8.19.11 Time for something new!

So I changed the “theme” for the homepage. I remember setting up this blog. I had no idea, as most of us didn’t, how to blog. I just chose a platform and went for it. I learned an awful lot about publishing and some it I have forgotten already. I guess that is how it is. In the meantime, I have learned that I should not doublespace after the punctuation at the end of a sentence. Boy is that hard to do after 40 years of doublespacing!

Well, then. Here are the Everlasting Towels, the weaving is finished but not the finishing. Heh. Not finished with the finishing. Since I made a longer warp than the pattern called for I ended up sacrificing weft to the warp. OK with towels but not with everything handwoven. I must remember that. They are in a pile right now, awaiting hemming and wet finishing. Then they can have their official debut. This WAS NOT a difficult project. I just took forever getting it done because of my stupid back and the stress that threading the loom places on it. Once the weaving commenced it was so enjoyable to see the progress.

I did some other weaving also. My young neighbor sold me a potholder loom for 8 cents. She told me she had “outgrown it”. So I have made some new potholders, to join my old ones that either my husband or children made when they were children. These things are great.

And finally, for Theresa, our kitchen has for 12 years been off white with an accent wall of deep, cobalt blue. This photo shows a failed blue that read as sage green with the light in here. Not a bad color but not what I was going for.
It is a north facing room and I wanted it to lighten without changing the lighting. So the experiments began. I tried yellow. I tried a faded red. But I came back to blue, in a medium tone.

The window treatments need to be sewn still but at least I have the fabric. It is blue with ivory animal toile by PKaufman, another $4 a yard remnant!

I also picked up another 3 yard piece of fabric at a local “antique” store for a few dollars. It is an “authorized reproduction of Old Sturbridge Village” fabric. I remember this colonial trend from back in the 80′s. I think we can call it vintage now.

5.23.10 Little Bits and Pieces

This week there has been knitting, sewing, spinning, laundry, dog medicine giving, movie watching, finch visiting, and oh, some shopping.

The knitting on the MS&W Miss Woodhouse Shawlette and a stealth project continues. Miss Woodhouse is just about finished and I added an additional repeat of the first chart.

Sewing of two quilt blocks from the Block of the Month series at Quilter’s Corner in Midlothian. Sweet little 30′s reproduction prints into highly geometric and classic quilt blocks, one a month for a year. Not too much to tackle when I have been out of the quilting game for a while. The 30′s reproductions fabrics are sweet. Mary Had a Little Lamb, Three Bears on the other. Mr. Lady said “those are really pastel-ee for you”. I don’t use these colors much but they are irresistible.

Quilt Block #1

Suzie-dog is sick with some sort of protozoa that she picked up from who knows where, maybe the kennel on one of her nature walks. The vet said maybe she drank bad creek water or ate the wrong thing. $60 and 2 antibiotics and a reluctant doggie. Deli ham makes the pills go down without awareness and she is feeling better. And the p**ps are formed now. Like you needed to hear that.

We watched the new Russell Crowe/Cate Blanchett Robin Hood in the theater! $30 for 3 tickets and $8 for a giant bucket of popcorn that made me feel ill even though I shared with Caroline and Mr. Lady. Mr. Lady doesn’t like popcorn but I could live on it I think. Yep, with “butter” (what is that stuff anyway? Gross thought). I hardly ever go to the movies and I want to do it up right so I always seem to over do it. The movie was weird. Good, lots of sword fighting, funny lines, costumes, horses, longbows but not what I was expecting and the theater had a whopping total of 12 people in it on a dreary Saturday afternoon. At $10 a ticket I think I know why. Wait for it on DVD people.

I saw the finch family yesterday and today, the one that made the nest in my wreath. The parents and the 5 babies visited my front porch windows and chirped and sang as I was coming down the stairs yesterday morning. It was nice to see them because they have not been around since the nest emptied out. It has been weeks and the mom is still feeding one of them. I guess he might have been the last to fly out of the nest. After they sat in my windows they flew up to the flag and sat on the pole then flew up into the beech tree. I swear they visit me on purpose just to show off.

