Where did it go?

It's gone! Deserted me! Aiyah! Such a struggle now. Multiple do-overs. Where did it go?
 
I want it back! So I can do what needs to be done. So I can move on. Where did it go?

I had it a year ago. I want that mojo back. That strip-piecing mojo. That narrow strip-piecing mojo. That mojo that enable me to do these:

What will it take? Is it a problem with the thread? the needle? the tension? the pressure foot? the speed? What is keeping that mojo away?

I plead with you for help. Help me get back my mojo. All you have to do is sing Looking for My Mojo (to the tune of Going to a Go-Go – Na-a-h, nah, N-A-A-H, nah, N-a-a-h, nah).

Thank you very much.

Back two, forward three

The first attempt to finish my ribbon quilt was disastrous. I threw pieces together in a hurry. Didn't look. Unstitching became the name of the game. I'd forgotten the maxim: make visual decisions visually.

I had to step back and take another approach. Satisfactory results come from listening to my instincts and taking time to play, to look and then be critical. No point in rushing through the process if the finished product is not acceptable.

After another week I'm quite comfortable with the new section. This photo shows it with some colors I've auditioned. There are a few more decisions to make. Back into the studio tonight.  

Maybe I'll meet my goal to get it to the guild drop-in tomorrow. Maybe not. I'm not going to push it just to get it done. I've learned my lesson – until next time anyway.

Can do!

The past weekend was lost to the EBHQ's quilt show. Saturday's dinner didn't happen until 10pm whereas Sunday I was in bed by 9pm. A great event but whew!

Only three weekends remaining! Yikes! Then I'm off to the Ohio for another two weeks with Nancy Crow. Feeling momentarily ambitious, here's my plan for the ribbon quilt, fmq and workshop homework.

Finish the quilt top for sandwiching on Saturday at the guild drop-in. That'd give me three weeks to quilt it. I already have an idea about that. Squeeze in more fmq practice sessions to give it a go. Sets and variables motifs will just fit in wherever and whenever.

Yes, I can!

EBHQ's Voices in Cloth

East Bay Heritage Quilters did it again! Another fabulous show! Don't miss it if you're in the area. It continues on Sunday from 10am to 4pm at the Oakland Convention Center, 10th and Broadway.

Thinking and seeing

Sometimes what I get is not what I want.

I've taken up the ribbon quilt top where I'd left off last spring. I've extended ribbon tails and pieced more ribbon together for the bottom.

The concept seemed good at the time but it just didn't work out visually. A case of too much thinking and not enough seeing. This pattern is too regular and the coloring too lightweight. Doesn't balance nor anchor the rest of it. Why didn't I see this before?

So it won't be finished tomorrow. But I now have a better visual idea about finishing it. I threw other ribbons on the design wall to see if they'd stick. Back to the cutting mat.

Simple beauty

The prestigious Pritzker Prize for 2010 went to SANAA architects - Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa - of Tokyo. They've designed buildings all over the world with two in the United States: the New Museum of Contempory Art in New York City and the Glass Pavilion for the Museum of Art in Toledo, Ohio. Christopher Hawthorne, the LA Times architecture critic, writes about them winning the award here. In an earlier review on August 23, 2006 he praised the pavilion. From that review:

". . . Minimalist architecture deserving of the name pares itself down not in the pursuit of style points but in an effort to frame the relationship between solid and void, nature and culture, and color and its absence -- and to explore how the eye sees and the mind understands those differences."

How about applying this poetic definition to quilts? Minimalist quilts.