I finished something!

Lily’s first night out. Wow! I’m looking old

Lily is complete. I need new knitting!! I'm waffling between another gnome, a shawl/poncho thing in cotton (with sequins!) or a sweater using the gnome yarn, cause let's be real, I'm never going to make that many gnomes.

Plus I could use a new warm sweater for my fall trip.

I just signed up for a jacket class with Threads...  They'd sent an email this morning with a broken link; I notified them about the link et Voila! I got a 35% discount. I have some fabric from Japan, hoping I can use that.

I’m mostly done with the Alabama Chanin scarf with the embroidered ends, more on that in a later post. I really enjoy the techniques and am looking forward to further experimentation.

I wound 5 100g ish hanks of that 10/2 cotton and dyed it using procion dyes in these colors: Avocado, Green Lantern, Indigo, and Grecian Sea. A couple spots are lighter than expected but otherwise I declare them glorious.  Photos when I start weaving with them. I was debating how to get them from the hanks onto the loom (yarn handling is always entertaining as it will tie itself in knots if not properly supervised), so I ordered a cone winder from Dreaming Robots. It arrives on Friday.

Still working on the table...

The little loom is finally warped. I had issues…  I cataloged them in an email to K, but I’m going to skip it here. Let’s just say I’m up and weaving. I’m going to play with some weft choices and wet finish a sample  to see what folks want to do for the weave it. The goal will be to weave a couple of towels to take to the folks at Unspun when we tour there in September.  The big loom will get baby blankets in the newly dyed yarn. 

I’ve also finally been working on the table top, on Monday mornings while the house is being cleaned. Apparently I can make a lot of progress in an couple hours per week. The wreath is complete except for one leaf, which I need to recut. I'm pleased that nothing feels off center to me. The background will be in tans, grout will be black. 

One last photo… I’m taking German again from the Goethe institute, and in our last unit we read a recipe for Zwiebelkuchen. So I baked one. What was interesting to me was that the dough for the crust is yeasted; next time I'll make it thinner. Also, one recipe said to mix the onions in with the filling, and one said to pour the filling over the onions; if I make it again, I'll mix them (there was too much separation). It was especially delicious with this most excellent Austrian Riesling.

Hausgemachter Zwiebelkuchen mit einem österreichischen Riesling

Q1'25 FInished list (12)

My Pebble Beach Shawl matches the
Anthony Murphy
painting in the bedroom

Apparently I haven't been photographing things, as I'm finding a lot of mentions of items without any documentation. So this will be photo-heavy. What have I finished this quarter?

Knitting:

• Modular vest: it's proved to be a great little vest for around the house, keeping me warm when I'm a little chilly. 
• Pebble beach shawl: "finished" 7 years ago, but I hated it and put it away with plans to rip it out. I found it last month and don't hate it anymore. Hard to count it as a finished object since all I did was block it and weave in the ends, but will do so as it's no longer in the studio but living in the closet.

Modular Vest

• A gnome.

 Printing:

• An edition of snowflake postcards
• An edition of quail postcards

Weaving:

• 2nd pennywise runner (with issues)
• 4 towels; 3 with carrots, 1 with corn (not pictured).

Carrots hanging out in the kitchen

Spinning

• The Diver's Cove roving is now a 2 ply lace weight yarn, all except for the dregs on one bobbin. I'll ply that with something leftover from another effort.

Other:

• Bunny shopping bag: I used a machine embroidery pattern by Urban Threads with bunnies and carrots to make a shopping bag/tote using yardage from my stash. Why do I have carrot fabric in my stash? I have no idea. The bag is super cute, and is going to the same charity as the carrot towels.

FOR Q2:

I'll still be out of the studio a lot but should be able to finish:

• The April cardigan just needs button and the ends woven in...
• I have a bobbin of merino/tencel singles that I've started plying, more blues.
• Would be nice to ply up some of the oddball spools
• I'm taking a spinning class at CNCH, not sure what the result will be.
• 2-3 more prints, hopefully a 2 color print in the batch,
• Doubleweave pillows; pattern is drafted, yarn is on the shelf waiting.
• A waffle weave project for the study group.

