Last weekend we made a trip to the Coast to pick up materials for one of Rick’s cabinet jobs, and visit with friends and family.  On the way to and from Anacortes, in the Skagit Valley, we saw large flocks of snow geese out in the fields.  They are quite a sight!  Then when we arrived home, it was obvious that rain and/or thaw had set in.  We still have snow on the ground, but it is soggy during the day, becoming icy at night.  Yech!  Navigating our driveway on foot from house to carport is a bit treacherous.  Although now, in the late afternoon, I look outside and it is…. snowing!!

Having dropped the ball entirely on blogging the last couple of weeks, I will attempt a bit of a catch-up.

My weaving workshop a couple of weeks ago in Seattle, with Margaret Roach Wheeler, was marvelous.  Her website is Mahota Handwovens – the type of weaving we were learning is shown in her clothing line.  She uses the summer-and-winter weave structure to weave decorative bands that emulate Native American beadwork and quillwork.  Here are a few pictures from the 2-day workshop:

Margaret discussing a finished sampler

A shirt with decorative work on collar and facings

A beautiful dress - note subtle colorwork at the very top

Our samplers were worked in 10/2 perle cotton.  She gave color value and contrast guidelines, but every warp was different and the colors chosen for wefts were up to the student.  There is a lot to explore and learn there – what works and what doesn’t!  But I am pleased with my sampler and will use it both as a guide for future work, and as a wall hanging in my studio:

My washed sampler from the Wheeler workshop

Meanwhile, the last few weeks I have written up the pattern for the “Mosaic Mojo Hat” and have taught 2 groups of intrepid knitters the techniques used there – short rows (including hiding the wraps in garter stitch), garter stitch grafting and mosaic knitting.  No-one left crying so it must have been OK.  I taught it as two 2-hour sessions with a week in between to get some knitting done, and will be teaching it again in March down at Uptown Woolery in Chelan.  Inevitably, some errors in the pattern were found and I still need to tweak it a bit.  Eventually I will offer it as a PDF download from my Ravelry page and will put a link here on the blog.

I made a commitment to have some woven pieces for the next show at Confluence Gallery in Twisp – the theme is “Lacuna”, which they said “can be described as a gap, an absence or a void, but the meaning is much more nuanced and evocative”.  It has different meanings depending on the application.  The show opens the first weekend on March so time is running out, especially as I will be gone to spinning camp on Orcas Island all of next week!

So this week I am trying to bring an idea along and I am not sure it is going to work.   The basis will be some woven and felted wall-hangings, which I plan to embellish further.  So here is what I was doing the last couple of days:

Sleying the reed off the loom -first time I have tried this, and I like it.  Much more comfortable.

I discovered the Hans Wegner “Wishbone” chair is perfect for sitting over the sectional warp beam to thread from the back.  [As an aside, we were thrilled to find the set of 4 chairs at a used-furniture store in Ballard a couple of years ago, for a very reasonable price.  Hans Wegner is one of Rick’s heroes, a famous Danish furniture designer.  We had them down at Benson Creek but now they are in my studio along with the smaller oak dining table]

Here is the first piece almost done:

What will this odd-looking blob become?  Stay tuned!

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After we returned from Christmas on the coast, I wound 4 warps for the plaited twill scarves – that is, 4 different colorways, 2 of which were new ones I had in mind but hadn’t tried yet.  I can get 4 scarves from a 10-yard warp so I have been weaving away and now have 16 scarves woven:

but not finished.  I still need to twist the fringes, darn in ends and wash and press them.

I wanted to get this many done because I sold most of what I had before and during the holidays (not complaining!).  It saves me a lot of time if I can tie on each new warp and pull it through the heddles and reed, so I don’t have to re-thread etc.  But I am going to have to take this warp setup off the loom I am using because I need it for a workshop I am going to the end of next week.

The workshop, which will be held over in Seattle through the Seattle Weavers’ Guild,  is with Margaret Roach Wheeler, a native American of Chickasaw-Choctaw descent.  Do check out her website (Mahota Handwovens) –  I think her work is stunning.  She will be teaching us how she uses the Summer & Winter weave structure to interpret native American beadwork and quillwork patterns in her clothing line.   There are many beautiful examples on her website.  I am really excited to have this opportunity to learn from her.

Speaking of the loom I am using, I was having a fit around scarf # 10.  It is my Macomber “workshop loom”, the model CP portable.  Tie-up hooks were constantly popping off the lamms (the hooks connect the pedals or treadles to the lamm, which is a bar that connects to the jacks which raise the harnesses).  Also the harnesses themselves were hanging up and not dropping and I was getting messed up areas in the pattern and having to take work out and fix it constantly.  And it kept making a lot of loud creaking and squeaking noises.

Finally the light bulb went off in my head and I looked on the Macomber Looms and Me blog (also in my sidebar at right).  Sure enough there were a couple of entries about cleaning old grunge and dust off the jacks, and about Spiffing up your Loom.  I am not sure but my loom may have been sprayed with some WD-40 during a workshop last fall at our guild room – turns out this is a big No-No for Macomber looms.  So anyway, I cleaned up the jacks and the wooden slots the lamms slide in as best I could with a warp on the loom, using acetone and a rag, then applied silicone spray and vaseline (recommended for wherever brass parts touch steel parts).  The result was a much happier loom and a much happier weaver!  The last scarves went off without a hitch as fast as I could go.

I also include a picture of the handspun yarn I finished up a week or so ago.  This was from a multi-colored grey Corriedale fleece I washed, carded into layered batts (dark, medium and light in 3 layers to preserve some color variation in the spun yarn) and then spun over a period of time, mostly during the last year.  I finished it up as a 3-ply yarn and definitely have enough for a sweater (maybe 2700 yards of sport weight).  I am thinking traditional gansey style but need to do some swatching.  It is the most yummy, squishy and springy, soft yarn – I love it!

We will have 2 sets of visitors this week, so glad to see them!  Our first visitors arrived Friday night from Seattle.  Yesterday was a gorgeous Methow day and we went snowshoeing up in the Rendezvous area out of the Gunn Ranch.

Kristin is with child, due mid- to late-March, but she looks just like…. Kristin with a basketball on the front!

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