Dark Dahlia

This post really started in the Fall when late blooming flowers such as dahlia's are in the gardens still.  They are so lush, and so colourful!  When we lived further south near Duncan here on Vancouver Island, there was a property by the main road where in the fall a table would appear with jars filled with fresh cut dahlias and a sign that said $4.00 a bunch. This invariably would go up in price as the years passed and the popularity of the flowers increased. I watched the dahlia beds get larger as root stock was divided down and new colour varieties added.

I liked to photograph them at their peak:

Then, in the summer of 2016 when we were heavily engaged in packing and getting ready to move, the lady gardener added a new colour that was stunning!   Sadly I didn't get a picture, or the flowers, before we moved.   I went on-line and looked at the various varieties available with a view of maybe adding some to our new gardens here.   I found this picture that is very close to the special one from the roadside garden. Her flower was a bit darker and not so tightly packed.

Sort of a cross between these two.  

I have woven colour gradations before in this colour range and also another project where I used four or five shades of blue. The Mac version of Fiberworks has this feature and I have played around with it  and its getting easier to create some interesting colour plays. So with the rich dark dahlia in mind I used 8/2 tencel in black, eggplant and red-purple (which I call magenta) and created this 16 shaft draft.  It looked fine both front and back.... another nice feature to use before committing yarn to the loom.

But.... there is no replacement for actual yarn on the loom!

It has the central glow I was looking for but it was overly dark and broody. Too much black.  I also had a problem with sleying the ends as I kept on missing dents and practically had to put a 'search light' on the reed to see what I was doing!  Seems darker cloudy days and a lack of natural light and a dark warp really don't go together well.

I only wove one repeat and there it sat while I tried to figure out how to redeem this problem child.  I went back to the draft and kept the threading the same, as its already in place, and tried different tie up's and different treadlings.    I removed all the old weft threads and then tried this draft below for the first scarf, using black as my weft again.  It has a better balance of plain weave and twill areas and so a better chance at being reversible and having the light play on the twill floats to show the pattern. Its still dark, but has the central glow I wanted like the flower.

On the second scarf I decided to use the eggplant colour as my weft. It worked well to soften the black areas, define the centre and pull it together. The colour shifts actually flow better.  I tried another treadling variation using the same tie up:

The pattern repeats are lengthy; well they are when your joints hurt, and so weaving went slowly for me. I have been having trouble with arthritis in my feet and last 'good' knee so had to take some off days to rest.  Its also a busy time of year so there have been many other domestic distractions!  🎄

I used my new 10 clip fringe twister I showed you last post on the finishing  of the scarves.   Did it save time?  Well, yes.  Setting up the bouts to the clips really takes the same amount of time overall, whether its four or ten, but only having to turn the clips for a total of five bouts of fringe is faster than only doing two. I'm glad I didn't get the 20 clip model as the angle of the ends would be too extreme.  It would be fine for someone doing blanket fringe or a project that is equally wide as the twister, but not for finer weaving.   I'm happy with it!  Its nicely made, smooth working and I like the handle end.  You can find it for sale here

Here's the first scarf on the fringing board with freshly twisted fringe flipped up as I worked along.   They were washed and pressed and then sat as we had day after day of heavy cloud, some wind and rain and no sign of the sun.  Lights on in the house even at midday.   What you need for a project like this is brighter natural light as the flash on the camera bleaches out the colours, creates 'hot spots' and generally makes things difficult to capture. 

So yesterday it brightened up and even a few rays of sunshine and I dashed for my camera!    They will have to do and if I still have them come spring, I will reshoot again in better daylight. 

I'm hoping the various pictures will show a better range of pattern and colours!

Then we have my personal favourite, the eggplant weft scarf.  I might just keep this one for me!

Thank you for being patient with me as my posts squeak in at a minimum lately. There are other projects to come  and are underway.  Its seems I'm not as fast a weaver as I was but hopefully the quality makes up for it!

For my long time readers who have followed along with the arrival of my grandchildren.... I present Ethan (age 7 1/2)  and Madison's (age 4 1/2)  2019 Christmas picture.  Don't let those cute faces fool you.... they both can 'kick butt' at Brazilian Jujitsu now.   🎄🎅🏻🎁

Blue Chameleon

I have been using stash yarns all year (so far) and I noticed that I must have six shades of blue, so I reached in and grabbed a cone and out came royal blue.   Its a rather intense brilliant blue.  It was also known as Lapis Lazuli and was quite rare; so rare that only royalty could wear it.  There is an amazing history of the colour, along with others, in this book: Colour: Journey through the Paintbox Colour.   It gives you the history behind all colours used for decorations, painting and jewellery.

I searched through my files and found this lovely, almost 3D effect pattern from handweaving.net  ##70110.  I modified it to create an edge border and tried it out in blue.

While not quite as brilliant a blue as the program,  the 8/2 tencel paired with black as weft produced a nice crisp design that is full reversible.  The treadling was easy to memorize and so it went along quickly.   