And hopefully make some progress on:

• The pink hawaiian baby quilt
• The in-progress table
• And maybe some stepping stone. I'm rethinking designs.

(19 things as of 12/25/24)

Spring-like projects!

It feels like anything going on the studios has slowed to a crawl... I do have a lot going on but I think the political situation is causing a lot of stress, making me feel like I'm swimming through Jello. Anyways, I have been doing some studio work.

The carrot towels are done; the towels are plain except for the carrot border.  The one with yellow is supposed to be corn (?); I think I did something wrong. That one will go into my towel drawer, and the other three will go to a charity auction. I'll put the photo into the finishing list.

I'm making a tote/shopping bag for the auction as well; it's changing too fast for a photo. I currently have one side of the bag quilted and trimmed, and am most of the way through the 2nd side. I'm practicing some of the machine quilting skills I'd like to be better at. Then it's just sewing it all together; should be able to finish next week and put it in the mail to the charity with the towels!

An early photo of the tote side...

In searching for quilt batting, I found an pink Hawaiian quilt top (baby sized) with backing and batting; if I recall correctly, I bought it, partially complete, at a guild auction 20+ years ago?  I'm looking forward to quilting that outside on the deck this summer. There's a blue one somewhere in the studio as well... Hoping I can find and quilt it too! 

The April sweater is almost done, just in time for April. I followed the instructions for the bind off, to discover that it was too loose and it rippled along the front.  I know better.... I ripped it out and started the button band again, picking up 2 for every 3 rows (pattern said pick up one in every row). Let's see if that helps.

I also found a completed shawl I made 7 years ago that I hated at the time; so I threw it in a bag and planned on ripping it out and reusing the wool. I actually like it now. So it's blocked and in the closet.  I'll add a photo later.

Coming up? I need a new knitting project, a new weaving project, and an old quilting project to resurrect. 

Lots to report for mid May!

New Born Yarn

I've been spending time in the garden, getting some food crops in for summer, and some out on the bike getting read for a BackRoads tour in September... and it feels like I'm not doing anything in the studio! But I assessed the last few weeks and here's the list:

I finished plying the fiber I'd bought years ago at the KAFF in Oregon... It's 8 ounces of slightly underplied two ply. I plied 4 ounces of varigated singles with 4 ounces of a brown sheep wool labeled "Tasmanian Comeback".

Border of double huck scarf

The double huck samples and project are done. I really liked the class; I learned a lot about how to think about and manipulate structure. It was pretty fussy and I made a number of treadling mistakes and I'm not pleased with the end result. But it's also thick enough to be unwearable in this climate so I'm okay with not wearing it. Will I do it again? I think it would make a wonderful and luxe bath towel (in cotton) but it was so fussy I'm pretty much not interested in weaving it again. This felt like a successful project even though I feel the result was not entirely successful.

Goat, ready for a project

That goat fiber I was spinning? I finally finished plying it all and it's in the finished yarn closet. It's a pile of yummy inconsistently spun worsted-weight+ yarn... Not sure what I'll do with it. The original thought was a carpet but after I started I wished I'd taken more time to remove the VM and to spin it a bit more consistantly.

I finished weaving the Atwater Bronson Lace sample in 20/2 cotton; I sampled at 3 different setts (36, 32.5, and 30). I thought I'd like the denser sett but honestly like the two lighter ones better. I'm still debating 32.5 vs. 30 and am now waffling on color but should be starting that in the next week or so.

DH helped me upgrade my sewing machine and I now have Bernina Pinpoint Placement. I'm working with a snap hoop and I had a lot of issues with the first project... So the pattern is off by a quarter inch or so in a couple of spots. I think it'll still make an okay pillow for somewhere... but it was leftover batting scraps and unbleached muslin for a practice piece so I don't feel that attached. I'll put together a post on all that I am learning.

I also made some decisions about the table-in-progress and did cut some glass for it last week.

Finally, the Shiny sweater is on the homestretch; I only have half a sleeve to go, plus 2 seams and the sleeve hems. I'm pretty excited about this!

