The Last Freezer Raid?

We applied velcro strips to the side of the freezer hoping that would deter Roni from raiding. We came home to this.

Finally we just took the handle off. No raids since. That seems to have done the trick. Who knows what she'll get into next. We'll just have to wait and see.

Settee and Stuff

 

 

Here is where we last left the settee. 

With batting applied to the front tack strip area.

With welt cord, cardboard tack strip and fabric over the batting.

With the tack strip done.

 With cotton on the inside arm.

With foam over the cotton.

The conversations in class always manage to take a nosedive to the gutter within 15 minutes of the door opening. For instance, Dawn had me test her chair in progress to make sure it appropriately cupped my ass. I was wondering why we're always so dirty,  but it occurred to me with objects like this lying around the room, how could we not?

 

Susan finished her chair last week. Isn't it gorgeous?!?

Sylvia Ji at Corey Helford Gallery

Showcard  www.coreyhelfordgallery.com

I have always enjoyed the artwork of Sylvia Ji. She's well know for her women with Dia De Los Muertos paint/make-up. She has a new show called Shapeshifter opening Sunday the 11th at the Corey Helford Gallery in Culver City (L.A. area in CA). The paintings are beautiful--all of women painted and/or dressed; or more accurately, in typical Sylvia Ji style, mostly undressed; in a way that represents an animal. Some of the symbols she uses remind me a little of  Gustav Klimt. However these pieces don't draw me in the way her Dia De Los Muertos paintings do. They don't quite touch that gothic, dark place inside. Although I am tempted to purchase the one titled "The Bandit" because the background of birch trees would go so well on my tree and bird themed family room. But not at $9,500.

From the press release: "Sylvia Ji is internationally recognized for capturing beauty in its most exotic forms. For “Shapeshifter”, Ji continues to evolve her elegant style, combining her narratives with elements of Native American mythology, designs and motifs. Shapeshifting is a theme that appears in Native American folklore, where a being acquires the ability to alter its physical appearance - such as a human changing into a wolf. Depending on whether the being is the subject of a curse or spell, the transformation may be intentional or not."

"Eagle" www.coreyhelfordgallery.com

"Employing Carolyn Niethammer’s book Daughters of the Earth: The Lives and Legends of American Indian Women as her muse, Ji adopts a more organic narrative style, adding to her stunning portraiture of the past. Ji’s fi gures are graceful and fl owing. Foregrounds and backgrounds merge, working together symbiotically and adding movement and pattern to her graceful subjects. Twelve large-scale paintings make up the collection of new works, which will introduce orange and blue hues to Ji’s red and gold leaf palette."

To receive a link to the advance online preview for the show, email jch@coreyhelfordgallery.com

More Settee

The settee is starting to look like a settee. Instead of a deck and removable seat cushion, I am making what is called a tight seat to save fabric. After painting the legs, I covered the burlap on the seat with several layers of cotton so it will be booty-ous maximus.  Then the 3-inch pink foam went over that. A piece of burlap was adhered to the front to create a pull so the front edge is nice and round.

 

Dacron went over the foam.

 

  The fabric went on next.

I am excited. I think it's going to be so pretty. Corey wasn't so sure of the fabric when I showed him the photo, but hopefully once he sees it all together in the room, he'll be won over. I love color. Here's a close up of the fabric.

Still to be done: the inside arms and back, tack strip, front arms, welt cord, etc., etc., etc.

Settee and Chair Update

I've been plugging away on the settee. The new legs were installed, the seat tied with spring twine for additional support and burlapped.

Then edge roll was added to the front edge and welt cord attached to the curves of the arms for additional protection.

Then I took it home and painted the legs a glossy white.

 

Next steps are to add cotton and foam to the seat.

Also, I completed the black and white chair: burlap, dacron, welt cord, plygrip and fabric to the back, and welt cord, tack strip and cambric to the bottom.

Viola!

Covert Freezer Raid

I just received the following email from Corey:

"At about 3:30 I noticed that Roni had two ice packs on her bed. They were still cold. This time, she was polite enough to close the freezer after grabbing her loot."

The Capitol Building

The day after Thanksgiving, I went for a tour of the capitol building. I had only been there once before, briefly, for the scavenger hunt. The architecture is amazing. Everything is original to 1888 except the terrazo floors which were installed in the 1930s. The floor below the dome represents the seals of the six nations Texas has belonged to in its history. I thought it was interesting that the design included several different types of hearts. It seemed sweet until Corey pointed out that it looked like a "weiner".

The level of detail throughout the building is phenomenal. Even the hinge plates used to hang the doors are beautiful.

But what really took my breath away was the woodwork.

 The electric lights are all original. Check out the chandelier in the senate room. The lights spell Texas.

Another Freezer Raid

 
Last night Corey and I went to see Morning Glory. It was cute. Not great, but cute. Worth seeing for the  eye candy that is Patrick Wilson. But I digress. We arrived home to discover Roni had ransacked the freezer yet again. This time she ate about 2/3 of a big tub of blue bell vanilla ice cream and a bag of frozen corn.  Now that she knows there's good stuff in there, she's going to keep doing it. We are going to have to start bungee-cording it shut.

Finished Chair

Here is a chair I worked on earlier this year. It's been sitting waiting for me to refinish the legs for months. Having Corey's parents over for Thanksgiving provided the needed incentive. Here are the before and after photos. It was a very faded blue velvet with a very bad black paint job.

There was a tag on the bottom of the chair that said Baumritter. I did a little research and Baumritter was what Ethan Allen called themselves from their inception in 1932 until they changed their name in 1972. I refinished the wood and reupholstered the chair in a cream colored nubby chenille-type fabric.

Here is the progress on the other chair I am working on. Almost done from the front.

 

But still some work to do on the back.

And speaking of Thanksgiving, here is what the feast looked like this year. Turduchen with pork stuffing, butternut squash ravioli with sage butter, sour cream and cheddar tater tot casserole, green beans, apple pie and chocolate souffle with creme anglaise. Yum!