We had company for a week and from time to time I thought about my choices for the second scarf.  It had to be something equally bright ?   Opposites from the colour wheel? (which is orange)

This picture sort of threw me for a bit. I thought there was something wrong with the image but after carefully examining it, I realized that it was iridescence.... of a darker kind! There are some areas of plain weave within this twill and so the shadow effect is actually a black sheen where they interact.

We were having some incredibly bright sunshine but it bleached everything out so I resorted to shooting indoors and fighting with the flash instead.   These pictures should be enough to give you the diamonds versus leaf shapes, the sheen of the tencel, intensity of the blue and drape of the scarf.

... and with the sunshine pushing through, just how fine the cloth is.

For the second scarf I selected dark teal and at first I was disappointed.   I covered the portion of the black weft scarf that still showed on the cloth roll and took another long look.   The royal claimed the blue tones in the dark teal ..... and left behind a green!

Its also a more subtle effect where the light plays on the cloth and reveals the pattern and the melded mix of colour.   I liked it even more than the first scarf actually!   And like most favourites in a family, it had more pictures taken of it....

Yes, I will try this pattern again sometime; its a keeper!  Satisfying on many levels.....

The loom is already loaded for a pair of shawls again.... with a shawl commission to weave after that.  I had to order in yarns for the client, but everything else is from the stash.    I'm weaving slower as I'm also looking after hubby who had (very painful) spinal stenosis and is waiting to see a neuro-surgeon for a possible back operation.  Fair turn around as he looked after me through two surgeries in 2014 and 2015.  I've put my foot reconstruction surgery on hold for now.... which is another reason why I'm weaving slower!

Now, slow is not a word I would use around our two grandchildren! They are growing up so fast....

Ethan: April 2012

and now....

....getting his eleventh Brazilian jiujitsu  belt; age 6

Madison  March 2015

And now she is 3 1/2 and just had her first day of (play) school and loving it.

Merry Christmas!

I love the tall ship gliding calmly over the waters in all its glory.   Its lighting up the dark as we end the year.   Its been a frantic year filled with fires, floods, wars, mass migrations, and a planet in decline.......then there's the  malicious politicians who have worked to divide people physically, mentally and financially.

We need light to shine on dark things and we need calm waters ahead.   Take deep breaths and perhaps spend some time each day doing something quiet (may I suggest weaving?) and simply enjoy what you have. 

I would like to thank my readers for following along all through the year, and wishing you all a very Merry Christmas!

I'll close with a recent picture of our grandchildren who are growing up much too fast!

Ethan 5 1/2 and Madison 2 1/2 

Our Big Little Adventure

Waiting on the ferry and hubby took this picture of heron patiently waiting for a meal to swim by!

Heading to Vancouver and area and that's the island slipping away in the wake....  The ferry trip from Nanaimo to Tsawassen terminal is two hours. (We had reservations for both trips and it was a good thing as they were sold out)   The drive from Campbell River to Nanaimo is two hours also.... plus an hour once we reach the other side (if the traffic is good)  So five hours all told, one way.  

This was our view from our hotel window. Beneath all that cloud and smoke are the Golden Ear Mountains.   It didn't smell smokey from all the provincial interior forest fires (plus south in Washington, Montana and Oregon) but the visibility was very poor.  You are aware that's fine particles in the air you are breathing. 

On Friday we found the chalk faeries had been at work and we found this greeting out front!  Grandad took a picture in the dark and good thing he did too, because the next day it was all gone with the rain.

Madison is two and a half.... and all girl!

Ethan is five and a half and just started kindergarten, plus is in ju-jitsu three times a week.

Grandad got busy with the camera and got some great pictures of them separately and together.

That's her little vacuum but he knows she can't make a fuss while the pictures are being taken. She carried it around to keep it away from him and I think I saw it going upstairs to bed later as well. 

Then she had to show us her "Miss Ooh La La" outfit. 

We also like to have our hair do played with and have 'piggies' added.  Just sweep up a bunch of hair and secure it with a small rubber band.  Did I mention she's two and a half? 

Well she sure melted Grandad's heart!  She showed us all her dollies and coloured pictures with him: "Grandad, make a picture of a bird pooping on my brudder's head".... so he did!

I really enjoyed some one on one time with Ethan while she was napping and we talked cars, kindergarten and watched videos of him as a baby.  He sat still with me for almost an hour!  He's a high energy boy.

Then it was all over and time to come home.  Ferry ride home yesterday and then driving up island singing mostly on key and loudly to Freddie Mercury and Queen songs.

Today?  well that would be laundry, and after four days in a kennel, steering Calli into a bath to freshen up.

I was, and will be continuing, to wind some warps, carry on with the small project on the Spring loom  and mentally bracing myself for the crown prep work to come later this week at the dentist.