I'll spend some time thinking about what's next... but what's clear is:

• Finish Shiny
• Work on the table
• Make 2 runners, one for the France Trip
• Finalize decisions and set up the Bronson lace for weaving
• Test the Seamwork Hansie pattern

Q3'23 finished things (7/17)

Done:

• 

  Two yards of 1/2" band

  Camp shirt from Kuala Lumpur batik
• Camp shirt from paper yarn
• Afternoon Tea Shawl 
• Sample from Inge Dam class at CNCH
• Card Woven Band
• Knitted Cowl
• Diversified Plain Weave sample for the study group.

I was listening to KQED a few weeks ago and heard an interview with  Jennifer Breheny Wallace, on her book "Never Enough: When Achievement Culture Becomes Toxic -- and What We Can Do About It"

The talk focused the effects on our children of expecting constant achievement from them. What occured to me is that the people I'm in weaving classes with are likely the same parents she talks about. These are the people that expect to produce an expert piece the very first time they try a technique and who do not give themselves room for experimentation and the possibility of failure. This is just my opinion, not having read the book, but the same parents that are expecting this of their children are expecting it of themselves. 

Two key phrases resonated with me. One, that our "failures and setbacks become indictments of our worth to ourselves and those around us". The second was the affirmation that "I am not my achievements and I am not my failures."

I bring this up in the this blog because I am often paralyzed by the need to produce the perfect piece and I don't give myself enough room for experimentation. I'm not currently okay with mediocre or failed results, and I think that blocks my growth as an artist.

Given all of that, is counting finished projects on a quarterly basis toxic for me? I don't think so. Failed projects count the same and successful projects, and I need a representation of what I've been up to.  So I'll happily continue with this, but will also try to stop the dithering and get stuff done!

In the Queue for Q4 and beyond:

Weaving:

• 2 rugs on the big loom.
• The piece from the Mary Z class
• A double faced cardwoven band.
  

Knitting:

• Sand and Sunsets
• Shiny sweater

Quilting:

• There are a couple of quilts I'd like to finish. And I want to continue to explore continuous line designs with my embroidery machine.

Sewing: 

• Stash reduction (this would go better if I stopped buying fabric).
• Sheep shirt
• Shirt for Scott

Other:

• There are mosaic and linocuts I'd like to work on. I've started on the dancing girls. And I worked a tiny bit on the table.
• It occurs to me that I have a minimum of 2 nieces, their spouses, and 2 grand-niblings that live in cold climates. Maybe scarves this year? I suspect I'll also have to start thinking about a baby blanket...

Speed Blocking

Afternoon Tea Shawl

I finished my second Afternoon Tea Shawl and forgot it was soaking in the sink... DH noted it was there and I had 30 minutes before I had to leave for an appointment; how long does it take to block a shawl anyways?

The answer is, longer than you expect. I worked through that shawl VERY QUICKLY, called it speed blocking and got fine results. I barely made it to my appointment on time.

I also finished the piece from the Inge Dam CNCH class; I showed photos of it on the loom and it looks about the same off the loom, so no additional photos of that at this time.

Wheely handy

With the Mac cleared off, I folded it up to take glamour shots of the loom "skateboard". It's basically 4 castors on an old shelf, with some stops to keep the loom from moving while wheeling it about. I used a strap on it when I move it at CNCH.  

Finally, I believe I've made it clear that there will be some cat photos on this blog... Owl has found a new place to nap, when I took out a bag of blocking tiles and left the cabinet open. 

A new source of fiber?

Q2'23 Finished Objects (7)

Comboweave yardage

Looking over my Q2 list, I realize that I've become awful at photo'ing my finished objects... Maybe I should make that a prerequisite to calling them "finished"? There was some spinning, too, but it's hard to thing of a finished skein as a finished object...

It does feel good to be finishing things... Here's what I've done:

Weaving:

• 2 pillow tops in beiderwand
• Comboweave fabric, finished on the last day of Q2; this is 8/2 tencel, sett at 27 EPI; colorful warp was dyed in a Kathrin Weber workshop, the rest is commercially dyed. It's twill and basketweave.
  

