I had a spectacular day. The weather was gorgeous. This morning Reva (my art quilting neighbor), Terry, Beth (another member of Stash) and I went on an art date. Our first stop was the Contemporary Crafts Museum and Gallery. The current exhibition is titled, New Embroidery: Not Your Grandma’s Doily. The works all contained vintage textiles, many that were embroideries. These were then embellished in new ways with embroidery and other effects. Some were really humorous. It was a great show. If you click on the link above, you can see a few of the pieces.

We then went to the Portland Art Institute to see gowns made of paper. They were really exquisite and had been worn in a fashion show so they were wearable art.

We enjoyed lunch on the patio of Henry’s, formerly the Henry Weinhard Brewery. I enjoyed the surrounding architecture:

I dashed back over the bridge and dropped Reva off and picked Mia up at school. She had an early dismissal day. It is Steph and Jack’s ninth anniversary and they went out to the Columbia Gorge for a hike, something they can’t do with two kids in tow! Standing outside Mia’s room, I saw these wonderful self-portraits that the children in her class had drawn so I took a photo of hers.

I was impressed with the detail in her drawing and notice that she is talented in reading, drawing and sewing!!

We had an hour and a half for some fun back at my house before we picked up Milo. She spent most of the time reading. I had purchased some new books for her and she devoured them. We picked up Milo and went to the park across the street from his pre-school for a snack and some play time.

Oh, but, look! Mia is still reading!

It was a great day capped off by dinner at church and an hour with a group discussing how to get connected in such a large church. We go every Wednesday and enjoy a lovely catered dinner for $7.50 ?¢‚Ǩ‚Äù can’t beat that. We have met some other people new to the area or new to Trinity.

I have had some requests for the skinny bit process. It is hard to explain without visuals so here goes.

Two pieces of fabric to be joined with a skinny bit.

Cut a one inch wide strip that will become the skinny bit.

Stitch to one piece of fabric with a 1/4 inch seam.

Press the seam toward the skinny bit piece.

With a rotary cutter, trim the skinny bit with a curved cut. This can be a small curve or just a skinny straight line. What you see will be the size of the finished skinny bit.

Press the seam back towards the larger piece.

With right sides up, place the skinny bit over the end of the other piece of fabric.

With a rotary cutter, cut the second piece of fabric along the curve of the skinny bit.

With a chalk marker make several registration marks across both sides.

Pin, right sides together, at the registration marks. Then pin carefully keeping the edges together.

Stitch a 1/4 inch seam. This is an important step – 1/4 inch!

Press the seams open.

Voila! A skinny bit.

Here is the completed strip.

If you are doing a curved edge, the skinny bit needs to be cut on the bias. Another interesting effect on a long edge, is to piece the skinny bit so that there is a change in pattern and/or color.

On Saturday afternoon, Steph, Mia and I headed out to the Clackamas County Fairgrounds in Canby for the Flock and Fiber Fest. It is a pretty drive on 99, along the Willamette. The trees are starting to show a hint of fall color. Stephanie and I both agreed that are favorite part of the event is the Flock. There are barns of sheep, goats, rabbits and Alpacas. Here is some of what we saw.

First, the flock:

I swear, this sheep stopped eating to pose for me.

The next two are rather exotic looking, don’t you think? The horns on the second one are quite extraordinary.

Here is Mia having a laugh with the horned sheep.

I love the Alpacas. They make a lovely low mooing sound.

These two were having a bad hair day.

Now to the fiber part. Here are Steph and Mia checking out some books. I bought Mia a book about making friendship bracelets with materials included.

There were buildings and booths and tents filled with all manner of roving and yarns and materials for use with the fiber.

This place is sensory overload for a fiber/color junky like me. I did lots of looking and touching and oohing and ahhing.

Here is my roving. I am planning to do some felting and make some small art quilts with it. I was going to buy plain roving and dye it, but Stephanie convinced me to start with the ready to use stuff.

I also purchased these three books:

Indigo Dyeing, Simply Felt and Colour on Cloth.

I didn’t accomplish much today. I have a fierce sinus head-ache. Looks like I will have fall allergies here in Portland.

I received this DVD in the mail this week. Gabrielle sent it to me because she dedicates one of the exercises to me! It is the something new from something old because I am the deconstruction queen, as you all know!

I had the best time watching this because I have never met Gabrielle in person, and I felt as if I was in the studio with her. She is such a natural in front of the camera. I liked how she just did the exercises as the camera rolled. She didn’t have things all cut up and stuff that was done ahead of time. She just simply talked and played in the studio. There are eight exercises in all.

If you go to Gabrielle’s blog, you can click on the store site in the sidebar. She has this and other DVD’s for sale.

Tomorrow I am attending the Columbia Stitchery Guild annual meeting and lunch. Rosalie Dace, an extraordinary quilter from South Africa, is the guest speaker. On Thursday and Friday, I am taking a class from her, titled “Up Close and Personal.” She was featured in the latest issue of Quilting Arts Magazine.

PS: Thank you to Debra Roby for her fix for my scanner. It is now working. I have to unplug it when not in use.

I finally finished the quilt that I started a while back. Last week when I was sick, I got a lot of the hand stitching finished. I have named it Not So Simple Geometry.

Here is a close-up:

I am quite happy with this as my first experiment in this series I have in my mind. I am planning the next, but also have in mind a quilt using some of the photos I took in Seattle- of reflections in high rises.

Before I do any more quilting, I am finishing the organization of the studio. I finally got the black felt design wall done today. Tomorrow I will work on the screen printing table and the ironing table. I need to hang some quilts and then I will take some photos to share.

Mr. C is finally getting some full spectrum lighting in my office area. As the days get shorter and darker, I will need some better light. Stephanie and I are going to work on a better storage for the kid’s toys. We need to weed out some stuff that they have outgrown. I’ll be so neat and organized that I won’t be able to work for fear of messing it up – Ha!

Now, I am going to go upstairs and watch the much anticipated Studio 60 on Sunset Strip on Mr C’s High Def TV.