Final Push

Well my carefully planned production schedule wasn’t so well planned. This is the final week before one of my largest Shows of the year, Bad Girls of the North, which opens Friday (tomorrow) from 4-9 and is also on Saturday from 10-5 at the Millennium Hotel in Anchorage. I had counted on having 5 final days of production this week but tomorrow (my fifth day) is needed for set-up –DOH! I scrambled a bit and am working evenings but I think I’ll be able to fit all of my want-to-dos in. Mainly, I wanted to be able to have enough of the special request items at the show that customers have asked for including “Steel Wool” garden sheep. I managed to make two babies, and oh and are they cute! After they’re done I always want to keep these guys for myself. I also wanted to make up enough of the Raven Garden Flags to at least fill the requests I’ve had. The sewing

task had my studio looking like a full-fledged northern sweat shop. I’ve learned I’m not very good at repetitive tasks…not a good trait when you have multiples of things to make. I do try and bend my mind around doing the same thing over and over by surrounding myself with my favorite mug of tea, listening to good music and saying this work suits me much better than a cubicle job. Doing the repetitive task thing also had me a bit worried this week as I’ve been (over) thinking that I will never be employable in a traditional day job ever again and I’d better quit feeling sorry for myself living the up and down life as a full-time artist.

With the heavy production load I desperately needed to make a run to the metal recyclers. The shot of the truck is at the tail end of my load. Thank goodness Daddy-O helped me stuff all of my scrap in the back on a tarp. I use Alaska Metal Recyclers on King Street. That’s also where I buy my copper wire by the pound –a good resource for other artists living in Anchorage. Speaking of Daddy-O, he is taking a personal day tomorrow and helping me set-up Bad Girls! I dread set-up and take down of ANY show and with Willie in Vegas celebrating his big-boy birthday I was short on muscle. Now, with my sweetie helping me I’m going to pretend we’re on a daytime date and it should actually be fun to set-up!