Knitting:

• Dan Doh's Permutations poncho (alas no photos)
• Sommerloch (also no photos yet)

Quilting:

• Machine quilted runner

Sewing:

• Shirt in linen (no photos... sensing a trend?)
  

Other projects

• Limoncello
• We sleeved and hung 3 of the Ikats on the walls!

And here's what is in progress:

Weaving:

• 2 rugs on the big loom; loom is threaded and I'm ready to start weaving.
• I'm pulling a warp for a class with Inge Dam at CNCH (local weaving conference); the class combines weaving and card weaving in one fabric. I've admired her work and book for quite awhile so I'm excited to learn this. I'll need to have the loom ready to go for the first week in August.

Knitting:

• 
  Still working on Sand and Sunsets... I got a manicure prior to my nieces wedding only to realize my nail polish matches my knitting! Scary, no?
  
• I started two things at the knitting retreat: I'm half way through a shawl (perfect travel airplane knitting) and I started a sweater. The sweater will probably have to wait until Sand and Sunsets is done, but I think the shawl will be my drag around knitting.

Quilting:

• There are a couple of quilts I'd like to finish. And I want to continue to explore continuous line designs with my embroidery machine.

Sewing:

• I have one camp shirt cut out and partly sewn, and would like to finish the paper one before the end of July.

Other:

• I'm taking an online ikat class from Mary Zicafoose in September.
• There are mosaic and linocuts I'd like to work on.
• It occurs to me that I have a minimum of 2 nieces, their spouses, and 2 grand-niblings that live in cold climates. Maybe scarves this year? I suspect I'll also have to start thinking about a baby blanket...

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. 

Warp all the Looms!

Doubleweave technicolor

I took Jennifer Moore's Double Rainbow Doubleweave course over the last two weeks... I still think I have about a yard of warp to weave on it. It's a delightful class; she's a wonderful teacher;  and I can see using her techniques!  Still working on this warp but hoping to finish by the end of the month.

Kitchen Towels

Meanwhile, on the other loom, I'm working on a towel kit I got from Eugene Textile Center. Yes, I have Plenty Of 8/2 Cotton but for some reason couldn't come up with a pattern, so I bought a kit. It's like magic; the selvedges are as good as I've ever done, tension is good so far, it's almost as if someone else is weaving it; and I can weave a towel in two days, while doing other projects. I've done the two solid colored ones and one of the striped weft. One more to go!

I'm taking a class in Andean Pebble weave on an inkle loom from Laverne Waddington. What fun! I've made one 80" band from 3/2 cotton; it's addictive. The second class is tomorrow and I'll post photos of the bands when I've finished the 2nd warp.

The 2nd set of mittens is done! Mittens were washed and blocked, then I'll put them away until October, when I'll send them to their forever home. 

Also started piecing the intermediate blocks for the pub quilt. DH has suggested I piece all of them (they'll be differences) before I continue... Sadly he's probably right so I'm stalled until I can get more machined blocks complete. 

On the cooking side of things, I made pork chops with blackberry sauce from Mark Miller's Red Sage Cookbook; the sauce was primarily blackberries and ancho chiles. Had I not known better, I would have suspected there was tea or tobacco in it; then realized that the blackberries have a high tannin content! Mystery solved.  I also grilled a New York Steak using the Buffalo Rib Eye rub from the same cookbook. I think their might be one or maybe two more dishes from this cookbook before the month is over!

Mittens, and a lot of "I'll tell you later"

Mitten and pattern

I just finished knitting mittens for my dear friend G who has up and moved to Canada with M... her mittens are next on the needle but I'm unsure whether I can get them done before things thaw for the spring. I combined two patterns (one for the mittens and one for the cuff). I had intended on doing a some embroidery on the hand but can't find a combo I like so I may leave them as is.  The patterns are from Anna Zilboorg's Magnificent Mittens. I wonder how she's doing and if she has moved off of her mountain yet?  Anyways, I had some issues with the thumb settling in nicely, will have to figure that out on subsequent mittens.

