Road Trips…

First, let me wish all of you dear readers, a wonderful fiber filled, adventurous, 2015.  As I finish up my sixth year of blogging, I look at all the wonderful and supportive comments, and the more than 600 posts and I’m truly grateful to have been able to embrace the technology to record my own adventures. The technical team that makes this possible, is of course my husband.  Without him this whole thing would have been a disaster long ago.

My dad once said to me, “Grass doesn’t ever grow under your feet…” which was at the time not intended to be a compliment, but I embrace it now, because above all, I am an artist and you can’t create in a vacuum.  There are so many sources of inspiration all around us, and part of the balance in life is going out to find them, and then stopping to actually look, contemplate and absorb.  I have to work on that…

In mid December, because of a voucher and some points with a bit of frequent flyer mileage, my husband and I were able to jump on a plane and fly to the west coast for a weekend, to visit fiber friends in San Diego, attend a concert in LA, and just have a little fun.  Because I travel around the country, and unlike my husband who stays in Marriott’s, I get to stay with real people, in real homes, and I’ve gotten some lifelong friends out of the deal.  Thanks Amy and Bill for putting us up for a couple of nights!

My sister commented on my facebook page, after posting my last blog, something about Why can’t I be like normal people who are completely crazed around Christmas time trying to get it all done, spinning their wheels, (not the fiber kind).  Truth is, I don’t live near any relatives.  If I want to gather together for a holiday, I have to go to them.  Which is great since I don’t cook, bake, clean or otherwise stress myself out over any holiday. One sister hosted Thanksgiving and my other sister hosted Christmas this year.  Which means family drama is at their houses, complex food issues from all the relatives on special diets are all on their watch.  We actually drove to Maryland the day after Christmas, ate leftovers, and missed all the drama. Everyone loved my handwoven towels.  It was lovely and wonderful and I got to see my mom, though she wasn’t able to attend dinner out as planned because she was sick.  But still…  It was lovely.

And my crazy sister followed her long tradition of baking gingerbread houses for everyone to decorate.  It is a fun and beautiful tradition and of course, Brianna decided that this year she would make a Turkraken Gingerbread house, if you don’t know what a Turkraken is, google it…  It has to do with an octopus inside a turkey…  I just can’t…

We left Maryland Saturday morning with my husband and daughter, and drove nine hours south, through Maryland, Virginia, Tennessee, and into the Mountains in Western NC to Asheville, to hang with more fiber friends and see the Blue Ridge Fiber Show at the NC Arboretum.  It was a quick trip, but totally worth the drive.

Again, thanks Barb and Bill for hosting us, we had a blast, and though it was cold and rainy in Asheville, we got to see and do everything on our list.

First stop Sunday morning was to another fiber friend, Kathie Roig.  Kathie has a draw loom, very old technology, used for weaving damask, and not often found in this age of digital jacquard looms.  I wanted Brianna to see how a real draw loom works, and Kathie is a pro.  She explained it carefully, and Brianna got to see it in action, and is of course plotting how she can someday acquire one of those in addition to the shaft switching rug loom she saw at Convergence last summer…

We stopped by the Southern Highlands Craft Guild, both the Folk Art Center, and the new location in the Biltmore Village to look at wonderful crafts, not just fiber, though there was plenty of that.  We stopped in Bellagio, a wearable art gallery.  I’m still  in mourning since Waechter’s Silk Shop closed last year…

We headed over to the NC Arboretum and the Blue Ridge Fiber Show.

It was so great to be able to see this show, there are so many wonderful works from around the country, actually from beyond the borders of this country as this is an international exhibit.  The show was beautifully hung, but the labeling was confusing and it was really hard to know who did what piece.  Still, there was a wide variety of fiber, felting, weaving, hand spinning, tapestry, two and three dimensional work, garments, wall pieces, accessories and household textiles.  And there was a lot of color. You can many of the winning pieces here in a slide show.

Brianna was excited to see her little Juggling Flock, a turned 3 shaft Krokbragd inkle band cut into little juggling balls, beautifully displayed safely under plexi, with the line up of awards down the front of the case. She received a third place and the HGA award.

She also found her summer/winter weave structure with pick-up scarf, with the Star Trek symbols on it.  She received a third place for that as well.

I had four pieces in the show.  My handwoven jacket with the felted collar…

My little needle felted Chromosome piece, hidden down on the floor…

And my two garments, the felted one on the left took a first place in Felted Garments and the hand dyed/handwoven one on the right took a second place in Woven Garments.  They looked happy hanging next to each other…  Very conversational…  I don’t remember whose scarf was hanging over my felted coat.

We had a wonderful dinner with Barb and Bill, and then returned to the Arboretum for their Winter Lights Spectacular.  It was beautiful.  Photos can’t describe how pretty everything was in a spectacular lighting display.  My favorite was the quilt out of lights…

We spent all day Monday at the Biltmore in Asheville.  I haven’t been in a number of years, and I love seeing these kinds of homes decorated for the holidays.  There were something like 65 decorated Christmas trees around the house, and of course, anyplace with a glass conservatory especially in the winter makes me smile.

We drove home Tuesday, through seven states in eleven hours.

Saturday morning the plan is for Bri and me to head into Manhattan to see a bunch of fiber exhibits at the MET before they close.  And then on the 11th there is the opening of an international tapestry exhibition curated by Carol Russell at the Hunterdon Art Museum.

Grass does not grow under my feet…  Only fiber…

Stay tuned…