12 Days of Christmas - Day 11

 Here's Day 11 - I can't believe this fun is almost over. But then I do get to ply all of it as soon as I figure out what I'm plying it with..........

 ..........someone should give me a pat on the back for not peeking ahead in the packages and staying with the program........I didn't have to, I could have done what I wanted, but it was kind of fun to do what the plan was for this fiber.......my friend Kathy who had it all spun up really fast and is on to plying.......other friend Cathy is drop spindling hers so she hasn't peeked ahead.

Since today was another snow day I wove a couple scarves from a painted rayon flake warp I dyed. I forgot to take a photo of the second warp - I used a royal blue tencel weft for that one. I really like rayon flake but it probably wasn't the best choice for a painted warp. In the painting/rinsing/drying process the flake areas of the warp all stuck together which made this really hard to wind on the loom through the lease sticks........it was slow going..........but the end result will be lovely.

Tomorrow is another snow day for me as I won't venture out on the roads or down our long steep driveway yet. My Outback will drag on the snow on the 1/3 mile of drive and I'm worried about sliding off into the ravine.......but I think by Friday I can get out, I've sure enjoyed being housebound.........well, I guess it's not really housebound, I have left the house, just not the property.........

More scarves and shawls....

More hand-dyed scarves and shawls finally up for sale in my etsy shop. It certainly is a time sucker taking photos, editing them, tagging with inventory numbers and listing in my etsy shop.....but all a part of the job. I did put aside 2 ice dyed scarves for some surface design/stenciling - I deliberately dyed those two very pale colors. I'm drawn to so many of the colors but only set aside one for myself out of the batch of 20 - I didn't take a picture of that one, maybe I'll get to it. There are at least 5 scarves I'd love to keep but being realistic I wouldn't wear them all so I settled for one. The shawls are lovely and there's one I have my eye on but need to think on if I'll really wear it - hopefully that one doesn't sell before I make up my mind.........I won't tell which one as having done that in the past someone I know then bought it immediately.

More ice-dyed scarves

 

Hand-dyed Devore Rayon and Silk Shawls

South Seas Scarves

I got the fringe twisted on the South Seas Scarves - the tencel warps were hand-dyed by me, wefts are various colors of tencel. Only the center scarf is listed in my etsy shop so far - others to be listed soon. As always, if someone sees something they'd like but it's not in my etsy shop yet please drop me a note or leave me a comment.  Sorry the color in the lemongrass scarf on the left didn't quite come out right as I was trying to lighten up the background - it's not quite that acid looking..........although I like it. I think these scarves would look great worn with jeans, and a chartreuse top - what you don't have any chartreuse tops in your closet???  I have several - one of my favorite colors. I've even got a couple pairs of shoes in this color.........

Weaving the day away.......

 I got to spend quite a bit of time at the loom today on a painted tencel warp - first scarf I used a chartreuse weft - a favorite color of mine.......

 .....next scarf a medium teal weft........

......final scarf a dark teal weft........

Has anyone else watched any of the new Netflix Original Series Grace & Frankie?  It stars Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, Martin Sheen and Sam Waterston. A friend and I spent yesterday afternoon noshing and watching the first four episodes. We both got tickled over it and will get together a few more times to watch the rest of the 13 episodes. It was really nice to spend the afternoon doing something decadent.....usually I'm way to driven to spend an afternoon watching tv.....I'm looking forward to the next get together.

I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend.

New shawl in the shop.......

I had put this shawl aside in the studio last fall after dyeing some silk/rayon devore shawls and scarves.......maybe I thought I'd use it, maybe I would but I haven't yet so up in the etsy shop it goes. I'll be dyeing more of them this summer so there's many more opportunities to dye one for myself. I just love the colors in this one.

This afternoon I spent some time twisting fringe on the rayon/cotton huck lace shawls that just came off the loom. Crisis when my battery fringe twister (Conair hair twister) stopped working and it wasn't low batteries. It's working intermittently now, hopefully Sam can fix it. In the meantime I did have a back-up so I finished the fringes. Maybe tomorrow I'll get the photography work done so they can be listed in the etsy shop and I'll put photos up here on the blog at that time too.

Corkscrews tamed........

The corkscrews were tamed somewhat in the finishing of that scarf. But look - even after washing the fringe is still kinky - it's like the steam during the dyeing process put permanent kinks in that silk - it's crazy. Even after ironing it still looked just as kinky - good thing I was planning on twisting the fringe.

Here it is finished, fringe twisted and ironed. I couldn't come close to capturing the sheen....the feel and drape is incredible with the silk warp & tencel weft. I tried a different technique of hemstitching which is actually knotting - it makes for a less obvious hemstitching. I visited the Webfoot Weavers Guild over on the coast last week to hear a presentation by Nancy Hoskins of Eugene. As an extra little tip she showed this knotting technique which, I think, is in one of her books. I tried it - I like it.

Silk Shawls/Scarves.....

Here are a few of the dyed silk/rayon shawls/scarves from the other day.......

Currently on the needles

This is what I just started knitting - the Morning Surf Scarf, I found the pattern in the Summer 2008 issue of Spin-Off magazine. I'm using some of my leftover hand-dyed handspun Falkland in the Harvest colorway. I'm really liking it, will be interesting to see it blocked when I'm done. Hopefully I have enough yarn to make a decent length scarf, I should but who knows.........

Off to the fair to spin again today, will try to get a picture of what I'm currently spinning to post.