Anticipation!

Its been three years and a month since our Airedale terrier Calli died suddenly.  Our hearts were so broken by her loss since she was only eight years old.     We weren't ready for another dog for a long time, but we also knew that getting another would also take time so we put our name down onto a long list.

The first litter turned out to be a false pregnancy, complete with swollen tummy.

The second litter was all boys.... and we had requested a girl.

The third try didn't take at all...no pups again.

So this time we were first up for Airedale terrier pups and  Irish terrier pups. We also said girl first, but will take a boy too.   So basically hedging our bets!

So the Airedale mum had another false pregnancy.....but the Irish mum had seven pups on July 17th.  Six girls and one boy....

So here's Mum Sienna having a well earned rest shortly after her  delivery.    One of these little nuggets is our new pup!     Homing starts mid to late September.  

We have a lot of shopping to do to get ready!

Yes, this is seriously going to get in the way of weaving for a time, but that's probably a good thing.

🍼🐶🍼

The Ripple Effect

I was craving more colour!  I have this fabulous painted warp from Iridescent Fibers called "Desert Vista" in my stash and decided to  beam this 204 end / 7 yard warp onto the Megado.   I added additional small borders of red purple, black and coral to the edges.

You can see my start of this project above with red purple as weft and it was fun to watch the changes as you wove through the grape, terracotta and copper.    The picture below is of the warp chain.  Such deep rich tones and smooth feathered transitions.

I didn't get a picture of the second scarf once under way. This time I used dark teal as weft and it produced a chameleon !  The terracotta became bright orange!   In fact, you would be hard pressed to say that these two scarves came from the same warp.  Its simply astounding...

Edit: I found this picture on line that demonstrates the colours of Nature and  they are all found in this scarf!   No idea where this is, but doesn't it look wonderful.....

Stunning Sunset Turks and Caicos Islands

Photo by: @waterproject [IG]

Here's the red purple (magenta) weft and I have tried my best to get decent pictures. My Mac screen really doesn't seem to like reds and red tones so I hope it shows okay on your screen.   Its deeply rich and the pattern more subtle, but no doubt about it, its full glorious colour!

Now, about the draft.... Its a 16 shaft straight draw, with a twill progression treadling.  It produces these lovely curves that ebb and flow like ripples on the beach or in the flames of a burning fire. It comes from a compilation CD of 4,000 twill drafts, called Thrilling Twills from Fiberworks some years ago.  They were designed by Ingrid Boesel, who has now sadly passed on.

Its a lovely effect and I know that I will weave this again sometime. I will also play with the treadling and see what variations I can come up with.  A program like Fiberworks makes  this possible and you can even see the back side of the cloth and check for float lengths!  I like to doodle with things like this and it beats the heck of endless scrolling on FB.   😳

🌺🌺🌺

I had a conversation with a new weaver (3-5 years along into her lifelong study!) and she asked me some interesting questions.   She wanted to know what little things I do to help make my weaving process runs smoother,  and how do I organize myself and my materials.     

I had to stop and really think about this for a time. To make a conscious note of the steps I take daily which have become automatic and trusted.

So here are some that have come to mind, and by all means are not complete. I hope to make changes to the way I do things when I discover a better way of doing something.  (disclaimer: I do have a natural tendency to being well organized.) None of these are the right way or wrong, just what simply works for me.   Maybe for you too?

• Green painters tape:  I have a couple of 1"width rolls of this tape in the studio. Its like a pair of extra hands. 

• Wide rubber bands.... broccoli bands in fact!  I use them to place on the treadles that are pivot points in a treadling. My feet 'feel' them and I know where I am in the treadling.  I also used them around the foot controller for my bobbin winder, sewing machine and serger. It stops them from sliding around. 

• a cone of fine seine twine cord: I use it for choke ties, lace on the lease sticks etc. Its my preferred cord as its fine, tough and has some 'bite' to the cord so ties stay tied.

• I always lace on a warp now. It started to save warp on expensive fibres such a silks, then it was the best method for slippery warps as tencel and bamboo.  I like that fact I can use all of the loom waste, except for a small knot, for fringes on scarves. Yarn is expensive  so every bit helps. I also hate fighting tying over hand knots and having them loosen up as I go and having to re-tie them again and again.  

