It's Just Peachy

Happy first day of March! You know what they say, in like a lion, out like a lamb. This was almost always true when I lived in Ohio, down here in Georgia it's a different story. Well, it's been raining a few of the past days and I dislike the rain. Don't get me wrong, it's needed but I have to bike through it and it's not pleasant! It's just peachy when I have to bike in a down pour.

Speaking of peaches! Here's another embroidering, this time of Princess Peach from Nintendo's Mario games. My first game I played on the gameboy was Donkey Kong, I think. It was the lovely game where Mario had to jump over the barrels to get to Donkey Kong and Princess Peach. That was back when the gameboy looked like and weighed as much as a brick. And the gameboy was technically my older brother's. From that I got going on my gaming. Not that I'm much of a gamer, heck I haven't played any gaming systems in months. I don't have one with me at grad school. I do miss being able to kill time and being engrossed in a complex story, but playing video games would not help me with getting my schoolwork done. I guess I'll just have to settle for embroidering game characters for now.

Floating Away

Over the weekend I didn't have a whole lot of time. I was attempting to get loose ends tied up with my thesis. My thesis is currently 53 pages and is in desperate need of revision. I finished up what I could, I'm still anxiously awaiting from a source, and sent the sucker off to my committee. I can get this sucker revised in two weeks before the quarter ends, just as long as my teachers get drafts back to me.

While I was attempting to sort out my own revisions and adding in more things I had forgotten I was working on this butterfly. I was going to embroider in some orange as that is the color these butterflies normally are, but this took well over two hours. Considering this is supposed to be a one-hour drawing I wasn't going to put that much effort into it. I'm noticing now that the wings aren't symmetrical... I'm nitpicking,  I know. I really feel the need to keep my sketchbook on me and actually draw thanks to these last two drawings. The bug has bitten me and knows I will have free time soon... Damn it...

Jellyfishing

I had a busy weekend again. This of course means my one hour drawings were embroidery. I find that my one hour embroideries are taking longer than one hour. Not that I mind that, it's so relaxing to sit and just embroider. It makes me want to draw more often, which after this quarter is over is just what I think I'll do.

Although, if I do draw more I highly doubt it will be sea creatures. I do like this jellyfish though. It was fairly easy to embroider. The reason its pink was because that was what thread I had on me, lots of shades of pink. The cloth is a bit wrinkly because I didn't have time to iron it quite yet. I spent an hour and a half scanning all of my one hour drawings into my computer. Sounds like bunches of fun doesn't it? Well, it wasn't. I had to scan everything because I'm required to turn in a CD at the end of the quarter with all of my drawings on it. I really want to keep ahead of that as my last day of work is also an important day at my work and it'll be more hectic than ever! Plus, if I do most of the tedious work now I'll have more free time later.

Oh Dear

When my drawing professor saw all of my one hour drawings more than a week ago, he only had one request from me: Draw more figures. Lovely. Figures aren't my strong suit, or at least I don't think they are. I did take a drawing class back in undergrad because I wanted to strengthen that. I can draw people, but I need larger paper for that because we drew them on large scale paper and it just helps me to flush problem areas out.

I'm not overly fond of this embroidery, but that's all right. I opted out of doing a face here, it didn't look right when I did it the first time. She's a bit out of wack in places. I really should start drawing in my sketchbook. Eh, I'll get around to that after this class is over.

Birds of A Feather

Another one hour drawing, this time I got slightly bored at work and started to draw one of the paintings that was in the area I was sitting in. For being in a historic house I can only sit a few places, especially within the house. I keep telling my coworkers that one of these days I'll be in period dress while working on embroidery on the couch that's in one of the rooms. And yes, I am allowed to sit on said couch, it was re-fluffed and the like so us employees could sit in one of the rooms to help keep an eye on things. Apparently people have sticky fingers or something of the like.  

I left out quite a bit of detail with this bird, but it was an hour in the making. I'm not too pleased with the critter, but it's a drawing and I'm working on my skill. I feel like a Victorian girl while I'm working on these, appropriate because I work in a house that dates to the Victorian time.

