Tag: Learn to Weave Class

Keeping very busy…

It’s what I do…

There have been some pretty dark times in my life. We all have them. And we all have different ways of getting through them. My way, is to stay so freaking busy I don’t have time to dwell on anything I have no control over. And so that will be my solution to the darkness that has set over my small family, with my son’s deployment to Syria.

NJ is sending 1500 troops from the 44th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, their largest deployment since 2008, to bases in Iraq and Syria. I am heartsick of course, and will worry constantly for all 1500 of them, because right now, that part of the world is in crisis and no one knows how to fix it. Mid month I joined my son in Trenton for a large send off, speeches by our Senator, Governor, and all kinds of higher ups that said meaningful things, in support of our troops.

My son is the bald guy right in the middle.

At this point, he has deployed, first through Texas, and then will be making his way to Syria. I won’t know until he can get word that he is there, and I don’t expect to be able to hear from him regularly. Internet is poor, and of course Verizon doesn’t have a cell spot in Syria. He dropped his jeep off for safe keeping and final hugs on Saturday, while I was teaching a two day remote workshop, with the Baltimore Guild, each participant making a vest over the two days. While the workshop was wildly successful, I’m glad they didn’t see my tears when I came in from outside, because my glasses had turned dark from the sun. And I’m incredibly glad I was in the middle of a workshop, and had no time to grieve.

Mid January is my guild, the Jockey Hollow Weavers’ Learn to Weave class, which I teach, along with my daughter. I bring 15 Structo Looms, and the weather cooperated. I bring prewound warps in 8/4 cotton rug yarn, and they set up the loom in a pattern gamp. They get to weave all sorts of structures with different wefts to experiment with color interlacements. It was a really fun day, and I’ve passed on 12 of the Structos to another guild member that would like to carry this forward.

I signed up for 8 workshops this year at Peters Valley School of Craft, because they all interested me, and because, I’m trying to book myself into oblivion! The first workshop took place over the last two Sundays, and thankfully it was recorded since I missed the second installment as I was teaching. The class, taught by Natalie Stopka, who is one of the best teachers I’ve ever taken a class from, was on Natural Dyeing, and it was remote. In January. I have never worked with botanical powders, and couldn’t have been more pleased with the results. My dye kitchen worked extremely well, I didn’t have to buy any new equipment, and the kit Natalie sent provided everything I needed for a successful natural dye experience. The second session was working with a fructose indigo vat.

So these are the results. I dyed the samples with madder (salmon color), weld (bright yellow color), logwood (purple to black color), and of course indigo (the chambray blue color). On silk…

On cotton (Note that I also played around with resists with items included in the kit.)…

On wool yarn…

Ombré effect on a silk scarf from my “to be dyed” stash…

Ombré effect on a cotton scarf provided in the kit. I used the indigo to overdye the weld producing a pretty aqua color in addition to the blue.

And to exhaust each of the pots, I used up the remainder of the dye with skeins of silk and wool. The blue indigo is still wet.

There is something about creating color in January that just makes me come alive.

And of course, it is not lost on me that the mother of all projects fell in my lap last fall, a retrospective of my work over the last 45 years, at County College of Morris in their main gallery opening February 29th. There was some major divine intervention that allowed this huge project to absolutely consume me in one of my darkest months since my husband died. I have to keep putting one foot in front of the other to get this all organized. There are something like 90 works involved. The really cool thing is that I’m pouring over archives, storage, attic, scraps, closets, 40 year old slide images, searching for each of the components I need to pull this off. I spent two hours the other day on the floor of my late husband’s closet looking for an image from 1994. I was just ecstatic when I found it.

And in all that I found a few things I’d completely forgotten about. Like this handspun sweater I made from cashmere, somewhere in the 1970’s. It’s been in the back of my closet since then. Miraculously it fit, and I like it, and it is unbelievably warm. It is my new favorite thing to wear. Go figure…

The gallery staff requested I have handling swatches with each garment. I know the public really appreciates it, most weaving conferences require it, and I spent at least five days rooting through the archives, attic, basement, and even my teaching bags, which I no longer need, and my design journals looking for a scrap of the original fabric. I found all but two maybe?

