Hearts, Hearts Everywhere

Yeah, I'm still in all-out heart mode.  The confluence of actual heart-related stuff + Valentine's Day has made it impossible not to be, you know?

But before I show you the latest projects, I wanted to think a little bit about color. I've been doing a lot with black and grey lately. Well, a *lot* for me, since those aren't usually colors I even think about. I've always liked that sort of heathered grey, the one that's the color of old t-shirts and athletic sweats, the kind the kids wore when The EGE was coaching. That color has always seemed athletic and energetic and healthy to me, a sturdy color that can hold its own and be dressed up or down. Black, on the other hand, is a problematic color of me because of one thing: fur. Cat fur gets on everything, of course, no matter what color. But nothing shows it off so stunningly as black: a cat (any color other than black) + a black garment of any kind = instant bag lady costume. You look like you've been sleeping in the back seat of your car and wearing the same clothing since the Reagan administration. I know this because I've gone there--most recently with the fabulous asymmetrical Cynthia Ashby dress, part linen, part cotton, all black. I washed and dried it, rolled it with one of those sticky garment rollers, put it on and left the house (no, I did NOT sit down anywhere before I left) and got wherever I was going and looked down at myself and omigod: I looked like I'd rolled in a pile of lint and cat fur. Even drying it with an extra dryer sheet did no good--it wasn't static; it was just a bit of texture to the fabric that made it grab and cling to everything that came near it. I loved that dress, but it's going back to be resold. I washed it and rolled it one last time and folded it up lovingly and packed it in the bin.

And whimpered just a tiny bit.

But there're also a couple linen apron/jumper-ish things, also Cynthia Ashby, one in black and one in grey, that I love. They're 100% linen and not at all sticky, and I'd love to be able to figure out the difference. I got to thinking about all the ways these could be embellished, given their blank-slate-y lack of color, and then I found some black linen on sale locally, and some grey, and, well--that's what's going on: I'm playing with black and grey linen. Whenever I wear anything that's not one of my usual colors, people comment, as if there's something wrong. It's funny about color: people come to associate you with the colors you wear most, whether those are taupes and beiges or pinks and purples. The kids at school think The EGE always wears pink, even though pink is just one of the colors he wears (I think purple is probably the one he has the most of). People think I wear mostly orange, although I don't think that's the case. And then, I think, we get comfortable in those colors and kind of settle in, sticking with the same ones because they're familiar and because that's what other people expect us to wear--they think you always wear black or always wear jeans or whatever, and so why not?

Also, for me, certain colors fit in certain seasons. Oranges get rustier in the autumn, and greens get more avocado. Then, as it moves into winter, the rusty oranges become rusty reds, then darker reds, and the greens go from lighter avocado to darker. At the end of the year, the reds get redder, and in January I think of red and black, starting with New Year's Eve, which seems to me like a totally red-and-black holiday. Then, moving into February, the black gives way to pink: red and pink. Then, on into spring, the red goes away, and purple joins the pink, and then green: green and pink or pink and purple are totally spring colors, never mind that they're bright (no pastels!). Then, in May, there's a lot of bright yellow, and as it gets hotter, there's orange, and then red, getting fierier and brighter into September, when they start to mute and move into autumn.

That's how I think of seasonal colors. I don't consciously say, "Oh, now it's spring: time for purple." It will just be that, one day, the windows are open and that distinctive odor of spring comes in, and I find myself looking at a piece of purple fabric, thinking, "Hmmmmm."

Back to the latest projects. I've pretty much given up buying things for my husband. The only things he wants are camera things, and I have no idea what to get--he's at the point where it's pretty specific. And we long ago passed the stage of buying gifts just because it's A Gift-Giving Holiday. I'm not one of those women who expects to be given diamonds, for instance. (We were with some people we know right after Christmas, people roughly our age, and the women were showing their new rings, big honkin' diamond rings, and I was thinking, "Wow. That's a whole new set of windows installed right there.")

