Taking Shape

Packing is an art, I mused, as I filled box after box preparing for my move. And being an artist who enjoys challenges and puzzles not to mention organizing, I should be good at this. I'd saved some of the boxes from previous moves and was amused to find many labeled for the studio. Yes, I could pack very much as I had the last few moves in the very same boxes. The strategy included as much logic as possible so that things would be easier to locate on the other end, but as with any good puzzle, I found myself throwing out logic and organization to find odd pieces to fit odd spaces as the boxes filled up. And then my memory failed me as I struggled to remember what was in the bottom of the box once I was ready to close it up and label it. In many cases, my cryptic notations left me scratching my head as the movers asked where some of these boxes needed to go in the new place. So much for organization.

Suffice it to say, I arrived in my new digs with the unsettling realization I literally knew not where to put my finger to locate many of my belongings. It's been one surprise after another as I've gone on searches or randomly opened boxes or drawers. Oh look! So THAT'S where I stashed my pincushions and more...I really have no recollection of doing that.

This week has seen a lot of shoving and shuffling of furniture, boxes and bins in the new studio as I try to get it to the point where I can start some work. And my brain could not remember just where I stashed the batiks I bought in Rochester, one of which I want to use as background to the first piece I thought I wanted to start on. Yesterday, I shifted a bin and look - I found the box in question quite by accident. Am blanking on what the "triangle cutoff's project" is, though.

But while I am supposed to be focused on setting up the studio and starting that new art piece, this is what I paused to do instead. You may remember the hundreds of half-square triangle units I've prepared off and on over the years (see this post and this one for the technique), finally reaching the total I needed to piece together a reproduction quilt top in, oh my...2010. The shoebox where those units reside was one of the first things to take up residence on a closet shelf. It has been shouting rather loudly at me ever since I got the flannel up for my design wall. Hey - you gotta start somewhere, and this has been a nice warm-up to getting back into designing and creating. Now, if I just get a machine set up...