Fest away

It's been two years since I last attended the Jay County Fiber Arts Fest in Portland IN. While the pandemic may not be 100% over, some activities are approaching "normal". So I headed south on US27 for a workshop and some shopping. I'll post separately on both.

Dyeing: Attended a workshop on a one-pot method for rainbow dyeing raw wool and roving. At home, I copied the technique on some yarn.
Knitting: Yes, still working on the Habitation throw. Too bad I am not a faster knitter.
Weaving: I fixed the big booboo on the leno curtains; if you think weaving leno is slow, try unweaving it. I'm still sampling on the SampleIt, this time Spanish lace with a thicker yarn and some clasped weft. I also started a sample on my Saffron pocket loom.

The trip to Portland and back exhausted me. I don't have the kind of energy I had even five years ago. It didn't help that once again I caught a little cold earlier in the week. I think this is cold number 4 for the season. Fortunately, they don't last long. Hope all is well with you and yours.

Agnes Martin swatch

Agnes Martin was an abstract artist whose work frequently featured grids. When I view these paintings (in books or online, alas), I can't help but think, I could weave that. I wasn't sure how, so I made a swatch as a practice piece.

There is more than one way to weave a grid in tapestry. The horizontal lines are easy - two passes with one color of the weft - but vertical lines are created by alternating colors with each pass. It is not so much a vertical line as a vertical line of dots. In this grid, the vertical lines are spaced apart, so I carried the line color across the back. Some weavers want the back of their tapestry to be as tidy as the front, but that is impossible using this technique.

Another way to create a vertical line in tapestry is to use a particular soumak stitch, so I may try that next, although I fear that will create vertical slits that I may have to sew up. Ugh. I'll have to meditate on that for a while.

(I pretty much HATE the new Blogger interface, but at least I figured out how to resize the photos so that they fit on my template.)

Four suns tapestry

Reminder to self: Do not weave in black or dark blue because your eyes are too old to see what you are doing.

That is not completely true. With pocket weaving, one can create four-selvage pieces. The problem is that once one is in the homestretch, it is really difficult to keep the warp covered with weft. An argument for matching the color of the warp to the color of the end weaving.

I really like "kindergarten colors" - primary and secondary on the color wheel. Hatching comes in handy for blending the colors. Cartoons (what weavers call the paper guides behind the weaving) help with shapes and such. I'm still perfecting my circles.

I kind of pooped out by the time I reached the fourth sun. Then I struggled with the final rows. Then this piece sat around for a long time, waiting to be hemmed. What should have been a quickie project languished quite a bit.

I consider my pocket weaving to be samples or swatches, a way to try out an idea or some colors. And when I'm done, I have a nice rug mug to add to the pile.

Becoming a germaphobe

Indiana has been slowly emerging from the shelter-in-place order, leaving me a bit confused over what is allowed now and what is not. I'm also concerned about scofflaws, people who think they can do whatever, wherever, regardless of the circumstances. I don't like crowds in the best of times, but now I have a legitimate reason to avoid all those germ-ridden people - I'm over 65, supposedly in a high risk group (although no underlying health issues). I also don't want to become a second-wave statistic, so thanks, but no thanks, I'm wearing my mask.

Knitting: I did reach my goal of completing the legs on the Ivy socks. Tomorrow I start the cuffs.
Spinning: I finished plying the navy blue and burnt orange merino (see post here) and started spinning some more Timbre Ridge merino, in purple and pink. There is also a package of angelina with this batch, something I have played with before. Not sure how I am going to use that. BTW, visit this link to see where the Timbre Ridge merino came from.
Weaving: I finally made some forward progress on the latest pocket loom weaving:

I also started, then completely unwove a piece on my 24" rigid heddle loom. It's warped in black 8/4 carpet warp, which is fine, but despite all my care, by the time I had woven 3" the sides had pulled in 1/2". And it was just beginning! I decided to start over. I also decided to invest in a temple, to see if that will help me maintain even selveges.

I grew up in houses without central air, something I would never consider these days - I like my comfort. My electric company sends out a monthly energy usage report. In the past, I consistantly used less than the most efficient homes in my area, but since I retired, my summer usage runs high. That's because I am home all day, so the thermostat never gets reset. The most recent report pointed out that ceiling fans consume less energy than AC units, so I am experimenting with using them more this year. This is going to be a warmish week, so we'll see how that works. Wish my shade trees were bigger.

