Lake Breeze made wearable, Baby Blankets

I finished the Lake Breeze sweater in March 2020. Knit from Irish vacation wool (but unlikely wool from Irish sheep), I loved the sweater but it was just too big. Big enough where had I tried it on in a store, I would have gone for a smaller size. I'd worn it maybe 3 times over the last two years...

Finally a couple of days ago I removed the zipper, basted the fronts together and threw it in the washer on Hand Wash with warm water, after measuring it carefully.  Then I threw it in the dryer for 10 minutes; when it came out, I'd lost nearly 3" in width and less than an inch in length.  After picking out the basting and drying it overnight, I tried it on and it's perfect! I sewed the zipper back on and now I have a warm, slightly denser very comfortable sweater that fits nicely. I'm very pleased.

Baby Blankets ALMOST on
their way to their babies

Here are the two Baby Blankets. The Mr. has emailed his sisters to get the addresses so we can send them.  I love the one with the white in it; it's dark blue and light blue in the warp, dark blue and white in the weft.

On a wine note, we opened a bottle of 2015 Domaine Leflaive Puligny-Montrachet for Thanksgiving and it was amazing! Can't wait to drink the rest of it over the next few years. Kudos also to Easy Entertaining's recipe for Indian spiced turkey; I'm not sure how everyone else felt about it but it was a REALLY good turkey. 

Long Break, and Mystery Yarn

 It's been awhile since my last post... Lots going on including a trip to Canada, a bout of Covid, and a trip to Chicago, then SOAR. Meanwhile I've been finishing off the 11 yard scarf warp and the baby blankets for the grand-neffs...  Plus thinking a lot about what I want out of the next 10 years. (Still thinking).

Mystery yarn on top, 
8/2 cotton on bottom

I started to think about what to work on next, and I'd like to put a Beiderwand project on one loom and the paper fabric on the other. I had thought about using a 8/2 cotton warp but it's not exciting me... I went looking through my stash of other-folks-destashes and decided on this huge cone of an adorable little boucle of mystery fiber. How do you figure out what a yarn is?

I used a McMorran balance to get yards per pound... It looked to be in the 3000 YPP range, but I couldn't find a yarn on line or in one of the yarn charts that was a boucle with that YPP. 

Then I started analyzing the yarn by unplying a bit of it. The single that's the bulk of the yarn was non-reflective, super soft and very short stapled; probably about 1/2".  The binder was long fibers that were super strong, and shiny. At this point I guessed cotton with a silk or synthetic binder but the cone had come in a bag marked silk so I wasn't sure. 

I think this is silk?

So I tried a burn test, but I've never had good luck with that. The only thing that was conclusive was that it wasn't synthetic and it didn't smell like hair so probably not wool. Some search online found a site that suggested you burn samples of things that you know the content of to learn the differences! What a great idea... I'll play with that someday.

Finally, DH and I looked under a microscope. What fun! I compared to photos online. I think the binder is silk; it is slightly translucent, wasn't as regular as man made fibers and didn't correspond to any of the animal or plant fibers. 

Cotton! Love the twist

The main fiber looks just like cotton; if 

you zoom in you can even see the cute little "Z" twist to the fibers. Cotton is traditionally spun in the Z direction, make it hold together easier...  

So I think I know the fiber content. Based on the size of it compared to other yarns (slightly bigger than 8/2 cotton) I'm going to sett it initially at 16 EPI and sample.

I've also been getting stuff done...

• Finished the two baby blankets except for trimming and hemming; planning a finishing day in the next two weeks.
• Finished the scarf and cowl on the 11 yard warp. I sewed the cowl together with a modifed flat fell seam and I've very pleased with it.
• Still spinning goat for a rug.
• Finished and published the Zoom doc I'd mentioned; it was well received and B. asked if she could give it to another organization. Sure!
• The green summer sweater (Sommerloch) is coming along... It's in the idiot knitting phase. So... Do I power through it? or save it to be idiot knitting and switch my evening knitting to something that takes more concentration? 
• No progress on the mosaics. 
• And I'm pausing everything to clean up the studios.

