Haste Makes Waste

This is haste.

This is waste.

I haven't changed my tie-up in over a year but I recently changed to standard tie-up for one project.  I went to change to the Texsolv system yesterday and realized that I didn't remember what it is for the turned taquete draft.  I dug out the old newsletter from my file box and in my hurry to get started, I didn't stop to make sure I was using the right one.  There are two drafts in the newsletter and I used the wrong one.  

I realized today what needed to be done.  I wasn't happy about unweaving but I was thrilled with the ease of the new system.  The lady at Yarn Barn suggested that I leave a length dangling from each lam but I thought that was too messy.  Forget messy, I'm doing it.  Changing is just a matter of moving the peg from one cord to another - that's it.  Minutes!

Now we're cooking with gas.

I posted a picture on Facebook of my looper rugs and a friend from the library book group asked to buy one.  She didn't even flinch when I quoted her $50 so I guess that's the price.  I took it to the meeting yesterday and she sent me this picture last night.  I called them bathmats but she wanted it to put under her husband's chair to preserve the carpet.  I never thought of that, but it's a great addition to their family room.

Desert Peach and Bitterbrush bloom at the same time.  Ian caught this pretty display on the side of our road with his cell phone.

Last year we participated in a program funded by a grant through the Fire Safety Council.  They brought in two bobcats with "masticator" attachments and ground up about half of the brush on our property while spreading native grass seeds at the same time.  It was really dry and barren looking through the winter, but this is the greenest spring we have ever had. 

Cherlyn, the gallery manager from the Artists Coop, called me Monday and asked if I would think about making some soap labels that would contribute the Rock Art show in June.  I thought about it while walking the dogs and decided to draw them on my iPad.  But first I had to learn the program.  They are in order from left to right as I made them, getting steadily worse.  I used InspirePro which is a neat program but there are so many things to chose from:  graphite pencil, oil crayon, air brush or paint brush, and what width, what kind of brush, what recharge rate and more.  It took me four hours to make these - most of Monday afternoon.  I wanted to photocopy them yesterday when I was in town so Ian can take the labeled bars to the gallery tomorrow when he goes to the dentist.  I'll revisit the right image.  He's never prone in the petroglyphs. I was running out of steam - he looks like road kill.

In Flux

I took my three bobbins of singles to the guild meeting on Wednesday night.  This was the last meeting of the year and it was also show-and-share.  I'm the newest weaver in the group so didn't pull these out until after the meeting.  I want to weave scarves from my handspun yarns but I need to know so much more.  I placed an order with Yarn Barn last week and was disappointed that they don't have 60s/2 silk which is what I had wanted to order for binder for my singles.  Guess what?!  The trunk sale at the meeting was for hand dyed 60s/2 silk from Just Our Yarn.  I bought the skein on top at a dear price.

I just dove in.  I taught myself to spin from Karen Raven's book and apparently she is left handed because I spin left handed.  That means all the articles I read and videos I watch are backwards, but somehow about halfway through the last skein, my hands caught on to the concept.  I have a long way to go but I'm not nearly as frustrated about my spinning as I was.  Now if I can only figure out how to translate this yarn to weaving.  Warp?  Weft?  I suppose I'll have to do it and find out for myself

I have the Fiesta warp on Maudie Mae and it's interesting how the colors influence each other.  You need to click to see the red.  I'm stuck at this point until next week.  One of the things I ordered from Yarn Barn last week was Texsolv tie-up.  I am not doing the Gilmore tie-up one more time.  It's just too gymnastic and requires flexibility I no longer have.  My order arrived but without the pegs that will make this happen.  They weren't on the order invoice.  I called in a panic.  They're shipping but not charging shipping.  I love those guys.

This is what Gilmore tie-up looks like.  Mr. Gilmore invented the jack loom in the 1940s and this system dates back to then.  It's archaic.  You have a piece of clothesline dangling from the lam tied in  a single knot and then a piece of clothesline coming up from the treadle, which you tie in an overhand knot and slip over the knot from the top.  Are yours eyes glazing over yet?  And then each has to be adjusted until all the harness are lifted to a uniform height.  We are not amused.  I'm crippled by the time I'm done, and that's why I'm done with this system and I should have ordered the Texsolv at least a year ago.