I also cut a little glass for the poppy mosaic... It's been cold and rainy and I haven't been motivated to be down there.

I wove and dyed my woven shibori piece. I'll detail that elsewhere.

I'm also working on the pub quilt. Yes, I realize I say that a lot but honestly I am working on a design using my fancy quilt design software. So far I've come up with a  lovely design that is mostly unpieceable. Stay turned.

January has been very productive for me!

Destined to adorn nightstands

More from Alice Water's The Art of Simple Food: I served the braised pork with chiles with polenta, and it was fabulous. The lemon sherbert was excellent, as was the sauteed fennel. We had the same baked fish again, this time with a garlic, lime, and jalapeno butter. I'm officially closing that cookbook now and moving to February! I'll publish the name of the cookbook in a later post, but it's one of Julia Child's... On February 2, I made the Provencal fish with some halibut and tomatoes that needed cooking up. Very nice with a French Chardonnay.

It's found a home on this table, 
but the table is moving

The same day I finished the overshot runners;  the star fashion and rose fashion runners, and a 3rd runner of my own design adding a second pattern color. My design looks very much like other designs in the group but I did work through all of the design particulars so I feel good about what I'm doing. 

I finally finished the baby sweater from JC Briar's class; it just needs a bath, a better photo, and a toddler.

Baby sweater in search of a baby.

I finished spinning and plying the purple/brown merino that's been in my stash forever. 

Newly born yarn

I also embroidered up a couple of hockey motifs that'll go on a bag; I haven't made it back to my sewing machine yet, but I will!

I'm going to put a list of the weaving projects I'd like to take on while I'm still in captivity... I'll do it here.

1. Turned monks belt warp shibori scarf in tencel for my study group. (March deadline)
2. Double weave sampler in Jennifer Moore's class (March deadline)
3. Doubleweave pillows from MA05 (the cover photo) in colors that match our living room.
4. M's and O's towels from Handwoven JF06, for the towel exchange (May deadline)
5. A new rug for the den slider.
6. Towels for the powder room.
7. A overshot coverlet.

Let's get this New Year Started!

I've been doing some cooking this month from Alice Water's The Art of Simple Food.  So far I've baked salmon and served it with a garlic, lemon, and cilantro butter, and tonight I'm cooking a slow cooked pork shoulder with chiles, which we'll have with polenta. This cookbook is as much a collection of cooking techniques as it is a collection of recipes, and I would certainly be a better cook if I read it through!

But instead I've been working on other things. In the garden, I've been dismantling the madder bed, pulling out all the roots and sifting the soil to make sure there aren't any bits and pieces that will sprout later to cause issues. I've got a good quantity of madder drying in the garage and will dye with it in the summer. 

Woven in star fashion

On the weaving front, I've been working my way through Janet Dawson's overshot class. The written lessons are absolutely amazing; the webinars have been okay to good but her teaching style does not necessarily click with my learning style. Regardless, I'm learning LOTS about overshot. I've decided to use the first 2 projects to make runners for the nightstands in the guest room, using a light grey-green 8/2 unmercerized cotton for the weft, and a natural 8/2 unmerc cotton in the weft, with 5/2  mercerized cotton as the pattern weft in a dark green called loden. Instead of making placemats I'm making runners for the guest room nightstands.  So far I'm pleased with everything but the edges... why is it always the edges?  This one is woven in star fashion; the 2nd one will have a different treadling and will be woven in rose fashion. The "fashion" just describes whether there are obvious crosses or poofy circle motifs.

I'll note that I'm using Texsolv cord for the tie ups on the baby Mac instead of the hooks that have given me so much grief; it's MUCH nicer. The Mac, though, is a little small for me and I find after using the Gilmore that the Mac feels more like a toy.

On the knitting front, I finished the Double your Pleasure cowl! I like it.  And it's subtly warm without being overwhelming.  

