This photo has been sitting on my desktop for quite a while now, since right after the last post when I was weaving it. I couldn't capture the iridescence in this scarf and the sequins don't sparkle as much as in real life. As I said in my last post this is my guild challenge - use gold to celebrate my guild's 50th anniversary. 

 I originally thought I'd weave a second scarf but then came to my senses and cut this one off to finish it. Since I'm no longer selling my handwovens what would I do with 2 scarves with sequins, even if I did use a different weft. I suppose I could have rethreaded to a different draft but still, I just don't need more scarf inventory, still have quite a bit from my selling years.  Instead I tied back on and am weaving using different variegated tencel wefts to create fabric to make notecard inserts. I will use notecards......I'll be using a dragonfly punch for the cardstock. 

It's snowing this morning - so nice to see some snow. It won't amount to a whole lot by the time it's over but it's covering the ground and is so pretty even though it's still dark out. 

Sparkle.......

It's not evident in the photo but those are sparkly holographic sequins in this tencel scarf on the loom. The Saturday Handweaver's Guild will be celebrating its 50th anniversary this year and our challenge for the year to weave gold. Hopefully there will be an exhibit along with other celebrations. 

At first I was going to weave this with gold warp & weft but in my sampling it looks so flat so I started trying out different wefts. I really like this greyed teal weft. I put enough on for 2 scarves, still trying to decide between a few colors what color the weft will be for the next scarf. 

This is plain weave with double weave pockets that I slip each sequin in and then close them up on the next shot thrown. I made some scarves many years ago using this technique. This scarf will have a repeat of 5 rows of sequins on each end. For a conference exhibit (2001) on recycling I wove fabric with bigger pockets and slipped small circuit boards in them. This is a 6 harness weave. At some point I'll need to figure out how to weave a fancy twill with pockets........I'll add that to my very long to-do list. 

I tried out 3 different styles of gold sequins when sampling. They all happened to be from my way too large stash of specialty sequins. These are square and holographic gold. I buy my sequins from Cartwrights Sequins. I don't know if they still have these, haven't explored their website in quite a while since I have such a huge stash in a multitude of colors, sizes and shapes. 

This project is a nice break from working on quilt blocks. I've made 40 of the 72 needed - they are slow going. I'll get back to them sometime this week. 

Auditioning wefts......

I've got the first warp on the AVL since moving.......which means since taking it apart piece by piece, all 40 harnesses off, all 80 cables off, all 80 springs off in addition to all the wooden and steel parts. I had run it through a straight draw without anything on it just to make sure it still worked but hadn't woven on it yet. Although I'm not in the mood to weave scarves it seemed like a good time to do some to make sure all is well with the AVL. In threading heddles harness 18 stuck the first time it was raised, spring went flying off leaving the harness cock-eyed.....then harness 31 stuck.  I ran it through it's paces a few more times and continued to thread, all seemed ok. I had a bit of time this afternoon to tie on and really give it a test - all looks ok as I was auditioning wefts in this sample. I'm thinking I'll go with the lavender, 2nd color from the bottom, then the teal, 4th from the bottom and the rust right above the teal. Three scarves, three different colorways. Of course, I may change my mind before I start weaving.........

For those who may ask - this draft was originally horizontal ribbons by Amy Norris published in the Complex Weavers Compilation book, I think it was 20 shaft but I could be remembering wrong so don't hold me to that - I took the draft and turned it so I have vertical ribbons, it's now 32 shaft.

I'm going to get a towel warp on the Macomber this week too. But alas, I think my last statement is in the mail today so taxes loom on the horizon. Somehow I let myself get talked into buying Turbo Tax Home & Business once again.......all along I was thinking dropping them off at a local accountant's office was sounding much more 'fun' but I guess since we dropped $79 on TT at Costco I need to use it.......

Yet another sad and stressful day......

It seems like it's never ending - always something tragic or unbelievable or depressing on the news anymore which is why I've cut back watching once again. I couldn't believe my ears as I sat down to the computer this morning and put on GMA. I eventually had to turn it off as my stomach was turning, my chest tightening. My heart goes out to all those affected by the carnage in Las Vegas.

Last week I finally got to the bead shop. This afternoon I worked on beading a scarf. Above I used long pins to audition the beads on. It would be much easier if I had pins with no big heads on them but I don't seem to have any 'standard/old fashioned' straight pins any longer.

