Change in renovation plans!

With the recent rains from Irene and Lee and the age (and permeability) of our foundation, we've decided that perhaps the basement is NOT the best place for my studio. We are now working on some other options for a creative space that will work for a longarm quilting machine, sewing and cutting tables, dyeing fabric, beading, garment design, and a few other things!
In the meantime, I spent this last Saturday at the Adirondack Museum in Blue Mountain Lake with my fellow ARTAA (Adirondack Regional Textile Artists' Alliance) members for the museum's annual festival celebrating the fiber arts. The theme for our display challenge was "Bugs" and my entry is below: The Renaissance Fly. As part of the curatorial staff working in a fine arts museum (The Hyde Collection), I thought I should add an art historical twist to my piece.

I used Bubble Jet to prep white Kona cotton to print the background (scans of Leonardo da Vinci's sketches) and the eyes of the fly. The eye sections have Mona standing by with a fly swatter (inserted with Adobe Photoshop) in case the pesky rascal bothers her during her portrait sitting! Had a great time adding details with thread painting, chenille and silk threads, and Derwent Inktense pencils. 

Working on a layout for my upcoming reno for a new studio/workspace

Working towards retirement, I'm pricing out a renovation to our basement, including digging out the south side and adding two nice windows there while keeping the old cast iron radiators that are there now. The space will be about 25' square with a few support columns in the center. (Nearly 4x the room I have now!)
Will start cleaning it up and post pics on the progress. Looking at a laminate floor, IKEA cabinets and computer station for the laptop & scanner, and cutting/ironing stations. A seating area for friends and family, bookshelves (for research and development days), and a long-arm quilting machine eventually. I've drawn out the floor plan and have Post-It note cutouts for the major pieces of furniture so they can be moved around.

Any and all suggestions are welcomed!

2012 Quilting Arts Calendar

Sorry to say that Katie-Klepto was not a finalist for the Quilting Arts 2012 Calendar...but I'll try again next year! This was my first attempt at this much thread painting on my own...and I learned a lot on this project. Here is the finished 12" x 12" wallhanging and a detail. I used hand-dyed fabrics and batiks from my stash, rayon threads in Katie colors, beads, scanned the notions and printed them on fabric treated with Bubble-Jet, and machine quilted. I have it hanging in my sewing room now...

How many projects can you work on at once?

Feeling a little splintered right about now with a number of projects I need to finish...and some more I want to start! Several quilts need to be quilted for our guild's quilt show in June, but there's also a smaller quilt - the one in the last post that needs a "granite" fabric. Collecting the materials for that has been fun - a friend even gave me a medium that has mica flakes in it to use as a top layer once the fabric is printed! Does anyone else have this problem...or is it just because I'm a Gemini? Having the Monday holiday off from work offers the possiblity of an extended period in the basement painting fabric on a plastic-covered pool table - here's to "play time!"