Happy Thanksgiving Weekend everyone!!

Can YOU believe that it is THANKSGIVING weekend? I am sitting here after a hard day at work - retail is getting tough now with all of the impact that the economic trends have taken... we are blessed to be here in Canada where the economic health of our Country has not yet been severely crippled by the US troubles, though I can surely see that many of my friends and colleagues are trimming back, not travelling quite so much, and being cautious about expenditures. I will be working both Sunday and Monday of the Holiday weekend and straight through until Wednesday and then have four glorious fall days OFF! So Happy Thanksgiving to all of you who will be home enjoying family - think of me and have a turkey sandwich for me, too!

I am afraid the registrations for my dearest FIBREWORKS KINGSTON Weekend Workshops are just trickling in and we need to support Fibreworks and Hilary Scanlon's mission to bring the best and brightest Instructors for us to study with if this important academic and creativity series is to be there for us in years to come. This coming weekend is the exciting workshop with KIT VINCENT, Brockville Area Designer and Fibre Artist and I for one cannot wait to have 12 concentrated study hours with Kit ... and yes, I know that many of you will be heading off to the Creative Festival in Toronto for a good dose of shopping, but if you are NOT - please consider spending this next weekend with Kit. I have added an example of her beautiful work "RIVER'S EDGE" at the top right header on this blog and it will stay there to inspire you, perhaps to come spend the weekend of October 17-19th with Kit and see this quilter's work in person. River's Edge is a beautiful and moving contemporary composition which Kit created with her own hand-dyed fabrics. I love the colour, the movement and the intentional focus on the portrayal of the water, the shoreline, and the colours of the Thousand Islands in Summer...beautiful. Kit has recently sent this quilt off to be included in a wonderful Exhibition in Columbus, Ohio, only one of a very few stellar examples of the best Art Quilts in North America. Kit will be teaching at QUILT TAHOE in November - and you could have the opportunity to study with her FIRST!!! Contact Donna Hamilton, Fibreworks Associate Coordinator and Registrar at fibreworks@cogeco.ca for more information and to register for the QUILTS BY DESIGN workshop with Kit.

The students in the Design for Textiles course at St. Lawrence College have been gathering in our favourite Room 12050 for four weeks now, with some great experimentation in design work being demonstrated by this small group of outstanding friends and students (10)... Three new students have joined in on the classroom fun, while three others work hard to complete their Textile Design Diploma requirements. This past week we saw some amazing efforts in creating cut-work squares - working from the inside out in positive/negative explorations. Creative paint work with COLOUR VIE paints have given the students some play time, and we have even done some discharge work with Lysol "Bathroom Cleaner with Bleach" as the discharge agent - a product which was a great discovery at the Jane Dunnewold full week workshop Margaret Morris, Sandy Garner and I attended in June 2008. Try using a small amount of the bathroom cleaner in a squeeze bottle with a metal writing tip for adding great text to your discharge work... or use a sponge brush to add a light layer to your favourite stamps...use a rubber banded brayer to roll on a layer of the bleach product across your work, or use Shibori technique to fold your fabrics for special effects and use a sponge brush to dab on the bleach cleaner, or dip edges directly into the product... JUST WATCH YOUR FABRIC carefully... this product "develops" onto the black cotton or rayon very quickly and you can "lose your design" very fast if you are not watching! Sponging, stenciling and dripping the cleaner onto your fabric are just a few more ways to use this unusual product for fabric art. Consider joining us in the January - April term for more design play. Watch for the Winter term Course listings online at Sl.on.ca and come enjoy 12 weeks of good fun with friends.

When you have a chance this weekend, take a few minutes and spend them with our own Kingston area Fibre Artist, PHILLIDA HARGREAVES, at her newly launched website at http://www.phillidahargreaves.ca/ Phillida has designed a wonderful gallery based site that will help you navigate through her beautiful new work including her amazing Fossil Series, Trees Series and Ice Series. Please do make time to visit and have a good look through the site, the opportunities Phillida offers you to add her outstanding and dynamic work to your personal Fibre Art Collection and for news of upcoming events where you can see Phillida's quilts and embroideries. I particularly love her Moss pieces and find the irregular shapes, the hugely focused attention to realistic design and colour collaboration and her unique and beautiful mounded embroidery stitches inspirational and very, very special. Explore the site and be sure to see Phillida's work next in the Kingston Fibre Artist's exhibition during the month of November at the John M. Parrott Gallery, Belleville Public Library. Email me for a copy of the invitation or scroll down and see it below in another entry here on my blog.

Hoping that you will have time this weekend for some time off. Curl up in front of a first fall fire to watch a good movie with family and friends, catch some of your favorite sports teams (I am watching the Boston RED SOX as they pursue a 2008 trip to the World Series - they will win their series against the Rays this next week and then the excitement begins for sure!) Needless to say I am a huge New England Patriots fan and as always, Red Sox baseball keeps me watching fall TV broadcasts and listening to the radio whenever I can. Have a great weekend and make time for stitching.

One last thought - just in case you have room for one ART-Focused free weekend in November - please consider committing that weekend as that of November 14-16th and dedicate your creative design personal time to CATHY BREEDYK LAW , who will be the guest Lecturer/Instructor for FIBREWORKS KINGSTON's second Weekend Workshops Series for 2008-09 and will bring her innate playful quilt design style into the classroom for one exciting weekend. Find a friend or two and come play! This weekend will offer you the opportunity to use up all of those bright and funky fabrics in your stash and take an opportunity to design a new original design for a quilt that can be well on it's way to "exhibition ready" status at the end of two days with this dynamic Instructor. Cathy will also be sharing her exciting framing technique with her students, and you don't want to miss out on that! Hope you will join in on the fun.