Here I've got the one end of the scarf beaded, working on the second end. It's probably hard to see in the pix but the beads also change color across the width of the scarf just like the warp does. I wish I could capture the iridescence of this scarf........actually I may have been able to if I had better lighting and background but this was just a quick shot in the middle of beading.

Last week I made a walker bag for a family member back east who is using a walker while recovering from surgery. These fabrics were from my stash, button from my vintage button jar. I think it's really fun and cheery - just what she needs on her walker. I've done some other sewing in the last week but it's all for holiday gift giving so I can't show it here.

And to end on a light note rather than how I started out - tiny little kittens!  We were on the coast this past weekend and the kittens across the street are growing up. Neighbor J had a feral cat, one of the many in the neighborhood, give birth in her bushes. J has contacted a rescue place that will come and get the kittens in a week and find them good homes. J has done a great job of socializing them so they'll be very adoptable. They will all be fixed before going to new homes. Since Momma wouldn't be very adoptable being somewhat wild J has offered to keep feeding and watching over her - they will come get her for spaying so there won't be a repeat litter..........at least not from her. Sure wish we both weren't allergic to cats because I'd love to bring one of the little gray ones home. I did snuggle one of these but then quickly went and washed my hands before touching my face or I would have been a mess for a couple days.

First scarf woven

First scarf woven off the warp I put on the AVL last week.

Next up........

Next up on the AVL........wound on the back beam, heddles and reed threaded.......next up will be tying on the front beam and auditioning wefts for this 16H scarf warp........but I'll save that for another day as I'm getting used to cutting back on the business end of my fiber life and enjoying playing a bit more.........off to knit.......

Patina......again.......

 Here is one of he finished Vines & Leaves scarves. The photo doesn't do it justice. The combination of 3 colors of copper in the warp and dark teal in the weft creates the most incredible iridescence. I wasn't sure if I'd like them or not but I like them so much that I'm considering keeping one for myself. This one is now listed in my etsy shop.

 Yesterday I blocked the shawl I started back in May. It really looks more pink in person than in these photos. I'm not quite sure why I'm having trouble of late capturing accurate color.

Here is it worn around the front as I so often see shawls online and in magazines these days. Usually it's too much bulk......in my opinion......but this shawl is so light and airy that it feels great wearing it this way........yes, I did put it on to test it out.........

This afternoon after I finished twisting the fringe on the scarves and taking photos I looked over at my shelves of handspun and decided I need to get brutal about going through it. Much of it that has lingered is from when I first learned how to spin, and it is lovely, but it's mostly Romney wool from a former local sheep herder and just doesn't suit the type of projects I care to do now. There are some really lovely singles I had originally planned to use as pattern weft for overshot afghans.......but I no longer have those colors in my house so go they must. So, I pulled everything down and have piles sitting waiting for photographs so I can move the yarn on to someone else......and then other bags that I will give away. So, how come I'm moving out all this yarn and the shelves still look stuffed??? 

Tomorrow I'd like to wind a warp to get on the AVL but I could easily get sidetracked taking photos of this yarn.........I'll see how I feel come morning......

Patina

I just finished weaving a couple of tencel scarves in my 40H vine & leaves pattern. They're soaking in a sink right now. I used 3 different shades of rust/copper in the warp and used a dark teal in the weft. This photo doesn't do the color combo justice - it makes me think of copper patina. Do I like the way they turned out? Don't know until they're dry. There will be some iridescence in them.

Packaged and out the door........

 It's always a rush to get something packaged up and out the door to the post office. I know I could do better but I strive to mail out an attractive package without too much additional cost. First almost all my items have this hangtag on them. It's a folded hangtag with item details and washing instructions on the back and a small story about me on the inside. The only items that don't go out with these labels are my embroidered towels and a few other small items, they have miniature tags.

 Here is the scarf wrapped in tissue with a reusable gift tag ready to mail. I also put a thank you note in the package and place it in a reusable plastic bag to protect against damp/wet during shipment, then into the shipping bag or box. My reusable gift tags are newer to my packaging - I created them using a tag punch with cardstock and then gluing on a piece of handwoven fabric.