The shopping?
Some cotton for double weave stuff. More on that another time. I just wound a warp of cottolin for some more twill tea towels. Hobby weaver. Multicraftual.

Bye!

11.2.09 4 in 1: Weaving, knitting, designing and massage.

I meant to blog yesterday but it rained all day. It is my only excuse.

I finished the Coopworth Scarf that was on the loom. The handspun coopworth warp was very sturdy, only one broken warp end, much to my delight. The handspun singles coopworth and silk thread weft was easy to bobbin and weave with. I wet finished by machine washing for about 10 minutes in warm water and then rinsing in the sink. Then I stuck it in the dryer. Gasp. Yes I did. And with a fabric softener sheet. Otherwise it would not have had its halo. I am always one to experiment with what I make and sometimes it doesn’t work out. But usually, things will go OK if you watch them.

I am trying to decide how to weave some upholstery fabric for 6 dining room chairs that I stuffed into my station wagon for a real bargain. They are beautiful mahogany chairs but the seats need recovering. The wood it really in pretty good shape and they do not need to be reglued. My husband is going to do the work on the wood now that he has gotten over the fact that they are in his garage. I could go to the fabric outlets in town but I thought that weaving my own fabric would entertain me and provide a unique solution.

I think I can go with cotton, cotton/linen or maybe wool. I think I can choose a color. But a weave structure? So many to choose from! I have a four shaft loom. I have lots of books. I wish I didn’t have so many choices. Twill would be interesting. Cord weave would be sturdy. I love satin but I don’t have enough harnesses. I need something fairly easy to treadle because I need yardage and I don’t want to fiddle around with a monster treadling where I have too many opportunities to mess up. My brain hurts from reading about so many wonderful choices.

All of this thinking about weaving is exhausting and makes me tense. I am going to go off on a tangent now about the benefits of a massage. It is a necessity. I think that I have never experienced anything so relaxing, de-stressing, or pain relieving as a massage. I am going once a month for a 30 minute focused massage on my neck, shoulders and back. It helps. It makes me more conscious of my posture and movement.

My massage therapist is Heather Umberger, a certified massage therapist. She is in the office of
Chesterfield Physical Therapy which includes a physical therapy practice as well as several other massage therapists. Heather offers wellness massage as well as fertility and prenatal massage. She is wonderfully intuitive about her work which is the best compliment that I can pay. The effects of a massage last differing amounts of time for me and that is apparently to be expected. At first I was going weekly, then less often and now monthly. A massage can only be compared to a nap, the effects of which are not as long lasting. I also like naps.

I think I will knit for a while. A new sock is in the lineup. At least there is no spitting in knitting. Unlike baseball.

8.5.09 Touch and Sew

Look what the Lady dragged in. A vintage Singer Touch and Sew with moderne cabinet circa 1965. For $35 cash. A Golden Touch and Sew at that. All metal innards. A two pronged plug without grounding. All of the fancy cams that will supposedly sew decorative stitches like zig zag and buttonholes. Why might you ask? Why not. The opportunity arose. It is in seemingly perfect working order, just had a check up about 2 years ago and has it’s owner’s manual. And it has all its feet. And you wind the bobbin in place so as not to interrupt your sewing. (We will see how that really works won’t we? I have some doubts and only one bobbin.)

I have been ripping fabric into strips for a rag rug and decided that I wanted to sew the strips together. Did I already have a sewing machine? Yes. Do I need to sew the strips together to make the rug? Apparently not. Could I not just use my old faithful Viking Husqvarna for the sewing? Yes and No. It might want to do another project.

1965? That was 44 years ago. Not that long considering. It was THE thing in sewing machines. All those stitches. All that technology. And it works. Well, maybe I will get back to weaving off that seine twine warp I put on the loom for this rug a few MONTHS ago.

And I have been knitting a little. An Entrelac Scarf from my navajo plyed Rovings polwarth that I finished spinning a while ago.

THe colors run from pinks to purples to blues to teal to peachy pink.