Wild About Fiber

Tomorrow, June 17th from 1 to 4 pm is the opening of the Contemporary Quilt and Fiber Artists second annual show at the Women's Art Barn in Mariemont. What you can expect to see is amazing fiber art.  Most of our members are art quilters and elevate their work to fine art through their skill and attention to detail.  We actually hold our monthly meetings at the Women's Art Barn, a beautiful art space.  If you think you might be interested in joining our group, come to the opening and view the art, talk with the artists and get a feel for the group.  It is an encouraging group of people who are enthusiastic and fun, and above all, so talented.  I am honored to be a part of this amazing and sharing group of artists!  If you are interested in the group but cannot join us for the opening, leave a message below and I will contact you!  Light refreshments will be served and we look forward to seeing you there! My coiled piece, Desert Sun, is my entry in the show.  This piece, w

I'm excited to announce that I have been accepted as an artist in the gift shop at Bay Arts in Bay Village, Ohio, near Cleveland.  It is a beautiful complex that includes an Art Gallery, restaurant, and Gift Shop and is in a lovely area. I will have the Journey Guides for sale in the gift shop.  I hope you will look up Bay Arts if you are in the Cleveland area.   The Gallery space hosts regular events and is an open and inviting space.  You will feel when you walk on the campus that you are entering someplace special.  It is a delightful and fun space to walk around in.  In the summer there are concerts and farmer's markets to enjoy.  They feature many art classes.   I couldn't be more thrilled to have my work in the Gift Shop at Bay Arts.  Please go to their website to learn more about this wonderful art space:   www.bayarts.net  

Giggle Fest These little faces make me smile!  I hope they do that for you, too. Each one is unique, hand drawn and designed to bring a giggle.  I delivered new Journey Guides to Under the Stars in Batavia, Ohio, last week.  You can find the address on this page. It is time to replenish my supply, so I have been busy sewing and cutting out new Journey Guides and now stuffing the bodies, drawing the faces and deciding what "hair" they will get!  Along with all of that, I decided to re-design the tags that hang with each Journey Guide describing the characteristic that I assign to them.  Some are called Grace, or Skye, Nurturing, Joy or Fierceness.  As we travel through life, sometimes we find we want to work toward something.  Maybe we need to be more fierce in defending ourselves or even those we love.  These Guides are meant to be a reminder, and a reflection of what we already have within us.  We just need to bring it out and fine tune it!  Who will you choose to trav

I recently had the pleasure of being a featured artist at the Miami Valley Christian Academy for their annual Fine Arts Night.  It is organized at the school by the Art Department and was my first such experience!  The students even made a sign for my table.  My obligation as a participating artist was to demonstrate coiling.  The elementary age children and the parents seemed to be the most interested in the coiling.  One little girl was so attentive and asked such good questions!  It was fun to explain the different types of core material I had used and how I use them for different effect when she said, "hmmm....that makes sense."  SO CUTE!  It was a great experience to participate in this annual event! While I was demonstrating, I had a signup sheet on my table for people to sign up for a coiling class and so now I have to get ready for that class!  Gotta run, lots to do!

I recently started making Journey Guides again after 5 years.  They are fun little dolls that will hang on the wall and have characteristics attributed to them that we might need in our lives.  I am doing more embellishment on the bodies and more facial expressions on them.  I think they are fun and I hope you will as well as you decide which one you will choose to travel with! The Journey Guides are available at Under the Stars, 97 E. Main St., Batavia, OH 45103.  The shop phone number is 513-238-7913.  Under the Stars is a wonderful shop owned by Vicki Watson and she has the works of about 150 artists in the shop.  It's a gem of a shop and easy to find as it is right off of Rt 32 in downtown Batavia.  I hope you will check the shop out!

A little over a year ago, my friend, Robbie Porter taught one of my art groups, Creative Saturday, how to coil.  I have found I enjoy coiling very much.  It is an old way of making baskets and can also be a very artful form of basketry.  These are the first 3 pieces I have made.  With every piece I make, I explore what happens when I do something different to them.  With my first piece, I had no finished product in mind, but as I worked on it, the yarn started suggesting sand and surf as I worked on it.  Before I finished it, I had a trip to Florida and another artist friend, Charlie Patricolo of  Charlieclothdolls on Facebook, was teaching classes in Florida and I was visiting friends in Florida.  Charlie picked my friend Cheryl and I up and off we went to Naples, Florida to visit one of the galleries that carry Charlie's dolls.  We had a lovely day with lunch in Naples and a stroll on the beach just off of downtown Naples.  The three of us collected the shells I used to fi