studioQ meeting

     Last Monday, my fiber arts group studioQ, met for our monthly get together...what a great bunch!  Everyone but one was present...we always learn so much from each other.  We just finished our latest challenge...Our "Color Chip Challenge" and are ready to start something new.  But first we have our own "show and tell"...this month many of us had been to classes all over and had stuff to show!

"Time"

 I had attended a Susan Shie workshop in Wooster, Ohio which I had blogged about earlier. I went with my daughter...we had so much fun and learned so much!

From a class Wendy took

Wendy and Heather had traveled to another town in Ohio and had taken a color/design class from Terry Jarrad Dimond. The pictures here are just a few of what Wendy did. This is a workshop I would love to attend!

Acrylic painting on tar paper!

And Beth took a class on painting on tar paper while she and her husband were on a trip to Santa Fe, New Mexico...he took the class too...a big first for both of them for this kind of painting!

A class on color discharge

Nancy took a class at Coupeville, Washington from Carol Soderlund on Color Discharge. I want to do this also...it is at the Pacific Northwest Art School on Whidbey Island off the coast of Washington!

Dyanna and Lynn

Dyanna and Lynn had just gotten back from a trip to Italy.  While there they took a class on marbling.  I wish this was a better picture because their stuff is really  pretty!

And several others had really neat stuff to show too....

a Bethany creation

Bethany, playing around with grommets!

Kay-using her own hand dyes!

And another one of Kay's with hand dyes!

Beth has finished her last color chip challenge

And Susan has completed another sketchbook!

Then we did a little activity to get us started on our next challenge.  Wendy and Heather had both taken classes from Nancy Crow and one of the techniques they learned several years ago was to create an element then use it repeatedly in various ways...size, color, etc.

Working away on my dining room table!

Showing off what we did

This is kind of fuzzy but is the only one with ME in it...I am usually taking the pictures!

We drew several squares and created line designs in them.  Then we created our elements with black and white paper. For our next meeting we are to make up several units out of black and white fabric of a couple of our favorite sketches.  We will play around with them on a design wall to see what we can do with them....then we will see where it will take us!!!

     And, of course, the last thing...most of us went out to lunch together!!!!

Memory Monday # 78

     Still a Freshman at Mizzou!  Making some life long friends! Because I was a Freshman, I couldn't live in the Zeta house, but pledges met thera lot of time.  We had our pledge meetings; there were social occasions; we would eat Sunday dinner there once a month.  My pledge mom was a Junior from Wood River, Illinois.  She was one of the reasons I pledged Zeta...the fact she was from Illinois as was I; she was tall as was I; and she had a great sense of humor!  It so happened she was also Pledge Leader which meant she was "in charge" of making sure we were all learning all the stuff we needed to learn, and keeping tabs on us  to see how our grades were doing!  We had to have a 2.5 or better in order to be initiated.
     I was probably a bit of a disappoint to her because I was NOT a good student!  I came to the BIG University from a very small high school and had no idea how to study. I was also very impressed by all the FUN that could be had!!!!  And all the boys to date!!! Who knew!!!
     The first time I saw The Stables...what became one of my favorite hangouts...was the first or second week of school.  My pledge mom had fixed me up with a really cute guy whose fraternity was right next door to Zetas; he said do you want to go to the Stables? I remember this was a a week night, and I said I didn't know what that was! So we drove this real "dive" looking place...it is out on the edge of town....being a week night, there were not very many people there.  My first instinct was...my parents would not approve of this!  So I said I didn't think I wanted to go in...he didn't ask me out again!  Must have thought I was a real prude!

Picture it at night with no crowd!

As I said, it became a favorite in months to come!  This picture really doesn't do it justice...it really was a dive, but it  is where I learned what TGIF meant...and my best bud and I would hit up any one with a car that we could find to hitch a ride out there on Friday.  When I hear of and see pics of college parties today, I think we were really pretty tame compared to now.  Beer flowed freely but there were no drugs...that I knew of...and girls had curfews so even though we might think we were partying high...we knew we had to head back to the dorm before lock out!

Three Generations

     This past weekend, my other darling daughter, Marti, invited me to go with her to Nacogdoches, TX to visit Kathleen..daughter/ granddaughter. She was being initiated into her sorority on Saturday; Marti had been a Zeta at the same campus, Stephen F. Austin, where she also attended college.  And I had been a Zeta at the University of Missouri (my Memory Monday topic for awhile).
      It is about a three plus hour drive; we got there a little after noon.  Kathleen's initiation was to be at 2:00.  There were 45 pledges going through the ceremony and they had broken it into nine groups/ five each.  Marti and I got there about 1:30 and got to look around at all the gift boxes the Big Sisters had made up full of all kinds of gifts for their Little Sisters.
      Then we were escorted into the meeting room, secret knock, secret handshake and all!!  We had been requested to wear all white, as all the girls...actives and pledges were dressed.  We both had white slacks, white shirts and white shoes!  As we wandered around town before going to the sorority house, we thought of all kinds of professions we could serve in our "uniforms"! From nurses to ice cream truck drivers!

Occupation???

Three Generations of Zetas!

After all the initiations were over, we all got together in the House dining room where the girls got to delve into their boxes!  

Kathleen's Basket

Later the three of us and Kathleen's Big sis went out to dinner. 

Kathleen and Sarah

The next day, Marti and I picked Kathleen up at her dorm, got a tour of the campus, then had brunch before taking her back to school and we hit the road home.  

Kathleen

An abstract Lumberjack-my interpretation! (The Lumberjack is SFA's mascot.)

Kathleen with her mom, Marti in front of a statue of Stephen F. Austin

Great weekend with  some of my favorite people!!

