So did any of you know about The Southern Poverty :Law Center? It's a non-profit civil rights organization, which was founded in 1971 "to ensure that the promises of the civil rights movement become a reality for all."  (It's kind of sad that it sill needs to be around 40 years later, no?)


One of the pages on their site has this thing called "The Hate Map" showing, state by state,how many active Hate groups there are in each.

Some of the states statistics were unsurprising to me - either because of what I had seen/read/heard ( like that fact that Florida has 55 active hate groups, Georgia  65, Alabama has 35) or from personal experience - (Michigan 26, Mississippi 41, Texas 45).

But what WAS shocking, is that free-wheeling California has EIGHTY-FIVE (Proposition 8 may not only have failed because of its counter-intuitive wording "vote no for yes" which I always thought was the case), that New Jersey has 47 active hate groups (why so much hate for others, New Jersey?) and that Oklahoma "only" has 13.

Little Rhode Island and huge Alaska have 1 each, and some big states like Maine (6) Iowa (4) and Wyoming (2) have surprisingly low activity.  (Maybe all that space means that people can live and let live.)

And did you know about this? One example of how hate works...

Finished piece on Friday and then something "light\' next week.  *phew*

Duck....



Goose!


Oh, and I also got a bit of work done on the next piece in the "Whitewashed" series...



And Tyler says "Hi!"


See you on Wednesday!

When the little blue clock in the middle of his work
Sings a song to the moon up above
It is nature that's all
Simply telling us to fall in love....


And that's why birds do it,
bees do it,
even educated fleas do it,
Let's do it, let's fall in love!


When I was making this piece, for some reason, this Cole Porter lyric kept running through my head - so even though I was initially just making all those squiggly squares and circles,eventually I found myself making some flowers and leaves and insects, despite myself.


Although I had suggested  in my last post that it probably would have made more sense to paint the stablizer/lutradur first and then cut it out, some of my little lines had gotten filled in with paint, and when I tried to re-cut them out with the heat tool, it worked, but...


all the paint got sticky and glommed up the tool - so... pick your evil. My preference would be to paint after. "Bees Do It" is 42" x 24, the bacground is scraps of black satin, wool, silk velvet, cotton and then quilted.


So, I'm done experimenting with the lutradur now, and will start actually working with it.... I actually have a piece done that I'm really excited to show you, but I can't until a MONTH from now (lol) so I'll have to maybe do some more thread work in the meantime, or start a new piece I have in mind about Angelique or another one I have in mind for a call for entry due in August.


Hmmmm...


Guess we'll all see on Monday! Have a great weekend, everyone!

A portion of the experiment.... not much to say about it (as this is, overall, a very simple, if large piece) - so it's stablizer, painted cream, and cut out with the heat tool...

But the finished piece will be available for your viewing pleasure on Friday.  :)


Joining in with other Canadian Fiber people at The Needle and Thread Network.

More experiments with stabilizer...




This time I've fused it, cut out my shapes, and then Ive painted it with full strength acrylic paint. Here it is drying on my drying table ('cuz where else would I dry it?) *s*

Of course as I was laying them out to dry, I realized, it would have been much more clever of me to paint it first and then cut out my shapes.  But you know, why make things easier?

Here's hoping I'm more clever about the rest of the process... which you'll grt a peek at on Wednesday!

Until then...
 

Here is a close up of the actual organ grinder, which I first painted and then outlined with the "anime" pen (it's an artist's pen that's marketed for use for anime artists, but I can't remember what it's called). And his little painted gourd and other decorative elements, and his key to lock it up at the end of the day.



His face has a little sadness in it - as it would be I think; he is such an anachronism in our time - perhaps even the last of his kind - playing his music amongst the glass and steel...