Thursday, August 30, 2012

Flow

Time flows, fits and starts
Impermanent and fleeting
Just beyond our grasp

Simple improvisational piecing of vintage fabric, with vintage buttons and random quilting with perle cotton.




Please excuse the less than stellar image quality - my camera has disappeared into the morass of my house, and I'm using my cellphone.

Saturday, August 25, 2012

July : Whirlwind

July's moon is called the Thunder Moon in most North American cultures. Appropriate that, given the prevalence of thunderstorms to dampen the fiery heat. Our prompt word for July arrived just days before the derecho. Whoever heard of such a thing? I personally had no damage other than some small limbs in the yard and a couple of hours of scariness. While a derecho is not so much a whirling wind, but more of a straight wind, I knew I wanted to try to make one.

The source image from the National Weather Service can be found HERE. (scroll down to almost the bottom of the page)

I tried making it with fabric. Twice. Both failed. It was too clunky or something. Then I tried sketching in the storm lines with pearle cotton in the bobbin, something I'd never done before. I like the technique and the textural effect, but the piece itself is weird. I thought maybe I could quilt it right, but that didn't happen either.

Even if I hadn't included the moon, it would still be weird. I haven't bound it. I don't like it enough to waste any more time or thread on it. Some things just aren't meant to be. I do like my background fabric though. The black streaks are meant to be flying debris.

Just for the sake of discussion though, if one of you had been trying to make this derecho map, how would you have gone about it?



July's Thunder Moon
brings daily bad storm warnings
still, it does not rain

then the derecho
speeding down from the northwest
brings rain, at great cost