So I'm making him t-shirts--you've seen those--and I made him one for Valentine's Day. I didn't get a photo of it because I finished it at midnight and he wore it to school the next morning, so it's wrinkled. But I used the left-over parts and made one for me, too, so we can be Twinkies:

 His is a short-sleeved t-shirt, a brighter pink. I wasn't sure the more muted purple and orange would go with such a neon-ish pink, but he wore it over a long-sleeved purple thermal shirt, and it looked fabulous: that's what I had planned when I chose the colors, but about halfway through I really doubted my choices. Glad I stuck with them, though, as he almost always wears a long-sleeved t under the short-sleeved ones I appliqué, meaning I have to think about how things are going to go together. For this one, I wanted to make sure he had a couple color choices--orange and purple--to alternate.

 His applique is just like this but opposite: the parts that are orange here are purple on his. What I did: I found a really simple jigsaw heart online, downloaded it, sized it, printed it out, traced over all the lines with a Sharpie. I didn't flip this one and trace them on the back, as I usually do, because there was no obvious "front" or "back" to this pattern. I traced it onto the paper side of two pieces of fusible webbing and ironed one to the sleeve of a purple t-shirt and one to the sleeve of an orange one. When I get t-shirts (Goodwill), I wash and dry them and then deconstruct them, removing the neckband and the sleeves. I keep a stack (well, several stacks--I have rather a LOT of deconstructed t-shirts) of the sleeves to use for appliqués.

Then I very, very carefully cut out all the pieces. I hate having to be so careful and cut exactly on the lines, but in this case, it was important that the pieces of the two hearts be identical so they'd fit together. I thought about cheating and leaving one heart solid and then placing the other pieces on top, but that would defeat the whole stitching-two-hearts-together idea I had.

 Then I put the jigsaw together on the front of his shirt, alternating colors. And I realized that I had another complete heart, and that there was no sense wasting it, and that it would be fun to have matching (more or less--they're not the same shade of pink-ish-ness) shirts. So I made this one for me.

I liked the symbolism: orange for me, purple for him, the pieces stitched together permanently into a perfect heart. Yeah, I know: it's corny. But Valentine's Day will do that to you.

And here's the newest Jumpron, Healing:

 More about hearts and protection--for me, the red cross is about protection and healing, and I've used it on a lot of stuff. I love thinking about personal symbols, what simple shapes mean to a specific person. X's mean much the same thing for me--they're sometimes petitions to Mama Good, a sort of voodoo muse, because of the association of Marie Laveau with the three red Xs people draw on her headstone. The thing I like best about symbols like this is that you make of them what you will. People can say, "Oh, that means blahblahblah," as if it's a given that a particular shape or color means a specific thing. Symbols have only the meaning you give them: the rebel flag means one thing to me and something else to an historian. If you were from some other country and had never seen one before (and had somehow never read anything of US history), it would mean nothing to you.

I like the sign I saw on, I think, Pinterest, with a swastika, which has an ancient history most people know nothing about (I think it was on the label for some cleaning product) and the note: "Damn the Nazis; this has been our brand since 1917." I wouldn't want to use an offensive symbol, never mind what it might mean to me personally, because some things stir up painful memories in other people. But for everything else? I love figuring out what things mean to me and how I can use them on garments to give them meaning.

 I love how the Xs and French knots turned out. I had planned to do the Xs because I didn't sew the seams flat by machine, as I have been doing on these, but I wanted them to *lie* flat. That looked pretty boring, though, and I added the knots and loved how it looks. I wish it were easier to do French knots on unhooped fabric--I don't want to hoop these, but if the fabric is loose, French knots are a pain in the butt.

And that's it for today. I've got a couple more things in various stages and need to work on those and finish them, but I doubt that's going to happen because I have ideas for MORE stuff I want to do, and then what happens is that I have half a dozen projects going. I move back and forth amongst them until one grabs me hard, and then I stick with it until it's finished, thinking I'll go back and pick up another one. But in the process of working on that one, I get all these other ideas. I saw a saying last week and fell in love with it, and I want to put it on a Jumpron. But it has to fit a certain way, in four lines, and the letters need to be small enough to fit but large enough so that the t-shirt appliques will hold up--if the lines of letters are too thin, they're shred when I wash the finished garment. In fact, sometimes they shred when I try to stitch them in place. Serifs are particularly tough. But I want a specific kind of font, not just a boring standard stencil. So I've got to figure that out. Today, I hope.

Thanks for coming by. I'm going to try to do a post about a book I read and really enjoyed--I'm telling you that so I'll be sure to come back and do it.

XO