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.

Q4'21 Finished Things (7)

I was so narrowly focused this year on finishing the Pub Quilt (which is in the closet right now for the Christmas Quilt season)... After I'd completed it I felt somewhat disconnected from my other projects. Anyways, I'm back on track now. For Q4, I did the following:

• Made a tablet woven mask lanyard
• Practiced my woolen spinning by turning a blue batt and some green wool into yarn.
• Took a class in ruler quilting, making a really ugly quilted table runner.
• Took a class in reduction lino print making, and made a 3 color print.

Wove two ikat scarves.

===================

With the 29 projects I finished during the rest of the year, the total for 2021 is 36! That's really high for me, considering 2 of those were a queen sized quilt.  There are a few things very close to completion that I almost powered through today but then decided I had other priorities, and a silly number isn't everything.

For 2022, I'd like to do more mosaic, more printing, some sewing and some band weaving.  On my mind right now are:

Owl wonders why there's no 
cat time in the 2022 list?

• A vest
• There's fabric that is still on the loom from the second overshot class.
• A vest made from that fabric.
• A cardwoven band to adorn the vest.
• Paper yarn
• I spun paper to knit with but ran out of paper... I just got more paper so hope to finish the yarn in Q1.
• I'd like to weave a paper sample from it, and start knitting something from it.
• Spin the silk I just bought for card weaving.
• Spin more cotton.
• Play with Paltiya.
• Fix the two needlepoint pillows that are falling apart.
• I finished two guest room towels in Q3; the other two still need hemming.
• A summer sweater that K and are I talking about
• A shirt for S
• I need to perfect the pattern then
• Find Fabric
• And sew him a shirt

Let's add to this that I'll have a wet studio by the end of Feb, I need to pick up the pace on my workouts, and I'm learning to play piano. And with any luck, we'll be able to start travelling again in 2022. 

First dinner party in what feels like years

We had some friends over for dinner on Saturday... Seems like forever since we've done that! I made a simple Lamb Tagine from Easy Entertaining, with couscous, and a salad with oranges and fennel loosely following this Martha Stewart recipe (butter lettuce instead of arugula) I really liked the salad dressing and I think the Tagine will become a go-to dish! For dessert I made a flourless cake which was meh... but also passed some homemade peanut brittle and some chocolate marshmallows which we dipped in dark chocolate... I think this candy making thing is going to become a yearly event.

Things have slowed down in the studio but I suspect with two weeks of rain on the way I'll be busy. I'm still working on the knitted shawl, the two ikat scarves, and the fabric from Janet Dawson's class. I'm also trying to get a pattern that works for a shirt for DH; I cut out a muslin today and will sew it up later this week and then try it on him for fit. I'm also half-heartedly trying to take the backs off of two pillows where the backing was disintegrating so I can sew them up all nice and new... We'll see what I can finish by the end of the year.

Three color reduction lino print

I'm taking a zoom class in reduction lino printing from Nick Collins via Palo Alto's Pacific Art League.   I'm learning a lot but also watching a lot of YouTube videos; I have so much to learn!

The image is from a photo I found on the internet. I decided I would do 3 colors; a light yellow-orange, a dark orange and a black. I resized and traced the image onto a piece of linoleum with this in mind. 

For the first color, I eliminated everything on the block that I wanted to be white, then printed it. I liked the "chatter marks" in the direction of flight so decided after a test print to leave them. This is made with Caligo Safe Wash ink (an oil based ink that cleans up with soap and water) on Strathmore 300 printing paper. I mixed the extender with yellow and red paint and I love the painterly effect it has. I also like the wash of color and will try to do that purposefully in the future. 

If I do a border again, I won't leave a 1/4" white space outside the border; it adds nothing. It's also possible that such a large white space is not a great idea... And, I'd wanted the butterfly going the other direction but got so excited about carving that I forgot to flip the image.

The first coat took overnight to dry; meanwhile, I carved out all the spaces I wanted to stay yellow. Then I printed with a darker orange.

I started with red and added yellow; then couldn't get the red light enough. One of the videos I watched recommended adding the dark color to the light for manageable results. I could have started over with the ink but just went with it. I carved out some of the chatter marks so I'd have yellow in the sky as well. I am using too much ink.

Here's the final! Only one of the 16 had good registration. Clearly some practice is needed... My big issue was with registration, plus the inability to look at a mirror image and figure out which way to move to adjust the registration. There are a couple of ways of getting truer registration and I'm going to try them on the next print! And probably just try 2 colors. 

The plate only has the black lines left... so I can't print another series of this. But I might trim the plate down and print some watercolor post cards; I can color in the yellow and orange bits and I think they would be fun.

Mid-November already?

I've neglected mentioning the cookbook challenges... October was Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cooking; I made halibut in a yogurt sauce and sauted spinach and peppers. November's cookbook is George Lang's Cuisine of Hungary.

It's also been a fall of apples. LOTS of apple crisp, apple butter, apple sauce, apple salads. The red with the larger fruit tastes best; the smaller red are good the longer they are on the tree.  They're tiny enough where I use a corer to core them then they are 4 bites. The green are very tasty too although a little sunburnt; I just finished stripping the tree. I'll miss them!

• I haven't spent much time in the studio lately, but today I spent most of the day there. I have a really long warp on the loom for Janet Dawson's class; I abandoned the samples and have decided to weave off the rest in petit point and sew something with it. It's complicated to weave so I'm taking it in small doses.
• Plied the singles I'd spun woolen from a blue/green/black art batt and plied more paper yarn. I also plied up little bits of stuff I was playing with in classes.
• Finished the runner I started in the ruler work class.

