The Christmas elves are busy here at Casa da Praia. Cooking, cleaning, pulling out the Christmas CDs and DVDs and generally getting into the festive spirit. Then this elf is going to take a short blogging holiday. I’ll be back on 1 January. In the meantime, peace and goodwill to all.
PS: We’ve been making these paper napkin elven shoes for years in my family (here’s a tutorial).
SantaUSPS made it through snow and blizzards in North Dakota to deliver this book by fellow “Twelve” Terri Stegmiller to me just in time for Christmas and inspiration holiday reading:-)
“If paper art and quilting are two of the hottest topics in crafts, imagine how super-sizzling they’d be in combination! To the delight of crafters everywhere, this decorative and inspiring resource finally brings them together in beautiful style. These 25 charming paper quilted projects, produced by a group of designers, truly showcase the medium’s vast creative potential.
Use traditional quilt block designs or various appliqué techniques. Incorporate photos and other images into your work. Learn how to integrate small paper quilt pieces into greeting cards, scrapbook pages, and collages.
A helpful basics section explains how to adhere the paper pieces, paint background surfaces, add stamped and stenciled images to your design, embellish with beads, finish quilt edges, and more”.
If this appeals to you, you can order your copy via Terri’s blog:www.stegart.blogspot.com
It occurs to me that Christmas is only three days away and we should really work out what we are going to eat and stock up. I expect it will be a low-key affair. Seafood will definitely feature, although we will be skipping the traditional southern Italian Christmas Eve Feast of the Seven Fishes. And there will be traditional Sago Plum Pudding. However, with the warmer climate of the Antipodes, I also like to have a lighter, chilled dessert dish. Perhaps a simple pannacotta with mango and/or berries. Or maybe a cheesecake. Anyone have a classic, lemon cheesecake recipe?
When I was making my Christmas cake this year, I decided to be more adventurous with the spices and reached for the Chinese Five Spice. What I actually picked up and poured into the dry ingredients was Hot Chilli pepper. Ahem. I managed to scoop most of the chilli out but some remained inextricably mixed. I wonder how the cake will taste…
PS: See that envelope and link straight above? I have added a Mail this Post plug-in to all my posts. If you read something interesting, now you can easily pass the link on.
The Laundry King may roll his eyes but even in an age of blogging, e-mail and Facebook, I enjoy Christmas cards that include a well-written, concise! letter with some of the highlights from the previous year. When time, geography and other factors can impede contact in person, I like to catch up on what has been happening in the lives of my family and friends. And that’s why I write such a letter myself.
In recent times, my Christmas letter has evolved from an A4 printed sheet, to a text e-mail and then to an e-mail with a pdf attachment. It seemed only natural that the next iteration should be an html e-mail with images and links.
I decided that my 2008 Christmas news would be an ideal project to try out some e-mail newsletter software before launching an html version of my occasional Serendipity Studio Newsletter. My research and call for reviews of newsletter software did not elicit much of a response. I first tried PHP List on the basis that Lisa Call has used it successully. In addition to being a talented textile artist, Lisa is a professional software engineer and perhaps I should have taken more notice when she said the set-up was not very intuitive. Not daunted, I slogged away for hours preparing the html coding for my newsletter and installing and configuring the software. I tested extensively (and successfully) using multiple e-mail addresses but, when it came to the real send, things fizzed. This may involve only a minor fix but, being a free product, the technical support is not immediately forthcoming so I moved to Plan B.
By contrast, or perhaps reflecting my upward movement on the learning curve, setting up Dada Mail was quite straightforward and the results more predictable. I successfully dispatched my first html newsletter soon after and have received some good feedback.
Despite this happy outcome, I feel the need to do further research on newsletter software. In particular, the Dada mail subscriber management features are very light on and it would be nice to have some open and click through tracking too. I may give PoMMo a whirl to see how it compares and Erica has mentioned iContact which appears to offer some more affordable pricing plans for accounts with a modest number of subscribers.
Now to write some snail mail cards…
This quilt is called Bon Bon but the diagonal silhouette also takes the female form. I guess if you eat too many Christmas candies, they can end up on your hips. Is that negative thinking? I endeavour to keep an upbeat tone to this blog and that’s not about to change. However, artists often overlook the potential power of negative space in their work.
Terry referred the quiltart list to this very good tutorial on Enhancing Your Art with Negative Space. Have a look at your artwork. Do you use negative space effectively in your compositions?
And don’t forget this excellent textbook
Binary Note #2 is my contribution to the mathematics mosaic of the Twelve by Twelve Collaborative Art Quilt Project.
Following on from our new surf club building, Copacabana is now getting a new fire station. Yesterday morning, it was just a concrete pad. Now it has walls:
Welcome to any new visitors popping over from Sharon B’s list of “S” blogs at Pintangle.com. Feel free to have a good look around while you are here. I have a tutorial for Binding Without Bulges and another listing of tutorials for Alternative Quilt Finishes. I write most days about quilting and textile-related matters. The best way to keep up to date is to subscribe to my RSS feed or enter your e-mail below to receive updates via e-mail.
My own public blogroll has recently been pared back. Like Sharon, my blog listing concentrates on blogs with a textile/art focus that are updated on a regular basis. My private blog roll (I use Bloglines as my RSS reader) is more wide ranging and I like to read blogs before adding any to my public listing. Let me know if you think there is a great textile-related blog that I might be missing out on!
My brother Rowan worked as an audio technician at the Beijing Olympics. A gruelling job in challenging conditions.
There wasn’t much time for shopping or sightseeing but, knowing my penchant for food and colour, he did buy me this cheerful set of chopsticks.
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©2006-2010 Brenda Gael Smith trading as Serendipity Patchwork & Quilting.
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