Have you all started making your plans on how you WILL be joining us at AFF next year? About a week and a half ago, I hopped on a plane to meet
Penney at the Portland airport and head over to
Art Fiber Fest. She surprised me with a wonderful handmade book for my birthday, wrapped in some linens she had dyed. She put a lot of work into it, and it has some very personal special parts to ti.
Then we got the rental, and we were off. We were offered a convertible VW. I told the lady politlely that those cars are a nightmare, as I was sure something would break while we had it and we would have to pay for it, so I convinced her we really needed something that held LOTS of luggage. Penney's took up the back seat and mine the trunk area. Good thing we had no other riders.Anyway, after driving around Portland long enough to only find things by accident instead of the ones we had directions for (looooong story), we arrived at Reed College and were greeted with registration packets, Oregon berry candy to die for, peanuts, a beautiful tote bag and a great name tag.
Then we hit
Teesha's yard sale, as she called it. Really, People, most artists don't have that much stuff in their whole studio, much less in the cast off pile. There were some amazing goodies like fabric, beads, fabric collage sheets, paper collage sheets, and so on. This was no time to think about coming back for it tomorrow because other people were right behind us slobbering over all the sale, too. Purchasing a whole big fat bag of stuff netted me another great totebag, this one made of fabric and woven newspaper.
We stayed in the new campus "apartments" which in our case was a double room with no door between us, so we could have privacy but still hang out together. Cool. We each had a built in unit where we could unpack our mountain of supplies and sort them out by what we would need each of the next three days. We also each had a gynormous desk where I set up my sewing machine each night and kept working on my project from day one.
Being gifted with a camera like I am, I decided to take pictures of my projects throughout the week, and wait to take pictures of my favorite places around campus on the last day. These are pictures of my works in progress. Each is nearly complete, but I didn't want to wait any longer to post about them. On days one and three of classes,
the fabulous Roxanne Padgett was the teacher. Each of those days was a real treat, not just the project, but her display of supplies awaiting us each day. The way she taught fit me perfectly, even on the day I felt dizzy and yucko. She is truly an artist AND a teacher. Day one was for the Studio Art Journal which is a book that serves as a home to transport art supplies you need while you are away and want to work on a project. The topsy turvy doll from day three went over really big in Nona land. When my daughter arrived home from work after the day I went over to show it to the family, I told her Topsy Turvy took a nap with Miss K and she had had lots of fun showing it to
Jeane. I was asked whether I would be able to sneak it back out of the house to get it back home. Just as I was starting to state that I would have to since I still needed to take pictures, a little 25 month old voice instantly chimed in with a very clear, "No, that is staying in the playroom!"
Miss K only uses complete sentences like that when something is very important, so... What does that tell us? I hope I can take more classes from Roxanne again because I am sure I have never had a better teacher.
On day two, I took a digital photo journal class and we printed out photos on different fabric surfaces. Kathyanne showed us ways in her journal on how to alter photos, but I had photos of my granddaughters that I just didn't want to tear up, so I kind of did my own thing after Kathyanne printed my photos. We had lots of fun giggling that day to the hum of a sewing machine without any pressure to be anywhere or do anything other than just relax. I was able to make a cover for a nice fat book and at least get all the pages in and underway for more photos and work later.
Anyway, back to "camera day," and my giftedness with it, that would be the day I put my camera in my tote bag only to discover that the batteries needed a recharge. Being tired like I was, I chose not to walk back to get new batteries to get the photos. Penney agreed to give me some of her photos instead, but I don't have them for the blog. But you will see the campus for yourself next year when you come, right? Exactly.
There were demos after the first day of classes, an artist's sale after the second day (
Alisa Burke was there and she had the best display and proved to be as much of a sweetheart as he she seems to be in her book and online classes.), and a big show after the third day where anyone who wanted to could put out what they made in the common living areas of the aprtments/dorms and anyone who wanted to see everything c0uld walk from dorm to dorm to see them all. Everyone registered for the event fit into three dorms that were only separated by a common green area, so this was a fun easy walk.
On Sunday after we signed out, Penney and I had the same luck with finding things, but we accidentally found Powell's book store, a real treat, and a few other places, so all was not lost, and it certainly did not keep either Penney nor I from having to repack out luggage at the airport to avoid extra fees.
Can anyone tell me why I can have two 50 lb. bags, but not one that weighs 57 lbs? Next time, we are each packing an extra suitcase that can be checked, and we are springing for the GPS and using the cell phone to call ahead. We had a great time crossing that river a gazillion times and can't wait to go back. For anyone who has ever thought of going, just turn yourself in and go. Teesha and
Tracy were the hosts with the most. They made it look effortless but we really know better. Now, if they could just sell those Oregon Berries thingies in Phoenix.
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