I stitched up a couple of these towels the other day just because I thought they were so darned cute. There are two of them for sale in my etsy shop now. I haven't spent much time at the embroidery machine lately but need to get back to it because I've got some great new designs. I buy my digitized designs from Embroidery Library and Urban Threads.  If anyone is ever interested in a particular design please let me know, I'd love to stitch it up for you - my only restriction is that it must not be larger than 4" x 4" as that's all my inexpensive little embroidery machine will stitch.  Look how cute that towel looks with my tea mug, total coincidence - hmm, I might have to stitch one of these up for me........

Pastels and food

 The pastel scarves have their fringes twisted and are ready for sale in my etsy shop. Pastel is not something I usually think of for a handwoven scarf but they turned out lovely. This one has a pale lavender weft...........

.........this one has an ecru weft. A customer of mine requested a pastel scarf in these colors, one of these may or may not fit the bill, it's her decision.

Today I met friend Theresa over in Medford to shop Top Stitch, our local Bernina store, that was having a fabric sale - yikes. Then to lunch at The  Ram Restaurant and Brewery - I had a great Asian salad with macadamia crusted chicken. It doesn't look like a big salad in this photo but believe me, it was huge........and good. The Ram is a chain that recently opened in our region, I have regularly eaten at one of the other locations up in Salem. They brew beer too but I'm not a beer person so I can't review that - the food is wonderful. Theresa gifted me with a box of bamboo from her late father's stash, so in turn, with trying to make room for the bamboo I gifted her with a bag of linen which she loves.

Big storms yesterday afternoon and evening - many fires being chased down today from the lightning strikes. Have I said yet this year that I hate fire season???  And the wind did a number on my fig trees - sure hope it didn't hurt them because they're loaded with figs this year.

Pastels

 I have a customer who asked if I had any pastel scarves, nope but I did tell her when I had some time I'd weave something. She requested pink, blue, lavender, green and yellow. I put all of those in this tencel warp that I wound and got on the loom today. Here is auditioning of weft colors - decided to go with the pale lavender and ecru, which actually looks pale yellow in the photo.

Here's the first scarf with the pale lavender weft. It's now finished, next up the ecru weft one. Will my customer like these? I have no clue but I'm hoping she'll decide one of them will work for her. I'm not really sure how well pastel scarves will sell so I'm only weaving two of them.

The robo calls continue to stream in.....the do not call registry does no good. Yesterday one number called 15 times, as late as 10:45pm. I did report this one to the FTC - not sure it will do any good but it made me feel better. Today there have been 6 calls.....so far, one from that same number. I might have to find out how to block numbers - there are too many different numbers showing up on caller ID to get them all but perhaps I could block a few of the repeat callers.

Lavender Fields Scarves

New hand-dyed, handwoven, tencel scarves in my etsy shop - a turned twill design



Another day, another crisis

Another day, another crisis in this country. Is it never ending??? What goes through a person's head when they head out with a gun for a morning of target shooting fellow human beings???

I could only take so much of the news this morning so I moved on to activities better for my mental health like making and putting tags on handmade journals and then weaving. Here's the first scarf on the painted tencel warp I put on the loom a couple days ago.

And here's the second scarf on that warp. These are ready to be washed tomorrow. I didn't feel like starting a new audio book while weaving so I put on Netflix and watched/listened to a totally mindless and funny movie to get my mind on things other than what's going on in this country - Bridget Jones Baby. It was actually just what I needed - no message, just silliness. I would have loved to have watched more Frankie & Grace but a friend and I get together to do that while lunching and knitting - she'll be over in a couple weeks for our Netflix day. 

There's a new product from Ashland Bay - knit sock blanks ready for dyeing. What fun! I just got some listed in my etsy shop.  The blanks are 4oz and approximately 435 yards each which is enough for most knit sock patterns. They are single stranded so if identical socks are wanted they will have to be folded in half to dye or if a person is good just dye it identically all in one length. This summer I'm going to dye a pile of them for winter knitting but I'm thinking gradations for shawls and scarves, both knit and woven. Gradation yarn is really popular right now and there are tons of knit patterns being designed for it.

These are 80% Superwash Merino/20% Nylon and they are a 100% USA product. The merino is grown in the US, the yarn is spun in the US and they are knit into blanks here in the US.

