Pages ... if I get around to it ...

Friday, August 26, 2011

Eventful Exhibitions and all the Fun of the (Craft and Quilt) Fair

ok ... so this looks suspiciously like an E post for ABC Wednesday, even though we are up to the letter F this week ... to be honest - that is Exactly what it was going to be, until the chunk of spare time I thought I was going to have to organise some photos and write it didn't actually Eventuate ... but that is Fine - because the subject of this post also quite nicely leads into a Few things that can also just as nicely work for the letter F  ;-)

A couple of weeks ago, was the annual Canberra Quilters Exhibition, which is now on during (and as part of) the Craft and Quilt Fair (organised by a mob called Expertise Events - lol).

As usual - I Entered a Few things ...

First (first finished in this case ;-) was the diary cover that I made back in January, and blogged about at the time - that post is here - http://aykayem.blogspot.com/2011/01/zzz-zen-and-art-of-stitching.html (yes ... another ABC Wednesday post - lol - scroll down past the couple of "doodles" I drew and you will find the diary cover ... and when I found this post to tell Mum where to find it so she could look - I also noticed that further down is a photo of another small quilt that I had sort of forgotten about - I probably could have entered it in the quilt show if I had remembered it at the time entries were due! ... next year will probably be too late, becuase it will have been made too long before the show to be allowed under the rules, unless they change them back to what they were a few years ago when it didn't matter when the item was made ;-)

Here is a photo of it hanging in the Exhibition:



... with the card for someone else's stuff, and the corners of a few other items "rubbed out" (using GIMP ;-) because I don't know if they really want photos of their stuff on my blog (or anywhere on the www for that matter)

and yes ... it seems the quilt judge actually liked it! (didn't come first/second/third - but I got this neat certificate saying it was "highly commended" ... which is more than I expected to get for anything I entered this year)

btw ... once I decided to enter it I took it off my diary, to keep it clean/new looking ... so my poor diary had to be naked again for a while ... it is back on my diary now - and I think I am the only person I know of who is using a diary with a cover that has been "highly commended" by a quilt judge - lol

Next is my challenge quilt (next photo, not next Finished - I Forget Exactly what order I Finished them in anyway - the last Few were done in an Extremely Fast rush - LOL)

The theme we had to follow, for the challenge, was "Home" ... as usual I had several ideas, most of them looked good in my head but I knew I probably wouldn't be able to make them look that good in fabric ... except for this idea - because I had actually done something that looks similar in the past - and that did look good (in fact I believe it is still getting admired whenever anyone sees it hanging up inside Mum and Dad's campervan ;-)

Anyway ... this is (a rather bad photo of) my challenge quilt - I can't take another one right now because I don't actually have it here at home (they become a travelling Exhibition for a year so it did not come home with me at the End of the Exhibition like the others did)



oh poop! ... I just realised, when I was fiddling with that photo - I Forgot to colour the lake in blue! LOL
(or draw on a few green tree symbols or something, for a bit of extra colour/interest/realism/whatever)
I came up with the idea of doing a map to Find my way home ... and got to thinking about how home is the place where one is at ... so this is kind of meant to depict where I am at, and the stuff that is happening around my life ... or something like that ... hopefully reading the place names on that map will help my Explanation make a bit more sense ... and it may help Explain why my blog posts are as weird as they are, and as sporadic as they are ;-)
(it is no co-incidence that the "here be dragons" is right near "procrastination plateau" at the bottom of "slippery slope" LOL)

My miniature quilt probably also explains a few things about me:



... there are definitely a lot of things about this that the "quilt police" would arrest me for - wobbly weird stitching and lumps and bumps and tucks and puckers and creases and wrinkles ... but I made it because I wanted to (the "Tiny Treasure" (miniature quilt) catagory does not have to be to any theme, but this quilt was actually another idea I had for the "home" theme - figured it was not that easy to make a good looking bigger version so I did a little one - and I like how it turned out ;-)

I only had 2 actuall QUILTS in the quilt show ... but they have catagories for creative clothing - which can be actual vests/coats/etc wearable things, and accessories. So ...

