Apparently it’s Saturday. You know how you blow off all that work anxiety that appears the week before we go back to school? Take a bunch of art/craft classes so you don’t have time to think about the fact that you’re going back. It’s very relaxing. I should do this every year. Somehow. Because finding classes to do right before break ends is always an issue. This has been nice though. It’s the last year of Craft Napa, and I took two crafty classes with Libby Williamson and one improv quilting class with Irene Roderick.

I haven’t gotten any ironing done on the other quilt due to all this stuff, but it’s OK. I’m enjoying all of it. The first class was a collage-type lesson that went through painting with ink on CraftTex and then stitching around those, cutting them out, and making an image on a paper-collaged canvas. I started out by making flowers and leaves like everyone else, but then went into Nida territory. The teacher was Libby Williamson, crafter extraordinaire of many materials and techniques. I think she sees random materials and then tries to figure out how to make something out of them, which is a great talent.

You can see flames and maybe a face over there on the top left.

I then collaged the background. Now you will see where I diverted from the class subjects…because I ended up painting over a lot of the background. I wanted the papers to show at first, but there wasn’t enough contrast between the face and the background. Since I had started with the person on fire (sorry LA…hoping the fires are getting more and more under control as the weekend continues on), I figured I could make the background go along with that. I stained the bottom with red ink, fairly diluted. I started with the clouds very light, so the paper came through, but it didn’t look good, so I went for a much more opaque and graphic look for the clouds.

I do want to write all over the red still…haven’t done that yet. I had leftover flowers that didn’t work with this image, so I made a second smaller one…

Which was a bit more like what the rest of the class did. And it’s nice. I like it.

Yesterday, I took improv quilting with Irene Roderick. I’ve taken improv classes before, but got stuck on making things (triangles, strings, stripes) and not the creative part of it. This class focused more on the creative part…and that finally made sense to me. I’ve never gotten past a pile of parts before, and they didn’t excite me. I think focusing just on black and white (and NOT color) and just doing one thing at a time and fitting it into what already existed…that worked for me. I have a solid start to a quilt top here…

A top I actually want to finish. So that was cool. It’s totally NOT how I usually work, which I appreciate. Stretch the brain! Try new things! I’m in another class today (waiting for paint to dry, literally), so those photos will have to wait.

I also finished the first block of Rooted, which was Sue Spargo’s block-of-the-month lite version for two years ago? 2023 I think? I’ve had them stitched down for a while; getting to the embroidery has taken a while. This is after Thursday’s stitching meeting…

And last night, I finished while at my parents’ house for dinner with my bro and my nephew.

One done! Eight to go! Yeah, nothing is fast. These are pretty easy though.

So the pro of all these classes this week is that I can barely consider school. So the anxiety is gone, plus I have the added benefit of the meditative qualities of making for three days straight. Peace and love, peace and love. I’m sure I’ll panic soon. I didn’t finish grading…almost did! They’re due in like 10 days. It’ll be fine. I need to pack up four more quilts after class today to deliver to a friend who will deliver up north (not near the fires). And then once all this is done, I can start ironing and quilting my friend’s quilt again. It’s been chaotic in this room this week. We’ll see how that goes. I’m not ready to go back, but I never am. Maybe it’s enough to just accept that, go into it with calm and determination to make art. Still. Anyway, that’s my plan.