Last week on Art With a Needle

After I posted about it last week, two readers informed me that the huge quilt hung next to mine at the Stitched: Celebrating the Art of Quilting show in Memphis was made by Els van Baarle, an artist whose work I have greatly admired over the years.  Thanks, and I will update my previous post for the record.

We had a household emergency this week -- the cleaning ladies were determined to make a good impression and decided to clean the tops of the ceiling fan blades in the kitchen.  Note to self and cleaning ladies: I think it's probably better to ignore the tops of the ceiling fan blades, no matter how filthy and nasty.  For one thing, after years of duty the plastic coating tends to flake off when you scrub hard.  More important, when you scrub hard the whole damn ceiling fan may come loose from the ceiling and cascade down upon you, throwing sparks as the circuit shorts out.

Fortunately somebody caught the fan as it dangled from the ceiling on its cord, and I jerry-built a structure to hold it.  (Note how clean the tops of the blades are.  Too bad, all that elbow grease gone to waste.)

Now comes the unbelievably good part -- I called the electrician, who apparently was taking the afternoon off.  He said he could be there in an hour, and if we ran out to Home Depot and bought a new fan he could install it.  So within two hours of calling for help, we were back in business.  When's the last time you ever got service like that???

On the art front, I've been quilting this week; did two tops, all ready to bind or face (haven't decided exactly how to finish them).  I am pleasantly reminded how easy it is to quilt something that's only 30 inches square, compared to something more than 80 inches across. 

Here's my favorite miniature of the week, made from the thin, thin wires inside a cable from my old computer.  Between the computer and the fan I have enough interesting parts to make lots of future miniatures and assemblages.