• I always beam my looms back to front. 

• Two Stick Start:  this is a relatively new addition to my repertoire. A friend showed this method on FB a year or two ago and I gave it a try. Now its a regular part of my routine.    At the start of a new project, open the shed and use some scrap yarn roughly the same size of the warp yarn. Do three shots into three sheds in a row and then beat to close all three together. You can redo this another time to close the warp bouts.   Then open a shed and insert a warping stick that is wider than the project. Open another shed and insert a second stick. Then redo the three shots, and possibly a second time. You should have a nicely closed up warp, flat and a firm start. No spongey corners, no gaps. Best of all.... useable warp for fringes or a great starting point for a runner or towel.    See it shown at this older post.

• Small Note Pad:  keep a small note pad in your bench or on top of your loom and write *everything* down.  How many repeats did you do for your border? how long is the fringe allowance? how many ends for your hemstitching?

• Further to the note pad: I don't like dealing with a pinned ribbon or tape for recording weaving length so I measure and mark with a simple cord of scrap yarn. So my note pad is also a record of how long my weaving is, plus its a daily record of how much is woven in a given session, plus you can mark your start and stop time if you like. 

• Camera:  I have a digital camera handy in the studio and I always take a picture of my start of a new project. It shows me what I did so I can replicate it in reverse at the other end!  The picture will also show you where the mistakes are in your threading far better than trusting your eyes to see it.  Even better when you send it to a friend and they tell where they are!  🤣

• Project notes:  record keeping starts when you did your project planning.  You will have worked out the width, the length,  the sett, the yarns, the colours used, your loom waste and take up.  Also allow for a sample. It only takes a few inches.    I budget 12 inches to every project.   Sometimes as things weave along, you either run short or have extra and so can't weave a sample or  you have enough for a whole extra towel or table square instead.  That's where a photograph will become your sample.  Have the project notes handy and nearby as a reference. *more on this later*

• I always move from taking a project off the loom straight into finishing mode.  A scarf goes right to my fringing board, a runner goes straight into hemming.  I take my time with this as the finish is equally important as the weaving.  I have no piles of unfinished objects.  No exceptions. 

• I clean off my loom immediately, vacuum and dust thoroughly and beam it again right away.   Yarns are put away, bobbins emptied, notes and records filed. 

• I plan a project and wind a new warp for a loom while the current project is being woven. I will even have several warps all pre-wound, complete with notes for each. 

• I recommend spending time organizing your stash either by fibre type, yarn size or what ever works for you. It means you can reach for a cone of yarn when you need it, know where your strengths and weakness lay and you can shop accordingly. Find hidden treasures too!  Regularly go through your books, equipment and stash.... down size  if need be.

• Lastly (for now at least), if you were to walk into my studio today you would find no piles, no mess, no unfinished projects, the yarns are organized, projects notes and samples stored in binders as my 'body or work'. The current project on the loom has the project notes on the desk. A weaver should be able to sit down at either of my looms and finish them for me, and one day someone may have to do this for me.    

I have helped with the dismantling of a weaver's looms, yarns and equipment over the years and have come away with a firm conviction that my friends won't find a disaster  to deal with when  I'm gone.   They will find a sizeable stash, books and such plus looms but it will make sense once they have taken a closer look.   To this end I keep re-evaluating what I need and moving items on, buying only what I need .....and enjoying what I have. 

There is a ripple effect to all of this.....

🎁 Towels for the Times

There is an awful lot going on in the World right now and frankly, not much of it is good. I guess that's why many weavers are doing just that... weaving, or spinning.   

Counting our blessings where we find them.   

In the evenings we find ourselves watching movies and seeing people in them all gathered together for meals,  concerts and wonder at it all.  People hugging one another and walking side by side.  We took such simple things for granted.

Its almost like someone did open up Pandora's Box and let the demons out!

I started winding this warp  in the 'before times'. Ten yards of  soft,  nice quality Egyptian cotton.  It was in my stash as a large three pound cone, along with another three pound cone of black. Not entirely sure where I bought it but its lovely. (I think it was Lone Star Loom Room.)

