Well, I did it, I got my sister’s website up and running. I still have a lot of work to do on the project profiles page, there are many subpages to be built under there, but after much hair pulling and gnashing of teeth, I actually managed to create the site, have it all work, and make the “client” happy. I will say that my sister, the architect designed the actual site. She knew exactly what she wanted, text and imagery was what she sketched out on what else, “graph paper”. My job was to get it all to work. There is no better feeling than to have pushed harder than you thought you could do, and reached higher than you thought you could go, doing something you thought was way beyond you, and to have succeeded. I still have a lot of work to do, like I said, but my poor sister, who still has to put up with dial-up service in northern rural Maryland, at least has a website for her business. Now of course, mine is really embarrassing… That is what prompted all this, I sorely need a redesign on mine, and so does my other weaving guild (the Frances Irwin Handweavers), so those are next once I fine tune and finish up with my sister’s. Actually, the Jockey Hollow Weaver’s Website could use a makeover as well, but my daughter maintains that one, and once I figure all this out, she will be pretty amenable to redoing that one, I’m sure.
If you are interested in checking it out, my sister’s firm is Ebeling Noe Associates. She is a great architect, and if you know me, she has my same sense of organization and work ethic.
I met tonight with the rest of the programming team for the Jockey Hollow Weavers Guild, to map out programs for 2009-2010. We had some great feedback from the members, and we are sketching out the year, using some panel discussions, some presentations from our own talented members, and we are looking to book a couple of out of town speakers with workshops. So now I get to surf the web, looking at all the suggestions, and see what other teachers offer on their websites. So this is a win win situation for me. Stay tuned…
When I sat down to make the lime green tassel, from a skein of embroidery floss, a number of the members asked how I was doing it, you know when you know something, and have always known something and you find out that not everyone knows it, and of course you are happy to share the knowledge. That’s what we do. Back in the late 1970’s, when I graduated from college with a pretty worthless Bachelor’s in Fine Arts, I went to work teaching crafts at a mall chain store called the Craft Showcase. I taught macrame owl plant hangers, calligraphy, stained glass making, needlework, and anything else they needed teaching. Macrame was big. And plant hangers were even bigger. And all of the plant hangers had a giant tassel at the bottom. We chatted at the meeting about those big tassels, which is where I learned to wrap the head of a tassel.
I’m using a Burda pattern, since I subscribe to the 
So I take my bolt of Pellon’s Tru-Grid, cut off a chunk, and lay it out on the “RED LINES” on the G Sheet. It is important to note that there are no seam allowances or hem allowances on the pattern pieces, so I trace the lines with my colored pencil, using dotted lines, making sure all the pieces are at least 1 1/4″ away from each other to allow for the allowances. I add the seam allowances later. I copy all the marks and reference lines, checking the little direction sheet to make sure they are all accounted for.