Evviva! I got a granddaughter, Cecilia.
I could perhaps have just sat there with my hands folded? No. Così, instead of clothes and blankets, my practical spirit pushed me to create a sort of storage rack to hang next to the changing table which will be used by the new mother to store some nappies, the pacifier, towel, scissors, spazzola, eccetera.
Poi, when the little girl grows up, she will put whatever she wants in those pockets, toys, matite colorate, slippers, pelouche and other little things that will be part of his little new world.
I dug through my drawers to find fabrics to help me achieve these African themes, simple and colorful designs that Cecilia's mother and father should also like, since giraffes, zebras, leoni, and elephants were not missing during their beautiful honeymoon.

You also know how these things go, they give you a piece of fabric, and then it happens that without you realizing it the desire to do something with it grows. Strange, because maybe until the day before you were planning to get some’ breath, or there were ideas floating around in your head about other jobs, but that piece of fabric persists, it shows up, it makes itself felt, it creeps into every one of our projects. So I gave up and set up a flying carpet, in the sense that I accomplished it “on the fly” without thinking too much about the composition, to the drawing, to colors, così, as it comes it comes.
In my opinion it turned out well.

In July we took a trip to Tuscany. One of the motivations was dictated by my participation sherpa / photographer / webmaster / tourist agency / driver / ecc. in a literary contest (with unexpected results), but while we were at it we decided to visit Arezzo and Siena, surroundings included of course.
You can find a sort of summary of our trip on his blog ultimelune.it, and more precisely in post “Travel notes T2”. More than tourist information (there are special guides for those), the article reports some impressions, beautiful and less beautiful, of those places, plus some tidbits of information that may perhaps be missed radar of organized trips.
However in Arezzo I could not miss a visit to the Pieve di Santa Maria Assunta, and not for religious or historical reasons, but to admire live the polychrome sculptures of the archivolt of the main portal that make up the "Cycle of the months".
It just so happens that nearby, in Castiglion Fiorentino to be precise, many years ago I learned the ancient technique of the Florentine quilt, and among the various works in which I have used this art there is also the reproduction of the sculpture which refers to the month of September.

Here is the photo we took in Arezzo,

and this below is my Florentine quilt.

I'm not going to explain this technique to you in detail right now, it would be a rather long affair, however, it is possible to learn it thanks to Rosalba Pepi's book, or perhaps going to her in Tuscany to take one of her courses (and not just Florentine quilting…).
Vi is going, further information on the sculptures of the archivolt can always be found on post “Travel notes T2″.

Enjoy

A year has passed, indeed even more, since I took a trip to visit an exhibition, in ottobre, ad Althofen, then nothing more.
I had Sitges planned, Prague, Birmingham, Karlsruhe, Toulouse, Val d’Argent, instead the Chinese plague has destroyed programs, initiatives, and lives.
It goes without saying that even the mood suffers, and as a result, inspiration and energy also suffer. Così, just so as not to lose the hand, I decided to waste time with a long Florentine trapunto work, even if rhizoarthrosis takes care of it to keep me in check when I exaggerate.
For a while, in short, I only work on white, on many shades of white, put, ivory, ancient, magnolia, eccetera, and at some point I felt nostalgia for other colors, also because I am surrounded by a foliage very showy autumnal. Continua a leggere →