My guest rooms are packed with dress forms, which come in weekly. My cat Mulder of course likes to help whenever he can, especially if there are boxes. And there are a lot of boxes.

Each form is bulked up with bubble wrap because the forms I purchased, which were very inexpensive, have hips that are only 33″ wide. I don’t know anyone with 33″ wide hips. There are no words… But the forms work for me, and bubble wrap adds the additional couple inches I need to fill out the work. I’ve had to do repairs on some of the pieces, especially ones I wear a lot, and even had to reweave a small area on a major piece when I discovered a cigarette burn all the way through. That was one of my more impressive feats. So one of my guest rooms is pretty packed with forms, each one ready to display, with handling swatch and temp label. The permanent labels will be fixed to the wall.

The college van comes Friday for the first load.

And I think the universe is sending multiple angels to help support me, suddenly people who have been off my radar are popping up in unexpected places and encouraging me to get out, meet up, do lunch, and just be with people. A former guild member reached out to see if I’d help her jumpstart back into spinning and we had such a delightful morning, as I dusted off my wheel, my old Ashford Traditional which I bought after my freshman year of college and still gets the job done, and we sat together spinning, and decided to do this weekly. It felt amazing. I think this is handpainted merino but I’m not completely sure…

And so dear readers, know that I am really fine. There will be moments of course, and all I can do is hope that all 1500 return safe and can get on with their civilian lives. I have people who are watching out for me, and I hope that my late husband is watching out for my son. Thank you for all who reached out privately, I know I’m not alone, there are 1500 other families who are in the same boat. I have turned off notifications on all of the news feeds I subscribe to, I can read the local paper each morning and that’s it. I cannot follow the news 24/7.

Back to writing artist statements and dressing forms. Stay tuned…

All on account of…

My friend came to visit this afternoon. She said, “You haven’t posted in a while, I keep checking… I miss your posts…” My friend isn’t a weaver, has no sewing skills. We are musicians together, and raised our kids together, but she loves reading my posts. Who knew?… So, I promised her I’d sit down tonight and post one. And I was shocked at how behind I was on all the interesting goings on in my neck of the woods.

I made it through the holidays. They were quiet and somewhat challenging, but this is January, and a fresh start, and unlike this time last year, my shoulder is mostly healed and I’m carrying on. But January, after a couple of years break for Covid, means it is time to buckle down and do the final preparation for the Learn To Weave Class that I teach for my weaving guild, the Jockey Hollow Weavers. I spent the last few months rehabbing a number of additional small Structo looms I had acquired, and though the looms were ready to go, I had to wind 16 warps (I wind two at a time, cross at both ends and cut in half), and print all the handouts, and of course packing and loading the car. All on account of I had agreed to do this. I always ask myself why, until I’m actually doing it and I realize why I agreed to it and how much I love it.

We ended up with 14 students after a number of last minute cancellations, mostly from people not feeling well and terrified of spreading something nasty to fellow weavers. In the past no one would have thought twice about coming with a little cold or cough. But I appreciated the caution, and to my knowledge everyone from the class was and still is healthy.

So I give them each a small 4 shaft loom for the day. Most have no previous weaving experience, though a few are rigid heddle weavers, wondering what the shaft experience is all about. I prewind a warp from 8/4 cotton, in two colors, with a striped section in between, and they sley the reed, thread the loom according to the draft I give them, which has a point threading and straight draw, learn to read a draft, and weave off a small sampler of all the cool structures you can do on that point threading and straight draw. In one day. They work hard, and learn a lot.

Usually they either kindly thank me for opening their eyes to the work involved in weaving, or they want to jump right down that rabbit hole and immediately join the guild and borrow loaner equipment and become our newest weavers. I already have three who have since joined the guild. And one discovered a two shaft structo loom hiding in her basement purchased from some consignment shop years ago. It is only 2 shaft but she is on her way. These were her samples.

