Monday, January 9, 2012

Time Traveller

Our family spent a wonderful two weeks in Thailand over the Christmas holidays.  Between preparing for the trip, enjoying the trip, and then recovering from the trip, I've been away from the blog world for awhile.  I have barely begun to look at my photos, let alone play with them, but I will share one now just in time to link up with Texture Tuesday over at Kim Klassen's cafe.  It was processed with three layers of her "Embrace" texture (two in color burn @100% and one in soft light @100%):

Reclining Buddha at Doi Suthep Temple, near Chiang Mai
We had a wonderful time exploring Thailand, and discovered that the Thai people are some of the most heart-centered in the world... there was a palpable sense of kindness and compassion that can only come from their strong Buddhist faith.  The food was incredibly delicious, too:  imagine, Thai food three times a day!!!  I especially enjoyed my holiday from Western breakfasts, and ate nothing but soup, noodles and rice in the morning instead of cereal, eggs or toast.  

On another note, I did have a shopping mission, too: I was constantly on the lookout for interesting fabric to use for quilting.  Here is some of what I found:
cotton

cotton 

hand-dyed hemp
hand-dyed and printed indigo on cotton
a rainbow of silks -- the fun part was that the solid colors only cost about $10-$13 per yard

hand woven silk in a traditional pattern 
ikat pattern in silk
Jet lag from Thailand is miserable, though.  There is a 12 hour time difference between Connecticut and Bangkok -- that's about as much as you can get!  We've been home almost a week now, and I think we are just about back to our usual sleep schedule; I tell you, it's no fun waking up at 3 am, raring to go, and falling asleep over dinner at 6....

Here is one of the first pieces I made for my new online class with Jane Davies on "Exploring the Self-Portrait." Jet lag does a number on you, alright -- I never noticed that I gave myself a beard, until I loaded this photo onto the class blog.
I hope to be back to normal next week!

12 comments:

nancyjean said...

wow it sounds like you had a wonderful adventure...lucky you! great photo and processing.

Teresa said...

What a marvellous trip and those fabrics are beautiuf . .and I love the edit you've done for TT . . .Teresa x

johanna said...

i envy you... these fabrics! but i´m sure you will show us a lot of great pictures in the next time.

Evelyn S. said...

Oh, the beautiful richness and color of your photos is just wonderful! What a fascinating place to visit!

brenda said...

Love the burn effect on Kim's texture in that photo. And that silk fabric?...wow!

The Artful Diva said...

The fabrics are luscious - and I really like your self-portrait - well done!

Cedar said...

Oh, Thailand would be a beautiful place to explore...worth the jet lag. Your texture work is just perfect for that image! Well done!

Nadege, said...

The fabrics are so beautiful.
Great texture work.

Sharon said...

Stunning colors! Looks like a wonderful trip!

Kia said...

Stunning fabrics, wow! Love your photos and your texture work, Kathleen!
What a wonderful adventure you had over the holidays :)

A Creative Grace said...

I love these pics! Wonderful colours and the texture in the first really works well.

Cathy Spivey Mendola said...

What a great adventure you must have had! Love your contribution to TT. Great photo made even better with the textures. Really envious of the lovely fabrics also!
And even with the beard your self portrait is wonderful.