Ian and I have been talking about where to put our battered wicker furniture.  It's second hand from a neighbor who moved away.  I realized today that one of our trees is big enough to give shade so took out one of the chairs and the table from the garage as a test drive.  This is the nicest afternoon we've had this year.

I read for a while and then had Ian help me bring out the rest of the set.  I can't explain it, but it's not the same as reading on the porch.  My book and I were in another place.  We only have one more day before the weather gets back to normal but I look forward to a summer of afternoons here. 

This the time of day that the birds come to feed and they fussed and scolded me, trying to get me to leave.  I saw them run a rabbit off earlier today.  The California quail were more forgiving. 

Two Kindle Touches, that's what you see here.  Since Massachusetts and seeing Paul's Paperwhite Kindle, I've been lustful.  It means reading in bed without a heavy book light.  I was sitting on the front porch yesterday morning when Ian came back from the mailboxes with two packages.  One was our onions, the other the Paperwhite he bought me.  He gets the hand-me-down Touch.  He says likes his original hand-me-down and has given my "cast off" to one of the kids.

Reading is so rich.  Books and information are in in a state of flux and we're just on the crest of this wave.  My job in resource sharing involved the physical shipping of articles and books and that was just five years ago.  It's an exciting time but a lot depends on licensing agreements.  As for virtual delivery, we need to keep our eyes open - pun intended.  Meanwhile, I have a stack of physical books on my nightstand as well as the four I've checked out from the library. 

Color

I finished the looper bath mats and I'm thrilled by them.  I posted a picture on Facebook and one sold to a friend from book group.  I have enough loopers for four more and then I have to decide what I'm going to do next.  The loopers are pricey.   I'm trying to decide if I can sell enough of these to justify ordering more loopers.  The postage is killers.  Groan.  I think what I sell pays for my materials.  I suppose there are worse hobbies.

I picked up our CSA box after my dental appointment today.  This is our first basket this year and it's our first year to participate as a single family.  In the past I've picked up weekly boxes which we split with our neighbor.  This year we're on our own so bought the bi-weekly subscription.  I have learned from past experience that we will be challenged to eat all of this in two weeks.  By the middle of summer, we'll be getting twice this many veggies. You don't realize it,  but produce is dense food.  Tonight we polished off the Swiss chard, accompanied by a ham steak.  Uber yum.  The carrots were planted in hoops houses last fall and the yellow ball is spaghetti squash.

Baby Steps

It's been a while since I have warped Maudie Mae for towels.  I have looked at these colors for a couple weeks, but it wasn't clicking for me.

When I substituted the red, I knew I was ready to warp.

Aren't these crazy colors?  I have the warp hanging from the front beam ready to go, but it's been stormy the past couple of days and it's really hard to see without natural light.  I'll wait for some sunshine. 

I'm still working on the sock looper rugs.  Lilith is right in front of the window so I'm just going to weave here, until we get more sunshine.

I'm working on making up my own miscellaneous batts for spinning.  This is some of the stuff I'm drawing on - it's wool, mohair and sari silk.

These are the batts I'll spin tomorrow morning.  I've also added some badly processed Cormo.  I bought the fleece and had it processed it almost ten years ago.  It was expensive and I've just hung onto it.  I didn't know how to use it but didn't want to throw it away either.  We'll see.

I finished the scarf project.  I learned a lot but I don't have a scarf.  The green will be my "sewing with handspun" cloth sample for the weaving conference at the end of this month.  I'm thinking they might both be the samples and that's okay.  I'm confident that my next scarf project will produce a wearable scarf.

For those of you who have encouraged me to write the story of my daughter's high school pregnancy and her baby's open adoption, I just want to say that John's dad and I are taking baby steps towards doing that.  

TaTa April

I had another pupil Saturday and this time we made the class three hours.  It was three hours last time but I only got paid for two.  Her name was Melissa and it was her 63rd birthday.  She treated herself to the class in celebration, her husband bought her this Ashford Flip Loom some time ago, and since she wants to retire in two years, she decided to see if this is a hobby for her.  Over beating is such a temptation but by the time we wrapped up, she was starting to get it and I think she did great.  I just hope she'll work on it again and relax a bit. 