All on account of I did something really really dumb, something I’ve never done in 35 years of teaching, I double booked the day. Apparently back in May, I agreed to pencil in a date to give a lecture for a guild in Oregon. The same day as the Learn to Weave class. Which wasn’t officially in my calendar at the time. I didn’t hear back from the guild until the end of December with final plans. That’s not unusual, but what was highly unusual was there was no record of the lecture in my calendar. I never ever make that mistake. They couldn’t switch speakers from another month, and I’m too professional to just say, “sorry…”, so my daughter and I decided to actually film a video on the topic of What to Do with Leftovers, which was what the guild had asked me to lecture on. I scripted it, used the slides from the original presentation, and we created a YouTube video, about 48 minutes long, which I offered to the guild for free as compensation. I admitted to them they were basically doing a beta trial for me, so I didn’t feel like I wasn’t benefiting from the experience myself.

There were some technical challenges streaming the video, my daughter worked with them to try to iron out any issues. This was a guild who was not only showing the video to the in person meeting, but to those out in Zoom Land who were tuning in. That in itself presented challenges. I was on pins and needles all afternoon during the Learn to Weave class, hoping we wouldn’t get a call that they couldn’t get it to work, or something technical went wrong and they didn’t have a program. In the end, it all worked well. I heard they loved it, there was laughter all through the video, something about my deadpan comedic expressions (all my daughter’s clever editing, I can assure you) and applause at the end. They told me it was one of their best meetings. The palpable relief at the end of a successful Learn to Weave class and a successful guild lecture happening at the same time, was incredible. All on account of I screwed up.

Last year I saw this lovely project download on Webs (www.yarn.com) that had kitchen and dining room textiles, in three color ways. The structure for the striking mats and runner was Summer and Winter on 6 shafts. I bought the download and printed it. It called for 8/2 cotton, which I had a tonnage of…

It was all on account of I couldn’t see what I actually had because the cones were all stacked to the ceiling on top of the wall units four deep. So I had my daughter climb up and pass me down all the cones, which I lined up on the dye sink counter so I could start keeping a log of what I had, where it was from and how much of each color I had.

We eventually got all the yarn labeled, catalogued on little cards, and stacked back up, but I held back yarn I thought would work for the mats. I didn’t have a key color for each of the colorway choices, but I wasn’t about to order more yarn for a missing color, so I got creative with what I had. I substituted out the green for a more celadon color, I didn’t really like the green anyway (I did have that green, just not enough).

And I spent the day Wednesday, winding the 8 yard warp, sleying the reed, threading the loom, and beaming the yardage. I was weaving by Wednesday night. It is nice to know what’s on your shelf!

Meanwhile, on account of I was giving a remote lecture to another guild, also on the west coast, late last night, on the topic of Doup Leno, I decided to try to see if I could actually do that technique on one of my four shaft Structos. And so, I spent the early part of the week figuring that out, and was really pleased that not only did it work, but I really liked the fine lacey cloth from the 10/2 cotton, and I could use it as a second live demo during the lecture last night. I’m still experimenting with the cell height, but that’s expected.

And earlier in the month, or maybe it was during Christmas week when nothing happens, and there is always fun to be had in my studio, I set up an eight shaft Structo with a honeycomb structure, from Malin Selander’s book, Weave a Weave. I am having a blast with this one. All on account of I have these 30 Structo looms…

I’m sorry January is nearly over. I like this month, it is cold and nothing happens in the garden and I can hunker down and really play. Once the Learn to Weave class is over.

Stay tuned for more adventures on account of I have a bunch of looms that are naked and not happy with me, and of course, I have to update the prospectus now, for the What to Do with Leftovers lecture that has a viewing option of watching my video instead of me live on Zoom, for a lot less money! Seems like each time I do anything digital, there are 57 things that then have to be updated…

Happy New Year!

When it rains it snows…

Just once I’d like to go to bed at night and think, “What a boring uneventful day.  Nothing happened, no major weather issue, no major political headlines, no one in my family had any drama, nothing went wrong with the house, or the dogs or the people I love.  Nothing.”    Hahahahahahahahah…

So it is supposed to be -20 tonight with wind gusts of 45 mph.  Everything has a coating of ice from all the rain yesterday.  Hahahahahahahahah…..