I also fished out a baby sweater that I started about 2 years ago in a class by JC Briar on how to do set in sleeves. The baby sweater was to teach us the methodology and I figured I might as well do something useful...  I had the best intentions to finish it quickly so I wouldn't forget how. I did find the pattern and the extra yarn and so am finally finishing it!  All I have left is the color, button band, and hiding all the ends.

I'm still spinning away on some purple/brown merino that's been in my stash forever. I finished one of the 5 ounce-ish braids and am maybe 1/3 of the way through the second one. I'll do a two ply then figure out what to do with it!

On the mosaic front, I've got the substrate for the table ready to go. This run of lovely weather has driven me into the yard instead of the studio, but I'll get to it soon.

4 sets of these for my niece and
her family

I made these nifty badges for my niece's family on the embroidery machine! I still need to get them in the mail... I also found the skull with hockey sticks and I'm making some quilt blocks for a machine quilting class; once quilted, I'll make more grocery bags from them, probably for DH. 

Aside from all this, I'm suffering a bit from pandemic-fatigue and I'm doom-scrolling the political news more than I need to. Somedays I feel like I'm trying to swim through peanut butter! Writing all this down is certainly helping me realize I'm actually getting things done.

May news

18 masks for ABQ

It's now a month later and I realized I'm neglecting this blog as time passes by... Here's a rundown on the projects I'm working on.

I went on a mask making spree, supplying masks to friends and family; I also sent 18 to my niece in Albuquerque who has been giving them to her friend and co-workers. I'm about masked-out. Today I made three more from some shibori fabric I dyed a few years ago. I'm quite proud of these.

A perfect trio of 3 shibori masks

On the spinning side, I finally finished spinning the 200g of silk I dyed in a Merike Saarnit class years ago; I still need to ply it up a bunch.  I'd like to order some silk from Redfish Dyeworks and use it together in a shawl.

I started knitting again; I cast on Laura Bryant's Double Your Pleasure cowl with a kit I bought at Stitches a couple of years ago; am knitting along with K and T from one of my knitting groups.  I finished the first couple of inches and have realized I need to pull back a couple of rows... Meanwhile here is the yarn.

Double Your Pleasure 

I've also been putting a lot of time into quilting on the Festivus quilt; I'm working on the border but will need to put a few more stitches into a couple of the blocks, as well as do the setting strips. I'd like to finish this soon!

And finally, I'm still weaving a shadow weave piece of fabric destined for clothing. It's slow going.

Double weave on the loom

I've spent considerable time in the garden in the last couple of months, and hoping to be spending more time doing other things in the next couple of months.

Bangkok chicken, rice with
turmeric, roast aspargus and
yummy Slovenian wine

Finally, the cookbook challenge! The April cookbook challenge was Lopez-Alt's The Food Lab. I made a butterflied roast chicken and some amazing crispy roasted potatoes that I'm craving now... I also set off the smoke alarm with the chicken and was forced to learn to clean the oven. May is Great Foods without Fuss by  McCollough and Witt; a fabulous cookbook!  I made the Bangkok Chicken with grilled chicken and will make a curried shrimp dish later this week. There's also a recipe for pot de creme as well that I'll try before the month is out.

Q1 '20 Finished Things (6)

For Q1, I clearly did a small subset of what my goals were... between an overly aggressive list and being distracted by the pandemic, I still managed to complete 6 things:

Wove a Rebozo from the yarn I dyed in Fresno.

Created a small and a large mosaic piece during my Esalen Class.

Knit a pair of socks from 20 year old yarn.

Knit the Lake Breeze Sweater AND put a zipper on it.

Finished the 2nd table top to match the first one .

This totally cracks me up

I also had some progress on:

The eye mosaic: I have some of it glued down and a plan for the rest.

The Festivus quilt: I've got a number of blocks completely quilted, working through those.

Shadow weave fabric of my own design for the study group: It's slow to warp, as I'm lacking the concentration, but I'm about 1/2 way through the warp.

And these are still on the list:

Finish the woven jacket with the knitted sleeves (I need some courage)

I need to do some other sewing thing (I have a top pattern I want to trial)

And I need to pick up a spinning project.

For Q3, I also would like to start an ikat project and start knitting something.

