Road trip to Cranbrook

This past week, my SO and I drove up to Cranbrook Art Museum to see an exhibit by Toshiko Takaezu. The artist is known for her ceramics, but she also was a painter and a WEAVER. In fact, she was besties with Lenore Tawney (who has a cameo piece in the exhibit). We came for the ceramics (which were amazing), but the weaving was icing on the cake.

"Ne (Roots)"
Wool, cotton, linen, silk, and rayon (plain weave, knotted pile, wrapping)

Shades of Sheila Hicks

Lenore Tawney amongst the closed forms (moons)

Crochet: My granddaughter came over for a lesson today, but her attention kept wandering, so I went ahead and worked up most of the body of the jellyfish I am crocheting in parallel.

Knitting: I'm approaching the toes of Bigfoot's socks. Lately, several of my fiber friends have been knitting Emotional Support Chickens, so I started one, using naturally dyed yarn.

Spinning: The Tasman comeback is plied but not yet skeined. I started spinning some Wenslydale Longwool top, but I'm not enjoying it very much.

It is finally getting cool enough for wool socks and sweaters and wraps. (I'm wearing this wrap right now.) I bought several ribbed 100% cotton long-sleeved tops from JCP just for wearing under sweaters. Toasty!

DST is ending - huzzah!

I think it depends on which end of a time zone one lives in as to how one feels about Daylight Savings Time. My brother lives on the East Coast, the east side of the eastern time zone, so he *loves* having extra hours of sunlight at the end of the day. I, however, live on the western end of the same time zone and, being a morning person, miss the early hours of sunshine. Also, those early evenings are a fine time for fibering.

Knitting: I took a break from watching TV for a while, but now I am back at it, which means I am making better progress on Bigfoot's socks.
Spinning: I've been plying the Tasman comeback. I don't recall what my original plan was, but somehow I ended up with three bobbins of various amounts of singles. I three-plied them until one bobbin ran out. Now I am chain-plying the rest.

Chain-ply on left, three-ply on right

I finished frogging the curtain knit from denim yarn and am holding back on the sweater - it's so cute! There has been a pause on crochet lessons with my granddaughter due to scheduling conflicts. And the weaving was put on hold while I purchased a new car. What an ordeal! I hope that is the last car I ever have to buy.

A-frogging we will go

I'd like to make more artisan market baskets out of cotton, as I have a lot of cotton AND several items knit from cotton that could be frogged. One item, or rather, items, are the pieces from a pair of knit dungarees that never reached final assembly. Those have all been frogged. Now I am working on frogging a curtain that hung in my bath for a while, long enough for the side facing the window to fade. There is also a sweater I knit for my granddaughter that she never wore. All that denim yarn could be recycled into market bags... someday. But first, one must frog.

Crochet: I decided instead of crocheting a whole rug, I would crochet a swatch. In other words, I stopped once the "rug" reached an 8" diameter and threw it in the wash to see how much it would shrink.

8" diameter before washing

7" diameter after washing

I had to stretch and flatten the piece while it was still wet, then weight it down with a heavy plate to get it flat again. I'm not so sure this design would work for a rug.
Knitting: I made some progress on the socks while sitting through my granddaughter's piano lesson.
Spinning: The Tasman comeback is all spun. Now I have a fair amount of plying to do.
Weaving: The scarf is tied on and ready to be woven.

This past week it was cool enough to wear wool sweaters... for a few days. Now it is back to short-sleeved tee shirts. I am so done with summer and summerlike weather.

Startitis

Lately I have had the urge to start a LOT of fiber projects. Despite being retired, I have only so much time and energy. What I really need is some finishitis.

Crochet: The lessons with my granddaughter continue. I've been working on a jellyfish pattern from a book to get a feel for how to do the one she likes. I also tried to start a crochet rug, but it's not going well.

Knitting: I worked on the socks at the recent spinning guild meeting.
Spinning: Yet *another* spin-in, this time with a group of friends; I worked on the last of the Tasman comeback.
Weaving: Started warping a log cabin scarf on the SampleIt for my SO.

I volunteered to help with the 2025 programs for the spinning guild. My motives are questionable - there are several programs I think we should do and the best way to see that they come to pass is to get involved in the planning. No one is objecting, though.

Disappointment

One of the spinning guild members brought samples of yarn dyed with amaranth to a meeting. It was pink! So I had to give amaranth a try.

I grew the plants myself (seeds ordered from Pinetree Garden Seeds). But instructions for the dyeing process itself was skimpy. None of my dye books mention it, and only a few online sources have anything to say about it.

I went with a cold water dye bath, which produced a promising color. I tried some alum-mordanted yarn (alum added to the dye bath instead of pre-mordanting the yarn), some rhubarb leaf-mordanted yarn, and some unmordanted yarn. The yarn soaked for over 24 hours.