Pet peeve of the day - robocalls. Whatever happened to the effectiveness of the Do Not Call Registry???  It stopped working years ago. My guess is that those companies have gotten much more sophisticated and can work around it. Now on caller ID it shows local phone numbers and business names but if the phone is answered one will find out that it's really a bank card company trolling or someone telling me my windows computer will be shut down by Microsoft. Because we have caller ID I don't pick up the phone but I still get tired of hearing it ring all day long - so far today 11 calls with no messages left, a tell tale sign they're not legitimate.

Getting an attitude adjustment

I decided I need an attitude adjustment so I'm working on that now. There are too many things in life that cannot be changed easily, if at all, so I've got to work around them. I'm cutting back my news watching....no, not hiding my head in the sand but if something is going to upset and I can't do a thing to fix it I'm going to try and keep it from cluttering up my mind.  I did spend the entire day in the studio, which was great, even if it wasn't all creative time.......just being in there was good for my soul.

 I posted some journals I recently made, here, I hadn't stenciled the inside cover of the green one at that point so I did it this morning. I'll take this journal over to the coast with me for drawing/writing.

I put a painted tencel warp on the loom and started auditioning wefts. I've got two scarves to weave on this warp so I need to find two different weft colors. Two of these are ok but I'm not really excited about any of them. I've got shelves of tencel but I don't think there's the perfect color. I'll look at it with fresh eyes in the morning and decide what colors will work best.

This and that.........

I finally found some time to do more dreaded photography work, otherwise these scarves would get moved from hanging over the back beam of one loom to another to get them out of my way. Now they're photographed, tags attached and hung with other scarves listed in my etsy shop.

Here is the second echo weave scarf - this one has a red tencel weft. I've been wanting to weave something in echo weave but hadn't gotten to it, always put on the back burner. Our weaving guild challenge this year is to weave something new, the perfect opportunity to make time to try it out. I'll show my two scarves at the June guild meeting.

I put a warp on the AVL for my original Iranian Tilework draft. I love this draft I created and hadn't woven it in a couple years. The iridescence in these scarves is incredible. They all have a fuchsia warp, above a dark teal weft........

..........here a gold weft...........

.....and here a lavender weft.

I sewed a couple more baby quilts for donation via the American Sewing Guild group I joined in March. These are a part of our community sewing. I'm not sure what I had in mind when I bought the sheep fabric many years ago - so far I've made two baby quilts and there's enough to make two more. The polka dot flannel was from the ASG stash.

The train flannel fabric and navy polka dot was also from the ASG stash. I've got a third quilt in the works, a simple pieced top in red, white & blue, but I ran out of my leftover stash of batting so I'll have to finish that one up after I feel like going to JoAnn's with my discount coupon.

There are days when I just don't think I can stand to watch or read the news. It's something new each day with this administration, I use that in very loose terms. And the news is not good, it's disturbing, embarrassing to our country and downright scary. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that 'he' totally implodes at some point but he's such a weasel he might 'do a little sidestep' and get out of it. Yes, that's from a song from the Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, very fun movie, hmm, that would be much more fun to watch than the news..........

Pet peeve today - when people say 'you guyses'. Ok, when we moved to Oregon back in 1992 I noticed wait staff in restaurants would always address us as 'you guys'. Then it progressed to a plural  'you guyses'. I didn't realize guyses was a word, is it one of those new ones that I don't pay attention to???  Or is it an Oregonian word???  So, I'm used to hearing it these days in restaurants, store, coffee drive-thru but now I'm hearing it from our local newscasters........didn't they go to college??? didn't they take any English or writing classes???  Am I wrong? Is this really a word and I'm just behind the times?

Love/Hate relationship.........

I'm having a love/hate relationship with technology right now. My little inexpensive Brother sewing/embroidery machine that I bought only for embroidery is not wanting to do any embroidery, correctly, at the moment. I had taken it to a get together where others were using it (as a regular sewing machine) and lo and behold when Sam was working on it he found a pin (not one of mine) down near the bobbin case and a needle had broken off after it went through the bobbin case - argh.  He's worked on it and it's better but still not good enough. I haven't figured out what to do yet as the repair may cost as much as a new machine...........will be thinking on this for a while.  All I'm thinking is thank goodness I didn't bring my expensive Bernina for others to use............