I took a class in andamento which is how to place the tiles in a mosaic to create a flow; the teacher teaches the classical method but also talked about some of the contemporary treatments. I have a couple enlarged drawings that I might mosaic.

I am also taking a class in print making. Or course there came the part of the class that I dread, in which the instructor says "Okay, draw something". I just took an easy photo off my phone (of the ground cherry) and used that; we'll see how it prints. For next week, we'll need an image for a multicolor print; I'm likely to steal one of the fetching drawings out of my child's Beginner Piano book and do that; they're super cute and I think would adapt to a learning situation.

Pub Quilt finished and on the bed! And Cape Gooseberries!

 I’ve  been waiting for the DH to take some glamor shots of the finished Pub Quilt, but with everything else going on I suspect that’s not going to happen soon.  So I took a couple of plain photos...

Heres's my side

I did want to note that I did straight grain binding but now I've done it I prefer bias; also, I did 2.25" binding and I think I prefer 2". 

I’m very pleased with myself. I’m still trying to figure out when I started it; it was between  28 and 30 years ago. I finished it a couple of weeks ago and I’ve been playing since then.

And here's his side

Specifically, these are the other projects:

• I’ve been spinning paper, with a goal to knit something from it. Below is a knitted sample, using silk singles as a  binder. The yarn is between light fingering and lace weight from 1/4” strips of sewing pattern tissue paper.  1/2" strips make a thinker yarn. I'm using some roughly spun silk I got from someone's destash as the binder on the yarn for the knitting project... (In case I forget, I'm adding twist to the silk with a 4 count out and a 4 count in, and plied it with an 8 count out and 2 count in. 

• 

  Knitted paper yarn!!!

  I’ve been spinning a blue stashed batt with a woolen draw, to get ready for the next project. The singles are ready to be plied.
• I carded the green fiber from 2020 CNCH some random silk bits, and some zwartbles together, and will spin it into a 2 ply woolen yarn. There's a competition for the yarns, which is why I'm practicing with the batt.
• I spun some cotton but need to work more on this.
• I’ve been weaving some of the samples from Janet Dawson’s class but am not ready to share. There are some fun and some overly fussy samples.
• I cataloged my sewing fabric and patterns with an eye towards engaging a sewing tutor; I put together a list of goals.
• I took a class in ruler quilting at PIQF, made a super ugly runner which needs to be bound.
• I have a mosaic class in Andemento coming up in which we won't be doing any mosaic, but really just drawing pieces and grout line.
• I enrolled in a Lino block carving class and got to order art supplies!!!! Hurray for art supplies! Sadly it’s nearly impossible to get red ink right now.
• And yesterday I dyed the yarns for the next run of ikat scarves. It was an utter disappointment; I'll detail that later!

Now I need to think about how to structure my life so I can get all this shit done.

New Pool Toy

Meanwhile, construction continues on the laundry room that will morph into a dye studio, and I'm taking piano lessons. We had a huge rain storm in which my favorite oak fell into the pool, and we had several new leaks. Good thing we have contractors working on drywall right now anyways.

And last but not least, the cape gooseberry crop came in just in time for me to candy these adorable tiny fruits for DH's birthday. We had these for the first time at a rural hotel in England, as part of a dessert tray, the year we got married. So I guess 27 years later is the magic year to get things done. 

Things From SOAR

I often take classes then don't practice what I learn, then I forget what I learned. I promised myself I wouldn't do this with the classes I just took at SOAR. So...

Here's a lovely finished object from SOAR... a tablet woven mask lanyard. It's 20 cards of 10/2 cotton in Egyptian diagonals pattern (iron age tech), started in a class with John Mullarkey. It's about 3/4" wide and 35" long with lobster clips. I sloppily zig-zaged it together by machine; I need to find a better way.  The double diamonds in the center section were a mistake! You'd think I could have watched my weaving and caught it... but I liked it enough to replicate it (with John's help). I have notes!

Speaking of card weaving, my new friend S. pointed out this delightful site: http://ladyelewys.carpevinumpdx.com/. She's hosting a weave-a-long for historical card weaving that includes historical or archeological information. I'm hooked.

I took a break from The Quilt That Must Be Finished this morning to practice a couple things from SOAR. I had cut up some pattern paper in 1/2" strips and tried spinning it on my Kromski wheel; it spins beautifully but will not feed on. The orafice is more convoluted than on the Louet, and all the little hooks seem to be a bit of an issue. I'll go back to the Louet and try it again. I've also bought some colored tissue paper from Target; one of the ladies had brought it to the workshop and Judith had declared it fabulous, so I'll give it a try some morning. 

I also tried some tweed. I took the green fiber from the CNCH Return to Sender challenge and carded it with about 15-20% Zwartbles wool  and some silk floor sweepings from John's class; it ended up being a lovely olive green with the little silk bits showing through. My spinning technique, however, needs some work... So I'll spin something else up with a woolen draft before I go back to this. The good parts are very good but there are some unattractive lumps...

Zwartbles

Zwartbles, by the way, are a Dutch sheep breed that are naturally black in their un-unburnt state; the wool goes a little brown on the older sheep.  Here's an awesome photo of them from https://zwartblesireland.com/. They're milk and meat sheep; the wool has a good crimp but is in the 30 micron diameter range which makes it a little itchy for next to the skin use.

The aforementioned quilt will be done this week!