Fall is coming on fast here and we are starting to think of the end of season clean up in the yard and garden.    Oh, did I tell you that we plan to have the inside of the house painted?  Yeah, that's later this month and they will do the studio first.    Doesn't that sound like fun? 😳

Well, That Didn't Go According to Plan

So things were going well and then Bruce came down sick with a cold and cough.  Three days later, I got a sniffle.... then a sore throat and the cough came on.  There were two weeks where I coughed my way from day to day.  I sat up in a chair to sleep some nights and other nights Bruce slept in the chair to escape my coughing (where I sounded like a barking seal.)

There was a third week where we felt well enough to be functional but very tired.  We actually took naps  sometime planned.... and some others just snuck up on us when we took a break.  I've never had that happen before!   I'm still coughing but not as much.   It just doesn't want to leave me....

There is an additional problem for me.  The week before the cold and cough hit me, I got a tooth ache and took antibiotics for an abscess and booked a time for a root canal with a new dentist.   Well, you can't do one of those for two hours and have a bad cough..... so the appointment was moved to April.
 That was okay until this past Friday when the tooth woke up again and so now I'm back on the antibiotics again.

There was NO weaving for at least three weeks. I had zero interest and we found that we both were too tired to focus on things.   Eventually, we have slowly come back to life and some lovely sunny days really helped cheer us up.  We have made plans for the garden tidy up, what needs pruning, replacing and maybe even new patio furniture?    Now the rains have returned but it was sunshine enough to know its spring and we'll be back in the sunshine again soon.

Life has gone on around us and very nicely left us alone while we were sick.  I have been weaving two concept shawls  (both the same) and have one finished but not pressed and the other is just as it came off the loom. So they need to be completed and photographed for show and tell.  This is all I can give you for now.

Just as I completed the first shawl, I received a request to weave a special shawl for a client who has three weddings in May. So I got busy winding a warp and here we have 700 ends  of 10/2 tencel being beamed this past week.  Weft will be ivory silk.

So sleying is well under way and then a 12 shaft tie up to be done...therefore nothing to show you there yet.    I sold two of the four recent table runners, and two kitchen towels to one weaver, and also a silk scarf to another weaver!  This must the kindest compliment a weaver can get.  😊   Then I got another commission to weave two silk scarves for Christmas 2017 gifts (so no great hurry)!  So I had better shake off my cough and fix this %$#&  tooth  and get BUSY!

Other fibre news:    I bought some 30/2 silk in what I thought was a clear red or a little to the blue side.   Nope!   Its a rich red with an orange undertone and I will use it. Its a lesson in not trusting pictures on computer screens.    So this....

..... was actually this upon arrival :

The picture doesn't do the depth of shade justice.... its lovely, but not what the client wants for a red. 

The next  bit of news is one of those "special person",  and a "special moment" kind of thing. I frequent (mainly lurk) at some Ravelry weaving groups and follow along. One is a page where people reveal their finished projects and do some show and tell. One weaver, also named Susan, posted about her newly finished  turned taquette towels and I was quite struck by them.  I cheekily suggested she could mail one to me and asked if she would like my new address?   Susan said YES!   I said I was only kidding and she said she wasn't.    Oh, my!

So  big thank you to Susan in Staunton, Virgina!  Its not going to be used as a towel of course and will be in my studio. Fully reversible and impeccably woven on her Glimakra.... and with hand sewn hems!

I was caught a bit short of full sized towels to do an exchange but I did have one guest towel left in the huck lace diamond pattern from this older post and she liked it very much!  I wish you could feel how soft this towel is. Susan used 10/2 American Maid cotton from Lunatic Fringe.   If the dollar ever goes to par again, I would order some and give it a try myself.

Birthdays came and went....  Bruce turned his odometer one more turn, but we were both too sick to do much other than to write a rain check for a better time for his birthday dinner and cake.  

I must say that he did a fine job of  celebrating my recent birthday with me and I had a lovely day and received many calls from family and friends.   But we both agree that the numbers are starting to pile up and there are moments when when you find yourself wondering "where the heck all the time went!!"  I thought it would take far longer to get old. 

Another birthday at the opposite side of the age spectrum is this little cutie patootie, our grand daughter Madison who just turned two. 

I love phone calls with her as she says "hi Nana"..... and then tells me all about everything!

Ethan will be five in April and is very much an active boy and into all the boy toys. Here he is last week helping Dad at a pin ball conference. He's pretty good at it!   That's also the most stationary I have seen him as he's usually a blur!

Well, this post is a mixed bag of news and such and hopefully I will have things back on track for more show and tell and weaving related.   I'm hoping to show you my birthday present to myself as well.  I have a new traveling spinning wheel on order and on its way to me.

I have a lovely Majacraft wheel at home but its heavy and a bit bulky for taking to spinning days at the guild. I also worry about it getting bumped and banged around being lugged around so haven't bothered with it except at home.   So I researched my light weight travel options, took a look at my well made Louet looms and went with the 6.5 pound  Louet Victoria wheel (and carry bag)

It comes in either beech (shown) or oak and I won't know until it gets here!