Alright, the Fiber Feast show is over. I saw so many beautiful things, beautifully made. It was fun, and worth going. It was a learning experience. But I keep forgetting how good it feels to make what I want, and who cares if anyone else wants it. Periodically, I decide my work should pay for itself, and I go off on a saleable-items-making binge. Which is always a bad idea. And one I can't help but relearn every so often. So, I will try to remember my goal is to find my own way, do my own thing. Do not let the lure of possible sales direct me to a series that does not feed my urge to interpret the puzzle in my head, in tangible form. But instead just leads me to create a mess.
When I had to force myself to work last year, and turned out 36 sunflower quilts, because I could not allow me to do nothing, it was difficult even to enter my sewing room. Sewing one thing every day was both the most I could do, and the least. It broke the great resistance I had developed, by limiting the task with very defined rules. I could only make a sunflower, it was always 12"sq., and I could only use fabrics I could reach from my cutting table. None of my stash was allowed, only scraps and leftovers. I could not take a thing off my fully stocked shelves, lest I dither about the fabric, and lose the opportunity to work. I learned a lot doing that. Apparently repetition and discipline is the way I learn best.
Now I need to learn it is of no value to make a thing only for sale. It has to solve a problem, present a challenge, answer a question, experiment with a technique, try a new combination, satisfy a hunger. Not leave me wondering why I made it. Hope I can learn that in one year.