Everything today is over the top. My job is filled with forms and computers and numbers and budgets. Television requires two college degrees to change the channels. The clock next to my bed takes an electrician to reset every time the electricity goes out. So as of late I renewed an old passion of mine, the needle arts: a solitary, basic activity rooted in old fashioned skill and patience. Something where I could find personal peace, and the joy of developing my own skills.
Well, sort of. I decided I wanted to learn more about art quilts, where my creativity could run amok. These are wonderful things, filled with color and expression. They are free form and not bound by the rules of “regular” quilting. The sky’s the limit. Finally, I could let my creative juices flow.
So I decided to take a class in art quilting in Columbus. It was a two day workshop, and what I discovered was what I didn’t know about a quilting is a lot. I was surrounded by people from all over the country, indeed the world. And I discovered that quilting was now filled with forms and computers and numbers and budgets. I was up the proverbial creek.
As I sat eating humble crow midst these very talented people, I discovered that what they had that I didn’t was a “studio”. To be a cool quilter, you need a studio. Some of these folks had pictures of their “studios”, and they would make they the House of Chanel look like a lower east side sweat shop. With lights and boards and tables everywhere, these folks personified the saying, if some is good, more is better.
I returned to Youngstown, down but not out, determined that I would have a studio, too. Unfortunately, the only thing that would resemble a studio in my experience was my mother’s old dining room table where I did my 4-H projects (yes, I belonged to 4-H) and sewed my Barbie Doll dresses…and it don’t get much better from there.
My visions of studio grandeur are now confined to the basement of my 3 bedroom ranch home… the dry part. I’m OK as long as the sump pump in the far corner keeps working. The lighting isn’t good, but it doesn’t make any difference because I can’t see anyway. My artistic inspiration is continually interrupted by my 22 year old son bounding down the steps to do his laundry, or my husband calling down asking me for some sort of food of one kind or another. Of course, he will never find any because my display wall is the pantry door. He has taken off 20 pounds since I stuck one of my quilts in front of it.
This year’s trip to Columbus is now looming in front of me. I found a really neat picture of a sewing studio in Southern Living Magazine. So when they talk about their “studios” in Columbus next year…hey…what they don’t know won’t hurt them.
In the meantime, I think I will move the quilt on my pantry to get some potato chips.
Well, sort of. I decided I wanted to learn more about art quilts, where my creativity could run amok. These are wonderful things, filled with color and expression. They are free form and not bound by the rules of “regular” quilting. The sky’s the limit. Finally, I could let my creative juices flow.
So I decided to take a class in art quilting in Columbus. It was a two day workshop, and what I discovered was what I didn’t know about a quilting is a lot. I was surrounded by people from all over the country, indeed the world. And I discovered that quilting was now filled with forms and computers and numbers and budgets. I was up the proverbial creek.
As I sat eating humble crow midst these very talented people, I discovered that what they had that I didn’t was a “studio”. To be a cool quilter, you need a studio. Some of these folks had pictures of their “studios”, and they would make they the House of Chanel look like a lower east side sweat shop. With lights and boards and tables everywhere, these folks personified the saying, if some is good, more is better.
I returned to Youngstown, down but not out, determined that I would have a studio, too. Unfortunately, the only thing that would resemble a studio in my experience was my mother’s old dining room table where I did my 4-H projects (yes, I belonged to 4-H) and sewed my Barbie Doll dresses…and it don’t get much better from there.
My visions of studio grandeur are now confined to the basement of my 3 bedroom ranch home… the dry part. I’m OK as long as the sump pump in the far corner keeps working. The lighting isn’t good, but it doesn’t make any difference because I can’t see anyway. My artistic inspiration is continually interrupted by my 22 year old son bounding down the steps to do his laundry, or my husband calling down asking me for some sort of food of one kind or another. Of course, he will never find any because my display wall is the pantry door. He has taken off 20 pounds since I stuck one of my quilts in front of it.
This year’s trip to Columbus is now looming in front of me. I found a really neat picture of a sewing studio in Southern Living Magazine. So when they talk about their “studios” in Columbus next year…hey…what they don’t know won’t hurt them.
In the meantime, I think I will move the quilt on my pantry to get some potato chips.
