I have something to admit. When my weaving guild, the Frances Irwin Handweavers, first announced their fall/winter line up for their programming, I was less then excited. OK, I admit, I was downright disappointed. I admit it. I don’t do rugs, I’m not interested in rugs, and ask anyone whom I’ve juried for, sadly I don’t really know anything about weaving rugs. (This is a bit embarrassing…)
So the programming chair thought a bunch of rug related programs would bring a consistency and longer term study to the meetings, and I will admit, that part was a good idea. Studying something for more than an hour and a half, is kind of a novel idea, as far as guild meetings go. Well, maybe it isn’t, I haven’t actually been a member of my two guilds for more than a couple years, I’ve been traveling to guilds all over the country for 25 years, but I’m the speaker. I don’t know what else they do during the year for programming.
When I got the September Newsletter, I was sort of surprised at how much effort the programming chair had put into this whole adventure, she figured out a way to put on a warp, 10″ wide, and with some minor rethreading (it is only 6 threads to the inch), you could use the same warp for all the fall programs including the December exchange. How cool was that? Not wanting to be a party pooper, and admitting that I don’t know everything, and I could really learn something here, I was a sport, and pulled my 4 shaft Leclerc version of the little 
Structo. I have a Structo, but it was a bit narrow for this project. The draft we were given could be just squeaked out of the 10.25″ width (I think the requirement was 10.5″). The loom set up quickly and I went to the meeting. I blogged about this back in September (it seems so long ago… do I have an out of control life or what? The title of that blog was “Overload”). Anyway, it was sort of fun. And the yarn I chose, some hot pink wool that matched my daughter’s hair, and some brown handspun both from my mother in law’s stash, worked out perfectly, though I found out after plying the yarns, they didn’t need to be that fat.
Sidebar: My daughter attends a night class in Japanese, at the local community college, once a week, even though she is still in HS. Part of a challenge program for gifted students. She is loving it, but, a) the local community college is 40 minutes away, and b)she isn’t driving on her own yet, so someone has to take her and pick her up. That someone would be me, unless I am traveling. So, I bring lots of busy work, drop her at class, wait endlessly for a parking space near the student center, and then haul all my busy work up and wait for three hours.
Two weeks ago, (last week I was traveling), I took my inkle loom, and attracted lots of attention, lots of opportunities to talk about weaving, and the
weaving community. I feel like the weaving community’s PR person. This week, I took my trusty little Leclerc’ Structo’ wannabe (but better) and hauled it up to the student center in a big tote bag I whipped together from two freebies right before I left. That’s the green and purple thing the loom is sitting on. I just have to pull it down enough to expose the critical parts of the loom, and it acts as a surface protector as well.
So I wove. I had a woman come up who turns out teaches history in a home school setting, and we of course talked about how fiber can be used to teach almost anything, especially the history of the world. Every culture has some kind of interlacement process in their origins, and the United States especially, is full of them. The conversation would have continued, and I wouldn’t have gotten much weaving done, except a political science class came into the student center to watch the NJ gubernatorial debates on the wide screen TV. I won’t comment on the stupidity of the candidates in these debates. Except to say, what happened to our political process when the only way to get elected is to discredit your opponent while not committing to anything concrete you would like to see happen on any of the issues that matter. It isn’t good enough to just say, “We have to cut taxes…” Well duh… Everyone knows that and supports that. Duh… The question is how? No one, except the independent candidate will dare say how they intend to do that, including the incumbent… Ok, I’m off my soapbox….
What I’ve learned (besides the fact that I hate politics)…
- Rug Weaving is sort of fun and uses a lot of yarn…
- I found myself actually thinking I’d like to set up my large loom and weave a throw rug… (I’m actually not going to, I just thought about it.)
- I love working on this little Leclerc table loom and think I might even warp up my little eight shaft Structo and see what it can do. I can actually haul a shaft loom in a tote bag and sit in a student center for three hours and weave. How cool is that?
- I shouldn’t have been so quick to judge the fall programming choice for my guild. I’m learning a lot. Now I actually know what Taqueté is…
- I’m really proud of my little sampler, and did a computer draft of the five treadling variations on a Summer/Winter rug.
Now I’m off to rethread my loom for the Double Corduroy program next week…