I can't imagine teaching a large class.  One pupil exhausts me.  I spent a good part of Sunday sewing.  About 4:00 I decided it was time to take my book and knitting basket onto the deck, put up my feet and enjoy what was left of the afternoon, when two nekkid sheep wandered into my view, looking confused and bewildered.  I know I was.  This is Mickey Mouth and he's talking to me.

I came back in and asked Ian if he knew that Devon was coming and that he had been here.  Is he still here?  Well now, that was a very good question.  I hadn't thought of that, and yes he was.  Our guys are so small and used to him that he easily does it by himself.  He was just putting his stuff away so I offered him a beer and we kibitzed on the deck for a while and then he was off to the next stop.  He's like the scriptural wind - he blows whither he will.

 This is what I sewed.  It's the Schoolhouse Tunic by Sew Liberated.  The fabric is from Jimmy Beans and it washes up like a dream.  It's the second one I've made and plan to use it for when I'm a substitute librarian.  Two of them are two outfits in my wardrobe that I didn't have before.

Speaking of wardrobe, I recently purchased The Wardrobe Wakeup: Your guide to looking fabulous at any age."  I know - odd thing to buy in retirement, but I've thinned down my closet a lot and was looking for some tips to make everything count.  My favorite tip so far is to sort all clothes by color.  I can't believe how effective that is - I found a lot of things I had forgotten I had.  Man, do I have a lot of black tops. 

I finally finished my sweater.  I decided I wouldn't start the new sweater from Diane Soucy's pattern until I knitted this one from her stash sale about 15 years ago.  I'm glad I went back and reknit the tops and fixed the problems.  I like the look of the black line separating the two colors.  I haven't decided about the collar.  It's kinda high and I have a feeling won't be comfortable.  So it's still not totally done.  I'm pondering for a day or two.

I had to drive in this morning to deliver some soap.  I sold a couple dozen bars to a potter I know who wants to put them on soap dishes and sell them together at his open studio show this weekend.  We ended up chatting way too long - we always seem to do that.  I wanted to get up to the storage unit where DS Matty, girlfriend Julia and middle-school friend Dave were loading up a U-haul.

When I got there they were down to trying to fit in the last weird pieces.  Out of my purse came the trusty tape measure that Amy gave me years ago.  They hammed it up with their dirty hands, but tomorrow is the big day.  They'll be on the road, Matt towing his truck behind this rig and Julia driving her car with their pets.  They've made the decision to relocate to Bend, Oregon where his brother already lives.  I'll miss them but I know that Bend is a very good place to build their future.  Sigh.

To get my mind on something else after I came home, I decided to card up some mixed batts.  I brought down a lot of miscellaneous stuff last week and have been looking at it for days. 

Here are the first batts and I'll start spinning them in the morning - merino, llama, silk and Angelina.  I omitted the Angelia so had to go back, add it and card a second time.  These are over blended for my taste, but this is only 2 ounces of fiber.  I'm just getting started.  Now I just need to perfect my art yarn spinning techniques.  I'm signed up to learned that at the conference next month but I want to know now.

Books Read in April:

The Night Circus,  Erin Morganstern
The Messenger, Daniel Silva
When You Reach Me, Rebecca Stead (Newbery Award)
Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman (Newbery Award)

New Fibers

 

The first weft I tried was the purple from the small stripe.  Let me say that I've just learned I'm not a fan of little stripes.  The purple didn't work for me so I unwove it.

So then I tried the green, and I tried it in a twill which was way to fiddly for my taste.  I unwove it.  Tencel isn't all that forgiving and the weaving was hard on it.

Then I decided to weave it in simple plain weave.  I figure if Sara Lamb has made a weaving reputation as the Queen of Plain Weave, that's good enough for me.  The selvedges are out of control.  I had floating selvedges since I started  in twill and decided to lose them both.

