Summertime... and the living' is.... continuing.

I would love to be posting the finished images of the last two woven tapestries of the Calendar Series, but, oh woe, that is not to be. They are still 'resting,' awaiting mounting. In fact I haven't even nagged my dear husband/woodworker into making the stretcher frames for them yet. But a new week is coming....!

My creative energies have been used tearing into a far-too-long-neglected house, sorting things I no longer need and use, to discard and donate. The completion of a tapestry always does this to me: I get the cleaning urge, first in the studio and then it spreads like falling dominoes throughout the rest of the house.

I have also been doing an occasional sketch, most of them inspired by photos from the Sktchy app on my iPad. It is easier to do a 20-30 minute sketch of someone I don't know than to try to sketch someone I know, love, and want to please. Above are some of the sketches I have played with. What is amazing me about them is that I seem to have developed a 'style,' without really trying to! I post the sketches on the app, and also post many of them on Instagram (search for kjdspoering.) These are all done in a Stillman and Birn sketchbook (which has lovely paper) with watercolor, watercolor pencils, and ink. The exception is the woman drinking coffee, which was a special challenge and was done with floral dyes in the same sketchbook.

Other than this sketching and cleaning, I am surviving the summer heat and the political craziness with my pets and men (husband and dad) and am singing and playing a couple of times a month at assisted living places in the valley.

I am also at work planning a potential exhibit with some other tapestry artists whom I admire.... but more info on that to come soon!

Cutting Off, the last of a series....

Although I was determined to get this tapestry off the loom by the end of June, I still had this much to weave when I finally got to the loom after the 4th of July holiday. I spent most of the past few days in the studio, and I finally wove the upper hem this morning.

As this is the last tapestry in my Calendar Series, which I have been working on since February of 2008 (!!!), I had hoped and planned to have a big cutting off party for this tapestry. Completing the weaving of 12 tapestries over the course of eight long, and several difficult, years is something that should be celebrated.

However, today did not feel like a day for celebrating in this sad and crazy world. So I completed and cut off the tapestry alone.

This is the 'December' tapestry, the twelfth in a series which includes a tapestry representing each month in the year, following the weaving of the Four Seasons series tapestries. I now have the finishing part of creating a tapestry to do: trimming all those weft threads on the back, sewing slits, blocking and mounting the tapestry: still a good bit of time to spend to complete it.

The backside of the tapestry, after the top was cut from the loom

I have posted several things from my sketchbooks recently. Sketching has become a form of meditation for me, along with knitting and playing my guitar. I am finding life requires quite a bit of meditation time lately! I begin and end each sketchbook with a self-portrait, so this is the beginning sketch in the most recently begun book.

Pray for peace in our nation. Put as much good out there as you can, for we reap what we sow.