More practice hatching

I created a second practice piece on the Mirrix Saffron pocket loom. I used non-superwash wool for this one and worked from the front, just for a change. While I think the results are better lice-wise, the selvages need work and the fabric is not as flat as I had hoped. After one signs up for a class from Rebecca Mezoff, one gets access to a private Facebook page where there is lots of good advice from other beginners. Also, some of the "bonus" reading at the end of the course I took provided more helpful hints. So maybe the *next* practice piece will be even better.

Weaving from the front is actually a bit more difficult than weaving from the back because loose ends need to be tucked to the other side. I am going to return to weaving from the back, now that I see a definite advantage. I am also having trouble at the end of the piece, where there is not much room for "bubbling" the weft; that's another area needing improvement.

One way to improve is to weave every day. I find that is easier to do with this little loom, as I can complete a project in about a week. I'm less likely to get stalled and frustrated and overwhelmed, too. No matter what hobby you are starting, be it fiber or gardening or whatever, start small!

Practicing hatching

I've discovered that it is one thing to follow along in a book or with an instructor when learning something new, and quite another to try it on one's own. But once I dive into whatever it is that I am trying to learn, it gets easier and feels more automatic. Thus practicing hatching as taught by Rebecca Mezoff.

Hatching involves alternating colors in the weaving, to create shades, shapes, whatever. It can be irregular or, like here, regular. It can introduce subtle color changes, especially from a distance, while producing different effects up close.

This piece used Valley Yarns superwash wool yarn, not the best choice for tapestry weaving, but I have SO MUCH YARN - I don't want to buy more right now, especially for practice. The warp is 8/4 carpet warp in gray, which blended in enough that the "lice" (uncovered warp) was not obvious enough for me to correct. Rebecca teaches weaving from the back of the fabric, so sometimes the front is a bit of a surprise, but this example turned out okay, considering. I'm working on another, from the front, just to see if I like it better.

Another technique Rebecca teaches is "meet and separate" which involves weaving each color with two ends. This has its advantages, but when weaving a small piece in multiple colors, yarn wrangling gets to be a bit much. The loom is too small for using butterflies (yarn wound into figure 8's), so I was using tapestry needles with bent tips to weave. I also used a double-pointed knitting needle to set up the shed for each row. This helped when "beating" the previous row, as well as when weaving the current row. Just a non-professional tip.

Saffron pocket loom debut

I really love the Mirrix loom that I purchased for the online tapestry weaving class I am taking. I love it so much I purchased their latest loom, the Saffron pocket loom. Unless you have really large pockets, it won't literally fit into a pocket, but it is small enough for traveling, can be easily disassembled to fit into a purse or project bag, and requires no special tools (except maybe a wrench or two).

It's total length is about ten inches. Unlike some frame looms, the plates provide a fixed sett, 8 epi. I think Mirrix is planning to offer plates with other setts, and when they do, all you need is a screwdriver to change plates.

The bottom beam is fixed; the top beam with its wing nuts allow you to adjust the length of your piece. You can also adjust the tension of your warp. While the wing nuts can be tightened by hand, to avoid torquing the loom, you may need to tighten the nuts with a pair of wrenches.

Warping is a snap. Here I used 8/4 cotton carpet warp in gray. Since the tension is adjustable, you can start weaving right at the base and continue all the way to the top, which gives you a four selvage piece. No fringe! I used a plastic fork as a beater.

My plan was to weave a sample for a rug I have been contemplating, using some yarn I recently recovered from an unfinished sweater. I wove some weft using warp, then a few sequences of the yarn, then a row of soumak which creates a fold for the tapestry, then a few more rows of yarn before beginning the rya/flossa thing. I repeated this pattern from the top so that I would not have to try to weave it at the end when things get crowded.

The technique I used was a kind of rya/flossa thing, wrapping around a large knitting needle (US 10.5, I think), without cutting the loops. My skill at this is still a bit amateurish - I have trouble remembering to keep the selvages even. My goal with this sample was to see how it felt underfoot as a rug.

One trait of this loop-making method is that the loops hang in one direction, as the expectation is the piece would hang on a wall, not lay on the floor. Consequently, one end is exposed while the other is hidden. Were I to make a rug, I might do a few loop rows in the opposite direction to correct this anomaly.

While pleased with the results - it is very rug-worthy - I have to ask myself if I really want to go to all that trouble on a large piece. The loop rows take time and effort and every four inches takes two yards of yarn. I want the rug to be about five feet long. That would be a LOT of looping... and I might not have enough yarn. I have a tendency to be overly ambitious with my weaving, and right now I want to keep things simpler.

BUT I really like this little loom. It offers some advantages over the 3-in-1 swatch maker, is designed specifically for tapestry weaving, and is very sturdy.