Q3 Finished things (8)

 
It feels like things are starting to work for me again... This is the list from this quarter, for a total of 8 "things':

• Scarf from the mistakes warp
• The big blue rug
• A class at Canada "Copying Ready to Wear", and made a pattern and muslin for a dress
• Deflected doubleweave scarf in blue, green, magenta and orange
• 2 blue on blue deflected doubleweave scarves
• Tiny basket and tiny basketry mat

For next quarter, this is what I'll be working on:

• Finishing the two baby blankets.
• Finishing two neck things from the 11 yard Zephyr warp.
• Mosaics, probably stepping stones and the table. I'm also thinking about a sculpture and the pot with the cat.
• Dye something.
• Make 2 small rugs for the Lodge master.
• Beiderwand for the study group. I'm looking at 4 shaft 1 block beiderwand with a decorative yarn; I'll sample with ladder etc.
• Fabric from the paper yarn and a shirt from the fabric.

Events for the quarter will include SOAR in October (and a few days in Chicago) and I'll be receiving my Electric Eel spinning wheel and will be playing with that as long as the color isn't Blue.

I got the blues... bad...

11 yards of blue scarves

S from the Study Group gave a demo last month in how to lash onto the front apron rod instead of tieing on... it saves time and a lot of yarn (6 or so inches per thread? And possibly 600 threads? That's 100 yards).  I lashed on both the scarves and the baby blankets. Here's the scarf... and so fast. 

Speaking of the scarves, I wound the warp for them on K's warping mill. I'm frankly tired of guide strings and figuerd for a 5 1/2 yard warp, I just needed to go around it 5 times, right? I wound away... As I chained off the first of the two sections, I found myself thinking... this is really long... And of course it was, since the mill is TWO yards around, not one.  I wound the 11 yard warp onto the loom and figured I'd just do a couple of extra scarves. Anyways, I finished weaving 2 of them; one will arrive at J's house tomorrow and the other is going to live in Canada as a host-gift. I know I have enough for one more scarf; the last will either be a cowl or a scarf, depending on how long it is. Tension, so far has been perfect. I have no idea why.  The scarves are from  Double with a Twist by Stubenitsky; one scarf is the same motif repeated for the whole scarf, scarf #2 has different borders; they're in Zephyr (50% Merino 50% Silk) sett at 24 EPI. I wove them Looooonggg!! 90", and they wet finished closer to 80"... The next two will be shorter. S took photos for me which I'll add to the Quarter End Post.

Baby Blanket, 1 of 2

One baby blanket is off the loom but not finished... I found two issues in it. First, I'd skipped a dent in the reed and was too lazy to go back and fix it (Shame!!!)... I think it will be less obvious after it's washed. Then, a yard into it, I found a threading error! I fixed both between blankets, and it's lashed on and ready to go. I'll need more yarn but will order that just before we get back from a little vacation. Here's a photo of it on the loom if you want to play "spot the error".

See a color trend here? Yep, after that rug then these two projects I'm getting awfully tired of blue...

I've also been doing the following:

• Writing a document for the guild on how to host a Zoom session. I'm not a tech writer, let's leave it at that.
• I'm practicing piano daily (working on full octave C scale right now)
• I'm knitting slowly away on that green cotton summer sweater even as I see summer drifting away...
• I am spinning goat for a rug
• I bought and Instant pot and have been making food in it.
• I played with Tanghulu, which is fruit covered in a hard sugar shell. I used the cape gooseberry from the garden.

And as the quarter ends, I'm thinking about Q4...

Back at it!

Mistakes Scarf

 Now that the Rug is off the loom, lots of stuff is happening...

I wove off the scarf we put on the loom for B's Mistakes Clinic in April... It's going to J's charity scarf project. Yes, I know I've been weaving for many years now but this is the first time it clicked that the tension of the threads after I advance the warp greatly affects the WPI and makes a huge difference in how the textiles looks... Light Bulb Moment!!! I'm excited to weave more consistent cloth. It's 8/4 cotton carpet warp,  probably sett at 10 or 12 EPI, maybe 8 inches wide? I used purple, blue, magenta and yellow warp, with the same blue weft.

This is so light and
squooshy and warm

I also made this deflected doubleweave on for a study group project, and to wear to upcoming cool weather trips... It's from MA 2020 Handwoven magazine, Gilia and Locoweed. I used 18/2 wool and 18/2 wool silk from stash, set at 24EPI. I was aiming for 16 WPI in the weft but was afraid of beating too hard (this has been an issue) and so I beat WAAAY too lightly for the first 15 inches. Note to self; check WPI often at the beginning of a project, and put on an extra 12 inches so I can play with the weave structure before beginning the project.  Here I'm showing the last part of it, which is pretty consistent, and correct.