Live in Knots

During the weekend that led up to the 15th I was attempting to get as many of my one hour drawings done as possible. I worked the entire weekend, which was my 4 days off from school. Not that I mind working at all! I like my job, but this was probably the only weekend I did not have one day off and other things that needed to get done.

I have time to sit and embroider at work, so this little thing came to be. I'm all right with it. It's not my favorite piece and the knots could have been done a bit better, but it was a rush job and well, it worked for what it needed to be.

Initialed

I had a bit of time over the weekend at work to assist with one of the programs that children are allowed to do. This program involved embroidery, so I was over the moon! I had to start a project so that I could show the little ones how to do a back stitch. I was surprised how enthusiastic all of the children were about embroidering (they were all girls)!

These letters were from stamps at work, so I cannot claim to have designed the letters at all. The thread is much thicker than what I have here. I really should order embroidery thread or go find some, which is looking rather dismal. Oh, wait... I could have picked some up yesterday when I bought paper at one of the art stores in Savannah. The local Walmart didn't have anything useful, which is disappointing. I digress, working with the thicker thread was much more enjoyable the stitches really pop from the cloth.

And don't worry I went back on Sunday and I ironed all of my pieces so they would lie flat. Yes, that includes my paper pieces. I was informed on a makeup class on Friday that if I turned the steam on my iron off this would be possible. It probably made my weekend! I cannot believe how nice my snowflakes look now that they are flat. Although it'll make them slightly more difficult to transport. Once this quarter is over I'll see what I'll end up doing with everything. I might sell some of the pieces I've been working on, I know a few are going to be given as gifts.

Today is Brought to you by the Letter "A"

This marked the tenth drawing for my class. The review was on Wednesday. I only had to complete ten of these one hour drawings for class thus far. Well, this one was the limit, though not the last one I completed before the review. You probably figured out that there's been a bit of a delay of me posting these. I'm also busy with thesis so when I get the chance I post these suckers in bunches and scatter them throughout the month or else I'll fall off the face of the earth, again.

This happens to be my second favorite after my heart embroidery. This is the letter "A" in ASL. If you are wondering, no I am not fluent in ASL. I know some words and phrases from taking two semesters of it, but I am no where near fluent.  I do happen to admire the language as quite a few of my sorority sisters are capable of speaking it insanely well (many of them are deaf education or special needs education majors).

In high school I'd draw my hands if I got really bored in my classes, this happened a lot. I've known the ASL alphabet since I was in grade school and figured why not draw my hand in the shape of some of the alphabet. Since I haven't drawn my hands in a while (notes were slightly more essential in college and grad classes) I figured the letter "A" would be a good place to start off.

Perspective of Day 8

Another day of embroidery. Can we see this is one of my preferred methods of drawing? I ended up running out of all but the green color on this project. Which was insanely disappointing. I was in class when I whipped this up.

I decided to challenge myself a bit to see if I could do a bit of perspective AND a person. I will admit that this doesn't really look like much of a person. This was how I was taught in undergrad to draw a person by my architecture teachers. Yes, it's pretty much squiggles. All of our hard work in drawing was supposed to go into the building we were working on and we just needed people for sizing.

I don't think this went too terribly. Some of the perspective is off on the one counter-like thing. But it could be much worse. If I would have taken more time and pulled out a straight edge this could have been a bit better, but it works in experimenting.

Another Day

Once again I decided to head back to embroidery and use an architectural feature in my adventures. This time it did not work out so well.

These squares and rectangles are supposed to represent Savannah's grid. Tything and trust lots surround squares in the historic district. It doesn't read all that well here. That is probably because its about half finished. I got bored with this after spending over an hour on it. I did figure out that doing any map like embroidery will be out of the question for my larger projects. Far too boring for me.

I did show this to my roommate who looked at me like I was crazy. She wasn't impressed with the whole idea, then again her major doesn't deal with maps, plans, and buildings, which I can get obsessed with.