I entered this bag:



which was easy to make - machine quilted some grey fabric, hand stitched between the lines of machine quilting (which takes quite a while to do but I really enjoy doing that kind of stitching and stuff) and made it into a bag ;-)

I also found some green fabric that I had machine quilted with black thread (as an experiment for something or other that I ended up not needing for what it was originally done for) and I decided that seeing DH had just bought us an iPad - it needed a bag to keep it in (so it didn't rattle around in places like the car glove box when we took it somewhere) - so I did some gold hand stitching in between the black, and made it into an iPad sized pocket:



Trouble is ... I finished the bag in time to use it on the holiday we were taking the iPad on ... but the quilt show was AFTER the holiday - so I did not want to use the bag and get it dirty/scuffed/whatever before the quilt show (which could have easily happend while I was taking all those photos of food that I posted to Facebook - lol) - so I put it away, rather than using it, and then had to whip up another bag for the iPad!
(no photo here ... think I took one, but it is still on the camera - I might have to post that, and some better photos of some of this stuff, at a later date)

The other thing I made ... was for the creative clothing challenge - same theme as the quilt challenge ("Home") but had to be either clothing or an accessory ... so I kind of somehow came up with a rather weird idea ... and was in a bit of a contrary/cheeky mood - and figured that I would be a bit mischevous and enter something rather weird and wonderful ... I was kind of expecting to totally confuse the organisers and have them wonder what the heck it was and what to do with it ... because this is actually a HAT!



pity they didn't tell me they needed a "head" for it - I could have found/made something that would have worked (even a foam ball on a stick with fabric over it would have worked, had I known ... or been able to be there helping in the afternoon/evening on set up day like I usually do, but couldn't this year because I had a meeting to go to on the other side of town).
It does actually fit my  head - I made it so it would (no Mum - you don't have to walk beside me when I wear it - and yes - I DO intend to wear it ... somewhere - lol)
 ... it is meant to look like a hollow tree trunk, that is "home" to a bird (in a nest) and a whole pile of other creatures (worms and spiders made from yarn, plastic lizards, spiders, snakes ... etc).
(and the bird's body is a ball of yarn - because I ran out of time to crochet the body - although now I kind of prefer the idea of using a ball of yarn anyway ;-)

Funny thing is ... my weird idea kind of backfired on me - in a really nice way - lots of people actually liked it, including the quilt judge! - in fact she liked it so much that she awarded me that nice blue ribbon - yes - it came First! LOL
(and, I have not got it yet, because prizes are awarded at the next meeting - but according to the list in the catalogue - my First prize is a voucher to go and spend at a local quilt shop ... so I can go buy more Fabric to Fill up my sewing room ... or maybe I could spend it on some Fancy quilty gadgets/tools to Fiddle with?)

btw ... I Found the blog post where I wrote about the other quilt I made that looked like a map ... the post is at http://aykayem.blogspot.com/2007/07/magical-map-of-journey-of-life.html ... but now that I know when I posted it I can go and copy the html for the link and put it in this post so the same picture also shows up here:



... and so you don't have to go read all the other junk in that old post (although you can if you like - your keen stare will not wear the electrons off your computer screen ;-) I will explain what it is right here - I made this small quilt for Mum and Dad, and gave it to them for Christmas one year ... Mum made a LOT of quilts, and Dad used to work in a hardware store - so there is a "Quilt Town" and a "Hardware Hill" ... and a few other odd things ... lol
Both of those quilts are made from bits of the same peice of fabric - a length of calico that I rust dyed (by wrapping a whole pile of rusty junk, and dirt and stuff, in it and leaving it in a wet soggy heap for a day or 3 before I shook all the stuff off/out of it and washed it)

Anyway ... too bad if this blog post is not Finished ... because I have dedided it is ;-)
- I should be heading off to bed ... and even if I don't do that - I was meant to be doing other things this evening and still have not done them - and the main one was to Find some Fabric that I need to start making something that I want to have Finished For the textile art exhibition that is also coming up in a Few weeks time ... a Few too Few weeks ... as in I only have about 2 weeks to Finish the thing that I need that Fabric For!
(hopefully it will only take me a Few hours to make it ... providing I can Find a particular box of Fancy Fabric that I know I have hiding away ... somewhere ... !)

er ...

goodnight.