I also took a basket class and made my first ever basket. It's darn adorable, and just big enough to fit in today's crop of Peruvian groundcherries. It's seagrass bound with raffia, and it's a coiled basket. It's almost round.... 

I also have been knitting on a green sweater for summer... I measured it and sadly it's too small. I'll be ripping it out.. 

Also have been prepping some of the ikats I bought in Indonesia for hanging. This is time consuming! And I've been spinning paper; I think I have enough to start weaving.

Next on the Gilmore is 2 baby blankets in blues; I'm in the process of threading them. One will go to the newborn Grandneff, the other probably to his slightly older cousin. I'm using 8/4 cotton (not rug warp) in a rose path pattern with alternating colors. It should go quickly once I have all 544 threads on the loom.  There may be some more baby blankets in my future; I'd love to have a couple of them put any just in case they're needed anywhere.

And for the baby Mac, one or two more deflected doubleweave scarves in blue; one for R, as a thanks for letting us crash at his place in September, and the other? We'll see. 

There's a work queue... later this year, it'll be the paper yardage, an ikat project (more yardage?), a trip to SOAR and it's ensueing projects, and some bulky stuff for a rug. I also want to make a couple of rugs for the lodge master, and... and... It never ends, does it?

I showed T how to spin paper a few weeks ago; she's intending on spinning bulky and weaving with it. I'm thinking I'd like to do the same, making coiled baskets with it, and using thrums as the weft...

Tales of the Rug.

 I'm going to document most of the issues I had with The Rug. 

Inspector Zig 
looking for errors

The impetus for making The Rug was DH declaring we needed a rug of a specific size and material for by the den slider; it has to cover dirty feet coming in from the door, and also needs to go under the cat door and stepping stool to keep the stool from scratching the floor. The material should be of cotton so it can go in the washer, since this area needs regular cleaning. It also gets a lot of direct light, so fade proof would be great, and it has to absorb water from people and cat feet in the winter. It needed to pass my idea of what might look ok in the room. A quick survey of what's available in the market place yielded nothing. Good thing I'm a weaver!

I decided to make a rep rug from one of the books in the library; it has a mid century modern vibe and a sturdy construction. It's a type of weave that takes forever to warp but weaves up very fast. I ordered an 8/4 poly/cotton warp in dark blue and light blue that's supposed to be fade resistant, and loaded the draft into my weaving software.

1. The first issue was that this warp rep weave is so dense I had to order more heddles. Not a big deal, and they arrived quickly.
2. I wound 30? 40? ends too many, and I'm not sure why. I think I was going by EPI and inches as opposed to following the pattern... I took them off the warp chain before I started, so also not a big deal. They're chained up nicely awaiting reuse.
3. Then I threaded... and threaded... It's about 1200 threads. I took it slow to favor my back and also to avoid mistakes. Then I wound the warp on.
4. When that was done, I tied on and then doubted my tension... I unwound the warp and rebeamed it, retied it on and started weaving.
5. I could not get the reed easily through the threads!!! I checked everything I could think of... Asked for help. Verified the sett. Pouted. Tried again. Varied tension. Nothing worked. I decided I needed a less dense sett.
6. I arrived on 30 EPI (down from 36 EPI) because it would be 3 ends per in a 10 dent reed instead of 3 dents in a 12 dent reed... That would avoid uneven reed marks on the finished rug. I probably should have sampled to see how much denser I could have made it, but this is what I decided on. Simply resleying in the other reed would make the cloth wider than my loom could handle, so I decided to throw the extra ends off the back.
7. Oh if it were that easy! There are a lot of stripes in this warp, and I had to remove threads proportionally from each stripe. 
8. This took months, as I avoided the studio to avoid the "Dog on the Loom". Several folks recommended that I cut my losses, get rid of the warp and start something else but DARN IT I'm a weaver and I was going to make this rug.
9. I didn't finish the resleying before my vacation, so when I came back I had to figure out where I was. I signed up for a sewing class at the local community college to justify my procrastination.
10. Finally I got it to a near weavable state! and found a couple of threading errors. I fixed those and started weaving.
11. As I finished the hem, I noticed a spot that was less dense than others... Yep, I had one thread in that dent instead of 3. Luckily it was close to the edge, so it was easy to fix. Had it been in the middle, I would have fixed it anyways; I really want this rug to be right!
12. I think there were some crossed threads, too, which I fixed and forgot about.
13. The first 3 inch border is a bitch. It requires switching shafts and pickup to get a solid color right across. I thought this might look weird, and I wish I hadn't done it! Sadly it's too late.
14. Ahhh... then the real weaving started, and went quickly. I wove most of the 60 or so inches in a few days, then started on the last foot, which took about the same amount of time as the first 60"

    

    Finally weaving!!!