The idea behind this warp was to simply sit and weave  and enjoy the process. Listen to music or podcasts or just the silence.   Then the pandemic hit and we  stayed inside our homes and the choice to use bright cheerful colours as weft really made sense to me to help lift spirits.   Little dancing boxes. 

I wish I could share the soft lofty feel of these towels. You can see how squishy they are!
Grape, creamsicle, honey, and key lime.

Then there are the blue cool tones: bubblegum, peacock, blueberry and raspberry.

Towel number nine was created from having left over yarn on many pirns. So I created a colour way that worked together to use them up.  I call this one Candy Mix..... but it easily could be called "All colours under the sun matter".   This towel  is winging its way to my daughter as she is trying to work out what colour to paint her kitchen so something in this one will work!  😁  🌈

The 16 shaft draft was sett at 24 epi and they were woven to 35 inches. Width in the reed was 24 inches.  After a small turned hem they measure  21 wide by 28 inches long. So a fair amount of shrinkage.   The threading is a point twill and so is the treadling; all the pattern is in the tie-up.

A couple with the hem flipped to show the other side, which is equally nice. Boxes again, or if you look at them with a tilt of the head, there is almost a Celtic like intertwining.  If I had woven two towels in each colour, I would have turned one towel the opposite way and so they would be a nice set.   Maybe next time....

Here's the draft from Handweaving.net that I used showing two repeats of the treadling.   The draft is our road map to a successful project, along with some 'local knowledge'.

Maybe that's why everyone is feeling so discombobulated right now? There's no clear road map to a goal. Life feels on hold and if things are opening up again, it feels weird.   

So perhaps the little daily personal successes mean so much more right now. 

Some lovely peonies from a friend's garden.... and left on our front doorstep as a gift.   Huge blossoms and so lush.  The white ones were especially fragrant.   Thank you Donna! 💞

Inspired by Nature

A view of a coastal region somewhere on Earth as viewed from the International Space Station.

Maupiti, in the French Polynesian Islands

Kalamalka Lake, and Rattlesnake Point, near Vernon, BC, Canada

Maligne Lake, with Spirit Island, Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada

So with these natural beauties in mind, I  have this warp from Iridescent Fibers  in my stash that they call "Across the Universe."   

I had this 8 shaft crackle draft that showed great potential!   The white sections in the draft are where the painted warp would go, along with a soft gold and dark teal tencel borders. Its rather difficult to translate a diverse painted warp to colours in a weaving draft.

From the initial start of weaving, I was very pleased with the results! I used dark teal as my weft colour on the first scarf. On the second scarf I used the colour azure which is a medium bright blue. 

Finally they were woven and final finishing completed. Yesterday I took "Judy" outside into the garden for a photoshoot. It was a lovely day with a breeze blowing, so you might notice the fringe looks like its moved or the bottom of the scarf as ballooned out a bit.

So the next three images are of the scarf woven with dark teal as my weft. Its difficult to get the colours shown to their best advantage  as depending on the light, the  camera settings, and your computer screen.... it changes colour!   Its quite the chameleon!

I call this scarf Kalamalka Lake as we used to live nearby to it and go and dabble our toes in this gorgeous coloured water in the summer.

********************************

Now, all the pictures below the line of asterisks are of the scarf woven with the azure blue weft

The greens are still there but more subtle now.   I call this scarf "Blue Lagoon" after all the beautiful atolls and coral reefs in the south Pacific.  I was lucky to walk a beach like that near Fiji many years ago as a 14 year old wondering how the water got to be that colour.

I also took some pictures of our snap dragons and irises in full bloom. Its such a lovely time in the gardens right now with all the flowers and all the greenery out and looking lush.    Our back yard has a few nests and lots of babies (who are as large as the parents) running behind them begging for food.   We had a baby robin sitting on our front doorstep who clearly was too young to have left the nest.  His or her feathers were just coming in and the poor thing had no tail feathers at all.    I sure hope it makes it!