Sheltering...

We're a week into "shelter in place" due to the Covid 19 virus; my darling husband has been home for a week longer than that. You'd think being stuck at the house would make me more productive, but I've been cooking a lot more, and doing house cleaning and yard work! 

So what have I been doing? 

• I finished the socks. They're a little loose but should shrink a bit in the washer.

• I finished the green sweater but haven't taken any photos. DH says it looks fabulous, but honestly had I tried it on in a store I would have reached for the smaller size. It's wonderfully warm though... I may try to shrink it up a bit when I wash it next.

• I've swatched the Razzle poncho but haven't hit gauge yet. It's a little frustrating.

• I'm threading the loom with my shadow weave project; at 35 threads per inch it's slow going and I'm not motivated. I have 6 of 15" threaded so far and should try to do a little bit every day.

• I'm working my way through the Festivus quilt; we're watching a lot of Netflix in the evenings so I think I'm getting a lot done; I need to spread it out and check my progress. I'm working on all the blocks, then will do the setting strips, then the border. 

• Lastly, I'm spending a lot of time in the mosaic studio. I finished all the motifs on the table top and spent about 3 hours working on the border yesterday. Can't wait to finish! I also have a couple of small 3-D pieces in progress, more on them later...

Bubbles, concrete, babies...

Bubbles!

A few weekends ago, I went to a mosaic weekend retreat, 8 of us with two teachers for three days. I made this lovely picture of bubbles with the help of Wilma and Ilse! The iridescence of the glass does not come through on this photo... I'll have to get DH to re photo for me. I learned a lot and I'm very pleased with the outcome.

I'm finding the 3-4 day workshop format (regardless of media) with a finished object at the end a little tiring; I find I don't have time to look at and reflect on what I'm doing and I think that's not good for my art. I do like the feedback I get from the artist instructors and the artist participants. I'm trying to figure out how go forward.

I did sign up for a couple more of Wilma's classes; two days ago I learned how to make these concrete substrates suitable for mosaic. Nope, the photo is in color, not black and white; it's just concrete forms on a white surface. I'll be making more of these! Next weekend, I'll mosaic one of them (also in class); I think I'll do the top right.

Substrates.
Lower right most is the size of a toilet paper tube.

Meanwhile, Mollie Stone's (a local grocery chain) brought in a truck load of Hatch Green Chile and a roaster... I bought 20 lbs of roasted chiles, which is somewhat less than that roasted. DH helped me strip off the skins and take off the stems and seeds. OMG the kitchen smelled good! I immediately bought a big hunk of pork and made some green chile stew. I used this recipe to make some corn sticks to eat with them.

And I've been making baby things. I made a baby sweater for one of DH's coworker; I powered through this thing to get it done in time for a dinner later this week. I just have to sew on buttons and sew in all the ends and I'm done.  This has to be my favorite baby sweater in the world to knit! It's self striping sock yarn, so it's easy to make. I'm also pulling the warp for 2 baby blankets, one for the new grandniece, the other for a friend, hoping to get it on the loom soon!

Devan

I'm also starting to think of what I want to do in Q4, seeing as I only have a week left in Q3...  More on that later.

Things are getting done!!!

OMG I finished a sweater!

DH left 3 days ago for France to bicycle up three mountain passes on the same day... I did not go because I can't handle heat, altitude and that much climbing in one day! I have been back on the bike lately but even in my strongest riding days I doubt I could have ridden that... While he's gone, I've been trying to get some things done around...

For the fiber part of it, I finished Mystic River! Okay, almost, I still need to sew on two buttons. It's drying right now, and I'll sew the buttons on tomorrow before I put it on to wear to Knit Night. I'll swap the photo out for one on me when I wear it the first time.  I think it'll be adorable over a tank top.

Card woven badge lanyard

I've been hosting the Guild's Card Weaving Study group every two weeks to make lanyards for our guild badges, hoping to get folks past the fear of making simple bands. Last meeting, I used a warp that was  John Mullarkey's class demo, which he gave it to me because he couldn't remember my name. Win! I added two border cards to each side and wove it up into a lanyard. Looks like 27 inches finished length puts in mid chest; I sewed one end to a lobster clip and tied the other one on with twisted fringes.