15. Yeah, and I realized I was likely going to run out of thick weft... I found the invoice from January and went to order some more, then realized my credit card had been hacked and I had no way to pay for it. DH came to the rescue and bought the yarn for me.

16. 

    I added even more weights
    later in the process

     Remember back where I threw a bunch of threads off the back? When I warp back to front, I loop the thread over the back apron rod... so when I near the end of the warp, the threads under tension that had mates that were not under tension started going limp. At the end of the weaving I'd deployed over 30 weights to weigh these down, and had started putting two threads per weight in some places. This slowed down progress considerably, as I found and fixed and found and fixed the threads.
    

    

    Not a lot of weft left!

17. Turns out I had enough yarn with just a few yards to spare! I'm sure that was only because I ordered some. So now I have a spool of blue mop cotton waiting for the next project.
    
18. That 3 inch border was a bad at the end as in the beginning, and doesn't look any better to me. I can't really fix it, so I will live with it, maybe put a sticky note in the book to consider it carefully. In the transitions between stripes there are often two threads in the same shed; I'm not sure if that's an artifact of doing odd things in rep or if it's an error on my part... No one walking on it will notice it, but a fellow weaver might.
19. And it's done except for borders, fixing a surprisingly few errors, and a good bath. Then a photo shoot. The loom is cleaned up and ready for the baby blankets that'll go on next.

The Rug usually has 2 cats on it...

I'll also post photos of the blocks DH constructed to keep my loom from walking across the room... It's only useful for those types of weaves that require a hard beat, like most rugs do. They are awesome!!!!

Q2, '22 Finished Things (1)

 And... that would be the shoelaces..

There was that super long ambitious list I'd made at the end of Q1, some of which got worked on and most of which did not. Honestly I spent a lot of time in the yard, playing games on my phone, traveling, and a lot of time procrastinating.

And speaking of procrastinating, this post has been sitting as draft for over a month! So I'm just going to publish it and get on with life.

Post vacation, nothing getting done...

Sunset in the tropics

 I've been back from our trip for a few weeks and honestly getting nothing done!!! I'll post here about the trip at some point... but still trying to wrap my head around the culture, the weaving,  and all that... I did come home with a number of ikat textiles that I'd like to mount on the wall; I found this article and I intend to follow it's instructions to safely attach velcro to the back of the ikat.

What I have been doing is:

• I've started and restarted the back of the sweater I took to Indonesia with me several times, and I think now it's good... It's knitted flat in two pieces to the armhole then the rest is done on circs... I'll be knitting on that for awhile, although it is DK weight so maybe it'll be faster than I think. 
• I went to my spinning guild meeting and spun more paper.
• I'm taking a class in copying ready to wear, so I'm working through copying a Hawaiian shirt from Hilo Hatties.
• I 3D printed a band weaving rigid heddle that I found on Thingiverse mostly because I was confounded as to how it works; I bought a book but haven't tried weaving with it yet.
• I poked at my loom. Then walked away.

On the wine front, I do have a report on wine in Bali. Apparently there are of wine makers (Balinese, Antipodean, or European); some of the grape juice is brought in from other areas (I think primarily from Australia and New Zealand) but they are growing some grapes in Bali as well. We had a decent but not spectacular white with dinner at Warung in Uluwatu, and then tried a few more wines on the tour... At best, I'd suggest that they need a little more time to adapt their practices to the climate and terroir; at worst, I'd say "Just order the beer". The Bintang was nice.

For June, we're opening an Italian Soave... More on that once it's opened and tasted. 

Pre-vacation shoe lace waving

I'm getting ready to leave for a longish vacation... All my shopping is done and now we're sorting and waiting and not doing much until we can start packing. Honestly you'd think we'd never been on a vacation before. Of course I had to have new shoelaces for the shoes I'd intended to bring, but since they're not broken in enough, I will take other shoes. I think I need to acknowledge the calming power of making shoelaces during times of stress. Here's the laces!

I have almost finished the vest from Petit Point fabric but I don't like the way the armbands sit on the body... I'm still thinking about solutions. Meanwhile, here's a bad photo of it.