For now, I have power, and internet, and I’m going to try to post this way overdue blog, because, it isn’t like anything important happened this month…  I read a lovely funny meme on Facebook, 30 days hath September, April, June and November, all the rest have 31 save January which has 374…  I use to love January, it was dark and cold and there was no travel, and no drama, and I got to hunker down in my studio and just make stuff.  It has been that way since I started doing craft fairs in 1979.  I loved January because it was so dark and uneventful.  I didn’t want it to end, because that meant February and craft fairs started with the ACC show in Baltimore.  This is 40 years later, and nothing has changed, I get on a plane next week for the first trip of the season, to Southern California for a five day garment construction class.  

This January was an anomaly.  Just like everything else in life.  It goes from 40 degrees and raining to -20 overnight.  The world is an anomaly.  My family is an anomaly.  My life is an anomaly.  But I finally broke through all the things that were pulling at me preventing me from doing what I love and buckle your seatbelts, its going to be a wild ride…

I finished the first draft of my article for Heddlecraft. 16 pages. Toughest article I have ever written.  Meanwhile, I had applied to a number of exhibitions last fall, and not only was I accepted, I received the print copies and found out I had won an award.  At the Blue Ridge Fiber Show, when the work was returned to me, there, attached to my yardage, was a third place ribbon.  This was the yardage, Chaos, the draft is available as a download from my eShop.

 

And of course I already knew that my other entry, the duster, won the HGA award. The draft for that is available as well. 

And the latest Fiber Art Now magazine arrived  within days, featuring the Annual Excellence in Fibers Catalog, an annual print exhibition.  There I am on page 63.

And then a few days later, when I dropped my artwork off at the Montclair Art Museum, they handed me the catalog for the exhibit, New Directions in Fiber Art, 2019 NJ Arts Annual – Crafts.  The exhibit runs through June 16, 2019, unfortunately I’ll miss the opening Friday night February 8th, because, well I’ll be teaching in Southern California.  I hope it is warmer than 20 below.

I loaded the car with my 16 Structo looms and set off to teach a one day Learn To Weave class for my guild.  It was a nail biter, the weather was iffy right up to the day of the class, with a major storm due in late in the afternoon.  The governor had already called a State of Emergency.  I’m happy to say, there ended up not being a major weather event, you might say the afternoon was uneventful, except that there were more than a dozen new weavers and some very happy people.

I said goodbye to my son, he is off to war, first to Texas and then onto a location in the middle east, which I can’t name for safety reasons.  I’m very very proud of him, I wish his father could have been there.  Meanwhile I put all his stuff in storage, vacating the basement apartment he has inhabited for the last 14 years.

I had my handyman come in and paint and fix up the basement space.  My daughter is slowly moving in down there.  She has stuff all over the house.  Way too much stuff for a 26 year old.  But she is the creative sort and so everything has potential use in some grand piece of artwork.  I totally get this.  Which is why I’m working with stuff from my stash for my current project that dates back to 1981…

Meanwhile, the last big project I wanted to do on the house was to have the wood stove removed and replaced with a similar stove except gas fired.  No mess, no chimney cleaning, no wood to haul, no ashes to clean up.  The installation was completed last week, and I’m just waiting for the rest of the inspections before the final hook up.  I want to curl up in the living room with my dogs and my knitting, flip on the fire, and then when it is time to go to bed, flip it off.  