I don't know what I'm doing

Did I mention that I've become the guild librarian? It's a heady feeling to have all those books and magazines at my fingertips. I'm working on getting enough shelf space for all of it as well as moving things in. I want to drive more interest in the library so I decided to weave something from the library books periodically and wave it around at guild meetings with the book it's from. I picked Handwoven Scarves as my first book. They have a twill scarf in blue with random bits of white in it (she calls it random ikat) that I thought would look fabulous on DH and it's time for him to have a new scarf anyways. Note that I've never done ikat, but am scheduled for a class on it next month. So I pulled an ikat book from the library shelves and dyed the warp and weft today; it's drying outside.  I'll put technical details about the scarf in a future post.

I noticed something interesting looking at older weaving magazines and weaving books. Most books I've looked at contain exact instructions, numbers of threads, colors, yarn, tie up, methods, etc. The older books are more like a suggestion; there's data on how it was woven, but so much depends on the weaver knowing what needs to be done. Have you ever looked at an old cookbook? Where an instruction might be "prepare the dough"? Depending on the cook to know what needs to be done? I'm fascinated.

Next up? I have too many things in flight.

• Sew two pillows out of that Kilim of my mothers that I have for the couch in the den. 
• Clear the Mac and cut texsolv cords for all of the tie ups. 
• Warp up a strap with a new card weaving technique (AngloSaxon?) and get a little bit done before the next card weaving meeting.  I'd like to use the strap for my new wine bag.
• I'm also working on a Devan sweater for one of Scott's coworkers who is expecting a baby in the fall. This is easy enough to qualify as "idiot knitting".

Springtime catchup

So much has been going on but not much fiber or cooking related!

We took a three week trip to Italy; visited Rome, Orvieto, Montepulciano, Citta di Castello, Ravenna, Ama (population 5), and Florence, and many points in between. The food was amazing; the wine was amazing; the sights were amazing; the trip? amazing.  I'll come back to describe several of those places in later posts. Before and during the trip I listened to a book about the Etruscans, a Great Courses lecture series on the Roman era, covering the monarchy, republic, empire, and fall, and stared a Great Courses lecture series on the Renaissance in Florence, so was able to put what I saw more into context; I think DH was entertained as well.

Socks!

I came home to an empty loom and an empty house; DH took off almost immediately for some business trips, so I went from having a constant companion to being constantly alone; this is a little depressing. I'm finally coming out of that and starting to be productive again.  So here is what I'm up to.

Fabric for a bag by one of
the 4H students

• I finished a pair of socks from some of my oldest yarn.
• I am working on a cotton summer jacket called Mystic River; I got part way through a front panel and couldn't decide on the length so I put it away and started the second front panel; I'll have to decide on length in the next week or so.
• I wound a warp and started dressing the loom with some alpaca I bought in 2001 and some alpaca that was gifted me around 2010. One of the yarns is a singles yarn and one of them is a two ply; so I'm doing a plain weave pattern called log cabin, and weaving it doublewidth on my loom. This'll be my first project using doubleweave to get an item longer than my loom will support. It'll be a throw blanket to use in front of the TV; it should weave up pretty quickly once I get the loom threaded.
• I did spinning demos at two events and went to the Spinning Guild meeting, spinning on some wool/tencel mixed top that I've had for forever. I hated spinning it, it was not a happy fiber to work with. It's done and I've moved on to the next blue fiber that I have, a dark blue merino Tussah.
• I poked at some tiles on the mosaic but haven't had the concentration to keep going on it.
• Most of the kids in the 4H group finished their bags!!! I have no photos of the finished ones, but have included one of them before it was sewn together and straps added.

I have been spending a lot of time on the yard, getting the new yard in shape and getting the pond cleaned out. I came home from Italy to find it full of pollywogs and string algae! Also, we're starting work on the kitchen on May 6, so I've been spending a lot of time chasing down materials.