Maker In Residence

 And if you are a creative type, you know I'm not talking about little green men. UFO = Unfinished Object.   A little suncatcher I finished on the weekend. First a disclaimer: I do have many UFOs in my house, in boxes or lying around. I also have several projects 'resting' on my craft table. But these days when I start something, I try extremely hard to finish it. Finishing projects (or not) is a huge factor in how my mental health is travelling. (I'll write another post on this tomorrow).   A bag of 'scumbles' which need to be crocheted together as a freeform crochet ... very much a UFO. So first off... what causes MY UFOs? When you look at the reason for a problem, it can help you tackle it. So here's a list of reason's my projects go off task; 1. I've discovered I don't yet have the skills to get the result I want. 2. I have the skills, but it's still not turning out how I envisioned. 3. I've decided it needs something else and I'm...

 Does it bug you as much as it does me that people refer to Mental Health like it's a bad thing? Mental Health is an area of health, not a condition. Positive or Negative Mental Health is the condition. Ok so I'll hop off my soap box now and write about the real purpose for this post. My progress on this Bruges Lace is such a positive mental health booster because it's a physical measurement of my achievement, of the time well spent and a new technique learned. This is what it looked like after using a full ball of thread. About 26cm. This is what it looked like this morning. That's about 37cm if you count the bottom half. And even more satisfying is the decision I made about what to do with this lace. I have a short black skirt that I will embellish with this lace. So now it has a purpose and I have a target length. Like I was saying to my wonderful Life Coach, Judy, yesterday, it's one thing to make something lovely, but so much better if it gets finished and turn...

 WARNING! This will be a long one. As part of the Maker in Residence program, I've been encouraged to find my voice, my style, my artistic identity. In the first few weeks, this caused a serious doubt to well up inside me. I work across so many mediums that, at first I couldn't see it. My mentor encouraged me to journal and to experiment to find it. Then this morning, while in the shower it hit me (I often get epiphanies in the shower). I've already done all that!!!!! Ever since my teen years I've scrapbooked, journalled, flipped from one medium to another, followed and sought many influences. For one little moment there, I just forgot. So here is an affirmation. (for those who don't know me quite as well as others, these images are all my own work done over the past 30 or so years. And I apologise to those who have seen these images before, though I think this is the first time I have collected them in a statement like this.) My voice is evident in the sparkly mate...

 Here's a little video showing me working with a size 40 thread. It's not the smallest thread I've worked with and I'm still pretty new to this, which is why I'm looking all fingers and thumbs still. but I know I'll get quicker and more confident as I go. This little flower ended up encased in resin... The experiment wasn't a success unfortunately, but these little flowers only take about half an hour to crochet. In the same experiment, I was trying to encase half this piece of lace I made. I like the way it turned out actually and I'll definitely do something like this again... Even though the experiment didn't go as I wanted. I love how the lace hardened and conformed to the shape. I get excited thinking about all the shapes I can mould the lace into.  Here's what they looked like before they were encased. I've always wanted to make fabric pieces that I knew would stand the test of time, not fading or breaking down as is their natural proce...

 My mentor, Liz, at The Hawkesbury Remakery has encouraged me to find materials that speak to me when I'm making my pieces for exhibition. Thinking about it lead to a bit of a materials study. Below, you can see three different materials (3 sizes of crochet yarn with their 3 different size hooks). Not only do you get seriously different results on the size front, I chose three different types of yarn to test.  The one on the left is a 60 weight lace thread (crocheted over a 4 strand cord) with a 0.6mm hook. It's super fine, (though I might add, not the finest you can do - stay tuned for the 100 weight and the 0.35mm hook (I'm waiting for that to arrive from Japan). This is a thread designed for making fine laces and is not for the faint hearted. This was only my second time using it and I still felt like I was all fingers and thumbs, but I managed a nice little sample. I can't wait to do dome more gorgeous fine laces with this. The one in the middle is a perle from DMC ...