Happy holidays and rigid heddles

Visited my friend this past Sunday. We get together once a month to drink coffee, eat banana bread and knit. She wanted to learn rigid heddle weaving, so I let her borrow my RH loom last month and said if she needed any help, I'd work with her. Well, she did need help. When I got there, she had put the warp on the loom backwards (front of work tied to back apron  and vice versa). She was sort of almost in tears. I said no worries, we'd fix it. We took the warp off the loom and turned the loom around. So... in answer to a question on Facebook, on the rigid heddle page, this is how I tie little bundles to the back beam bar. We took small bundles of the warp, being careful to keep them the same length, tied them together, then lashed them to the back beam. These are thicker bundles than I would do, but that was her preference. Now, you can also tie them directly to the bars themselves, but I don't like the Ashford bars. They are rectangular, flat pieces of wood instead of dowel shape. I don't like this design at all, thus the bundles. Then of course she will sley the warp, and tie the ends to the front apron bar directly. 

This is an odd sort of way to warp I suppose, but I am used to warping an 8 shaft, 10 treadle monster of a Kessenich, so warping a RH is no where near as time consuming and tedious. Therefore, I don't mind taking extra time doing it. 

Another odd thing she did was this... instead of using brown wrapping paper or butcher paper, she used a bunch of cut up little cardboards. See how uneven this can be? You can use flat, narrow, even sticks, but these are totally uneven and cardboard has too much give. So we got rid of that hot mess too and luckily she had some brown paper on hand so we rolled the warp onto the back beam, tucking the brown paper in and around as we went. Hopefully, she will call me if she gets in a bind next time. 

And now... Happy Holidays from the kids of Messy Art! 

Good weave reads

In the Loom Room:
Finally got the Kessenich threaded and now the tensioning begins. No matter how many times I do this, it's always a little stressful. Maybe that's not really the word... more like very focused. There, that sounds better.

Jerry helped me thread the heddles... him at the back of the loom. I'm one of those people that warp from front to back. You know, what's the diff? Whatever way you feel comfortable, I always say. If there are any new weavers out there, I'd like to recommend this book for warping:

It is marvelous and very easy to understand and follow. The title made me laugh though, the first time I read it. I immediately thought of the old Eric Carmen song, ... All Byyy Youuurself.... don't wanna warp.... Aaaalll By Youuurself, anymore

And speaking of good books, I just got this one through interlibrary loan. I have just started reading it and it's very interesting. Let you know how it turns out.

Check out these neat-o charts in the back of the book. 

Bought this glass frame at a yard sale for $ .50. It's a 12x12 and I'm going to clean it up and paint it and all that good stuff. I go to yard sales almost every Sat. and see so many unwanted little frames. Sad really. This little frame is calling for a mixed media piece. Something unfortunate happened to me a couple of months ago in the painting realm of my life and I sort of lost heart in it for a while. All I'll say is, always get your money up front when you sell a painting. Anyway, I'm feeling better and have an idea of what I want to do. Collage mixed media, I'm thinking.

Oh yeah... sing it Eric 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbn6o5tiPds

Happy Valentine's

Messy Art - Well, today being Valentine's Day, we made,... you guessed it, Valentines. This is simple ... I just folded 12x18 construction paper in various pinks and reds into fours. Then you cut along the open side of the folded paper in the shape of a half heart, unfold, and you get two hearts.

We decorated with tissue, sequence, magazine pics, anything you want really.

 

This is my model for them. Found the old lady in a magazine. I told the kids that was a picture of my grandma. They believed me, ha ha!

Here are some from the kids:

I ordered a shorter temple for the tap on the big loom. I'm probably not going to weave wide pieces anymore so I figured why not. The temple I've got is 24" at it's shortest. I may sell that one, don't know yet.

I had help with the threading which is the part that hurts my back to do. Jerry was very good at threading! I told him he would make a good weaver.

I supervised and passed him warp ends...

And of course the top supervisor was there to make sure we didn't have too much fun.

It was really nice to have help. Threading can be a lonely business. We listened to Bruce Springsteen, Darkness on the Edge of Town while we worked.


Looked out the kitchen window this morning and saw that one of my little tree orchids had bloomed. I love when this happens. It's so spontaneous and unexpected. A treat for sure.