or articles I enjoyed!
• Artful Blogging Magazine, Stampington
Blogging for Creatives: How Designers, Artists, Crafters and Writers Can Blog to Make Contacts, Win Business, and Build Success (Robin Houghton, 2012)
Writers Can Blog to Make Contacts, Win Business, and Build Success (Robin Houghton, 2012)
Blogging for Dummies (Susannah Gardner, 2011)
How to Sell Your Crafts Online(Derrick Sutton, 2011)
The Handmade Marketplace (Kari Chapin, 2010)
Grow Your Handmade Business (Kari Chapin, 2012)
The Real Reason I Blog
At the end of my presentation, I shared why personally I blog: Connection.
At first my blog was to be a vehicle to gain potential customers for my Etsy shop, but then it became more than that – it became a vehicle to connect with other individuals with shared interests and discover other blogger and their blogs.
I so appreciate my readers and I now follow many blogs myself (trying to keep up with them all as best I can). I love reading the life adventures of other individuals and the experiences and lessons their share!
“Death by PowerPoint” – only 23 slides, I did not torture the audience too badly…
I have been working for a while on downsizing my stuff and reducing clutter in my life (see recent post The Space in Which We Live).
As part of this process I have been working through my craft magazine collection (as a prequel to some day conquering my craft book collection – see post Craft Book Hoarder?!?!?!).
Since 2008 I have been reading and collecting Interweaves’s Cloth-Paper-Scissors Studios magazine (who’s tagline is “inspiration & ideas for your art and craft space).
In order to let go a a magazine, I feel like I have to read it again or at least skim it and see if there is anything interesting in the issue that I want to reference or stick in the back of my mind. So I stacked all my old issues of Cloth-Paper-Scissors Studios magazine and started going through them.
I came across this great article in the Spring/Summer 2009 issue by Lesley Riley: “Clutter Out Creativity In: 10 Steps to a More Artful Studio”, and I wanted to share a listing of her steps to deal with studio clutter. I think they are fairly self-explanatory but I have added a couple comments based on the article or my own experience.
Hoarding is a primitive instinct (but having a more limited selection may force you to be more creative!)
Know thyself (think about what colors and fabrics you now enjoy working with and consider ditching the rest)
Treat your stash like your clothes (in your closet if you have not worn something in a long time or it no longer fits you, maybe it is time to get rid of it – the same applies to using fabric)
It’s not “all or nothing” (you don’t have to get rid of things all at once, you can whittle it down over time)
Take your time (relax and find time to slow sort your stash)
Share your favorites (shared a little of your favorite fabrics with others)
Spread the wealth (I personally enjoy donating fabric I no longer need to the local Humane Society Thrift Shop as I know it can be a treasure to a fellow crafter who stumbles upon it and the proceeds help support the animal shelter)
Create coordinated bundles
The artist, not the fabric, makes the art
You control the fabric (it does not control you!)
After I finishing letting go of my already read (twice) Cloth-Paper-Scissors Studiosmagazine, I can’t promise I will never buy an issue again. This is truly a wonderful magazine with glimpses into artists’ studios and their inspiration.
Bohemian Modern by Emily Henson, photo credit: amazon.com
One of my favorite things to do on a Saturday morning it to sit with a cup of tea and look through decorating books (and crafting books of course).
I usually have a large stack of decorating/interior design books from the public library right next to my chair where I sit by the window with my tea.
I recently finished an awesome interior design book called Bohemian Modern by Emily Henson.
Contained in its pages was a wonderful title to one of the book’s chapters: “Creativity Before Consumption”.
This quote has resonated with me and I want it incorporate it into my general philosophy of life.
I think I do already with how much I enjoy working with recycled materials and fabric scraps.
I did recently implement this concept in regards to my front door. I have disliked my plain white front door for a long, long time. I priced at the home improvement stores what it would cost to replace it and the cost has discouraged me from changing it out.
The white door was just not aesthetically pleasing and I have been looking at it everyday for the 10 years we have been in the house and it does not make me happy.
A radical (but simple idea) fell upon me – what about painting it another color?!?! (and why did I not think of this years ago?!!?). So I bought a can of black paint and painted it today! Below are the before and after photos. I hope you agree the black looks better. I am very pleased with my “new” front door!
Before
After
A $8.95 can of paint was a much lower expense than a new front door (whose costs would have included the door plus professional installation!).
Yes, I think this is my new motto: Creativity Before Consumption!
(Be sure to check out Sassy the Highly Opinionated Miniature Schnauzer’s Schnauzer Snips page for her latest adventures and musing)
Interesting combinations of words, huh? One sounds positive (Progress) and the other sounds, well…fearful (Fear)!
Actually the title is about two positive things!
PROGRESS
Making progress on the five (5) quilts that are back from the long-arm quilter and need bindings to be completed (refer to the posts “Some Progress Made” and “The Quilting Husband Saga Continues” for more info). Terry the Quilting Husband assembled the bindings and I have sewn them onto all 5 quilts. Now they are waiting in a nice pile to taken turns sitting on my lap and have their binding sewn down. Then they will be complete!
“Please complete us” (Pile-o-Quilts waiting for their bindings to be sewn down)
FEAR
My previous post was on Creative Inspiration: Words. Currently listening to Susan Jeffers’ fantastic audiobook Feel the Fear and Do It Anywayand feeling very inspired. I wanted to share her 5 Truths About Fear she has published on her website (susanjeffers.com):
Fear will never go away as long as you continue to grow (this is a good thing)!
The only way to get rid of the fear of doing something is to go out and do it!
The only way to feel better about yourself it to go out and do it!
Not only are you afraid when facing the unknown, so is everyone else!
Pushing through the fear is less frightening than living with the bigger underlying fear that comes from a feeling of helplessness!
I am really enjoying this audiobook. Of course now you all expect that I will quickly complete the bindings on the stack-o-quilts as I should feel pretty fearless about them now…
tierneycreates 