Another shirt...

Crappy photo of me, 
good photo of shirt

I finished a camp shirt from batik S brought me from Kuala Lumpur several years ago; he called me from a marketplace stall and tried to get me to pick some out over the phone (with some texted photos). I made a vest from one of them, and still have 2 or 3 pieces more... It's a little stiff but I think all in all a good use of the fabric. I didn't put a back facing on this one; I like that better; but the finish isn't as nice inside.  And because of the stiffness it doesn't lay quite right on the collar. I wonder if I should have skipped the interfacing? Anyways, I'm now confident in the pattern and am getting ready to start the paper shirt.

For the paper shirt, I think I'm going to go with the back facing and tack it down. And I think the muslin band in the front should be about 1.5". Just a couple more problems to solve and I can start!

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...

Knitting retreat, errors, fun on the loom!

I finally put that tencel on the loom which includes the warp I hand dyed a few years ago... It's a combination weave (in this case, twill and basket weave).  It went on pretty easily, although I was worried about registration of the colored parts and I ended up slipping the threads and getting it pretty poorly aligned. I spent some time debating if I wanted to worry about that; but my color sections are 8 inches or so long and I decided after some thinking and some advice from A.K. to leave it. I'm super glad I did. 

I'd designed a special twill for the color changing sections... and HATED it after I've woven about 6 inches. It had strong horizontal lines which obliterated the color changes and were in general very distracting. So I rejiggered the tie up to make those sections zig-zag; it's a little boring but a lot easier than rethreading. 

When I wound on, the paper got pretty crinkled... I remember thinking that this is bad, it'll cause me tons of tension issues as I weave. About 6 inches in the tension went wonky. I cut out what I'd woven, then rebeamed it with smooth flat happy paper and now the tension is awesome. I also fixed a threading error... I'm about 10" into the weaving and having fun.

I have to have this off the loom by the time I leave for S's wedding as I'll have to rethread for CNCH as soon as I get home! So I'm holding off on the rugs until then.

I've been trying to make a camp shirt that fits so I can use the pattern for my paper yardage. It "finished" and in the washer at the moment, and I'll see how it looks when it comes out... I learned a lot but will sew one more before I cut into the paper.  I made some mistakes... The biggest was picking up the rotary cutter instead of the little rolly marking thingy and cutting a bunch of holes where I'd wanted to make buttons and stuff. I covered the hole at the sleeve cap with embroidery, but managed to get my machine to seize up doing so... It was the trip to get it fixed that caused me to take the runner I made in the last post. I covered the button band with a bias strip of matching fabric, and the buttonholes sit on top of the slits so that's okay. There are two minor holes just under the collar as it turns, and I haven't decided which visible mending to wear there. I may or may not add a pocket with the same embroidery as the sleeves. But I like the fit and it's not hard to sew. Next up, I'll do the same shirt again in a batik from Malaysia.

I'm bringing up the subject of errors because I'm making a lot of them. Nearly all of them are because I didn't listen to my instincts (like having to rebeam the warp) or because I didn't clean up my workspace (picking up the cutter instead of the marker). 

I'm still knitting on Sunset and Sand Dunes or whatever it's called... K's version is lovely and she's about 6 inches ahead of me! I decided not to bring it to our knitting retreat this year. I cast on another Afternoon Tea Shawl (I left the first one in Taos), in bluegreen; this will keep me occupied on the plane and at the wedding. I should finger out if I want beads on it... I also cast on Shiny in a red brown silk that I bought in Amsterdam. The retreat was lovely but I think one day too long, which is fine after complaining for so many years about it being too short! Highlights included a trip to Monarch Knitting, where I bought the yarn for a cowl I'd like to make for our Japanese trip, and inner at the Pocket, where Christophers used to be. 

I have been spinning some but there's nothing to note.

We had a bottle of Skouras Salto (Moscofilero); it's made with wild yeast on the Peloponnesian peninsula (specifically Nemea). Wow. Light, good summer wine, a little salinity; it would be wonderful with fish on the grill. I'm ordering more, while researching the Nemean Lion. 

I have to add that I did some research on the Nemean Lion to see if I could figure out its parentage. There are some legends that it's descended from the Chimera, but also conflicting stories that it's mother was Echidna. I did a double take then went down the internet rathole of researching what the relationship was between an Australian monotreme and a half reptile, half human Greek demi-god. Apparently the Echidna (animal) was initial thought to be a blend of reptile and mammal before the egg-laying mammal thing was figured out, thus the name... But did you know that they have elecrosensors in their snouts that they used to find prey? As far as Wikipedia knows, it's echidna, platypus, and one type of dolphin that do that. I'm fascinated.

Machine quilted runner on the embroidery machine

 

I took a class in machine quilting using my embroidery head; this is the runner we made. There are 10 repeats of the motif, all more or less well aligned... 