Day 6

Another paper cutting today. This one was inspired by the Gothic rose windows. I took a class all about Gothic art and architecture last year. It was a bit cut and dry but I still admire the details on many of the Gothic cathedrals I had to study, including the windows.

I would simply love to get my hands on some colored paper and place it behind this to add a bit more to it. But I still fall into the category of "poor college student" so no fancy colored paper for me. I did manage to impress myself by completing all of the circles without going crazy. There are so many circles I thought I would be working on this for a week.

Days 4 & 5 for drawing

I have discovered that embroidering is just slightly addictive. I have also discovered I cannot do a whole lot of it in an hour, especially when it involves lettering. I attempted to go back to my architecture roots here and embroider the plan of a small house (it's a bath house that goes along with my thesis).

I'm not overly pleased with this embroidery. Trying to follow pencil drawings are rather difficult. It's also hard to draw straight lines without a ruler or straight edge, go figure... After that I decided to try another method of drawing: paper cutting.

Now, I chose to attack a snowflake. Maybe I miss the flakes back in Ohio or maybe I just want to torture myself with them. Either way below is my first paper cut snowflake. It's the outline of the states the Appalachian Trail runs through along with some lovely text.

This in itself was a wonderful exercise on patience. This was over an hour and getting all those small details was just a slight pain. But I somehow managed to enjoy working with it. I'm just a glutton for punishment apparently!

Day three of my 50 one-hour drawings brought on my favorite piece so far. This little heart!

I have a great liking for anatomy, although I hate blood, guts, and dead things. Give me an internal organ and I’m happy as a clam (although don’t literally give me an internal organ, that would be weird...). This is the second time I’ve done an atomically correct heart. I’ll likely get into other organs as I continue to explore subject matter with my drawings.

As you can tell the color matches up a bit better with this piece. I am going off of sewing thread that is running out, and as of now all of these colors have been used up. This is great for me because I’m going through my thread and using things up. This is not so great because it means I have to go buy thread for the colors I actually need. I’m not looking forward to spending money, so goes the life of a graduate student. I’ll likely be tempted by cloth and patterns when I go, I shall try to abstain.

Happy Belated New Year!

Happy New Year all!

I’ve been incredibly busy these past few months. The past few weeks I was up North visiting family and friends. I haven't done much sewing in the past while. School ate up my time (as per usual) and I didn’t touch my sewing machine for the past 6 weeks. It’s been tempting me horribly. Unfortunately the sewing machine cannot write my paper for me. I’ve asked the machine nicely, bribed it with nice thread, offered it wine, and threatened it, no such luck with. Apparently I’m going to have to write my papers, so not fair.

I hope that will greatly change over this quarter, but I highly doubt that. This quarter I have a drawing class, I’m TA-ing, and I am working on my thesis. Add in two jobs (part time, thankfully) and balancing my social life, things are going to be super busy. So, I believe these next few weeks will be spent in a stress induced haze complete with rum, lots of rum. I may get some sewing done in correlation with my drawing class. 

For my drawing class I have to do 50 one-hour drawings. This will prove to be an interesting exercise. I all ready have one of my drawings completed. I had chosen to go the traditional route with a subject matter that relates to my major, then I got bored. Me bored is never good it leads to things like trying to take over small countries in my quest for world domination. 

This was a bit of challenge for me. I hate sitting still for long periods of time. The time dragged on a bit, but once I got into my drawing time passed too quickly! I found that I went from area to area randomly. Maybe I should have laid off the permanent marker? Hm... Likely.

I then cut up some of my remnant fabric (where the white came from I'll never know) and pulled out some thread I was hoping to use up. These are supposed to be lily-of-the-valley, in red of course! I hadn't embroidered for months before this, so I was doing this from memory. While I don't think it's all that great, it was much better than drawing!

So, it looks like I'll be working on small embroidery for a few days or other drawing related things. I'll be sure to share them so it doesn't look like I'm falling off the face of the earth. Once my thesis is complete (only roughly 40 pages to go...) I hope to get some garments out, but we shall see.