Weaving in the studio is carrying on at a leisurely pace as both looms have ten yard warps under way.  I have been taking advantage of the better weather to open up the French doors and sit outside and keeping busy oiling some of my wooden tools for their annual spruce up, which is only three years late!  Oops...    My warping mill looks brand new again.    I've decided that once the warp is off the Louet Spring, that loom is getting a tune up and resetting of shafts and lamms.  Something is a bit off and I'm not enjoying the weave as much.  Its been 12 years since I got it brand new so its well overdue for the overhaul.

I hope you continue to be safe out there..... the virus hasn't gone away.  😳   Not yet anyhow....

All in Good Time ⏰

It would appear that some things in Life simply can't be rushed.  They evolve " in the fullness of time".    Okay, I get that and can even appreciate it.

But this project borders on the ridiculous!

I wound this ten yard warp  four years ago just before we moved in 2016. I thought it would be great to put a nice long towel warp on the Megado and weave off some kitchen towels.   It was tucked away in a box and forgotten until I found it in January.   The project notes were long lost and so I sat and counted every last warp end to see what I had to play with.  I also wondered what was in my head by using this heavy cream beige colour! It doesn't easily pair with much..... but I soldiered on.

I played with some drafts at Handweaving.net, which by the time they made it to the actual warp on the loom, didn't thrill me very much.  The pattern was too diffuse, no clarity to it, or too intensely busy.  So the threading remained the same as it was already in place and I 'borrowed' tie up's from other drafts to see what I could come up with.   

I got this below and I liked it. 

It somehow reminded me of hardanger embroidery.   All was going well until the dobby died on me. Repairs were impossible as it contains all 1990's technology bits and pieces that no one can even get spare parts for anymore.  So there was a delay for a new refurbished dobby from Louet to arrive and set up.  (See older post for details)

Weaving resumed and just in time for a medical crisis with hubby Bruce in mid April. It involved large kidney stones, blocked plumbing, infection and a hospital stay.   It is still to be continued as he's waiting for an urgent medical procedure. I found I was alone at home and could weave 24/7 if I liked, but I simply could not focus on either loom.   Oh, and throw in a pandemic for good measure!

I wound warps instead.... and found it strangely calming.    Two warps, ten yards long for future projects! Incidentally they are both on the looms now....

So here's my melded draft, which is woven " as drawn in":

I wove seven towels and decided towards the end of the warp to weave a long runner as a change.  Finally the cloth beam was unrolled to produce a nice satisfying mound of fabric, and I got stuck into finishing right away.

I want to wet finish before hemming but the cloth is simply too long for the washing machine which would just twist it up, so I like to serge the towels apart and wash the shorter lengths.  The edges are very secure this way, and later when I use my steam press, the edge is totally flat for hemming.

That's when the old serger died.    It was 19 or 20 years old so not totally unexpected but  really?  It had to go now?

Two days later I was back in business with this younger model with more bells and whistles! 😊   (The old serger will eventually be repaired / tuned up and sold in time.   More waiting again)

So here are six of the seven towels  in a nice satisfying stack. I'm calling them my " Country Kitchen Towels" as they have an old timey look to them.  They are approx 20" by 30-31" and all are hand sewn so can be used as either a towel or small runner. 

Cinnamon Stick and Peach Cobbler

Plum and Vanilla

Herb Garden and Sage

Towel number seven is a compilation of all the colours as I had part pirns of all colours left over and this was a neat way of using them up. It reminded me of some 1930's table cloths I saw in a museum once.

So, last but not least there is the table runner. That turned out very nice and looks good on my large dinging room table!   Same warp, same pattern but this time I used 8/2 bamboo weft. It wove up beautifully, looked even better after wet finishing and pressing.   Fringe is a neat two inches and the runner measures 19.5 inches by 62 inches.

A final close up view: you can see the sheen which picks out the pattern beautifully.  The tea cup and saucer is part of a small set brought back from Hong Kong in 1953 by my Dad, who was in the Royal Navy, for his mother. The dragon on the china is raised  and is hand painted.   I just found out last evening that a friend inherited a cup with the exact same pattern from her grandmother. It must have been a thing back in its day.