i've been stitching all week and just loving it. this class is really fantastic - the content and projects, the instructor, the other students, even the location (the textiles studio here has an incredible view). more on all that later...here is an image of my desk and a few samples of my stitches.
i finished my first map yesterday, the island of mykonos in greece. i stitched the beaches and places i visited and some of the roads i drove to find them. i also stitched the ferry routes to and from the island.
i started an embroidery class called stitched maps today. the instructor is melinda barta. we learned about materials, tools, and basic stitching and i made this little sampler. it starts with back stitching and ends with french and colonial knots. my favorites, besides the knots which i could make endlessly, are the satin stitch (the little green pod) and couching (the blue spiral). it was incredibly fun and i am totally hooked! 
we will be stitching actual maps over the next two weeks...tomorrow i will start my first which i am pretty sure is going to be the island of mykonos in greece. 
i just finished this brooch moments ago...oxidized sterling, silk thread
something new. i really like it.
i am pretty sure this sweet wasp nest specimen i found yesterday got under my skin. i didn't realize until after i assembled the top layer.
as you may or may not know, i took the entire month of may off from online activities. i did not blog or read other blogs, i did not update my facebook business profile page, my website, or my flickr site, i barely touched email or my personal facebook page, and i did not even think about any of these things really. i have to admit, it was wonderful. i felt lighter. i had more time to do other things. i know how important this stuff can be so i'm coming back to it with a refreshed, open mind. i just want to figure out how to make it all work so i am blogging and such AND finding all the time i need and want to be at my bench, a challenging balancing act for sure. this week i will be thinking about how to do this and would like to have a plan of sorts by the end of the week. i spent some time considering it yesterday. it felt like a brainstorming session only with one person, me. i have a good start so far. also, i have to clarify that i am not loosing myself on the internet, wasting time by getting carried away. my problem is that i spend too much time making it all sound and look right, typos, grammar, spelling, image size, links...i am a bit of a perfectionist. obsessing over all those details can make a blog post that is maybe a short paragraph take over an hour or my flickr uploads two hours plus. then i get mad because i spent too much time. anywhere, there it is. more to follow.
i am really pleased to present this month's jewelry of the month because it is a very special collaboration with a ceramic artist from japan. his name is masaaki shinko and he lives in tokyo. masaaki and i were introduced to each other through a flickr group we are both members of called “artist-to-artist.” for the past two months we have all been making jewelry for each other using objects sent from a different members. masaaki sent things to me, including three different types of ceramic objects. since he sent so many i got to thinking about collaborating with him for june. i asked him if he would be interested and he said yes right away. i think masaaki’s work is a wonderful mix of the quiet, modern, and handmade and i wanted my metalwork to echo and complement his style. i experimented with the different objects until i came up with june’s necklace, “east meets west.”
east meets west measures about 20” long and the beads are approximately 1.25” and 1.5” wide. the chain is oxidized sterling silver. using the pieces masaaki sent, i was able to make an edition of 4.
may is here! my favorite month and my birthday month. for this month's jewelry of the month piece i made “graph paper and red,” a pendant composed of twelve layers of graph paper stitched together with red thread. getting here was not easy. i spent hours trying different ideas, none of which seemed to work out; some upon completion just didn’t excite me while others were scrapped halfway through the process. i finally settled on working with graph paper and simple stitches to create this kid-like, nostalgic necklace. the pendant measures about 2” wide and hangs from an 18” chain.
thanks for reading.