Then my AVL was acting up.......but I did get the last scarf woven on the Iranian Tilework warp. They are soaking as I type. And my desktop keeps getting stuck in Explorer and I'm having to do hard shutdowns - it must have been last week's update, usually they come in on Tuesdays so hoping there's a patch for the issue. I'm thinking after 3 days of dealing with issues with computerized machines tomorrow I'm going to do something that's more 'old fashioned', no technology required.

A bit of weaving...........

The AVL was working much better today since I replaced the USB cable - at least that's what I'm assuming the issue was for it going wack-a-do. It worked fine all afternoon so hopefully that was it, those cables do go bad. There's still the issue with harnesses not raising occasionally but I've had that issue for 4 years. In March AVL admitted that was a problem and will fix it when I (and others) send back our dobby boxes for repair. I'll do that as soon as the loom is empty.

This is one of my original drafts - a 32 H twill based on Iranian Tilework. Next scarf on the warp will have a golden/mustard weft. Then the final one will have a pale lavender weft...........unless I change my mind before I have time to get back to the loom..........

In two days we have gone from winter to summer - what happened to spring???  Temps are supposed to come back down by the weekend, I'm hoping that forecast is right as I'm not ready for summer yet, I want some beautiful spring weather.

Photography work........a challenge.........

I think photography will always be a challenge for me. Perhaps/maybe if I took a course in it I'd do better but I'm not sure where I'd fit that course into the limited hours in my life. We can't all be good at everything and photography is one of my downfalls - I can accept that.  I did get these 3 items listed in the shop..........there's still a chenille scarf needs it's photos re-done - instead of turning out hot pink, they turned out red and no amount of editing seems to help so I'll try again.

Here is one of the echo weave scarves. I love it. Since it is so dense warp wise it is heavier than my usual tencel scarves but it is still lovely and drapey and I'm happy with it. I love the iridescence in this scarf, it makes me think of peacock feathers. The other one was just washed this morning and is hanging to dry, I used a red weft in that one.

This is another one of my rayon flake shawls in silver and white. It's been sitting waiting for the fringe to be twisted for a long time. Since the other one recently sold for a wedding I thought I best get to finishing this one up and get it listed in the shop. This shawl makes me think of liquid silver, it's incredible feeling.

And here is a baby blanket - I love the way it turned out with the bright colors.

There are sewing updates but no photos. I went to the American Sewing Guild local chapter's Make It Take It event on Saturday. What a fun day. I was able to take 3 two hour classes for $15 (plus a few small material fees) and it included lunch. Many thanks to the group that put it on.

I took my small Brother machine that does embroidery and regular sewing - I only use it for embroidery so it was a challenge to figure out how to work it as a regular sewing machine going from settings to settings. I didn't want to cart my more expensive Bernina to classes. Looks like I'll need to spend some time learning all the features the Brother has other than embroidery if I'm going to use it for classes........or eventually buy another machine, maybe keep my eye out for a nice used machine to use for carting around.

I took a class on free motion quilting - oh my gosh, it was wonderful. I learned so much from the instructor and I can see doing many projects in the future using this technique..........of course there will be lots of practice before an actual project happens. I took a class called quilt as you go - it was a bit hard to follow as I had no clue what we were doing but once I got my samples made I can see using one, possibly two of these three techniques in the future, especially for the community sews donation baby blankets. And then I took a non-sewing class - a 3D star made from fabric. I have not unpacked anything so no pix.

A view from the back..............

A view from the back of the looms - warping in process on two looms

Tencel echo weave warp - many ends alternating purple and teal in the lease sticks.......I did get the heddles threaded on this warp....this was one of those drafts I really had to pay attention to while threading........still need to sley the reed. I haven't woven echo weave before so this is a test to see if I like the feel and drapiness of it for a scarf or if it feels to heavy......I know I like the look of the weave structure.

Tencel warp in the raddle, going through the lease sticks awaiting threading of the heddles and sleying of the reed - these will be scarves using my original Iranian Tilework draft. This color is really fuchsia, for some reason came out looking more burgundy in the photo.

Auditioning wefts....

I got the AVL warped with one of my painted/dyed tencel warps. There's enough for 2 scarves here. I'm auditioning wefts at the moment....sometimes I find it easier to decide by looking at a photo. So, I think I'm going to use the first color, a maroon which is closest to the knots where I tied on and then maybe a purple, maybe - second from the top of the page.......but I like the contrast of the black weft too. I'll probably change my mind on all of it by the time I walk back downstairs........