I've been knitting away on Sand and Sunsets but it's gotten too big to be vacation knitting; I'm probably 1/3 done? Meanwhile, I'm looking for a DK cotton knitting project for travel.

The rug on the loom is stalled. Don't ask.

The textile trip that was scheduled for July (not June and I'd thought) has been cancelled.  

On other fronts, I did finish marmalade and limoncello... And have planted tomatoes, basil  and cucumbers in the garden. There are 2 other tomato plants that I bought before I decided to rehome one of the many volunteers... they need spots this week.

Q1'22 finished things (4)

Did I honestly not publish this at the end of March??? Shame on me...

This is what I finished in Q1'22...

• 5 yd warp from overshot departures class, including a bunch of samples, 3 1/4 yds of petit point and some plain weave samples using paper yarn as weft.
• 2 card woven mask lanyards
• An icelandic wool shawl

I also started a rug, started spinning a painted roving for a sweater, spun and plied more paper yarn, started a summer sweater, and have partially sewed together a vest from the 3 yds of petit point weaving from above. I also tried fitting a shirt for Scott and have stalled on it...

I'll hope to be spending nearly the entire month of May travelling so Q2 may not be that productive either... we'll see...

Here's the list from December; the green stuff is new. Wondering why the list didn't include the icelandic shawl? In green are things that are in process or new. In orange are things I want to finish or get substantially done in Q2.

• Sewing
• A vest from the Petit Point fabric (started)
• Make a shirt from paper fabric
• Sew up some of the fabric in the stash
• Fit a pattern to Scott (started)
• Make a shirt for Scott
• Embroidery Machine
• Figure out how to "machine quilt" strips and sew them together.
• Green shirt
• Blue sweatshirt
• Another grocery bag, with embroidery
• Spinning
• Spin enough paper for a shirt (started)
• New: Spin that colored roving
• Spin silk for card weaving
• Cotton
• Band Weaving
• Bands for the Petit point vest
• Weave with handspun silk
• Weave the the silk yarn in the studio
• New! Shoelaces
• Quilting
• Finish the two Judy Niemeyer quilts
• Duvet in lodge from marbled fabrics (quilt top to plain fabric, plain backing) (played with marbling)
• Make some baby quilts to practice quilting techniques (craftsy)
• Knitting
• Summer sweater (started)
• Cashmere sweater
• Knit a yoked sweater from stash of fingering
• Ann Zilboorg sweater
• New: Dan Doh Shawl
• Weaving
• Keep working on ikat
• Paper yardage
• Rug for Main slider
• Rug for entry and sliders at Lodge
• Lodge bedroom rugs
• Rag rug for guest laundry
• Finish guest bath towels
• Make Guest bath towels for lodge
• Hand dyed tencel warp
• Mosaic
• Play with Paltiya.
• Finish poppy table
• New: table for lodge entry
• Printing
• Print some fabric and sew with it.
• Print some cards 
• raven from the 7 ravens
• Christmas card: nutcracker
• try multi-color again
• Other
• Fix the two needlepoint pillows that are falling apart. Decided to retire them
• Marble panels for duvet
• Explore my sewing machine
• Take one class a month from Craftsy
• SOAR
• Stitches
• Retreat
• 2 textile trips
• Don't forget the garden, processing garden produce, exercise to make me sleep, cooking for the two of us and tending the home wine cellar.
• Made lemon marmalade and limoncello

Limoncello!

Doldrums...

With the trip to DC and a familial visit, and some random stomach ailment, I haven't been getting much done. 

I actually finished something...

I did use my plane time to and from DC nearly finishing my shawl; then finished it right when I got back. It's blocked and drying... The fiber is a single strand of Icelandic wool, slightly felted, then natural dyed; DH brought me the kit from Iceland. it's a pretty straightforward garter shawl with slight Faroese shaping on the shoulders. I'm also working on a summer sweater using some yarn I bought in Florence; it's coming along nicely but it's a slow process.

Unhappy rug

On the weaving front...  The rug on the loom is unhappy. Or is making me unhappy.  Or maybe both. At any rate, I think it's sett too close, and since I can't make it wider (I'll run out of loom) I need to throw some threads off the back. I'm waiting until I'm ready for this. 