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Here Be Dragons ...

Drats ... I have missed quite a few ABC Wednesday posts, but I have just Decided that, Despite the fact that I am Dead tired and I already have less than 8 hours in which to sleep before I have to get up and Dash off to work, I might Duck in here and do a D post (before the linky thingy closes in a few hours time ;-) after all - I Did take a couple of photos, a few Days ago, just for this post!

I took a photo of a Duo of Dragons!

water dragons ;-)

and then I took a (blurry) photo of another lizard - Drinking 

this is a stumpy tailed lizard, also known as a sleepy lizard (which is what I grew up calling them)

this is a better photo of a sleepy lizard, and 3 blue toungue lizards

All these are native to Australia, and I have seen all of them in the wild (well the sleepy and blue tounges definitely ... the water dragons I often see in the botanic gardens are probably not totally wild ... but they are not fenced in or anything either). These photos were taken at a reptile exhibit at the CSIRO Discovery Centre - they had an open weekend as part of Science Week.

I also took a video of the sleepy lizard Drinking


hmmm ... reminds me of that saying "flat out like a lizard drinking" lol

and now ... on a Different subject - a couple of photos I took last month:

who needs a cat when you have a Dog who Does this?


and this:

I am glad this is DHs pillow and not mine! ... he slobbers so the pillow was a bit Damp (er ... probably a LOT damp actually ;-)
(ok ... some might think that is Disgusting - lol - but Diesel (the Dog) is part of the family - we are probably already sharing his germs anyway ... and I think humans probably have more germs than Dogs Do ... except maybe if the Dog has just been rolling in or eating some "Doo Doo", or Dead things, or some other Disgusting stuff ... lol)

D is also for Div tags ... which this Darn blog editor insists on putting in, even though I keep changing the settings to try and stop it Doing that (although the reason it doesn't work could be that I probably Don't know what I am Doing) - when it adds Div tags it seems to stuff up the formatting and make it Difficult (or Downright impossible!) to put the text where I wanted it to go ... so I have to Dive into the "edit html" mode and Delete them all and that seems to make things work ok - lol

D is also for Drawing Doodles ... I have Done a few of those lately, but I have not taken photos of them or scanned them yet ... I will Do that later ... (I guess I could post them under L for public Lectures - because that is where/when I did them! LOL)

oh good ... the video uploading is Done ... now all I have to Do is publish this, and I can head off and Dive under the Doona, and Drift off to "sleep, perchance to Dream" ... (I Don't remember what that is a quote from - one of Shakespears plays I think)

btw ... I have something perfect planned for my E post ... (just happens to be the right timing for something I want to post about anyway ;-) that is if I Do get around to Doing my E post (rather than just Doing some of it and saving it as a Draft, and then finding it, still unpublished, a year or 3 later when I am Digging around in blogger) if it Does get Done - it is Definitely going to be Delightful ... well ... maybe not? lol ... but I Definitely Do want to share it with you ... (all 2 or 3 people who read my blog - my MUM doesn't even read it, unless I e-mail it to her ... lol)

oh ... I just realised - I Didn't post anything about my crochet Dragon!

... I Did it for an online Exhibition - so I will try to remember to add it to my E post ... which, if I actually Do it this week, will be about another Exhibition or 2 anyway ;-)

but I Decided I just had to put at least one photo of my crochet Dragon in here - in my Dragon post! lol


I also found this:

- an interesting example of a "what  not to Do" - when out walking the Dog in the Dark, it is a good idea not to try and take a photo, in the Dark, when one is still wearing a pair of fluffy blue gloves - LOL
(it is a good thing I take Digital photos ... so I am not wasting film when I Do Dopey stuff like that ... DH would argue that I am wasting space on the hard Drive on the computer - because even if the photo is a "failure" I still tend to keep them, rather than Do what Mum does and Delete the Dodgy ones  ... I guess that is because I think I might find a use for them one day - and see - with this one I DID ;-)