--------Turn, turn, turn.DATE: 05/31/2006 11:08:20 PM-----
Helloooooo, Quilt Fans!
Thought I'd pitched it in, didn't you? Thought this was just one more 3-month flash-in-the-pan blog, glorious in its brief prime but doomed to inevitable burnout and failure?
No way. Not "State of the Craft."
But to everything, turn, turn, there is a season, turn, turn, etc., and for many of us quilting is pretty seasonal as well. Other things get pretty distracting in spring and summer, like travel, hiking, outdoor activities, and, unless you are Charlie or Eric, the garden. Also, not everyone wants to have five pounds of thick, insulating blanket on their lap during high summer. So the quilting slows down, and naturally the quilt blogging slows down as well.
For me, the quilting year generally begins at the kickoff of the first Oregon Ducks football game, which this year will be Saturday, September 2 (at home vs. Stanford -- a cakewalk). Then, or maybe a little before, the quiltin' will commence in great earnest. Until then, though, progress will be piecemeal at best.
One small thing I do want to do over the summer is find a new host for this blog. Two reasons. One is that the noise-making ads that Friendster has been using lately make me, and everyone else I know, want to put fist through screen. Secondly, only my registered Friendsters can make comments (and even they often have trouble with it). Not that you aren't special, Friendsters. You are. You TOTALLY are. But comments are half the fun with a blog, and the rest of the (suprisingly robust) readership needs in too.
I'll let you know.
Anyway, there are two things worth mentioning from the last month and a half. In quilting, that is. In life in general, there was a fabulous road trip, documented at http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/drhandley/my_photos.
The first thing was the Guild Show. Several of y'all came to it, which was TOTALLY GREAT and YOU ROCK. I was very happy with the whole thing. Both of my entries -- the Oregon Map and the Log Cabin, shown in earlier entries -- were hung very nicely, with neighbors that complemented them well. Response from viewers and other members of the guild was very nice. Rather than feeling like I was "OK but way behind the pack," this time I felt like I was "definitely in the pack." It was good.
I volunteered a half day at the show, and when I arrived was given an identifying pink ribbon to wear. "Hostess," it read. The volunteer coordinator seemed surprised by my hesitation to wear this ribbon, but offered no objections as I cut the "ess" off with my jackknife.
The second thing was completeing the wedding present that I obliquely referred to three posts ago. It is one of two mirror-image pieces that are, in terms of design, fragments of a traditional style called "Around the World" that I will talk about in a future post. (This is called "leaving them wanting more.") One of the two goes to our friends Helen and Keir in the UK, who were married last August -- please note that I met the one-year wedding present deadline. The other goes to Sue and I, as a much later wedding present and wall-hanging for our room.
Because of their pattern and because they will be widely-separated twins, I named them "Partway Around the World #1 and #2." I told Helen and Keir that they could decide whether they wanted theirs to be #1 or #2, but I haven't heard back yet.Well, that's all for now. But we'll talk soon. In September, if not before.