Meanwhile the project that appeals is a vest from some fabric I wove for a class and some lightweight commercial denim. It's also being problematic and I'm trying to work through it purposefully instead of winging it. Today I cut out the pieces and stabilized edges... I still need to cut out the lining. I have to put in a style line (in this context this means I screwed something up and am fixing it by putting a seam where a seam would not otherwise go) and want to add a horizontal in seam pocket! I'll need to sew a test.

I also bought some shoes that need custom shoelaces... Maybe soon...

One the subject of wine, we're currently drinking a white rioja (viura grapes); darn tasty with a mushroom risotto. It's not new to us but worthy of mention.

New! Monthly wine challenge and lots of fiber stuff

I sat on my last post for almost a month, so the info is a little dated... I wrote this post last night so we are, dear reader, caught up. 

I've gotten a little burned out on the food challenge, plus some recent and annoying new discoveries about my digestive system has made cooking a lot less fun. Fortunately wine is still on the menu, and I'm going to try to find wines that I've never tried, don't recall trying, or wines I'm familiar with from regions I'm not familiar with. The cookbook challenge will likely reappear in the next couple of months.

December: 2007 Amarone della Valpolicella Classico Costasera

Amarone is full bodied, raiseny, with high alcohol content. I've been trying to save it for the right meal but haven't figured out the pairing; so I just finally served it with some lamb. This one was just at the end of the recommended drinking window but really a delight to drink. I'll need more amarone in my life. This bottle, by the way, was brought to me from Europe by M, who suggested I drink it right away... but I cellar EVERYTHING so I've had it a few years. M, if you're reading this, Thank You! and let's schedule a VC.

Based on this experience, we opened another Amarone that had been in the cellar for quite a while; it's from Arizona and a friend of DH had brought it to us. I've frankly been avoiding it because I have doubts about the US southwest being a good wine region... Sadly it was way past prime...

January: 2009 Domaine de la Grenaudière Muscadet de Sèvre-et-Maine Sur Lie La Grenouille

Muscadet is from the Loire Valley and made from melon de bourgogne grapes. It's light body, dry, crisp, and minerally. We subsequently went to out dinner and DH made me pick the wine pairing; I confidently choose a muscadet to go with some of the raw fish appetizers and it worked! Anyways, this varietal is a delight.

February: 2019 Sclavos-Zisimatos Vino di Sasso Robola of Cephalonia

There's more info that you can ever want in this article which gives details about how the grapes are grown and how the wine is made.  Robola is food friendly, with high acidity and good minerality, and almost always comes from Cepholonia.  They can pick up some of the notes you'd expect from an aged riesling if you let it cellar awhile... I bought more.

Sensing a theme here? Maybe that there's wine I haven't met but I haven't met a wine I don't like?  Anyways, I have a couple more wines bought already and I'm waiting impatiently for March.

On the fiber front, I've been jumping around a bit...

Tablet weaving: I made a couple of Egyptian Diagonal card woven mask lanyards; one for KC, and the other because I can't do a short warp on my current card loom.  I did well backing out issues with the first one (I make a lot of errors with card weaving); I started a second pattern and got it so screwed up I abandoned it and reset the deck to try again.  Then Monday I walked to the next town for breakfast and back for a total of 13 miles, and sat down after to finish off the warp. I'll admit to some trepidation since I was tired, but unbelievably wove it off without errors. I talked to KO about it later; we think that the errors we make card weaving happen when our minds wander, and when tired enough, my mind does not wander... At any rate, they're done and ready to gift.

Incidentally, Egyptian Diagonals is not an Egyptian technique. There's trim on garments in some of the ancient Egyptian reliefs with strong diagonal patterns that were suspected to have been card woven; Mary Meigs Atwater was able to reproduce that pattern via card weaving. Later examination of an actual textile fragment showed that it wasn't tablet weaving, but by that time the name had attached. Why do I bring up Atwater's name? I'm reading her biography right now and it's very interesting.

Weaving; I'm also almost done threading the rug that I've been working on for some time... I need to get a couple of smaller weaving things started as well but plan to be weaving on the rug this week.

Knitting: I've temporarily laid aside the shawl I was knitting but am working on the orange sweater; I've finished the right sleeve and started the body. 

Spinning; I'm taking a spinning class at Stitches West in a couple of weeks and needed to clear off some bobbins for it... So I plied the rest of the paper I'd spun. I also started that really big braid I won at SOAR; I divided the braid into color and will be doing a DK weight 3 ply. I'm also spinning up some singles of natural colored Zwartbles (almost black) as homework for my class; she says a bobbin full but what does that really mean? Anyways, aiming at DK weight 2 ply. I'm hoping to knit a DK weight sweater in the near future.

