Thing-a-day.com

So we bought this amazing piece of property, ten acres, two years ago with the plan to build in a few years. It is in the north Georgia Mountains, on a ridge surrounded 360 degrees by mountains. Our entire north view (which is what you want in the south) is protected. It’s less than 1/4 mile from a scenic overlook. Magical place.

Problem is no house plan worked for us and it. So, as usual, I did it myself. Started from scarth three times to get it right. My plan has been vetted by a house designer and most every detail has been researched and decided, so tomorrow we are meeting with the builder to give him a fat package of plans, photos, drawings, etc. so he can cost it out.

The design part has been full of elation and dread (”How the heck am I going to figure out a window plan?”) creative highs and paralysis. But I’ve been there done that so many times in my life (cried during breaks when I filmed my first TV show, “What made me think I wanted to do this?” a number of awards later and many hours of taping I’m so glad I forged through the scariness.) that I bit the bullet and kept going. No nial had been struck yet, I figured.

 It’s funny though how everything distills itself into the same thing. I am a quilt designer, with 30 books to my credit. I have stopped saying it to those who know me, but truly everything comes down to designing and making a quilt. The inspiration comes. You make a first sketch, rehearse fabric, stop, start, backwards, forwards. then start sewing. it goes along swimmingly and then you get stuck. You leave it on your design board and walk by it for days, “Please tell me what you want to be?” It does; you just have to be patient and open to it, and trusting. Sound familiar? Everything in life is like making a quilt.

And the more you exercise that creative muscle the better you get at it. (Thing-a-day!)

Although, then you step out on another limb and wobble precariously. Like having the nerve to design a house.

Here are the plan and supporting materaiss, plus my mockups for the stairs and cabinet handles all ready to go to the builder tomorrow. And the quilt–still in prgress as is the house design. The quilt has been my way of letting the house speak.

P.S. Appropriately enough, the center of the house is an aviary.

This weekend I was determined to do nothing but work on our house plan so we can deliver it to the builder by my self-imposed deadline of March 1. Designing a house from scratch and putting all the details into a coherent form on paper is a huge undertaking. especially for one who has never done such a thing. (The nerve!) We’re looking for a good, solid preliminary price, then we’ll get a real house designer to make real plans. The task here is to find out if this thing costs X, 2X or 10X!

Between the living room and dining room of our house will be a bar area on the LR side and a serving counter on the DR side. Over the back of the bar/serving area will be lit open wood shelves. In the bar we have a curved tiled (I’ll paint the tiles) counter on the bar, with the back bar having our Kegerator (I make beer), a sink, beverage center, and counter. Saturday I finished up in the floor plan and worked out the detailed sheets that are below. As I said, I did nothing but work on the house this weekend (and excercise and make a fabulous pumpkin shrimp bisque and veal picatta) so I am tardy in posting this.

I included in the picture a photo of our front door, a window seat that will be in the kitchen, and the NE side of the house (studio below and DR above, and bedroom above that) that I’ve designed in Plan3d.

This would have been my Feb 23rd post.

Today I worked on the cabinet layout for the kitchen for our new house in preparation for next week’s visit with a cabinet supplier. We’ve designed this house from scratch so, it’s amazing to have preliminary plans in hand. Now we’re working on every detail so our prospective builder can give us a price. Yikes!

While I’ve designed the house in 3D software complete with an substantial amount of detail and the ability to walk through the house, quilts are my design medium: I work out my thinking in fabric. To me it’s all about how this house will feel and the best way for me to visualize and express this is to make things. Therefore, I sketched up a rough for my House Inspiration Quilt a few days ago.

The idea for the backgroud is to arrange horizontal strips of fabric depicting the forest in which our house will live, starting with the browns and beiges of the leaf litter floor, up through the canopy and the mountain behind to the sky. I will applique branches and birds over the pieced background. Our house will sit on a high ridge between two mountains, so the strips will give that sense of loft. (At least that’s the plan!)

There was no discussion in my head as to what fabrics to use. BATIKS of course! Here’s the pile I pulled out of my batik stash to use in the quilt.

Today’s task was to make a pieced strip. I glued three pieces of newsprint together along their 8 1/2″ edges. I then cut strips of fabric about 9-11″-wide and started paper piecing them. Here’s how the first strip came out all trimmed up.

My 20-minutes were up (I fudged a little since it took time to take pictures and I chronicled the process in more detail for a later how-to on my blog) but I kept going and made another strip with darker browns and golds and some green, to be the bottom row of the quilt. I am extremely pleased with how it’s coming along!

But I realized my stash is lean on blue batiks so I placed an order with Hancock’s of Paducah to replenish my stock.

I love to make things!