Week Two Check-In

This week I only managed to do my morning pages three times and one of those was extremely abbreviated, not the requisite three pages. Interestingly enough the mornings that I did do them were the mornings that Hilda was here. Prior to that I was distracted in the mornings with things I needed to do before she arrived. I don't dislike doing the morning pages, but they frequently feel like they have nothing to do with discovering my creative self (I've decided I feel better about "discovering" rather than "recovering" which makes me feel like I'm an alcoholic or drug addict and in a 12-step program - although since this runs for 12 weeks, I guess I am in a 12-step program of sorts). The pages feel more like a stream-of-consciousness litany about what is going on and none of it has much to do with quilting -- which I suppose when I analyze that means that my focus is/has been elsewhere and that's what I'm trying to do, pull it back to the part of what I do/who I am that gives me the greater sense of fulfillment. So far I don't feel like they're whiny necessarily, just too much to do with non-creative things - and the one day I tried to deal with more creative aspects, I wound up writing the same sentence over and over for 2 pages or more.

This week was a very full one as far as artist's date, filling the well, etc. Hilda arrived on Wed. evening - Dale dropped her off at my office in the late afternoon. We stopped for Thai food on the way home and I ordered something called Evil Jungle Princess - just because the name was intriguing. Fortunately, it was also delicious! On Thursday, we met a couple of the other AZ retreat hostesses, Ellen and Carolyn, for lunch, then we went to the Bead Museum Store in Glendale. Wandered around there with little trays and tiny plastic bags for an hour or more, making our selections from a huge variety of beads. The potential for spending a bundle in this store was HUGE, so I was quite pleased when my purchase rang up to $12 and some change. After that, we stopped by the LQS fwhere Ellen works or a quick visit - Hilda found some wool for primitive applique, and Ellen and I picked out the 2006 border fabric for the AZ Retreat banner and fabric for the nametags. On the way home, we stopped at a GoodWill and wandered around there for quite awhile -- more wool for felting for primitive applique for Hilda. I didn't have any ideas for something to use creatively there, perhaps I need to go back?! Friday was our day devoted to dyeing some fabric and I'm going to consider that my artist's date for the week. It really took up most of the day -- we did several rounds of gradation dyeing in plastic bags and a mudbucket for all the leftover dyes. We also did four parfait jars from the Color by Accident book and the results from these were spectactular. I definitely want to do more of the parfaits. They are easier to do when you're working by yourself than the dyeing in ziploc bags is, because you don't have to try to hold the bags open and pour the dyes by yourself. I really love dyeing fabric, but sometimes let too much time pass between sessions. Once we had all the fabric in the dye, we walked over to a nearby restaurant for a late lunch. Much of the evening was spent rinsing fabric - always the most difficult part of the process. In my dream house, there's going to be a laundry sink for this purpose! Something large and deep and at a much better height for the rinsing process than hanging over the side of the bathtub. Saturday, I made a breakfast egg casserole and Hilda made scones, which we took to Sew Day with the AZ Retreat group. Hilda spent some time on Denise's Gammill, and we got to visit with quite a few other quilters. On the way home, we stopped at Sally's - a fabric store near Denise's - and JoAnn's. I got partitioned boxes at JoAnn's for my beads, sequins, etc. and came home and sorted them into the boxes. So much easier to access now, instead of having to sort through so many little plastic bags when I needed something.

Most weeks I don't have nearly enough time for this kind of filling the well, so I was really grateful for it. I'm going to visit Hilda and Dale over Thanksgiving, so hopefully we'll be able to have some more opportunities to do some things to spark our creativity.

Pat