Change One Thing

Change one thing and everything can change.

Such a simple sentence.  Such a complex concept.

This is one of the principles that are explored in the Olds Master Weaving (level one) class.  I say this over and over.  Usually after saying "It depends."

The best short answer to almost every question in weaving is "It depends.  Because change one thing and everything can change."

So, this scarf.

It's 2/20 silk, most commonly set at 20 epi for plain weave (using 2/20 silk for weft - or other yarn of the same thickness).  But I wanted to put the emphasis on the warp, which is hand dyed.  One way to do that is to make the cloth slightly warp emphasis.

Silk is a fibre with lots of drape, and the weft I had decided to use is rayon from bamboo, so also high in drape.  I knew that a denser warp would not negatively impact the drape of the finished cloth with such flexible warp and weft.

To make things a bit easier for myself (I thought) I started with 32 epi.

However, when I started weaving it wasn't a huge surprise when the weft would not beat in nicely.  Instead it got 'trapped' in the dense selvedge creating loose bubbles.  This is a sure sign that the warp is just too dense.

Of course I had enough warp to sample.  (Of course I did!  Sometimes I do work with full sized 'sample' warps.)

So I cut off the inch or so that I'd woven, resleyed to 30 epi and started over.

Voila.  No problems with the weft not beating in nicely.

I'm still getting the warp emphasis I wanted.  At 30 epi it will drape and behave nicely.

We're good to go.

And registrations are open for level one classes in Tenino, WA (sponsored by the Olympia Weavers Guild), and in Cape Breton (at the Gaelic College).  Registration for Olds College opens on March 1

All Mixed Up

Notice anything 'wrong' with this warp?  No?

This is the first prototype warp for a new scarf line.

The past few years I worked a lot with dyed warps but recently acquired a bunch of commercially dyed solid yarns.  I had to think for a while about what to do with them and this warp is meant to test a design where the stripe sequence will be 4 x 4 for 1/3 of the warp, then 2x2, then 1x1.  

When a student asked if I wound the warp that way, I explained that I just wound one of each colour with my finger between them, then manipulated the threads so the colours were in the order I wanted them.  I have done this before and, so long as the yarn has some elasticity and the shift from parallel isn't too great, never had a problem.

Looking at the cross nothing appears amiss, but I also remove the lease sticks and once they are gone there isn't anything for the yarns to catch or hang up on.  

Now to sley, lash on (because slippery rayon!) and start weaving.  And hope it looks like I hope it will!

Never ending

Just cut a blue/black chenille warp off the loom with two more scarves woven.  Unfortunately weaving chenille scarves is beginning to feel like a never ending story.  The next warp - black and grey - is ready to be rough sleyed, six more warps are wound, ready to go, the next colour is at the warping board with four more colour combinations pulled, waiting in the wings.  

I guesstimated I had about 50 pounds of yarn before I started this production run.  I'm thinking now that it was probably closer to 75.  With each warp taking about 12 ounces of chenille, I have a lot more weaving before I see any appreciable reduction in my stash.  

Yay?

End of the Line

See that rats nest of yarn in the foreground?   I reached the end of my patience fighting with the rayon chenille yarn at the selvedge and as soon as I finished one scarf, cut the rest of the warp off.  Life is too short to be fighting with yarn.  It's not a great loss...less than six ounces of yarn. 

My problem is that I think the next warp is going to be equally challenging.  The black I used at the selvedge was stiff and felt pretty nasty.  It may suffer the same fate.

Snip, snip!

Day Two

overall look at the booth

close up of painted rayon warp scarf

close up of bamboo warp, Tencel weft shawl

close up of bamboo warp, rayon weft shawl

Since today was Hallowe'en, I figured it would be pretty slow after around 4 pm.  And so it was.  So I took some photos.  

I rarely remember to get 'beauty' shots of my textiles.  Mostly my blogging is just sharing what I'm doing with people.  But I also need photos for media and promotion.  I think the last one shows the iridescence of the plum shawl rather well.

Working In Series

I like working in series.  Yes, that means that I am doing essentially the same thing, over and over again, with minor tweaks.  It means that once I have found a design I feel is working, in a general way, I can then begin making small changes in order to see how they affect the whole.  

In a stripe sequence such as this, I can change the colours, the values, the weft yarn.  All such changes are tiny.  Many people would get 'bored' but I find it endlessly fascinating how such small changes can make such a large impact on the cloth.  

