inspired

i've been knuckling down and getting on with my 'quilt 2008' entry this week, i've left it a bit late as per usual. and i haven't made life easy for myself...this is just a drop in the ocean compared to all the little collages i've still got to make. colour-wise i've just realised i've been inspired by the beads that i packaged up in amy last post. ha - who knew that would happen? technically, it's going to be based on a well-loved patchwork and quilting block, but obviously the twist is that it's made up of paper collages instead of fabric. it's going well so far, i'm really happy with the intensity of the colours together. onwards and upwards (only some 187 'blocks' to go :)

lengthen or shorten here

a while back the lovely dawbis and i arranged a swap. we decided to both make a 6x 6" piece (or actually it could have been 5x5", i can't remember! blonde moment! ;) and send it to each other. the above piece is mine to her and if you click here, you can see a sneaky peek at the one i will receive shortly. it's so cute, i don't think i've ever owned a piece that was made especially for me!

c'mon, don't be shy...

just to let you know that the competition to win '&A' mini paper quilt will be drawn tomorrow morning around 10am gmt.
i'd like to change the rules slightly (apologies; i wasn't sure how this would go) as i'm getting lots of visitors, but either 1) nobody wants to win this quilt or 2) by specifying the comment content i've scared people off. *i'm kinda hoping it's number 2!* so to be in with a chance of winning just leave a random comment. it could be about your dog, your grandmother, the weather, the state of the planet, or you could just say hello. and if you want to mention anything to do with pricing, that would be cool. happy friday!
many thanks to those who have alredy left a comment, your words have been taken on board and will hopefully help me make a decision! :)

harry the happy horse

a vision in lilac for today's nahcotta piece, with a delightful drawing of a horse by me circa 1982. this is actually the last piece, so i've got a ton of binding to do. what a thrilling saturday evening i have to look forward to! :) (actually, at the risk of sounding like a tragic dullard, i wouldn't want it any other way.)

have a happy and restful weekend, y'all!

b,d,h&l are tall letters

orange and brown for today. and yesterday i did speak too soon, this was a pain in the ar*e. it has been reworked, unpicked, reworked again to get here. now i like it. it's quite simple and that's what works with these pieces. right, onward and upward...

i've got a very stroppy kid. frank has finished pre-school today and has come home with a tiger painted face which he keeps forgetting. he then wipes his face and smudges it, then gets upset cos it's all coming off, starts to cry, his nose then runs and we have rivers of snot and tears and tiger face is no more. yuck.

this girl is running away

a peppy new red paper quilt for nahcotta, i'm so loving making these. this one was quite tricky, (it nearly ended up in the dustbin more than once) but i persevered and i think i got there in the end. i'm on a roll now (although i bet i get stuck having typed that out loud) but i've got some difficult colours coming up. (difficult in that they're not colours i use often.) finger's crossed!

on sunday i saw a little cat

blacks, greys and creams for this piece today. it went together so nicely, it was a pleasure to do. the 'little cat' in the title is referring to our first ever family pet; she turned up on our doorstep and never left, much to my dad's horror. not a fan of felines on my paternal side - there's a family horror story about a feral cat shut up in a cupboard and my grandmother's aunt's father's second cousin five times removed was very badly wounded when she opened the cupboard door and out sprang the half dead cat. my father has a tendency to exaggerate wildly, (not a trait i have at all, *wink*) so i have always treated that story with a large dose of skepticism. anyway, we called the little cat 'diana' - and guess what? it was 1981 and charlie and di had just wed, what a bunch of royalists we were. or replace 'royalists' with 'saddos', whichever you prefer.

get used to them, there's more to come

these are probably getting boring now, but i'm loving making them. again, this is unquilted and the pics of these are coming out rather poorly. i think it's the time of day i'm taking them, it's been hot, humid and grey today. anyhoo, this is called 'do your corrections' and has once again some of my school work as background, this time maths and my very, very awful work. every page on it had 'DO YOUR CORRECTIONS' scrawled across it, i swear i only got about three correct per page on average. 1985 was obviously not a good year for me and maths problems. if frank comes home with this sort of work in 6 years time, i'm gonna get him a pivate tutor. shame on you, mum and dad, why didn't i have a private tutor? oh, yeah, that's right i did. and i'm still crap at maths.

