While watching the morning news I saw a young woman reading her op-ed piece she had sent to the Wall Street Journal about being rejected by some colleges. You can read some of the story here if you missed it, or you don’t subscribe to the WSJ (I don’t).

I thought the piece was funny and a little satirical. Here is a smart young woman who was probably told all her life that she could be anything she wanted to be and go to any school she wanted. And she got rejected by Ivy League schools.  Remember, I was listening to her read the piece with all of her tonal qualities exactly the way she intended it to sound.  The problem for this young woman has been caused by other people reading her comments without the expressions she intended to convey. There are a lot of people who think she is a spoiled brat because of what they think she meant rather than reading what she really said. Think of your favorite comedian….if you read their performance without knowing it was from a comedian, you would probably be offended and irate.

It drove home a point that I think all of us should consider when we read online what someone says. It can be a list serve, a yahoo group or just an email. So many people go off half-cocked and perceive negative tones that maybe really aren’t there. Friendships are lost, flaming occurs and many people have their blood pressure raised unnecessarily.

In the spirit of making my little part of the Internet a nicer place, I promise to think twice and read more than once with an open mind before I interpret something I read as negative.  Will you pay it forward? I Will.

Kiwi seemed to be a hard one for everyone. When we chose the colors this year I immediately saw green for kiwi and that was appropriate for March and St. Patrick’s Day.  But like the color cucumber last year it was hard to not see fruit. With this one you could also see feathers like the bird kiwi. 

I chose colors from the kiwi fruit and included black for the tiny seeds. I decided to do this in paper rather than fabric. I like the results and can see this as a larger fabric piece using surface designed fabric. Try a right click and open the photo in a new tab for a close up view.

I started with heavy pastel paper and paints for the background. The light green is an interference that goes from green to yellow that was applied with a palette knife. The little gold ovals and brown areas were printed with a plastic piece I found in the medicine cabinet that I had no idea what it was to. I took the left over sections of the background after cutting out the cards and painted them over with a gold acrylic ink that was semi-transparent. The original plan was to use my woodburner on the edges but it was pretty stinky so I took the little pieces outside and burned them over a candle.  They have an artifact look that I liked. I added details with black acrylic ink.

The cards have some free form embroidery along 2 edges that doesn’t show up well in the photos. My camera wasn’t cooperating today partly because I mistakenly got the gloss Modge Podge instead of the matte finish.

This was a real pot stirrer.  Half the people who responded, most privately, thought I should toss this in the trash and move on. A couple suggested I should start over from scratch and redo the piece. Then there were the people who thought I should work through the construction issues and save this at all costs. 

I can’t start over without totally changing everything. I love the choice of fabrics I used and there are no more in my stash. It would also be too much like working from a pattern and it would loose the spontaneity this one has.

Tossing it in the trash isn’t a viable option right now. Once before I had a piece that was real crap. I took that piece and kept working on it. The results were enough of a WOW that it was chosen to be included in a book with 26 international artists. If I had tossed it who knows if another piece would have made it in the book.

I had a lot of positive comments in my SAQA critique group and not one thought it should be thrown away.  I had suggestions for removing the fused pieces and how to disguise the holes.

Did I learn something from this piece? Absolutely…the biggest lesson is that no matter what the bottle of liquid basting, school glue bottle or stick, or any other stick-um says….Don’t leave it set for 3 years before working on it and you may not be able to stitch through it when it dries. The fusible?  I went through my drawer and tossed every bit of it out. Now I will have to order some if I decide to ever use it again.

I will post photos when I get this done. Thank you everyone who took the time to give me your views.

 I started this a few years ago in a challenge, photographed it to show unfinished and promptly folded it up into a UFO pile.  I took it to a SAQA state meeting a few months ago and decided by the positive reaction I got that maybe it was time to complete it. The title is “Frog Water Shallows” and it is apx. 24 x40.

Now here are the problems; I used glue stick on the lily pads that has now solidified and I must have used the wrong roll of fusible from my stash since I cannot stitch through it. You can see the holes that don’t heal next to the frog. I pinned tulle over the whole thing and tried again to quilt it. Nope, no, nyet.

I took the whole thing into the bath and soaked it to hopefully get rid of the glue stick. Its drying now. I will try again to quilt through the lily pads. I’m thinking of trying to heat the pieces with the wrong fusible and peel it off. If I do that, I will need to do something different since they will still leave marks.  I know I can paint these images and applique them on the right way.

My question:  [ Right click to open in new window/tab for close ups]

Suggestions for replacing the fused pieces.
Any design comments.
Should I just toss this and call it a learning experience

Full look anarkali suit

Here are photos of the Indian clothing I made for my granddaughter, Ms. P. I am pleased with how they turned out. Amazing what you can do with a little upcycling.  And there are 2 sleeves and the back pieces left over for use in art quilting. The china doll who is modeling is a little smaller than the American Girl. I used an original AG pattern and checked measurements I found online. The trick was to stitch, fit and cut the sari top so I didn’t cut any of the beading threads. I felt like my own mini version of that popular runway show. See what others are doing on Off The Wall Friday

Leather Sandals, Elastic Backs