The alum mordant produced a lilac color, no mordant resulted in pink, but the rhubarb leaf mordant seem to mask any color change.

Alas, the color is already fading, especially the pink. I may give it another try, as from what I read, amaranth is a rampant self-seeding plant. I doubt I will get anything less fugitive, though.

Crochet: My granddaughter and I are continuing her lessons. I think next time, we will be able to start the project that is her end goal (photo below). I started one from a similar jellyfish pattern to get the idea, plus a fiber friend helped me with how to do some of the details.

Dyeing: See above.
Knitting: The heels are turned on the Bigfoot socks.
Spinning: Thanks to a spin-in on Saturday, I finished spinning the maroon merino top.
Weaving: I dragged out the Ashford SampleIt loom and am playing with color combinations for a scarf for my SO. I am also adding to the circular weaving project that has been "resting".

This past weekend was a fiber-filled one. Besides the spin-in on Saturday, both the spinning guild and weaving guild demonstrated various fiber arts at the downtown branch of our local library system, in honor of Spinning and Weaving Week. We always enjoy these events, but have some ideas to make them more fulfilling in the future. The spinning guld members wore their tee shirts; we are working on getting some for the weaving guild as well.

Mostly cotton artisan market bag

My fiber journey began with crochet, but I haven't "hooked" much in recent years. My granddaughter is interested in learning to crochet, which rekindled my interest. Then a fiber friend crocheted one of these bags, which pointed me in this direction.

Pattern: Artisan Market Baskets, from Crochet Southwest Spirit, by Susan E. Kennedy
Yarn: A Good Yarn (hand painted fingering yarn by Mary Ann Habeeb, superwash wool and nylon); Maysville 8/4 Cotton Carpet Warp in 'Tulip' and 'Yellow'; Lion Brand Kitchen Cotton in 'Blue Ice', 'Tropic Breeze, and 'Grape'; Lion Brand Lion Cotton Solid in 'Off White'; Omega Sinfonia in 'Matizado Azules'; Pisgah Peaches & Creme Ombres in 'Spring Meadows'
Hook: L (8.00mm)
Modifications: Handle

The pattern calls for seven(!) yarns to be held together. I have a LOT of odds and ends of yarn from various projects, so this seemed like a good way to use some of them up. To start, I pulled both ends from the cake of A Good Yarn (blue and brown), added the 'Blue Ice' Kitchen Cotton, the Lion Cotton, the Sinfonia (various shades of blue), and the two colors of cotton carpet warp. That made a nice bulky yarn. When I ran out of the 'Blue Ice', I switched to 'Tropic Breeze', and when that ran out, to 'Grape'. Similarly, when the Lion Cotton ran out, I switched to the Peaches & Creme.

A fair amount of effort goes into yarn wrangling, so I had to sit at the dining room table to work instead of curling up on the couch. One problem I had with all that yarn was sometimes one of the fingering yarns escaped. When I noticed it, I backed up to fix it, but I missed several of these loops. Lesson learned. The other problem I had was crocheting makes my hands hurt!

The pattern called for a leather (or leather-like) strap handle, but I went with something I found on a YouTube video. One simply skips 8 stitches, making 8 chain stitches in the process, on either side of the bag. On the next round, crochet 10 single crochet stitches in the loop created by the chain stitches.

The bag is a bit floppier than I expected. Since it consists of all cotton and sock yarn, it is machine washable (theoretically). I wouldn't try to carry a watermelon in it, but it would have worked fine for the baklava I purchased at a recent fair.

At that fair, I chatted up a woman who was selling crocheted boxes. They were much stiffer. Her secret was to crochet around a rope, like clothesline or mop yarn, and to use wool, which locks together better than cotton. I may have to try that someday.

Felted up

This past week I felted the L-Bag and its pocket patch. Initially, I didn't use lingerie bags - MISTAKE. After deciding the fabric couldn't be too felted, I ran it through two hot water agitation cycles with a pair of jeans. The bag has a nice shape to it, but the rectangle is a bit skewed.

Crochet: I finished the artisan market bag - it's a bit floppy; separate post to follow. I met a woman yesterday who makes similar fiber boxes, but she uses wool and crochets around a core of rope, like clothesline. Hers are much stiffer.
Dyeing: As I write, some skeins of yarn are soaking, destined for the amaranth dye pot.
Knitting: Still working on Bigfoot's socks.
Spinning: Still spinning the merino top.
Weaving: Fourth Third wash cloth off the SampleIt loom. I'll explain that later.

The local parks and rec department put an end to our spring fiber festival, instead inviting us to join their new fall harvest festival. I didn't attend last year, but this year demo'd spinning. It's a lot of fun chatting up the visitors, both kids and adults. I spun on my wheel, but the kids could also spin a little yarn of their own on a spindle. Some improvements for next year: have microscopes or some kind of magnifiers so the kids could look at wool fiber and see the barbs. Also, have samples of wool they can feel and SMELL.