What Color Is My Head?

Getting better. At least I got some stuff done on this long beast of a quilt last night (will it be a quilt? I don’t know. Better start calling it fiber art). I’m getting a better idea of how to construct this and how long it might take. Still frightening, yes, but I think I’m OK. Maybe.

So I had made a pile of lighter blues on that side table and went all the way up one arm until I ran out. Then I started on the other arm Thursday night, but didn’t get very far. So last night, I kept working up the one arm until I ran out of the lights again.

Then I neatly (well sort of) folded all those up and considered the giant pile again and pulled more midrange blues to continue up the arm.

I have to admit to having very little clue what I’m doing at the moment. I occasionally try to visualize the whole piece, see where the colors might go, especially later last night when I was trying to decide where to go next. But I can’t. I can’t see the whole thing. I mean literally, I can’t see the whole thing…it’s freakin’ huge…but also in my head. It’s not coloring itself yet.

Here were the lighter blues by the way. Still dipping deeply into Mariah and Sandi’s stashes, which is nice, but pulling stuff from mine too.

It’s amazing how small of a dent this giant thing is putting in to my stash. I still have a ton of fabric. I make more and more quilts, and there’s still so much fabric (yes, I do know how to fix that, but I’d rather fix it by making more quilts).

This was my setup last night, trying to keep the rest of the body out of the way while I’m working on one arm at a time. I did finally cut the arms away from the body because they were driving me bonkers being all tied up. Most of that sits on my lap as I sew. I think at this point, I had one arm done all the way to the shoulder, and I was working on the second one.

Same deal as before, use all the fabrics before you and then do the same on the other side. Obviously I’m not using them in any particular order.

Here’s both arms all the way to the shoulders. I think the arms are taller than I am.

I do kinda want them to hang down almost to the ground. From the ceiling…or the beam, to be specific. Which means I might have to do the same thing on the back of them. Or not. I have one part of my brain parceled out to shortcuts at the moment, a list of steps that I could do if I don’t end up with time to finish. Because really, it’s going to be OK even if it’s not exactly how I originally wanted it. I can be experimental. I don’t have to finish all of my edges (although I will need to do something to them).

Meanwhile, I’m quoting on copyediting jobs, writing stories, and teaching school. I entered two shows this morning. I missed one last week because I calendared it and then forgot to do it when I got home from Boston. Really it was incredibly stupid to think I would remember to enter a show in the hour after I got home, but whatever. My fault.

It sucked to come home to a very empty house last night. It was bloody hot, over 90 degrees inside, because I have to close the windows due to Kitten’s new escape tendencies. Once I got all the windows open, it took forever to cool down. Plus I was exhausted so I just lay prone on the couch for a while. I even stayed at work late to finish stuff because why come home? There’s nothing there but furry beasts, and they are needy, and sometimes I don’t need more needy. But I don’t have time to go hang out with people much; I really need to be here finishing things. So that is what I shall do.

So back to that part of coloring it in…I’d really like to do the head before I do the chest, but that would mean I already knew what color the head should be, and I don’t. And I really do need to know…like now. Like as soon as I post this. I could just use blue for this whole thing, but I don’t think I want to. And the mood I’m in, it’s telling me one color, but is that what I really want this piece to be about? It might be too late. I think it is.

I’m just sitting here, staring into space, trying to visualize all the possibilities. Each means something different. I guess you’ll know what I did by the next time I post.