UPDATE: 18th july: the above pic is pretty poor, i have retaken it and it is available to look at here

one and two (or possibly two and three)

well hello there! i've been beavering away today, and have created the above collages for nahcotta. they are as of yet unquilted. the blue one is entitled "poorly mrs morley", this is because there is an example of my handwriting in an old school book as a 5 or 6 year old child used as part of the background saying: "today mrs morley is off sick and we are in mrs gibsons classroom, we must be good and quiet." (i can't help feeling that was something written on the blackboard for us to copy; i can't for the life of me imagine my 6 year old self being that pious.) the pink piece is called "spring bulbs need water to grow". in the background (very pale) is a beautiful (?) drawing from another of my old school books of snowdrops, daffodils and tulips. i still don't like the previous pink piece, don't know why, it just doesn't make me happy, so "spring flowers" will take it's place.

today i had to take my eldest son frank to have his starting-big-school injection. i had warned him that it would "feel like a sharp scratch" and may hurt just for a second, but i didn't actually tell him they stab you with a needle. until of course my mother (bless 'er) mentioned to him that they stick a needle in your arm and he turned to me and said: "a needle? don't be ridiculous grandma!?" and turned to me rolling his eyes as if to say, "crazy old bat, where d'you find her?" needless (oh, that was an unintentional pun!) to say he got a bit of a shock at precisely 3.45 this afternoon. but he was very brave and got a sticker with a drum on and a chocolate button. my kids are so easy to charm when it comes to stickers and chocolate buttons.

have a good evening/day/night/whatever, i'm off for a bag of crisps and a pimms! jeez, i'm a classy bird. chin chin!

UPDATE: 18th july: the above pics are pretty poor, i have retaken them and they are available to look at here

nahcotta number one

busy, busy, busy. reality struck me today and left me feeling queasy. art work wise i've been basking in the knowledge that nahcotta gallery wants little ol' me to participate in the enormous tiny art show ii, but i realised that i'd better get my skates on cos they want the goods by the beginning of september, and i want to send them by the end of august to be sure of them getting there on time. in between that i've got a wedding sampler to make, an abc one for my son's pre-school, my website to redesign, and my dreams of getting an etsy store up and running seem to be receding by the day. i seriously need to start making some money from this gig, i can barely pay the broadband bill as it is, and that simply would not do. while i work (see the above evidence, a piece for nahcotta, possibly to be called 'dates for examination'- not entirely convinced i'm pleased with it yet) anyway, as i was saying, while (or should that be 'whilst'?) i work i've been daydreaming about the lead singer of maroon 5 (don't even know his name) in a not altogether appropriate manner for a 32 year old happily married mother of two. ahem. back to work, methinks.

good evening and welcome

hello everyone (hehe....is there anybody out there? sit back watch the tumble weeds) this is the place i've decided to start my blogging career, i'm kinda nervous, but i expect i'll adapt.

here goes......my name is lusummers, i'm *cough*32 years old with two small boys (aged 1 and 4). i'm a really crap housewife and live in a constant whirlwind of trying to keep a reasonably clean house, tripping over copious numbers of toy tractors, and trying desperately to have a career as a mixed media artist. my background is in textiles, but i've been using other stuff lately, particularly paper, and i feel quite comfortable with the tag of 'mixed media artist'. it sorta fits, if you know what i mean.

i want to use this as a place to put down my thoughts, to post pics of my work and that of other artists, and hopefully meet some like-minded people along the way. so, the journey starts here then. *looking around* i think i'm gonna like it here.

(by the way, the above pic is called 'revealed 2' and it's not quite finished yet, it's 20"x 20" and made from paper collage units, and has been quilted.)