Week 51 in my sketchbook practice.
progress on the little fabric boat pattern : removing the nuts
One of the many unexpected benefits of designing craft and sewing patterns is that I end up questioning why I do things the way I do and pushing for better, clearer, simpler and cleaner solutions. The exercise of explaining a process to someone else, breaking it down into steps, highlights all sorts of imperfections, inefficiencies and details that complicate and don’t enhance significantly.
The little fabric boats had a detail like that – a detail I was very attached to, a detail that was difficult and time consuming to execute with consistency. I love these little boats and I’ve made tons of them over the years – it was nutty of me to put up with that sticky point for as long as I did.
The boats originally had a curve in the back – you can see it on the green boat above. I experimented with a bunch of adjustments to try to make it easier but nothing worked. As much as I liked that curve the difficulty did seem unreasonable. These boats are so sweet and fun, perfect unexpected presents and lovely as a group so I am determined that they be easy to make. And now they are. In the end I tried a simpler piece for the back you can see on the brown boat – no bend or curve. I ended up liking the simple shape better – much better. The more complicated back was nice and clever but didn’t REALLY add any charm to the design after all – I was just attached to it.
Look for the pattern in about a week – just in time for a spring regatta. And there will be a sample sale too – I’ve made a bunch of these little boats while working it all out. If you’d like to be notified by email when the pattern and boats are in the shop you can sign up here.
sketchbook : week 50
cloth, a podcast interview and spheres – a free template to experiment with
I love cloth.
I always have – as a child it was something I had in abundance and I learned to think well in stitches. I especially love old cloth. Lovely old cloth. I love it for it’s simplicity, it’s commonness, it’s possibilities and meaning.
I spend happy hours considering and choosing – today I’m gathering bits of indigo for an owl. I love the textures and patinas that comes from decades or centuries of life and use and I make things that celebrate it as I find it – all it’s scars and mending apparent. And I add my own patches and mends and visible stitching – I love the sewness, the make believe. The fragility and other unexpected qualities of very old cloth send me in new directions, new ways of doing things. I used some of my most treasured scraps from Sri Threads to make these toadstools.
I love the little guy. You can find all three in the shop today.
As I was working on them I was thinking about constructing shapes in cloth and what a fascinating process that is. If you’re experimenting with that kind of sewing, especially if you’re just beginning to play with three dimensional sewing – spheres are a great place to start. When I teach a workshop I almost always give away a pattern for three and four part spheres. You can download that pattern here if you like.
And speaking of patterns – more are coming soon – fabric boats, tiny dolls and the flamingo kit. I’ve hit a lot of snags and complications putting that together, it’s been a bigger mountain to climb than I expected but it’s almost there.
And in other news:
A new podcast interview! My second ever. Find my conversation with my good friend Elizabeth Duvivier (founder and director of Squam Art Retreats) here. I loved our chat – Elizabeth is a smart cookie, a truly curious person and I love her new podacast. Two of my favorite episodes are with Suzan Mischer and Kerry Lemon. I hope you check it out.
sketchbook : week 49
rag doll #2 and chuzzlewit
This is rag doll # 2 – Camille. I had not intended to name the rag dolls but as I worked on her that name kept occurring to me so she must want it. She has a very nice life – she just sits around looking serene and thinking about things. Sometimes just in her underwear…..
Besides her name she also wanted fancy shoes and pantaloons. She is in the shop today along with the fellow below – an owl made from Mrs. Brown’s skirt – Chuzzlewit.
He seems a little suspicious of you.
sketchbook : week 48
Week 48 in my sketchbook practice.
building the focus muscle
I’m working on a large project for Fortuny – I can’t show it to you for a couple more weeks but I can show you some of the fabrics I’m working with – their new cashmere velvets – I wish you could feel them – and the colors are glorious.
It’s a project I love and one that makes me wish for more hours in the day which of course I can’t have. But maybe I can increase the depth of my focus and attention to make the absolute most of the time I do have. I know the sensation of deep focus but it’s a place that has become increasingly difficult to get to.
I think of my creativity, my imagination, as a muscle – something to be cared for, fed nurtured and exercised.
I think of time as a precious and finite commodity and I manage and protect it thoughtfully and carefully.