Memory Monday # 77

     I just got back from a two week trip with my darling daughter, Andrea. The first week out, we went to a workshop in the home of Susan Shie, a fabulous fiber artist who lives in Wooster, Ohio..(that is "WUS...ter" we were told...not like ROOster!)  We had an absolutely wonderful time and learned so much! Which I will write more about later...but now for my memory post!
   Actually this is a  combined post...the years I was at Mizzou, a favorite hamburger/ beer joint was The Shack.  It sat right across the street from campus and had quite a reputation for the best burgers (secret recipe) and fun atmosphere!

Above insert is the Shack as I knew it!

Look closely....you might see my name there!  Carving on the walls and tables was encouraged!

A guy named Jim Lowe attended Mizzou...he must have hung out at the Shack too because he wrote a song "The Green Door" (click on link to hear it) which was in reference to the Shack's Green Door!  There is a line "what's that secret you're keepin'?" which is about their great hamburgers...a fun song!

     Now, the connection to our workshop is with the collaborated work we did together..the three students (myself, my daughter, Andrea and another fun lady, Mary) and teacher Suzie! We learned three basic techniques: painting on fabric, air brush and air pen.  After doing a couple of starts of our own (later info), we decided to do a collaboration where we all added to the quilt.  We started with our airbrush technique and our theme for the day was "houses".

Top right-Andrea (tree house), top left-Mine (castle)
Bottom left-Susan's, bottom right-Mary

Then we all added more and more details..whatever we added to our own, we added to each others!

Each time we changed color of the paint used for airbrush. 

At this point, Andrea had painted all our doors with green paint...which triggered my memory of The Shack and the Green Door! So I pulled up the song for everyone...Susan, although younger than I, was the only one besides myself who knew it!

And at one point, Susan added Sphinxes..another object Andrea had in her first quilt.

Then after we decided the whole had enough on it, we cut it into four sections, then added more of our own personal ideas!  The picture above is really the quilt from the back; I wanted to show the vividness of the colors by showing how bright they are on the back side.

This is a picture of all our work this week...our collaborated is the four in the center which we titled "The Mystery of the Sphinx...Behind the Green Door!"!!  Realize, none of these are completed...there will be more details added, embellishing, stitching, quilting.

   

     

Memory Monday #76

     Here I am...a freshman...finding my way around campus (and I don't know if I told you or not but I was and am directionally challenged!) so finding my way around was more of a chore for me than some, I am sure.
     Mizzou had two distinct campuses..the Red Campus and the White Campus!  A very brilliant observation...most of the buildings on the Red campus were made of red brick...it was the older campus; and the buildings on the White campus...yep..were mostly made up of white brick.  I had classes on both.  As a freshman, there are a few required classes that all Freshmen take...English being one.  Most of my classes were on the Red campus as that is where the Liberal Arts and School of Education were located. Jesse Hall with the columns lining a large quad was the focal building...it had a dome at the top...very impressive.  The Student Union on White campus, had a tall rampart/castle-like tower. Both of these landmarks were my guides to which campus I needed to head for...so you would find me looking skyward for my directions! Probably not the usual way for most!

The Student Union on White Campus

Jesse Hall with columns on Red Campus

   Both campuses were about a mile from my dorm...and we hoofed it back and forth twice a day!  If I had morning and afternoon classes with just a short break for lunch, I would stay on campus and grab a bite to eat there; but if classes were more than an hour apart, I'd head back to the dorm for lunch and back to afternoon classes...a schedule which was more than half the time! I could walk that mile in about 10 minutes then!

Memory Monday # 75

    As I had earlier stated, I had pledged Zeta Tau Alpha...not really knowing a thing about sororities.  It was a good decision for me...a couple of my friends who went through rush also pledged Zeta so that was fun to be living near some fellow pledges! And my pledge mother was also from Illinois...Judy (which was also my sister's name)...a senior and also Pledge Captain, so she was not only in charge of me but the whole pledge class!
     Freshmen girls could not live in the sorority house, which was a good idea because the friends we made as Freshmen were probably the ones we remained closest to in later years, regardless of what sorority we pledged...and even with those who never pledged...at least I did.

My Zeta Pledge class 1958-59-being tall I am on the back row! Third from left.

The Prez-pinning on my pledge pin

Dad's weekend at the sorority
My pledge mom and her dad on the left; my dad and I on the right!

Airpen and Air Brush

  Andrea and I are here at Susan Shie's Turtle Art Camp, learning so much! Yesterday and Tuesday we worked on air pen and air brush techniques! I have wanted to be able to write on fabric like Susan does ever since I saw her work and now here I am....learning the process!! I will say, it looks easier than it is to do! Practice, practice, practice!!! Which I am not very good at doing!

My first attempt (a start) of air pen..theme/Time

Our collaboration of air brush....all

Andrea and I-geared up to do air brush

Susie's astrological chart table cloth

     Susan Shie is big into  Astrology so we are learning to read our charts!

Art Quilters Around the World-Monochromatic

     The theme for this month for Art Quilters Around the World is "Monochromatic".  My choice of color was shades of blue...one of my favorite colors and, as I explained on the blog AQATW I satisfied two challenges with this one!  I had missed a couple of challenges in the winter when my husband was on hospice, so as I was doing this one, the title "'Eye'-land in the Stream came to me!  Click on the link above to see more of my explanation and all of the other beautiful quilts that are out there!

Monochromatic / 'Eye' land in the Stream!

     I kind of like this technique of using stripes of fabric and am working on another quilt using this technique for my studioQ challenge...color chips.

Incomplete challenge for studioQ

    I think I may develop this into our next challenge for studioQ.  We have exhausted the Color Chip Challenge, which I really enjoyed.  Next we are going to develop an element to be used repeatedly in different configurations and color schemes to improve on our use of design.  Each person will develop their own element and do something monthly with it.