But then I'm also the person who finds it challenging to weave plain weave, so take this observation for what it's worth.   ;)

Crunch Time

The first show of the season is this weekend.  Doug is packing up all the inventory we have ready and I'm juggling the dry finishing with getting more woven.  As usual I think I can do more than I really can.  Guess at my advanced age I'm not about to learn that time is finite and there are still only 24 hours in a day!

Tonight I will take this bucket to guild drop in and trim the fuzzy bits off the end of the fringe.  Tomorrow they will get tagged and priced so that they, too, can get packed, ready for set up Friday evening.  It isn't looking good that I can get any more shawls ready but I might get them done on the weekend.  If Doug will do booth duty I could still trim and tag the dozen new shawls that are woven and wet finished.  If not, they will be ready for the shows in Vancouver and Calgary.  

I just wish my stash looked like some of it had been used up.  I still have waaaaay too much yarn!

Currently reading Fools Quest by Robin Hobb

Optimistic

A friendly elf came yesterday and wound some rayon chenille warps for me.  Even better, she says she will come back on Saturday.  So I had to pull some more colour combinations...

Since I'm leaving for a 12 day trip next week, and the show season begins the week after I get back, perhaps I have been a trifle optimistic?

Currently reading Christine Falls by Benjamin Black

Free Shipping

lots of copies, some signed (12?)  $20

12 copies - $40

Well, it's that time of the year again!  Where has this year gone?

As per usual, I will be having my 'birthday bash' special offering - July 1-9 buy two items and get free shipping.

I will be posting photos of the tea towels I have available - pretty much anything I've posted in the last six months on my blog.  Which I realize isn't much but then, I haven't been weaving much, either.
However, I also have some left from last year like these:

They are made from 2/16 cotton warp and a singles 20 linen weft.  The design is Young Lover's Knot woven in twill blocks.  I think there are six left.  Have to check for sure.

Or contact me to see if I have something in a colour you'd like.

There are also lots of painted warp scarves, too many to try to post because each one is individual.

The colours change along the length of each scarf, sometimes dramatically, sometimes subtlety.

Towels range in price from $24 to $36.  Prices will be going up this fall (just saying).  Painted warp scarves are $125.

The silk shawl/scarves I wove during recovery are $150.

Happy birthday Canada (July 1), the United States (July 4)...and moi...

(email me laura at laurafry dot com to inquire about photos or place an order)

Fuzzy

I have been very low on rayon chenille scarves for the past couple of years and this year after all was said and done, there were just three scarves left.  I could have sold a lot more if I'd had more, and since I still have significant inventory of rayon chenille, I'm revisiting them.

Actually a friend came and wound this warp for me last summer but with my back issues they never got woven.  So it was a slam/dunk to take the already wound warp and get it onto the loom yesterday after I cut the last painted scarf warp off.  I even got it threaded before dinner so it took just a few minutes this morning to sley, tie on and begin weaving.

My challenge now is to use up as much of my rayon chenille stash without buying more to go with it as I can.  Of course that means stretching my creativity to the limit as I'm very low on the colours I like and have plenty that don't sing to me.  But sometimes that's when you really begin to stretch and grow as an artist/artisan.  It is only by pushing our boundaries that we do grow.

My friend wound two warps for me so I'm really hoping I can get both done and deliver the four scarves to the fringe twisting elf tomorrow night.  Since rayon chenille needs a pretty substantial beat, I don't know when I'll be able to whomp away at weaving so I'm trying to get these and some place mats done now.

Crossing Things Off

This is it - the last of the painted warps.  It's been a very long time, much longer than I had hoped, but then when Life Happens, all you can do is weather the storm as best you can and if your plans go awry?  Well, that is how Life Happens.

Weavers are, by their nature, a bit of a control freak.  We tend to love the tiny minutiae that is involved in the process.  We talk about a thread under tension being a thread under control.  We nit pick the slightest inconsistency.  We fuss when things don't turn out the way we want, even though the results are perfectly acceptable.

Weaving keeps us humble as time after time things go zooming out of our control and we fight to bring them back to where we want them to be.

So at last, at very long last, I am getting the 'last' of the painted warps into the loom.  It will be done before the official new year will take place (she says, trying to exert control).

I have a long list of stuff to make for the craft fairs next year and a much too large stash that I am hoping will yield the majority of the yarn with which to make it.  I'm really hoping to see my stash reduce, not grow.  So far that hasn't worked too well as I have bought yarns to use as warp in order to use Lynn's Legacy.  And I have used up quite a lot of that fine linen.  But there is more!