Other: I broke in the wet studio by doing some marbling. The Jacquard Marbling Kit I bought was a bust... The paint floated well on the marble sizing but didn't adhere well to the fabric... chaos ensured. I then switched over to some airbrush fabric ink and that worked well. I need to investigate what other folks are using, and develop a method of laying the fabric down that works better than what I was doing. Meanwhile it's nice to know that airbrush ink comes off the counters, the cabinets, the walls and the floor without issue.

A couple other notes... I read this statement on Joe Moorman's mosaic blog, which resonated with how I feel about making things.

By angels led, by demons driven. We are the lucky ones. We experience purpose at a physical level in our creative process.

And, M from the study group sent me a link to this publication by Alice Schlein on amalgamation (related to network drafting) which was pretty exciting. 

Ten Tales of Woe

Cotton warp, 
paper weft

I finally finished the warp I put on in September, saving 8 inches or so at the end for testing weaving with paper.  It survived wet finishing! I now have quite a few samples and 3+ yds of petit point that I intend for a vest. (Sorry, no photos of the petit point).  I did do some research on petit point. It's a treadling system to produce a patterned plain weave structure on one side of a fabric, and large floats on the other side; mine is an overshot pattern. It's similar to swivel, but swivel doesn't allow for repeated pattern pick. 

Now on to the Ten Tales of Woe.

1. The shirt pattern for DH... The 36 is a little small but a preliminary fitting shows the 38 as too big. I talked it over with my friend B and the next step will be to widen the upper back on the 36 by adding a little fabric... I looked over DH's other shirts and it seems like there are two common ways of doing this on men's shirts; a box pleat in the center back or two small outward facing pleats at the shoulder blades. I'll have to take out the side seam, remove the sleeves and dissect the yoke and I'm not there yet.
2. The vest for me... Two woes here. One, I need another 1/2 yard or so of fabric; it's not long enough. That's okay, though, I have some light weight denim which I can use for the sleeve bands and front bands, and add a band to the bottom of the vest as well. 
3. But when I sewed the muslin, nothing fit right. Immediately I assumed there was a problem with the pattern but then quickly realized that this particular pattern maker would have fixed it by now... I went back to the paper I traced from and Hey! apparently now I can't trace a pattern. I need to redo this by next week.
4. Not sure if I mentioned the two needlepoint pillows with the shredding backs. I've been meaning to recover these for year. So I ordered velvet and gave one of them a try. There's a knack to piping on needlepoint pillows and I don't have it. After some tears I decided to get rid of them. They had black mold on them (probably from living in a plastic bag). They're an awkward size. They spent years living in a bag in mom's closet, then in my closet too. I just pulled them out because I found the box. I think it's time to say goodbye.
5. While I was in a getting rid of kinda mood, I threw away this woven piece I made a few years back, shaped on the loom. I've tried numerous times to do something with it that will make it attractive enough to graduate to my wardrode and it ain't gonna happen. 
6. I tried to salvage some of the yarn from #5 (there were some knitted bits); it became a knotted mess. I evaluated; it's maybe 50 yards? Into the trash it went. Incidentally, when DH asked what I'd been doing that day his comment was "You mean it took you 6 hours to fill up one small bag of trash?" Yes, Darling Husband but it was an emotional 6 hours.
7. There's a mistake in the shawl I was working on, about 4 rows back. They are SUPER long rows and I'm dreading pulling it out, but it's too obvious to leave...
8. So I started a summer sweater with that orangey cotton I got in Florence... K and I are doing the same projects, mostly stash yarn. I had issues making gauge so ended up dropping down a size. I finished the short sleeve before I got around to finding a tape measure to check gauge in the round... Turns out in the round I'm right on gauge. Grrr. The sleeve fits, but probably not with a shirt underneath. So I've restarted the sleeve in the larger size. The good thing is that it's pretty fast going.
9. The rug for the den slider... Well... I had warped up a good deal of it and ran out of one of the colors, which is weird because I had calculated it carefully... then realized I'd wound a slightly longer warp AND had gone by pattern inches not by thread count, which will yield a wider rug but needed more light blue yarn... Luckily they had the yarn in stock so it arrived quickly and I was able to keep winding.  Sadly the inches vs. threads thing affected heddle count so I stalled while waiting for more heddles to arrive.
10. BTW, it's a bit over 1100 threads... Today I started to put the threads through the raddle and onto the apron rod, I realize that I have 2-3 inches too of one color sequence too many. So I would have had enough of the light blue without getting another cone.

