Saturday, August 25, 2007

Yesterday was one of those day

I had to make my own sunshine which I did because it rained or felt like rain all day not that I dislike rain. After all it is great for the garden and the humidity is good for the skin. But making my own sunshine is not hard, it only entails me doing something creative and 90% of the time it entails me listening to a good audio book or music. Listening to a book on tape was what I did yesterday. The creativity came in the form of me spending time painting a screen for deconstructed screen printing.
Because of the humid and the urea in the print paste the screen I painted didn't want to dry and I don't think it was quiet dry enough even when my patience ran out and I set about helping it along with a hair dryer. Even with that I don't think it was totally dry before I start the printing process.
I let the fabric batch for 10 hours before washing it out this morning.
This is my printing/dyeing area in the garage and what the screen looked like after six prints were made. Here is the washed out fabric drying on the line in the garage and an area of interest I liked.



Posted by Picasa


Back to the books on tape. The library here has a great selection of music cd's, audio books (cd's and tapes) in my favorite genres but I had gone through all of the books on cd's by my current favorite authors so during my last library trip I went in search of some earlier writings of my favorite authors and found about a half dozen or so, on tapes, (sigh) and there I was without a tape player. I checked them out anyway.
Do you know how hard it is to find a portable tape player anymore. Five places I went and finally I found one in the Wally World superstore I am suppose to be boycotting, (that's another story for another day.) The grandson when asked if he had a tape player before I spent money said, "ME why would I have one of those OLD things. Modern technology, is where it is, I-pods, you know." Sixteen year old humans . If you didn't love them, you would kill them. He no longer had a CD player either when I asked a month or so ago when mine stopped working from being dropped too many times. However when I shopped for a new portable cd player,I had no trouble finding one the first place I looked (Walgreens), unlike the tape player that turned into a two hour zig-zag trip across town from one store to another ending with me compromising my principles to step into the Walmart on West Broadway. I must be honest not all of the two hours was spent looking for the tape player, I knew they did not sell them in Michael's or Hobby Lobby Speedball squeegees yes, djanting tools no .
On top of that at the check out counter in Wallmart the sales associate asked if I worked there. ME? It seems I was dressed in the current wardrobe dictates of the company. Navy blue shirt paired with kakki bottoms; skirt (does anyone wear them anymore), shorts or slacks.

The tape player I finally found and brought was not the kind you can stick in a normal size pocket or hook on a belt, but rather one that sits on a desk for both recording and playback complete with microphone, built in speaker and an AC/DC plug and a head set for personal listening . Which are all good things. When I am stationary like at the sewing machine or in the garage dyeing fabric, it can be plugged into a wall outlet to save on cost and use of batteries. PLUS I can listen to it with or without a headset because of the speaker AND it is small enough to pick up and carry from one place to another or drop into one of two over sized pocket on my studio I'm making a mess and loving it apron.
NOW BACK TO THE RAINY DAY FUN IN MY SUNSHINE PART. yes I like the process of deconstructing screen printing and yes I will try more of this (the dyes and the print paste are waiting) and yes I woke with an idea germinating about what I will do with this piece of fabric as soon as it is dry and pressed.

Does anyone know if they have down load-able books for I-pods? Never-mind, I guess I should go ask the modern technolgy expert who resides in our house, he'll know.

2 comments:

Karoda said...

Hi Juanita, did all the colour in the fabric come from the screening or was it dyed first? I like the imagery and the colour choices alot.

and I don't have an I-pod but I think you can download books to it. Let me know what the tech guru says so I can be certain myself.

Anonymous said...

You can download books to your Ipod from the Columbia Public Library web site for free! You can also listen to them right from your computer.

There's a site called Audible.com where you can buy them for your Ipod, too.

Also, there are some interesting audio books in the children's and juvenile sections, so keep searching.

Good luck!