Brrrrrr! Blustery day here in north Georgia!

No, not the snowfall that's happening to the north and northeast of here but enough to keep me in the house and not at the studio today!

Big black walnut outside as seen from an upstairs window.

View across the back yard toward the studio (the little house at the left).

I've been keeping busy here at the house as I'm working my way through the first month of 2016 in this year's tapestry diary.  I mentioned my plan of action in an earlier post.  Here's where I am today and I should be able to finish it tomorrow--in my month-long time limit.

The image of the black walnut coming out of its hull... based on the photo I'd taken a few weeks ago and barely visible at the lower right behind the weaving.  The painting from the photo is clipped at the back of the warp as reference.  The darks within the hull and the nut are very close in value and hard to photograph, I notice.  They're more apparent when seeing the actual piece.  The colors below and to the sides of the image are the record of the days that have passed.  Each day of the year will be woven with its own bit in bands, squares, or rectangles of color.  Although you can't see it in the photo there's a metallic thread incorporated with yesterday and today's entries--representing the snow and sleet we've been having.

I had a wonderful visit from Rebecca Mezoff earlier in the week.  She'd been in Atlanta to teach a workshop for the Chattahoochee Handweavers Guild and I invited her to stay a couple of days afterwards.  I picked her up on Monday and then on Tuesday we did a driving tour of some of my favorite places in the area.

We first stopped in Clarkesville at Grace-Calvary Church where Pat Williams' beautiful tapestry kneelers are installed.  You can see the individual kneeler tapestries at Pat's website at this link--scroll down through the commissions to see them near the bottom. Here's Rebecca taking a look at those:

We drove on north and visited the Lillian E. Smith Center near Clayton where we took a walk around the grounds and peeked into the buildings.  Next we had lunch at Grapes and Beans and then on to Hambidge Center.  It was a beautiful sunny (and chilly) day as we drove across the mountain to Brasstown to visit the John C. Campbell Folk School.  Too bad there wasn't a weaving class going on but we were able to peer into the weaving studio through the window of the door.  After walking around and stopping in the craft shop we headed south toward Dahlonega.  On the way we drove by to see the petroglyphs at Track Rock Gap near Young Harris.  I gave Kathe Todd-Hooker a similar tour a few years ago... here's a link back to a blog post about that jaunt.  Seems the slide shows I had at that post aren't showing now--think I changed some settings in my flicker or picassa account... will have to look for those, I guess. 

Rebecca wrote about her Georgia trip at her blog posts here and here.  Thanks for coming to the South, Rebecca!  We hope to see you again in the future--for a longer visit.  And maybe an artist residency at LES Center or Hambidge will be in your plans in the next year or so!