But now I need to turn my attention to other things, other yarns.  Topping the list are some special orders, which I'm really determined to get woven and delivered before surgery.  I'm just waiting for a part for the AVL and the wide table topper warp can go on that loom.  Once this scarf warp is done, I need to weave two special orders of place mats.  And then I can begin inventory for the shows next year.  I've already got the yarn for a run of shawls picked out and a tentative draft.

So much yarn, so many ideas, so little time.

Begin Agin

....and here I go again.  The first few ends in a warp that will be 764 ends.  You might just be able to see that it's mostly blue with a little 'sea green'.  The threading is another variation on point twill that will likely be woven in an advancing progression.  It's not quite what I had envisioned, so I may play with the treadling and tie up some more once the loom is up and running and I can see how it actually looks in the cloth rather than on the computer screen.  In the flesh, so to speak.

Yes I do use weaving software - Fiberworks by choice.  I have played around some with Pixeloom which in many ways is similar but I know Fiberworks so very well I have never felt like wallowing at the bottom of the learning curve to learn a new program.  What I've seen and done looks great, though, so if you are in the market for weaving software, either of these programs is pretty intuitive for most people to use.

If you want to know way more about Fiberworks than I do, Margaret Coe has pretty much written the books you need.

For the iPad I use iWeaveit.  I began this threading by messing about on the iPad, then when I had a threading I thought I liked, emailed it to myself so I could open it on the desktop in Fiberworks.  From there I derived a tie up (my standard 1:3:1:3:2:2:3:1) and played with woven as drawn in, advancing, variations on advancing.  When I knew I could do something close to what I wanted, I generated the threading only to follow as I thread.  I keep a pencil or pen handy and as I do each handful, mark off where I am in the sequence.

When dealing with a very long repeat (5 repeats in this warp plus borders) it's all too easy to get 'lost' if the phone rings or something causes my concentration to fail.  Something that happens more and more often these days.  And something that I hope will improve after the surgery.  Or not.  I am 64.5 years old now.  I've been told memory gets a little funky as we age!

The small loom is still nekkid so perhaps I'll get that dressed too.  I would sure like to finish off those last two painted warps so I can cross that task off my job list.

And then I can begin agin with something completely different...

Colour Blast

After 30 yards of beige, especially during the dreary grey days we had been having, I really needed a palette change.  Since the AVL was nekkid and the Leclerc still had the last half of a painted warp in RED, it was a delight to switch over to that loom.

Not only that, but to finish one more warp was very satisfying!

There are two more red painted warps left, which I will continue to work on in between working on the AVL.

Now that I have an approximate surgical date we are beginning to make plans for the coming year.  Ultimately it is looking increasingly as though I am 'retired' from teaching in the US - the difficulty of getting across the border is just getting to be too much of a hassle - but I hope I can continue to teach in Canada - either here in Prince George taking private students, but most especially in BC and Alberta.

Right now we are looking at possibly being at the provincial conference in Red Deer next May, and Olds Fibre Week in June.  The ANWG conference will be held in Victoria in '17 so I'm hoping to be healthy enough to apply to teach there.

But essentially I have a couple of pretty large 'swords' hanging over my head in terms of health issues as well as the little ones most people have at my age.  So I'm not making big plans about much of anything right now.  Mostly I'm focusing on getting through next Jan/Feb and then see how things are going.

Stash reduction will continue to be a priority as I fill up the 'holes' in my inventory from a fairly successful craft fair season.  Such a nice 'problem' to have!  Even better that enough things have sold out that I get to design whole new lines of things.  I can hardly wait for my energy to come back!

Packing Up

will be on display in my booth - Doug managed to get it pressed (along with a dozen others) in spite of electrical problems at the annex

We have spent the last couple of days getting ready to leave for Circle Craft.  It seems as though we are packing everything - booth, electrical stuff, inventory, our clothing plus food.  We will - hopefully - have a kitchenette in Vancouver so we will be able to make breakfast and lunch.  That will help with the trip expenses.

It has rained pretty much all day and it is black as can be outside.  I'm really hoping the weather forecast for dry weather in the morning is accurate!  Of course the weather can change - repeatedly - during a nearly 500 mile journey.

And then there is the trip from Vancouver to Calgary - a two day drive - through not one but several mountain ranges.  Keep fingers crossed for good driving conditions!

I think I'm getting too old for this much...fun...

