Tag: Housekeeping

Word of the Day Housekeeping

No, the Word of the Day is not Housekeeping. 😉

I decided to contemplate a Word of the Day back in October 2008 when I was starting to hear rumblings about New Year’s Resolutions. Actually, I had wanted to work through 365 Tao since last year or the year before as a personal exercise. As January 1 approached I thought it would be great to weave the words into quiltmaking and share them with you.

Sadly, it hasn’t been great. I thought I would easily be able to digest it for myself and then post it here for you, but the posting of the word felt like a chore and taken some of the joy out of writing to you, so….

I won’t be posting the Word of the Day anymore on a regular basis. It has also taken over the blog a bit and taken me away from what I want to talk about, which is quiltmaking.

I will post a Word of the Day when a particularly relevant one comes along. As usual, your comments are welcome.

The Purpose of Blog Comments?

I agree with Mimi in that I don’t put my work out there for criticism. I am happy to take comments, but I do my work for me. I love sharing it, but I am my own best critic and don’t need others. I love it that people from all over the world and friends I don’t see very often can see what I am doing and keep up.

I heard a great quote while I was away: Creativity is an Expression of Joy. The world, I think, needs less criticism and more support for creativity.

clipped from mimikirchner.com

Does that say something about the corner that we inhabit? I don’t think many of the art/craft blogs I look at are putting their work out into the world seeking constructive criticism. Who asks for that from strangers? If I want a critique of my work, I ask someone I know well, whose view point I respect, who I believe has some understanding of where I am coming from and who I can watch as they interact with my work. So why do I put my work out there? To connect with other people who are interested in what I’m interested in. Imagine- look! look! embroidery! wool! cool!…. I can assure anyone who questions this- it is not so easy to find people who get excited about this stuff. So, of course all the comments are nice and oh so gushy- we are thrilled to find someone else who gets what we are into!

  blog it

Goodreads Test

Goodreads has a new feature where they give the HTML for a review you have written. I am trying it out here. I originally wrote a review of Collaborative Quilting for this blog on October 21, 2006. I filled out a review today on Goodreads and thought I would check out the feature to see if I thought it would work for you. If it works, it will make writing reviews of books a lot easier. Note that if you click the “view all my reviews” link, you will get non-quilt related reviews as well.

Collaborative Quilting Collaborative Quilting by Freddy Moran

My review


rating: 5 of 5 stars
One of the best reasons for buying this book is the huge number of photos. It is amazing how many photos of quilts and blocks the publisher was able to cram into this book for the price. I also like the idea of collaboration between the two artists.

View all my reviews.

Organization

It is very hard for me to accomplish anything if I am not organized. The first thing I do on any project is organize the pieces. I get a lot done, I think, because I am organized. It drives a lot of people close to me insane.

The fabric closet in my workroom had dropped off the organization list sometime in the last century. I have been flinging things into it randomly for some time. There was no space for me to get into to do anything. I knew I had to take everything out [EVERYTHING!!] and start over. There was no possible way I could face such an endeavor alone. TFQ mentioned it last year when she was here for PIQF. It had gotten so bad between times that this trip she convinced me it was time. I also asked her to help me clean it out.

I threw out, recycled, and organized, for Goodwill and Freecycle, a ton of stuff. It felt good. I have been on that binge for awhile in other parts of the house, but this was a major quilt/fabric related effort.

Sadly (or perhaps not), I didn’t take before pictures. I think that is, at least, partially a good thing. I do have the after pictures.

Closet Right Side: Quilts are on pants hangers and hung in the corner. File cabinet was moved closer to the door so I can file paperwork easier. Fabric bins that I use a lot were brought down, so I don’t have to crawl up to get at my fabric quite as much. We didn’t do much with the fabric bins, but have gone through them together in the past. I have also been going through them recently as I work through the bag project. I will go through them again in the future, I am sure.

Closet Left Side: The new drawer thingy is full of dots. Closest to the left side of the photo is a continuing part of the project. I have to get some crates to replace the bankers boxes for ‘current’ fabric. In the middle on that upper shelf is a weird bin (the style of the bin is weird) full of projects in process. They are organized, so I can find them, which is a good thing, because I would like to move through some of the projects that have been lingering. I also went through a lot of of my projects that were going nowhere and got rid of them. No point in keeping something that never even made it to my UFO list. A number of them were block exchanges from the early 1990s. Lots of teal went to people I hope will make great quilts for others.

We really needed one more day to get the project completely finished. We didn’t have it, so TFQ sent me to the Container Store with a list of items to buy. Above are the containers I bought to fill with stuff. The clear plastic garbage can is full of rulers now and I want to get another. After I filled it up, and amazingly all of my rulers fit, I decided that I didn’t like the rulers with instructions and packaging in the same container as the regular rulers. The other frosted garbage can was a ruler possibility, but the shape is wrong. I may actually replace one of my garbage cans around he house with it. I am definitely going to get another one of the clear plastic ones.