I do have two projects on the spinning wheel but so far they're not causing woe. The mosaic is neglected and also not a problem. 

 

Result of the construction project and
the next major distraction

What is the common thread here? Between all this and the construction projects (and cleaning up the dust from them) I am distracted beyond belief and have found myself working on one project while thinking about another. I need to say "in the moment" and leave the mental planning for long walks or dedicated planning time. 

Things to do in 2022

Yes I have a talent for biting off more than I can chew; it's been a lifelong problem. Somehow I have problems accepting that there are only 24 hours in a day. I'm starting a list of things I'd like to do just to track them... We'll see what happens this year!

• Sewing
• A vest from the Petit Point fabric
• Make a shirt from paper fabric
• Sew up some of the fabric in the stash
• Fit a pattern to Scott
• Make a shirt for Scott
• Embroidery Machine
• Figure out how to "machine quilt" strips and sew them together.
• Green shirt
• sweatshirt
• Another grocery bag, with embrodiery
• Spinning
• Spin enough paper for a shirt
• Spin silk for card weaving
• Cotton
• Band Weaving
• Bands for the Petit point vest
• Weave with handspun silk
• Weave the the silk yarn in the studio
• Quilting
• Finish the two Judy Niemeyer quilts
• Duvet in lodge from marbled fabrics (quilt top to plain fabric, plain backing)
• Make some baby quilts to practice quilting techniques (craftsy)
• Knitting
• Summer sweater
• Cashmere sweater
• Knit a yoked sweater from stash of fingering
• Ann Zilboorg sweater
• Weaving
• Keep working on ikat
• Paper yardage
• Rug for Main slider
• Rug for entry and sliders at Lodge
• Lodge bedroom rugs
• Rag rug for guest laundry
• Finish guest bath towels
• Make Guest bath towels for lodge
• Hand dyed tencel warp
• Mosaic
• Play with Paltiya.
• Finish poppy table
• Printing
• Print some fabric and sew with it.
• Print some cards 
• raven from the 7 ravens
• Christmas card: nutcracker
• try multi-color again
• Other
• Fix the two needlepoint pillows that are falling apart.
• Marble panels for duvet
• Explore my sewing machine
• Take one class a month from Craftsy
• SOAR
• Stitches
• Retreat
• 2 textile trips
• Don't forget the garden, processing garden produce, exercise to make me sleep, cooking for the two of us and tending the home wine cellar.

A shirt for DH, part 1

DH does not fit in standard American men's sized clothing; he's short, with wide shoulders and a narrow waist and should be wearing a small, but here in the US men don't like the word small, so he's spent years looking for a button down that isn't super baggy.  When he started working a lot in Asia, I suggested that he look for something there, and all of a sudden he could find shirts that fit better! When Uniqclo opened shops in the US, he could often find things there, but generally had better luck in their Tokyo locations. But he never really found shirts with interesting or fun fabrics; they were all made for the work environment. He's bemoaned the hole in his wardrobe that could be filled with a good fitting fun shirt appropriate to wear to jazz concerts.

I found a pattern with regular, fitted, and slim versions... stole one of his shirts to measure against, and came up with a size that I thought would work. I traced off the pattern and was ready to make a muslin when he revealed that wasn't the best fitting shirt to compare against.

So I retooled for a much smaller size; it looked good so I sewed it in muslin. The purpose for making a muslin is two-fold; first, to check the fit of the pattern in an inexpensive fabric, and the second, to work through all the pattern particulars and practice anything (like sleeve plackets) that might be tricky. The muslin fit! It looked good! It needed very minor tweaking... Then he swung his arms and we both decided he needed a little more movement... the next step will be to try the next larger size.  I'm preshrinking more muslin today as it's easier to get his take on fit when the fabric's been washed.

Meanwhile, where to find interesting fabric? I've had fabric printed by Spoonflower in the past, although the fabric I got was a little too stiff for shirting. I checked back and they are now printing on lawn; it may be slightly *too* lightweight. I've ordered a sample of the next heavier fabric, in a few different stock patterns, and if that doesn't work I'll probably have to drag HisSelf to a nice fabric store.