Meanwhile, once I finished the first draft on my 16 page article I promised my fiber friend Linda, who sponsors my wonderful five day retreat in the Outer Banks the end of October, that I would make her vest for her, that she wove out of Kathrin Weber Blazing Shuttles warps, in exchange for a pair of clogs from Chameleon Clogs, using a gorgeous hand dyed Tencel scrap from one of my students, Victoria Taub.  I love my clogs and Linda loves her vest.  Done and done…  (There might still be a spot or two left for next year’s retreat, leave a comment if you are interested…The vest is one of the options to make in my workshop)

I will say that one of the major obstacles in my life right now is the inability to function in my studio.  When my daughter moved back home to take a job closer to me, she brought four looms with her (leaving one with a friend), more yarn than any 26 year old should have, and a cat.  The two 8 shaft 45″ looms had no where to go but into my already too small studio, the one I just had renovated.  I struggled for a few months, falling over equipment, barely able to lay out a piece of fabric and the plan to move one of them to the basement once she settles down there, is still probably a couple months away, because there is a huge warp on it that has to be woven off first.  I’ll keep my original 8 shaft, the first one I bought in 1978, and work around that in the studio, but the second one is making me nuts.  I got a brain storm yesterday, since we hadn’t moved the second bed down from the attic to the guest room she just vacated, and in a fit of shear craziness, with help from my willing studio assistant Cynthia, we folded that baby up and pushed it right across the hall into the guest room.  Done and done…

Now I can actually move in my studio.  It isn’t great, but I can function in it.

So with my new found freedom of space and major projects crossed off my to do list, I dove in head first.  My looms are screaming at me to put warps on them.  They have been naked for months.  I have requests to exhibit work this summer and I have no new work.  I bought some new fiber reactive dyes from Dharma a couple months ago and want to see what’s inside.  So I started up the dyepot again.  First batch is something called Mars Dust.  Gotta love the name.

Second batch is drying, called Muir Glen.  I misread the calculations and put 3 Tablespoons instead of 3 teaspoons.  Hahahahahaha….  I’ve never gotten such a gorgeous deep gray before.

Third batch is in the pot, called Kingfisher Blue.  Meanwhile, I started winding a warp.  Way back, a couple of years ago, I bought some Noro Taiyo Lace on sale at a knitting shop somewhere in the Pacific northwest.  I made this jacket from the cloth I wove using one of the colorways.  

I still had four balls of a different color way, and I’ve been dying to weave that off into a similar kind of fabric.  

So I looked at my stash, and I had about 21 ounces of Harrisville Shetland Singles from my early craft fair days, circa 1981 or 2.  They don’t even spin singles anymore, well actually they do, but they ply the yarn and don’t sell it as singles.  I wound a seven yard warp until I ran out. 

Then I looked around for something else since I wanted the fabric wider than the 14 inches I would get from the Harrisville.  I found four 2 oz tubes of Maypole Nehalem, a 3 ply worsted very close in grist to the Harrisville, and in a close enough color to blend.  So not ask me how long they have been in the stash.  I think I inherited them.

I got about 6″ worth of warp out of those babies, and then sat down at the computer with my trusty Davison and picked out a draft where I could use the two warps most effectively.  I chose a Finnish Twill, page 37 if you have the book, and figured out exactly how to use what I wound.  I love to wind first and then decide what to make later.  

Meanwhile, my studio assistant sat all day perched on a stool winding 2 yard skeins of some of my vast stash of dyeable cellulose yarns.  She wound a lot but didn’t make a dent.  I have hundreds of pounds of natural yarn.  Don’t ask…

And between us we cleared a lot of cones.  Unless you are a weaver, you don’t understand the importance of a trash can that looks like this…

Because I was running around like a distracted crazy person, enjoying the space in the studio and finally getting to do something fun, and running back and forth to the dyepot and the washing machine which I use for rinsing skeins, I did the most stupid thing a weaver can do, I don’t think I’ve made this mistake in 40 years if ever, I forgot to tie off the cross of the first bout of warp.  If you aren’t a weaver the magnitude of this mistake will be lost on you, trust me, it is a big deal.  Fortunately it was only the first 6″ bout, and each 1/2″ was carefully marked, so the warps won’t be too out of order.  But this is a sticky singles warp, of all warps to screw up…   Sigh…

I am going to curl up now and watch the next episode of Project Runway All Stars. And hope that the rest of my life will be uneventful.  Or maybe just tomorrow.  Or maybe just get through tonight and hope the pipes don’t freeze or my trash cans don’t blow down the street…

Stay tuned…