I fought with the green selvedges and then realized that I need a sample of handwoven fabric for a class I'm taking at the Conference of Northern California Handweavers next month.  Guess what I'm taking for a fabric sample.  Moving on to the next scarf, I went to the pink and I think the predominant color in the warp makes a much nicer weft.

Again, the selvedges weren't playing nice.  The left side is perfect, but the right.  Oy!  It wasn't until I changed my beat that it began to resolve.  I know you're supposed to beat on a closed shed so I was trying to follow the instructions.  Finally I decided to beat on an open shed, which is what I do for towels.  Problem solved.  The last two inches here look pretty good to me.  Ignore the color.  My camera is a liar and is going to go to camera hell very soon.

I finished my skein of art yarn and I'm more interested than ever in learning how to make my own batts.  I realized that the book Rae Stuart loaned me several months ago on spinning art yarns is by Lexi Boeger and last night I discovered that she's an instructor at the weaving conference I'm attending next month.  I was able to make a class switch today and will be attending one of her sessions. 

This is the commercially prepared batt I spun made by Cottage Creations.  I'm sure I can make up something equally messy from all the stuff I've managed to acquire over the years.  I'm taking a bag full over to Mim's tomorrow after lunch and get her take on this whole thing.  She took a class from Lexi last summer. 

I've knitted a hat from the yarn which is tame compared to the stuff in Lexi's book.  Still it leaves me wanting to make my own batts and see what I can come up with.  There's always something else to learn.  I'm trying to get my head around how I would weave with this.  Obviously I can weave with it, but I guess what I'm looking for is how to weave to the highest and best use of the yarn. 

Back to the Future

Christina and I were amazed by the size of houses as Karen showed us around the area.  She explained that the farmhouse addition is common.  The original house became too small as the family grew, so an addition was built onto the back.  In time that became a third addition, then fourth and so on. 

It's so different here in the wide open, disposable land West where properties were abandoned and people moved on.  We were impressed by how well these houses have withstood the elements and time.  The West wasn't even a mote in their father's eye.

I got home to a gimpy-backed husband.  He damaged it years ago moving stone and has tried to make peace with it ever since.  I suggested a new mattress a couple years ago when we bought new living room furniture - one delivery price.  He wasn't interested.

He was very interested when I got home.  Our mattress, which I loved, was over ten years old and he had been limping along with this piece of plywood on his side.  By the time I got home, he had researched mattresses and was ready to buy.  Pain is a powerful motivator.

Out of the box, onto the bed.  That's our new mattress.  That's the last picture I got because once we sliced off the plastic, it grew up into a 14" mattress and we were busy.  I was skeptical but now I'm a believer.  Sleep just got better.  I'm a great sleeper and now I'm an ultra uber sleeper.  Who knew?!

Almost all of my Webs order has arrived.  This the 8/2 tencel that I've gotten from them - the four cones on the right are what I ordered and the four cones on the left are what I bought in the store.  I see I have an affinity for green - two of the cones are the same.

Wednesday I got my hair cut in the morning and had a doctor appointment in the afternoon, so I treated myself to a visit to Jimmy Beans.  I got both yarn and fabric.  I was just getting ready to leave when I heard - Sharon?!  It was Diane Soucy and we haven't seen each other in a couple of years.  I laughed because I had just bought yarn to knit one of her patterns.  On top of that, I was just finishing a sweater from yarn I bought from her stash sale about 15 years ago.  Irony!  Much of my stash is second hand.

This is said sweater, however after returning home with yarn for the next new exciting sweater adventure, I realized that I had major major problems - one was a pattern omission that I was aware of, two was my tight two-stranded knitting and three was the dreadful raglan decreases I had invented in the absence of instructions from the pattern.  Frogging and reknitting is in progress.

As for weaving, I got a warp on and started my venture into the world of scarves.  I'm terrible at it and it was not a gratifying experience.

I learned a lot and I tore out a lot.  I hate being a beginner but I'm afraid there's no cure for that, other than to keep at it until something makes sense.

Thank goodness I've returned to spinning art yarn.  My 30 minutes of morning spinning with my "happy' light and coffee were the most productive of the day.