Quick Post: Stitching Progress

Yesterday I accomplished... a whole lotta nothing.  Except, some more stitching!

First Skirmish

Yesterday I decided that my first act of war in countering Resistance was to begin to tackle the epic mess in the studio.

I thought I'd start on my desk first, since that is where most of the creative work takes place.  Here's a picture after said battle was well under way.

I've had the loose idea for a little while now to try and organize supplies by project or purpose.  I've done a bit of that with the drawer units I have on my shelves.  However, I decided yesterday that it'd be nice to be able to store project bits and references together.

My eyes fell upon my "rainbow drawers".  I added two of these 10 drawer units to the studio shortly before our big move.  So far they've been storing some random things, thought I did sort of already start the project storage idea by putting the Rio Rondo saddle in a drawer.  During the move though, things got chaotic as I basically stuffed every drawer full to minimize what the movers had to pack - they just wrapped of each unit of drawers as one piece.

I wrote down a list of possible contents for each drawer and then stuck some quick, temporary labels on to decide what drawer might hold what.

Closest to my desk, a couple of the "Project" drawers.

The top few drawers on the other unit.

Feeling accomplished in my planning, it then occurred to me that there was a slight problem.  Two of the drawers are already stuffed with leather.

Plus, in the closet, lies this pile.

And of course these: the two tooling sides that I got from Tandy a while back.

Okay, so my "Leather" will most certainly not fit in one drawer.  I'll have to think on that some more.

About this time, I noticed that the studio fish tank was looking dirty, so I decided to clean it.  That was the end of the day's battle.

The first skirmish was short-lived, but it's a start.

Going to War

Last night I received a couple of book in the mail that I had ordered, including this one:

It was recommended by Khrysalis Studios on her Facebook page; it sounded very interesting and I felt it was something I needed to read.

Between last night and this morning, I've read the first section, which deals with "Resistance" - the force that keeps us from following our dreams.  I can relate to many of the ways that the author describes Resistance and how it works to block us.

I want to devour the rest of the book, particularly the next section: "Combating Resistance", but at the moment I'm inspired to tackle an "excuse" that I've been using for far too long...  That would be the ever present mess in my studio.  I get stuck in these loops where I don't want to make stuff, because the studio still isn't set up the way I want it to be, but I don't want to take the time to clean up and organize the studio because...  I want to make stuff.

Silly, isn't it?

There are MANY other blocks that stop me from creating things, but that one seems like an important one to handle.  It also helps that Jeff is actually out of town right now, so if I need to make an even bigger mess to get things sorted out - like, oh, say, dragging things out into the hallway over the next few days - I can.  (haha)

Anyhow, I've decided that for right now I'm going to split the difference between cleaning and creating.  I'm going to wade in there with the intention of "organizing" and clean up for a set period of time, then I get to make some stuff.  Or, if I find I am enjoying the clean up, I'll work at it for longer.  Either way, it should be a win-win.

Pardon me, while I ride off into battle...

I Made a Rope

Yesterday I spent a few hours in the studio.

I started trying to come up with a pattern for a Traditional scale blanket.  (strangely much harder to do than the Stablemate ones I made...)

A small, but exciting, something that I made was this:

I've seen many times where people have made lead ropes and such by twisting embroidery floss, but I hadn't ever tried it.  I decided to go for it last night and was VERY happy with the results.  Ohhh the ideas now!

Of course, as usual when I'm working with any kind of "string", my supervisor had to stop by.

Yesterday I also filmed a new (shorter!) video tutorial for finishing a cross-stitch saddle pad.  I haven't watched it yet, but hopefully it came out okay.  I think it's just under 5 minutes long.  I'm hoping to have it uploaded in the next couple of days.

Part of today's creative agenda is to finally finish some of my own personal hoard of stitched pads!

Not Quite Green and Tan

I've been getting some stitching time in on my latest saddle pad.  My vision was for a green and tan combination and this is not quite it, but close.

The green is there, but the closest I had to a full skien of tan is actually more of a golden brown.  I think it will still be okay.

Side note: how is it that with a ton of floss colors, I still rarely have the exact color I want for any certain project?  Haha.  I'm going to add "tan floss" to the craft store shopping list.  It's such a versatile color, and great for anything Western; I'm surprised I don't actually have much of it.

Stablemate Swap Props

Last month I signed up to be part of a prop swap for the Stablemate Performance Group.  I sent off my box a couple of weeks ago and the same day I found a props for me at the post office.

I received some neat stuff!

I've thought of making some scene pieces like this for some time now, but I hadn't gotten around to it yet.

 Also included were a few fence panels, a cactus, a bush, and a tree.

The neatest  thing was a Native American costume and rider!

His horse here was a quick grab out of the body box, but I'm inspired to make him a proper war pony.

I'm really happy with the props that I received and I'm looking forward to trying to set up some proper photo show pictures with them!

Motivation Monday - Action

I hope everyone is having a good Monday and that this will be a fun, action-filled week!

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