Almost the Weekend

Tons to tell you!!

Finished tax return work after 7PM Tuesday; task definitely takes longer now I have to download invoices; not sure if saving the forest and opting out of paper bills is good for my soul. Still, done and dusted and once again vowed not to waste money buying stuff: it saves $, it saves space from clutter, and most importantly I save fewer receipts that needs scrutiny.

Came Wednesday; ran errands; went to The Suter to see three fab ceramics exhibitions; (I do like craft exhibitions better than "art"; must return to enjoy it more throughly;) want catalogs to both exhibitions, one rather expensive; then remembered another book I want badly. Then I went to the library and got my hands on India Flint's new book, "Second Skin".  Good God...

Beautiful, well-written, but also big and heavy and I'm too clumsy to read it comfortably; it's the kind of book you want to take on a holiday and not do anything else but read it, OR, be transported to a holiday but making time to read it in peace.  More dedicated fans may clean out the closet and reorganize life; I'll clean my closet, at least, and dye the cottons I prepared for India's workshop in 2010 which I had to bow out because both cars needed urgent attention a month prior. Confronted by  body size/image issues vs wanting to learn to make patterns and sew better; reminded of a talk Mama had with me about how I'm lazy about looking nice and respectable.  That's for a whole other post; way, way too loaded, eh.

Recommend reading the words and considering the issues, not just gazing at the pictures. Surely I am not the only one? And yes, the oft-mentioned Jo Kinross is our own Group R's Jo. Vicarious fame; at this rate, including Jo's name in my posts will become name-dropping!

Had an overnight house guest, Kate. (We don't have a guest room, so she toughs out on the living room floor, bless her.) Every time she leaves, I'm left with a sack full of seeds for thought.  Annoying, but exhilarating.

TAFA website is updated; click on the picture. If you sell your work and have a blog and/or Facebook Page and/or Flickr and/or especially Etsy promoting your work, you should consider signing up by contacting Rachel Biel. She takes good care of you.

Having to update my TAFA profile was part of why I had a rethink about photos and images and such. I've also had a good talk with Andrea from The Suter Store, and decided I don't want to make any more simple-structure/easy-to-weave pieces to sell; I want to up my game and spend longer time with each piece.  More artist-like, if you please. 

I think many of us thought we could sell a bit of work around the World Cup time, and it turned out retail in general, not just art, did badly anyway. I wove an awfully lot of Log Cabins, (and I still have the last warp on the 4-shaft Jack), but I find the "bread and butter" range demoralizing. I feel they don't represent the kind of pieces I like/want to weave. And though Andrea is too polite, I think she doesn't want any more of those pieces. So a goal for the rest of 2012: no more b&b "merchandises" after the current warp.  With the wonky arm and the two exhibitions coming up, I may not have any time for them anyway.

Another problem is NZ prices and exchange rate.  London, Honolulu and Tokyo have always been considered some of the most expensive places on earth; this time around I didn't feel Yokohama, (included in the greater Tokyo when it comes to economics, if not more expensive than,) was any more expensive than Nelson. And that's saying something.  So not only do I have to rethink the type of things I want to weave, but the prices, too, if I want to Etsy.  But then buying NZ yarns, I'll really be slave-laboring.

Good grief!  Still, tomorrow is another "making" day! And we've a long weekend coming up.