PS. I surpassed 450 posts yesterday. Thanks for reading!

Please Note: That is Not Me

There seems to be a lot of confusion around come of my recent posts where I have used Clipmarks. Clipmarks is a social networking tool for posting and providing attributes to non-AQ websites and blog posts I use in my blog. Each Clipmark post has an address bar at the top giving you the original URL or link to a blog post, so you can go back and read the whole thing. It is good to use the links to go back and read the original post as I often don’t convey the original meaning of the author’s post, but put my own personal spin on it.

I use Clipmarks when I see a fantastic image that provides inspiration or someone has posted something particularly interesting that I don’t feel like rewriting or reviewing. I was turned on to it by a subscription newsletter called Neat Net Tricks. Check it out!

Which brings me to the title of my post. The picture of the lady in the post from yesterday is NOT me. She is from Apple Blossom Quilts. See the cartoon to your right? That is me. 😉

Halloween Revisited + Some General Notes

I was browsing Deirdre’s Sloppy Studio when I came across the Sassy Art Goddess blog. I think of this as the best pumpkin I saw.

Other notes and tidbits:

Yarnstorm has some new and interesting links to other blogs. Pea Soup is quite good and I love the creativity of the names of people’s blogs. How about Lobster Squad? Kind of makes me wonder if Artquiltmaker is a misleading name since nothing that I am working on currently could remotely be called ‘arty.’ Her drawings remind me of what I would like my visual journal to look like. Oh, yes, visual journal. Got to get back to that….

I was asked when is the best time for me to write my blog and my other writing and I really can’t figure it out….yet. I often write in my journal in the morning and my blog at night – bookending the day with writing. But I also write more blog posts on the weekends and more journal entries during the week. Today I am writing in my blog in the morning and I definitely feel much more energetic about it. Of course, since I am not at home, I don’t have all of my tools, so the posts are more texty that full of pictures,perhaps skewing the impression? Let me know if you see a difference in the posts I write in the morning vs. the ones I write at night. I know you are rolling your eyes at my unreasonable demands, but just let me know if you notice! Otherwise just read on!

Artquiltmaker blog has not shown up in Technorati yet, per my Entering the Internet Age post. I will have to investigate. The blog is showing up on Google results, however, which, I guess, is good. I haven’t seen any additional traffic, but also don’t have a counter. More investigation required, I believe.

Have a great day!

Entering the Internet Age

Well, I have finally done it. I have allowed Google, Technorati, and all of the other blog search engines to index Artquiltmaker blog. Up until now all you were here because of word of mouth or somehow stumbling on to my blog. You are the elite, the special and the charter members. Thank you for reading and commenting.

I am putting myself out there now, so, faithful readers, please excuse, in advance any spam comments or weird things that happen to the blog. You can reach me through the comments section or from the mail to page at Artquiltmaker.com.

Updated Blogroll

In case you hadn’t noticed, December and July seem to be bad months for blogging for me. Don’t give up! This, too, shall pass. Like everyone else I am busy, though trying to be relaxed about the whole holiday thing. The cards are done, except for a few “problems” and one where the card and address are never in the same place at the same time. We’ll get there. Presents, pies, TTSP!

Blogger seems to be bleeding quiltmakers. Both Deirdre and DebR of the famous Red Shoe Rambling have defected to other blog services. In any case, I have set up an account on WordPress as well, but haven’t moved everything there yet. Darn! Not a trendsetter this time. Stay tuned.

Blog Reflects Work

the dearth of posts to my blog reflects the dearth of quilt work in my life lately. I did take it upon myself to dust off the old sewing machine this weekend and finish up those napkins that have been languishing for months. JCN sent me some lovely new napkins and, although I had planned to get to these languishing bits of fabrics, her work shamed me into it.

I also mended some pants that have been on the ‘to mend’ pile for months as well. Now I have some templates out as I need to get going and make the basket block that my students were assigned before the Christmas break. Immerhin, I suppose. Photos to come.

Blog Out of the Closet

Well, I did it and came out of the blog closet to the Mavs. It is cool, actually, because a few people have commented. Now I feel pressure! I had better sew something tonight!

The quilt class is off for tomorrow, so I am off the hook for that preparation, but I would be smart to get my act together early rather than waiting until the last minute. I did pick out other blocks and make some of the handouts, so that is something. I also got some help on the basket block from EQ Tech Support. Penny responded, so I felt really special! I have to look at what she did and see if it will work.

Of course, I could finish the Drunkard’s Path and Grandmother’s Flower Garden blocks as examples. I feel a little lame for not having done those blocks yet.

I want to sew some more of Feelin’ Blue, Too (new name after talking to JZS and Aja) together as JZS and Aja are way ahead of me in putting the quilt together.

We’ll see. I may just rest.