Late March

While eating eggs the other morning, I decided it was time to break out the rigid heddle loom. This is some warp and weft sample choices to see how they might work together. The warp is assorted cotton yarns. The weft is this incredibly soft acrylic yarn (Bernat Softee Baby). Scarves should be soft on the neck...end of story. I'm also throwing a gold sparkle crochet cotton into the weft mix. All of the yarns are from my stash. There's no real rhyme or reason to placement of warp colors. I just sort of shut my brain off (not real hard for me to do) and let go.

Sunny side up scarf!

This is a sample piece that I'm weaving on the big loom. The pattern is from Marguerite Porter Davison's book... the triple draught bird's eye. This is very dainty weaving for me. I'm used to doing big hunking rugs. But I'm having fun with it.

St. Paddy's Day weekend fun

No good St. Pat's day should be without a ride on the bar bicycle. This was in St. Petersburg, FL. I have never in my life seen one of these things. You ride on it while sitting at the bar and you peddle...thus powering your own bar experience. Or some such thing. At least you're working off all the calories from the booze.

Here the city of Tampa is dyeing the river green during the Irish festival. I really hope that the dye is non-toxic to sea life :\ That's the University of Tampa in the background.

Irish dancers at the Tampa festival. Took me back to the days when my daughter used to be in step dancing competitions. And what a nerve wrecking hot mess that was.

Here we are with our BFF's in Ybor City (that's pronounced Ebor). It is the very place where the famous Cuban - Tampa cigars were manufactured by hand back in the day. And maybe still today. I don't know. The males in the group didn't want to watch the little history movie at the welcome center. And I'm supposed to be the one with ADHD.

While in Ybor City, we came across a vintage clothing store, La France, that was just off the chain. I took a picture of this old coat. Not the most spectacular thing in the store, but I did love the weave. It reminded me of my mother's spring coats when I was a kid.

Now, this was the most spectacular thing in the store. The most beautiful dress I have ever seen...ever.

And speaking of textiles....we took a trip to the Ringling museum in Sarasota. The Ringling museum is a collection of museums and Mr. Ringling's magnificent house. I must say, Ringling was one wealthy son-of-a-gun. Or as my husband said, "...a lot of midgets built this house". Here is a shot of the dinning room table cloth; incredibly beautiful lace!

Ringling collected quite a few tapestries from the 16th century. This one is just some little piece they threw up in the foyer.

This tapestry was in the art museum. It has deteriorated to some degree and you can see the warp showing. 20 epi ... I counted.

We also went to the Dali museum, but you weren't allowed to take pictures there. It was pretty incredible. I really like the Tampa area. Hope we can go back again soon. And now back to weaving. I'm working on a bird's eye pattern for a pillow at present. Pics to follow.

Busy bee

I have actually been very busy finishing projects and have gotten 3 done! Yay! Ok, well, almost done.

This is the wall hanging. I still have to hem the bottom and top. I got a dowel and nifty little knobby things to go on the ends to hang it from. I will post finished hanging.

This is the merino that I got last year in PA, all spun and plyed. Did I mention that I Love Spinning!

These are going to be pillows. They are little screen print butterflies on a soft denim material. I still need to heat set them. I think I will go back to block printing. Screen printing is ok, but I like the look of block printing better.

I've ordered some 3/2 perle cotton from the Mannings and am waiting for that to come. I'm going to weave a table runner in a bird's eye pattern...totally stepping out of my rug weaving comfort zone. Really looking forward to this project.

Fibonacci fun

I'm trying out the ol' Fibonacci using color. I've seperated the hanging into 3 areas of 3 numbers in the series; 5", 3", and 13" to give a total of 21" L with 12 " W. The two colors that won't vary are teal and brown. The first 5" will be woven in dark grey. Then 3" in light grey, the the last 13 in natural (white). Should be interesting.

This is the dark to light grey. The white at the bottom will be hemmed up and not visible in the finished piece.

And then light grey to white. I am liking these colors a lot. Just hope I have enough white to take it up to 21". I ordered another white 3 ply rug yarn, but I don't think it's going to match. Well, I'm going to go as far as I can and hope it makes it.

Rug 2

The rug for my mom is done. Finished at 22" x 35 ". I tried to puff up the yarn a little with some hot water finishing, and it worked a bit. But as I was washing it, I noticed a pretty strong smell. I looked at the dog thinking, maybe he got into last nights chili... but it turned out to be the yarn. Very sheepy smell. More like very sheepy pen smell. Weird. Baaaa!

So I decided to play with color. Using what's left of the warp that's still on the loom, I decided to do a wall hanging. Using a different yarn this time. I got it from the Mannings a while back and haven't used it yet. It's a 3 ply wool and sort of coarse. I think it's called Milltop or something like that. I'll have to call them and ask.

I measured out 120 yds. per color so I'll see how far I get with that. Originally this was going to be black, grey and white. Then I thought grey, brown and white (to sort of play with some neutral colors and give my retinas a break). Then I accidentally layed some blue/green yarn next to some brown and grey I'd layed out and loved the combination. So into the dye pot it all went. (And yes, I did wonder if the grey would dull the other colors but I'm going for it anyway.)

This yarn dyed up really nicely and very easy. Came out very even.

And this is how the colors are working together so far. Another krokbragd design. I kind of like it.

Uh oh...looks like someone went to the groomer's. Bwa ha ha ha ha!!!!

Rugs

I was off for a week, so I had the chance to finish my mom's rug. I threw orange in the top and bottom and now I'm not sure I'm happy with those color decisions, but it is what it is. I was in Amish country when I was getting the idea for this design, so thus the purples and oranges, etc. I learned from this rug that the Stitch Nation Full o' Sheep yarn, though lovely and easy to dye, is too lofty for a rug. It just didn't beat down tight enough, and I gave it a major beat down. I'll post a pic when it's hemmed and wet finished. Still plenty of warp on the loom so I'm thinking of a krokbragd table runner. I have a nice 3 ply wool yarn that I got from the Mannings. That should work well.

Catching up

Haven't written anything in a while. I've been taking an online art class and I kind of always feel like I'm behind in everything. And it's a "go at your own pace" kind of a class! That's pretty pathetic. And of course, now there's Christmas just in case I wasn't feeling harried enough.

Well, at least we got our tree up and decorated. Only took us 2 days. This is the largest tree I've gotten in a long time. 7 foot. It's the first year since my AN diagnosis that I've felt like decorating and stuff. It really helped to go on a brief trip to NC with beloved friends to visit beloved friends and the cold and Christmas feel just really helped ...

Haven't made snowmen in a long time :)

Here is the progress on the rag rug I'm crocheting. I'm surprised I've made progress on anything.
I thought maybe I could just use ready made fat quarters on this, but after using the art cloth I made last summer, I sort of think I'm going to have to just make my own cloth or it won't come out right.

And the "piece de resistance" .... I'm getting a spinning wheel for Christmas! I'm sooooo excited!
http://www.woolery.com/store/pc/Babe-Production-c120.htm