Change of Pace

In years past, I would scramble like a mad woman trying to get one more, one more, one more warp woven off in time for the shows.  After 6 years of dealing with health issues (and the fatigue from the undiagnosed issues for several years before that) I think I am finally learning that there comes a time when it really is too late to squeeze just one more, one more, one more thing into the schedule.

In spite of wanting to have these red scarves ready for this year, it isn't going to happen.  And I find myself strangely content with that concept.

They say with age comes wisdom.  Perhaps now I'm old enough to be wise?

Currently reading Shifting Shadows by Patricia Briggs (short story collection)

Missed Deadlines

three last painted warps for scarves

One thing about being self-employed is that you have to be self-motivated.  I find one way to do that is to have very clear goals and a time frame in which I want to achieve them.

So deadlines are my friend.  Even though they are self-imposed, they help to get me up in the morning, dressed and to the studio to work on the next step(s) in helping me arrive where I want to be.

Unfortunately Life sometimes has other plans.  And so the lovely red warps above are still just that - warps.

We are already into the show season and anything not woven by now has missed this particular boat.  That ship has sailed.

Not being able to weave for almost 6 weeks this summer means that I could not get everything woven that I had on my to-do list.  No blue place mats.  No red scarves.  Well, only one warp of red, anyway.

Bottom line?  I have depth of stock, if not breadth of stock.  The van is full of textiles and hopefully enough people will find something they like and buy.

As for the rest?  It will get done for next year's show season.

I hope.  Making plans.  Setting goals.  Making deadlines.  We'll see if Life co-operates.

A Little Pretty

What with one thing and another, a little blast of 'pretty' was very welcome today.

I had intended to take photos of the class and some of the things they accomplished over the two days but once I'm in teaching mode, I'm not in blogging mode, I guess.  Long story short I forgot all about it the instant I walked into the room.

While my fall earlier this week could have been significantly worse than it was, I think I bruised my tailbone so the low grade pain I've been experiencing has sucked the energy out of me.  In combination with spring break up, grey dreary skies most days, a funeral...well, life kind of happened, never mind my plans.

I love the brilliant jewel tone palette, so after dinner while Doug started loading the van I went to the loom and wove the first scarf on this warp.

The big advantage to the samples for the Big Project is that I can simply use some of my standard production.  For the rest, I can stash bust.

It's all good.

Studio Fair

So this is as far as we got before I caved.  Until the overhead lights are off we can't set our own lighting and it's hard to know just how it will look with the nasty hall lights killing the colours.

What I didn't quite catch in the photo was....see the catering guy in the white shirt and black pants to the far left?

As he walked by the booth he 'fondled' the scarves on the display rack.  :)

So I guess something is working?  Textiles do have to be felt.

To my friends doing shows this season - best wishes to you all for smooth travel, easy set up and lots of sales.

A Rebel Born

As a kid growing up, there were all sorts of dress 'codes' that were strictly adhered to.  There were certain colours you just never, ever wore together.  Red heads never wore pink.  You never wore white shoes after Labour Day or before Victoria Day.  Or maybe that was Easter.  Your hand bag and shoes had to be the same colour, etc.

When I was about 14 or 15 I paired a bright apple green skirt with a deep blue/teal sweater.  When I went to meet my school mate to walk to school, she berated me for wearing blue and green.  Horrors!  What had I been thinking?  Blue and green were never, ever seen together!

"Green trees.  Blue sky."

She wasn't impressed with my logic.

Of course all that went out the window during the swinging '60's and Mary Quant et al.

And today this pink/orange/red/yellow warp flames into being on my loom.

It's all good.

Currently reading Thirteenth House by Sharon Shinn

Measuring Progress

some of the scarves woven since Tuesday last week - still need to be fringe twisted and wet finished

One of the ways I measure productivity is by crossing things off a list of jobs to be done.

Unfortunately when one item on the current list reads "Weave 36 scarf warps" it takes a rather long time to get to the point of being able to cross that off!  In point of fact, I'm still 4 warps shy of the 36, with more warps arriving from the dyer at the end of the month....

But just because I haven't been crossing stuff off my list doesn't mean that I haven't actually been rather productive since I got home from Sweden.  In addition to the 33 warps already woven, I also dealt with a great deal of administrivia, including doing 3 months worth of journal entries and submitting my sales tax return, updated my Power Point presentation for Weaving Today, did some fringe twisting and got Doug to do some pressing which meant running the textiles through the washing machine and dryer.  Not to mention being away for a week, twice!

But I still can't cross that "Weave 36 scarf warps" off my list.

11 weeks to the first sale of the autumn and counting.