Obstacle: Word of the Day

 It was one of those days that I had anticipated getting right into it and getting this stage wet felted...at the very least to a nice sturdy felt and ready to full tomorrow, however, it was not in the cards!

It was raining...a beautiful sight here in California. No issue there. The thought of a latte on a rainy day before heading to my dark cold studio sounded like the best way to start. I was not the only one as the lot was full. I parked across the street at a restaurant that was closed only to get blocked in by their morning deliveries. Entirely my fault... so I waited 20 minutes for the guys to do their job in the rain and let me through. Note: my clock is an hour off ;o)

 Not a soul in my building so the guilt of the noise I was going to make with the next stage was nonexistent....Next stage? Noise, you ask?

Fibre ready, my first bucket containing 10 quarts of room temperature water...a squash of soap and I am ready to wet out.

 I put my mesh window screen over the fibre so they stay where I want while I apply the water. A bar of olive oil soap handy to add more as needed...Wetting out the entire piece took 3 hours and 35 quarts of water.

 I covered it with plastic as I wet out so that there would not be any evaporation as I was working and to keep some of the temperature from the cold room out.

The piece is now a wet soggy mess...and really to begin felting. with so much preparation and designing, getting to this stage is a real milestone and I was ready!!

Getting felt started or making felt at all with a sander is NOT normally in my practice. Not a fan as it is loud, dangerous and hard on the body. That said, getting it locked down for a few seconds each square inch will minimize my fibre shifting while rolling and save a little bit of time (or perhaps only a bit of control...which saves time in the end).

I have the perfect sander...in non-accessible storage (of course) so picked one up a couple of weeks ago. Only noting that it is the type with the dust intake today, on the day I need to use it (of course). A big mouth that works like a vacuum on a electrical appliance when you are using it in an unapproved manner with water...a shocking idea. Yes, I tried anyway and got a bit freaked out as water got sucked into the housing since I knew no one was there and no one would be checking on me.

 Of course in a small town, its all they have got at Home Depot. Amazon.com it is and, once again I am waiting.




My piece is wet, getting colder by the moment in my frigid studio. I covered it with plastic to keep it wet. I am tempted to roll it and begin felting without sanding but I am using this piece to calculate shrinkage of the other panels...if I don't sand this one, I cannot accurately calculate the others using the sander. Logistics, logistics...We will see if I decided to not use the sander at all and roll this thing up and get rolling. I am thinking that might be best.

Tomorrow is a new day, I will keep you posted.
Physical Hours today: 5
Tally: 26.5
Visit my site www.andrea-graham.com