I got home from my disastrous show in Columbus Ohio last week and set to work assessing the damage. One common problem was dye from the yarns leaching into the silk thread used to stretch out my pieces in their frames. Unfortunately, silk picks up colors beautifully, so I ended up having to restring several pieces. I also found a lot of damage on the frames, although most of it was minor. I’m lucky there, but I will need to re-sand and freshly paint some of them. I did some aluminum frame bending and re-shaping, but for the major structural pieces I just couldn’t trust the integrity of the repaired pieces. I called up a very friendly and helpful artist representing Light Dome Canopies and ordered a few replacement pieces. I also bought some new bars to enhance the strength of the structure and a vinyl repair kit. Things are looking up!
After a couple of days of triage and repair, though, I really felt 
the need to create some fresh art. I continued working on a piece I decided to call BFF (best friends forever). It features a beet, a carrot and a yellow onion sitting on a cross-section through dirt. That translates into working with my chocolaty brown yarn. The dirt sits beneath a cloudless, rainless, windless blue sky! I spent some time needle felting my friendly veggies for the piece. I had just the right color for the yellow onionskins, a fleece that I dyed using—you guessed it—onionskins! That really made me smile, and onion-dyed onion gives the sense that I’ve completed a circle.
This week marked the end of the school year. That means I need to transition into my summer mode, and I have two friends to play with each day. Yesterday we went to 
the Monroe County Historical Society’s garage sale, an annual event for the three of us. It’s the biggest garage sale in all of Bloomington and serves as a major fundraiser for them. I go looking for treasures and it never lets me down. My big find this year was a Singer steam press iron that’s in excellent shape. I’ve been eyeing them for a while. I’m thinking that when I needle felt a bunch of leaves I can press them all at once, or I can press my scarves without the ironing board. I can almost hear the 
big shhhhhhh! as the top comes down and steam pours out! Summer mode also means time at the pool, so I spent time with the boys and their friend Claire at the Bryan Park Pool this afternoon. I swam a little, but I spent most of my time needle felting broccoli florets. I decided that after I sold my ‘Fruit Salad’ piece at Columbus I needed to create a vegetable salad. Broccoli is something new for me, but I’m pleased with how it turned out. All my vegetable creations remind me that I haven’t been able to get to the Farmer’s Market for a while, a problem I hope to resolve Saturday morning bright and early. I read in the paper that it’s blueberry time, and blueberries make a great pie! I bet if I just buy waaay too many to eat and put them in the fridge in front of the milk - Jim will have no choice but to bake me one!
Until next week…
Martina Celerin
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