Craft Fair Detour

Thank you for all your nice comments about my monkey yardage! I am very busy right now-- I only have two more weeks left before the end of term. This past weekend I decided to put off all my school projects and create a product for a craft fair that our class was invited to participate in. As you can see, I made iron-on animal badges. The animals are silkscreened on cotton fabric with iron-on Heat-n-Bond on the back. Most of the animals I drew myself. The rabbit and the bug were taken from my 5,000 Animals book. It was a beautiful fair and I wish I had taken more pictures, but my camera ran out of batteries. I am happy to say that I sold quite well at my first craft fair!

Adventures in Pattern

Well folks, I have not been the best blogger of late. I have been hard at work on all sorts of new projects. One of my big assignments was to create 3 metres of fabric using a repeat of a silkscreen image. I have been thinking about this project for weeks. It took weeks to design and hours to print. Here's the result:

There's No Place Like Dressew

Maryka and Kevin came up to Vancouver last weekend. They said they wanted to hang out with Andrew and me but I think the real reason for the visit is that Maryka has become a Dressew Junkie. Dressew is a bargain basement wonderland full discount fabric and sewing related notions that has to be seen to be believed.



Kevin is thinking, "Maryka better not buy that creepy plastic doll's head! I don't care if it's only 25 cents!"



So much fabric, so little time.



Buttons! Buttons! Buttons!



Oh, my! Come to Vancouver and see for yourself!

Weaving and Felting

I wove two scarves (one for me and one for Andrew) for my latest weaving project. The project involved loosely weaving the scarves and then hand-felting them after they came off the loom. They are both wool and as they were worked with soap, hot water and friction, they shrunk, becoming softer and thicker. Here they are on the loom, pre-felted and then finished, around our lovely necks!

First Silkscreen Project

This is a series I created for my first silkscreen project. I was very much inspired by my children's literature class. I was thinking about the importance of reading and education, of discovery and imagination.

Rain City

It has absolutely poured for days here in Vancouver, but it is warm and sunny in the cockles of my heart thanks to the Red Sox victory yesterday evening. Andrew and I will now be spending even more money on beer and greasy food as we cruse the neighborhood pubs in search of places to watch what is sure to be a very exciting series. Being a Red Sox fan in Vancouver is a lonely pursuit. There were three of us in the pub last night: Andrew and me and our friend Steve Moss. We want all you Bostonians out there to know that we will stay strong!





Here are some pictures taken on a recent trip to Granville Island (it is not really an island, for those of you who haven't visited us yet, it is mostly surrounded by water in a tiny, peninsula-like fashion). Granville Island is a haven for artists and crafts-people and one of my very favorite places in the city. That cozy little shop on the right in the picture above is The Silk Weaving Studio. It is full of silk yarns and looms and I love it. In addition to silk, the other purchases of the day were sausages stationary and apples!

GO RED SOX!!!***pleeeeeease??!!!!***

Even though we don't have a TV and no one we know has a TV; even though when we try to watch a Red Sox game at a pub here in Vancouver, they will often change the channel to a hockey game (hockey??!!), our hearts are in Boston these days. I can imagine quite a number of my loved ones glued to their TV's and radios, desperately hoping for a comeback. So, if any of the Red Sox read my blog, take a good look at this picture. You guys do NOT want to to disappoint your youngest and most adorable fan.