I am realizing that my ability to focus needs to be cared for, exercised, managed and protected too. I know it has been diminished by constant connectedness, the myriad of small grabs for my attention that were not there 20 years ago. So I work at it, plan for it and block out chunks of time away from distractions – internet and phone free time to sink into deep focus. I thought that was enough until I listened to this episode of The Unmistakable Creative Podcast :
Rules For Focused Success in a Distracted World with Cal Newport
It’s a great episode and I hope you’ll listen. What struck me most was the idea that some habits and behaviors outside of those chunks of protected time have undermining, damaging effects on my ability to focus deeply, to manage my attention.
Newport offered the example of waiting in line at a grocery store – I pull out my phone – and so does almost everybody else. I notice the same on the subway – the train comes out of a tunnel and everybody pulls out their phone. It’s a habit and such a small thing – what harm could it do? Why not fill that little bubble of grocery line time with instagram or email etc.?
“Both our personal and professional lives are increasingly built around these sources of distraction. From a cognitive perspective, that’s like being an athlete who smokes.”
Cal Newport
It’s teaching my mind to run away from boredom – to fill gaps with novel stimulation from a never ending source, It weakens the muscle that resists distraction, the muscle that helps me stay truly present in the moment, the stitch.
Since I first listened a couple weeks ago I stopped pulling out my phone in little downtime moments like waiting in the grocery or post office line and it’s uncomfortable – alarmingly uncomfortable. In fact it’s easier not to bring it. I think it’s good practice for pulling my attention back to the present or an opportunity to daydream – that little device steals so much daydreaming time. I am far more likely to have an idea while day dreaming than I am while looking at twitter.
I’m not giving up my phone or the internet – but I am working harder to put them in their place. And I do feel a strong nostalgia for the pre- connected life.
* Further – If you’re interested in this sort of thing you might enjoy another Unmistakable Creative episode on focus and productivity too.
sketchbook : week 47
Week 47 in my sketchbook practice.
advanced beginner : ten years of blogging
Ten Years!
This February marks the ten year anniversary of my blog. 10 years of trying stuff and sharing it.
Posting my efforts and experiments has made me braver and continues to help me push myself to keep moving, take chances, and get over myself. And I love having a record – evidence of small consistent effort over a long period of time, evidence of growth, a catalog of moments and sensations I would have forgotten. It is also a catalog of missteps. I looked through the entire blog over the last couple days – I never have before – and a lot of it makes me cringe. Not even just the really old stuff. There is a shocking amount of things I felt good about at the time that I see now as terribly flawed or awkward. Part of me wants to edit that all out but that is not the spirit of this effort – the spirit of this effort is reaching and sometimes reaching is flawed and awkward. In all of it that is what means the most to me – I tried stuff and I will continue to try stuff and share it. I’m deeply motivated by the idea that my best work is always ahead of me – I feel like I’ve barely gotten started.
To mark the occasion I chose a photo from each year to share in this post – some are images I loved, or times when I felt like I got somewhere new and some are just little moments I’m glad were preserved. Some of the images remind me of collaborators I was lucky to have and people who have been showing up here for the entire ten years – I am truly touched and grateful for that.
Beginning with 2006 – paper birds.
2007 – the ginger rose
2008 – snapshots from Camp Wapameo for Birds
2009 – diorama/illustration – theater
sketchbook : week 46
Week 46 in my sketchbook practice.
the brown speckled wingnut and other new songbirds
Songbirds are slow work – it’s all slow work I guess but songbirds in particular will not be hurried. They are the boss of me. I know when I start it’s going to take a long time and I struggle with that for a while – try to speed it up – it never works. I don’t make any real progress until I settle in and forget about finishing at all.
They have evolved over the years into something more realistic than my early songbirds. And every time I make one I reach for more – more life-force, more curiosity, more birdness. I want them to seem to have just perched, or as if that are just about to take off, or take a step or as if they only discovered you this very moment. I’ve added the four above to the shop today – from left to right : a Brown Speckled Wingnut, a Mrs. Brown’s Nuthatch, a Bashful Finch and an Ebony Woebegone. You can see the Edwardian skirt the Mrs. Brown’s Nuthatch is made from here – I’ve been making things from it for years.
