Hope to see you at Fall Fiber Fiesta
in Santa Fe this weekend.
Admission is free.
I’ll have rugs and mats of all sizes available.
Mention this blog article and get 10% off any rug!
Fall Fiber Fiesta – visit Santa Fe this Weekend!
Category: photos
Summer colors’ last gasp = Inspiration
INSPIRATION
Being the fourth Tuesday of the month, yesterday was one of the Adobe Wool Arts Guild’s demo days (we’re there the 1st and 4th Tuesdays) at Albuquerque’s Biopark, specifically the Botanic Garden. And although it clouded up and eventually rained, the morning was gorgeous: blue sky, cool, crisp. The colors in the gardens sparkled. I felt a need to pull out my phone and grab a few shots before the flowers all disappear into the chill of fall and winter.
When I got home, I headed into my own yard to record the colors of late September. Like the hummingbirds, most will be gone within a few weeks.
Regardless of color, life goes on. Here at High on Hooking, we’re readying for a third show in less than two weeks. Sunday is the OffCenter Folk Art Festival at Robinson Park in downtown Albuquerque. Lots to do before that! I’ve sold out of all double mug rug sets and most of the singles. I’ll finish up another three singles in the next couple of days. Meanwhile I’m starting a double. Or maybe it’ll be a quadruple…
Anyone showing up to the OffCenter Folk Art Festival to buy a rug will get 10% off if they mention this blog post! Hope to see you.
The muse of minutiae
So the muse called yesterday. Not from anywhere far from home, but right in the backyard and even in the house. Fortunately, she called while I was watering the plants and before we hit the jackpot temperatures we’ve been getting lately. Yes, we are “enjoying” that heatwave that’s the talk of the Southwest. But if you stay in the shade and don’t move around too much, it’s not bad. It really is all about the humidity. And the fact that we live in New Mexico, NOT Phoenix with its 119º. Okay, it helps that both of our AC units are back online. Last week we had to limp along with just one of them for several days.
But back to the muse; I’m calling her the muse of minutiae because I was looking at things close-up rather than trying to see the big picture as I often do. Really, I wanted to find something extraordinary in the hum-ho of the yard I look at each day. But who really looks closely at their backyard every day? Guess I need to practice that more, particularly at off times. It is a nice backyard, especially at the end of the day when the hummingbirds visit while you sit out with a glass of wine.
Meanwhile, someone else is not enjoying the heat one iota! Tynan barely agreed to show you “what’s on the frame” this week. He’s barely looking me in the eye to shoot the pic. Instead he insisted that he was too hot to pose, to move even. That is until I got the shot and mentioned the usual treat. He was up like a puppy – not a heat-stricken nine-year old. He’ll feel better when he gets his hair cut tomorrow.
A reminder, the blog will be back in a couple of weeks. I think I mentioned that Tom and Tynan and I are off to Pagosa Springs in southern Colorado soon for a little R&R. Nothing big; it’ll be just as warm there. But nothing sounds better than morning hikes and afternoons spent lolling on the patio with books and beverages. Pics to come!
What fun are you up to now that summer’s fully set in?
“Hatch Chile” rug
Another busy, busy week. There are acceptance letters to get out for the Fiber Arts Fiesta happening here in Albuquerque – GASP! – next month. Yesterday was a demo day at the BioPark. The second part of the class I’m teaching up at Española Valley Fiber Arts Center meets Saturday. We’ll be finishing up the little rugs we started last weekend. And I really need to whip the larger, blue rug I’ve entered in Fiesta. Not a small job. Sewing through t-shirt is definitely harder on the hands than sewing through soft-as-butter wool. The RA doesn’t exactly help.
Best news: Tom and I haven’t been able to get away from home alone in almost 9 years when we vacationed on Jamaica’s quieter southwest coast (skip Montego Bay; it’s far more interesting down south.) We’ve recently – and rather suddenly – become empty-nesters. Not being sure how long it’ll last, next week we’re trying to take a few days down in Silver City (New Mexico) south of here. There’s food, artsy-fartsy stuff, and mountains to hike. Yes, Tynan is insisting on coming. He’ll appreciate the hiking most of all. (We keep having to tell him “No green chilies for dogs! Not even on burgers.”) Now I have hotels and such to research. No worries; I’ll have plenty of pics and southwestern inspiration to share when we get back. Hopefully, we’ll get a full week to vacation…somewhere TBD after Fiesta.
In the meantime, “Hatch Chile” is still the current rug on the frame. (Though I did start another small mat last weekend during my class. More on that later.)
So, other than Jean Ottosen over at JLT Studios who heads off on a South Korean adventure soon and my fellow guild member Nancy Huntington who’ll soon be in Indonesia diving with the fishes, where have you been and/or where are you going to find new inspirations for your artwork? Share with us!
Inspiration: Springing back to life
After a rough weekend (involving the dreaded norovirus), I managed to get out to take a few pics of New Mexico springing back to life, at least around our house. Maybe it’ll give hope to those back east who’ve been smacked by those last nasty vestiges of winter. And truth be told, much like last year, spring has come early to Albuquerque by about three weeks. We’ve been spoiled since we moved here.
I laugh that I can take these photos of spring in March which, to someone from New England, seems too freaking early for flowers of any kind. That we’ve been in New Mexico for almost two years matters not at all. Sure, Deb down in the Carolinas, of A Daily Dose of Fiber, you showing daffodils in practically January I get, but it’s still amazing to me to have lilacs before Mothers’ Day.
So, you’ve got all these beautiful trees blooming like crazy. You know what blooming trees bring? Pollen! Lots of poisonous powder. And pollen brings…sinus infections. I still maintain that, much as I hate what the pollen does to my sinuses, it’s a hell of an improvement over unending cold and snow.
Hope you enjoyed the floral show. If you were here, you’d smell them whenever you walked out the door. Then rush back in for the saline and Flonase and such.
Allergies forcing me indoors isn’t such a bad thing. I have plenty of hooking to do. Fiesta work is ramping up. The class I’m teaching at the Española Valley Fiber Arts Center starts in less than two weeks. Time to work on that. Then the selling season starts with the Recycled Art Fair the last weekend in April. And in my “spare time” there’s the novel I’ve been hired to edit. So, in most every way, we are springing back to life here at High on Hooking.
Are you springing back to life these days?