We started by centering a design 4" from one long border, and half way on the long axis, and stitching it out; then worked towards the edges. When one side was done, we did the other in the same manner. What I learned:

• Mark the line that everything will align to with chalk pencil.
• Use template paper made for stitching out a design, or stitch it out on organza to help align the design as you go along. Make sure to mark both axis.
• Put the template on first, then hoop the project; put it on the machine and use the centering function to put the center in the right place. Then check starting/ending points (on the Bernina, proceed to the stitch out sheet then hit the button that looks like a broken thread; the search button will let you enter the stitch number.
• Make sure to remove the template before you start stitching! Go to the first stitch, then bring the bobbin thread up to the top and hold on for a few stitches. Stop the embroidery at this point and cut the threads.
• If you don't have enough border to stitch everything out, hoop with the water soluble paper with the one sticky side and stick your project to it after slashing with a pin and peeling off the paper; trim it later and wash to remove. 
• Looks like if there is a problem, you should NOT remove the hoop! You can pick out the problem with a seam ripper and then use the same function as used to navigate to first and last points to get close to where you need to restitch.
• Embroidery tension is low, approximately 3 (of 10); the lower the tension, the further towards the back of the work the thread "knot" will be. If I'm using a quilt sandwich, I don't need stabilizer, and I should experiment with regular sewing tension (like 5).

The instructor, Allegra, was fabulous. She mentioned two things I need to look into. Dime makes a magnetic hoop that's supposed to be easier than managing thumb screws... And she uses Bernina's free design software to print out her design templates.

You can see where I joined motifs, on the left side of this flower... You really have to look for the joins!

New! Things!

Progress!!! Fiber-wise,

• I finished the Permutations poncho and it looks great; it's already been out to dinner twice. (Photo coming)
• The two Beiderwand pillows are on the couch.

  

  Beiderwand

  
  
• Two of the 3 Ikats that I've intended to hang are hanging; the third will go up on Sunday after DH visits the hardware store. I had to fringe one of them and figure out hanging tech for all of them.  Basically, I sewed 3/4" velcro to a cotton sleeve, and basted the cotton sleeve to the back of the ikat. The other half of the velcro was stapled to a baseboard sized piece of wood and nailed to the wall; then the ikat was applied to the to the hanging board. 
• Sommerloch is blocked and ready to wear (photo pending). 
• I figured out where I am on the Sunsets and Sand sweater (from last year) and knitting away on that. 
• I started a shirt in linen from the camp shirt pattern, minus darts. It's slow going as it's making me nervous. 
• My looms are naked, and it's been awhile. That's not good.

I also finished making the limoncello, and am working at spring cleaning my clothing closet. The piano lessons continue and progress is slow, but I'm still enjoying the process.

April '23:What I have been doing and what is on the short list

What I have been doing and what is on the short list:

Volunteer in the garden:
Spunky Monkey

• Permutations: A Dan Doh poncho pattern, travelled to Australia with me. I got quite a bit done on the flights and I'm currently working on the last 40 or so rows, and I want to wear this at our knitting retreat in June.
• Sommerloch sweater: It is done except the bottom edge curls up a bit and the shoulders need to be tightened up a bit. I'm lazily pouting about it, but really... it would take a couple of hours at most to make it wearable, and it does fit. 
• Sunsets and Sand sweater: I stopped working on it before I left on vacation last May. I think I'm half way. I need to figure out where I am and get working on it!
• The Beiderwand pillow tops: They are off the loom but need wet finishing and pillow-top-making.
• Shirt made out of paper fabric: I finally sewed up a muslin without darts from the Natalie pattern and it looks fine, so I can proceed with figuring out the rest of the project. I did by some cotton/linen to make the shirt first so I have more practice. For other fabrics, I think I'd like to put the dart back in and make it work, or move the dart to the shoulder and release it in a cute little pleat. And I found a cute collar trick in Threads magazine I need to try.
• I also need to get hanging hardware on the ikats so that they may be hung...
• There is currently nothing on the looms, either. The study group is working on combo weaves which I'm not excited about at the moment, so I'm tempted to use a kit I got from KS's stash for advancing twill scarves. 

I'm also playing a lot of piano, and I need to get the vegetable garden going in the next two weeks. I've got some guild stuff to do and it seems like an awful lot of doctors stuff going on for someone who is healthy.

Q1'23 finished things (3)

I'm late in posting my Q1 progress... I finished:

• First yarn spun on the Nano
• The cardwoven hiking belt
• Handspun paper fabric
• The Tasmanian Overland Track

I'm particularly fond on the 4th accomplishment on the list...

You'd think now I'm back I'd be getting a lot done. Well, between medical appointments from my unhappy knee, general malaise that results from returning from travel, and a true unwillingness to make any decisions about what's next, I'm a little stuck.