Often when I finish a great read, I’m sad the book is finished and the time I spent with it getting to know the characters has come to an end. Hopefully the book has a great ending where everything worked out for the characters and all is well. I’ve come to the last chapter on yet another year of teaching, and though I’ve loved every minute of it, and all worked out and I got where I needed to get on time and had almost everything I needed to work with there when I arrived, it has been challenging and stressful. I stayed with some wonderful people, met new faces, revisited with old beloved characters from previous books, and generally had a successful year. But unlike some of the great stories I’ve read, I’m glad for this one to be finished. It was a long hard slog since late spring.
I flew back on Monday from Atlanta, and the Southeast Fiber Arts Alliance, just a quick in and out, and though I had hoped for more participants in my classes, those that did sign up were really wonderful to work with and were very patient with me while I lectured for 10 hours straight, three different seminars on Saturday. I didn’t take a whole lot of photos, since the first seminar Saturday morning was on Photographing your Work, but the second seminar in the afternoon, was my beloved Color and Inspiration class. Since there were only a handful in the class, I took the opportunity to participate myself, and made my own yarn wraps along with the rest of the students. I really should do this more often.
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The class did some pretty great wraps too!
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Saturday night I lectured on What to do with Leftovers, an old standby, and since I haven’t given that class in awhile, I got to see it in a fresh new light. The audience was mixed, not everyone was a handweaver, and that always makes things fun, especially when talking about leftovers. The Southeast Fiber Arts Alliance represents a lot of different fiber disciplines, and so the wide variety of classes selected were chosen to appeal to all.
Sunday I taught a one day class in fitting muslins, and I had four very enthusiastic participants, and we even got to fit a couple pairs of pants.
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My delightful hostess and I had crossed paths before. Kay took a class with me many many years ago in Atlanta, for their local weaving guild, making a pieced vest from leftovers. I always love teaching that class, but it is rare that I actually ever get to see the finished garments, usually they are still in some kind of unwearable stage, full of pins. I was thrilled beyond belief when Kay pulled her vest out of the closet the night before I left to come home. It is one of my favorites to ever come out of one of my classes.
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And so I’m back. And I’m done. And now I need some me time, to “nest” as my sister calls it, to find my center again, get back into a routine, be very kind to myself, and to prepare for a spring teaching schedule unlike anything I’ve ever done. But for now, I need to re-energize in the studio, and there are Christmas towels to weave, and fall clothes to sew, and sweaters to knit.
On the loom… Four shaft towels using up all my discontinued Cotlin from Webs. I only had to buy weft from their new line of Cottolin from Brassard [10]. The inspiration came from the Sept/Oct 2014 issue of Handwoven Magazine in an article/project by Linda Gettmann Bright. I altered a lot of the specs, including the sett, I much prefer my 8/2 sett at 24 epi. The warp beamed on like a dream and is now weaving like a dream. As should all things in life…
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Just a side note, my two large Tools of the Trade floor looms sit back to back, the 36″ having the shorter castle tucks under the 45″ loom. Sort of a meeting of the minds. I think they get into all sorts of mischief whilst I’m away…
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I use regular rolls of craft paper as a warp separator, they wind on without me having to do much, and with a careful rigging of a tie yarn at either side of the warp, the roll self re-winds itself back up as I advance the cloth during weaving. Pretty cool.
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And on the needles… This is an alpaca vest, the “handspun” yarn (not by me) came from Woodsedge Wools [16] in central NJ. It is the softest and most glorious thing I’ve ever knit. Also slow and tedious… The pattern is from C2Knits [17], my favorite knitwear designer.
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And I have started on a couple of new garments, just to get back into the swing of the sewing machine. I have a sheer knit to make into this layered stretchy dress from a Burda Style Magazine pattern, and this gorgeous tencel/wool in a beautiful khaki color to experiment with a Marfy skirt pattern, from their free download [20]. Should be entertaining since there are no directions with Marfy patterns. The Italian’s must be pretty intuitive garment makers. I have a stack of Marfy patterns to play with and can’t wait to dive in.
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And so, fall is here, sort of, though the weather has been glorious. And no disastrous storms this year. I expect the winter will be long and hard, but that’s OK, there is plenty of wood on the woodpile for the wood stove, garden vegetables in the freezer, and I have lots of warm fibrous things to keep me happy…
And for those who read my last blog, my mom is scheduled to go home from the hospital either today or tomorrow.
Stay tuned…