First dish towels

I've been exploring the weaving process on the floor looms. The jury is still out, if I will stick with it. Just like so many creative endeavors, there is a difficult step required to get through before the real fun starts. Putting the warp on the looms in physically challenging, and must be done well or nothing good happens after it.

Weaving dish towels is considered the requisite first project for the floor loom, after, maybe a scarf or shawl. It should be rather mindless, sort of like chain piecing, but I find myself agonizing over symmetry. Arrgh! I'm not experienced enough to be able to visualize the entire towel, to make a pattern work over the length. The woven part disappears onto the cloth beam, leaving only about an eight inch section exposed. I forget what I've done, and what I planned to do.

I have a new set of towels on the smaller loom, and I'm planning to be random with these. I'm planning to not plan. There are fewer colors in this new scheme, so I won't have as many decisions to make, which is about as good as it will get. I'll let you know how long I can be random before needing to make a plan. I don't think it will last very long.

In between

The last few weeks have been delightfully quiet, with pretty much nothing that's newsworthy. My days have been taken up with physical therapy on my neck, and then resting until the pain subsides. I've been taking it easy, on doctor's orders, just sort of gliding through days with no real agenda or plan, something that doesn't sit easily with me.

The decision has finally been well and truly made: travel is off my docket for the duration. Instead of visiting over a dozen guilds a year, I will book only one or two. Air travel will be severely curtailed, as I just can't manage the heavy suitcases without the risk of further damaging my neck and shoulders. It is just too physically demanding for me. No matter how I exercise to build upper body strength, the damage can't be undone.

We've been sneaking up on this. Risking further damage to my shoulders by reaching around to pat myself on the back, I'm good at teaching and speaking, and I love it. I've always felt that knowing something only became valuable when I could share it. It's been a very tough choice to make.

And then there's the blog. Many of my favorite bloggers have been soul searching about their blogs. Some have changed directions, some have redefined, even renamed, and others have chosen to stop blogging all together.

It's always been a challenge for me to blog, I just don't think that I'm all that interesting. In the beginning it was just another marketing tool for my quilting career. What will it be now, if my quilting career is in the rear view mirror?

As I've ventured out into other fiber art forms, I've worried that I'd alienate my "base", the quilters who follow my projects, and perhaps, buy my patterns. I love you guys, and I hope you'll stick with me.

I've had tunnel vision while building my quilting career. But now that I'm off that merry-go-round, my interests have grown just so much wider. In the last two years I've learned how to spin yarn, weave on a floor loom, and weave tapestry. I've remembered how much I love to cook and bake, to feather my nest, to knit and read, and sometimes do nothing at all. And above all, I love to learn.

So, from now on, for better or worse, the blog will be about me, my adventures and misadventures (because who doesn't love a good failure from time to time?) I hope you'll come along for the ride. There may even be a quilt or two along the way.

A Good Day to Dye

It was something I swore I would never do. I'd given it a shot years ago, and decided that dyeing fabric was something I didn't need to do. I mean, it's not like there aren't a million zillion fabrics already out there, just waiting to be discovered and then chopped into lovely little bits. But....

Finding yarns for tapestry in a range of gradations (especially in the US), is a real challenge. In fact, finding yarns for tapestry is rather complicated all the way around, there are so many variables. Just as with fabric, the medium values are easy to find. It's the lightest  lights and darkest darks that are the biggest challenge.

Just as always, I spent a great deal of time trying to figure out how this hand dyeing thing worked. Wanting just small amounts of each color for now, I knew that I wanted to use mason jars and a canner for steam setting the dyes. Figuring out how much dye to use to achieve the desired depth of shade was the stumbling block. Different sources varied widely as to how much to use, so my first batches were way, way more intense than I was looking for.

But the colors came out so clean and bright and pure, it was still super fun to just toss the skeins in the dye and just see what happened.

After a while I just started mixing colors, adding black to skeins that came out too close in color to be useful, or blue, or red.

After my first day of dyeing, I was pretty darned happy with my yarns. It's a pretty good selection, if I do say so myself, especially considering I had no idea what I was doing! Not quite the light lights and dark darks, but hey, that just means I'll have to dye another day.

Hat Dance Hanging

Here's my Pilgrim/Roy Invitational Challenge quilt, hanging in a special exhibit at the American Quilter's Society show in Grand Rapids, MI! On my list of things to see at the show, I had to get special dispensation from the show organizers (Bonnie Browning herself took the picture) because the exhibit was labeled as no photography allowed.

Honestly, this is pretty much the only way one of my quilts will hang in a national show. Competition is just not my cup of tea. But thank goodness that there are so many quilters willing to show their quilts, or we would have nothing but vendors to see at a show.

Not that that would be a bad thing. Of course I checked out the vendors! I saw a fabric that I adored, and then didn't buy it because it wouldn't be enough to be the background for a queen sized quilt. Stupid, stupid! It would have been perfect for a smaller project. I can have such tunnel vision when it comes to purchasing supplies. Sometimes my need for an orderly stash really hampers my shopping.


I didn't see much that was new, but I did enjoy reconnecting with some old pals. I was heartened to see so many traditional style quilts and vendors. I thought that the modern quilters had pretty much run us out on a rail. But, it seems that we're still going strong, and maybe I will go back to designing new quilts and writing patterns.

One thing that did catch my attention was the brand spanking new Bernina sit-down quilting machine.  How long have we been asking for this? Only one of two machines currently in the US, I was able to sit and stitch for a bit, and it's lovely. It's quiet, and it has the capacity to use regular sewing machine needles as small as 70/10! For most quilting machines, it's 90/14 or bigger, and I know that folks do wonderful things with those needles, they've always been the deal breaker for me. But now... well, I guess it's time to start stuffing that piggy bank. They won't be available until next spring, so I'll have plenty of time to skim some cash off the grocery budget. (Don't read that sentence, Kent. I'm just kidding, really. Sort of.)

Rest is Not Idleness

Taking some time off to heal and consider my options is not as easy as it sounds, especially not for someone who is used to a lifetime of going at full steam ahead. Taking a step (okay, a leap) back from the physical challenges of travel, and starting physical therapy, have proved to be just the thing for my dodgy old neck and my creative burnout.

This has been my summer of weaving. I've always turned to learning a new craft when my creative juices run dry. I think it's a "making" thing. It's a new label, being a maker, but it perfectly defines me. I have been a maker all of my life, and when taking a break from making quilts, it was only natural that I should need to make something else.

The tapestry bug has bitten me, hard. I'm talking the weaving kind of tapestry, not the embroidery kind. I've taken two tapestry classes this summer.

Starting last spring, Rebecca Mezoff offered a three part, comprehensive online tapestry class. She's just charming, and the class format included lots of personal interaction. I highly recommend the classes. The sample to the left is from one of the early parts of the process.

In August I attended the Michigan League of Handweavers' annual workshop retreat. What fun! Just as in quilting, weaving is bent and shaped into so many intriguing art forms, just waiting to be explored.

While there, I took a tapestry class from Nancy McRay. It was awesome! The sample above is from her class. Three days of the quiet strumming of tightly warped looms, extremely individualized lessons and wonderful encouragement, were a balm to a healing soul. (Not to mention the nightly hugs from grandbabies, the retreat being in their town.)

And here is my class final project for Rebecca's class. That's a pumpkin growing there, just in case you couldn't tell. The tapestry is only ten inches wide, so I'm having to edit, edit, edit to try to tell the story. I'm really pleased with some of it, other parts, not so much. I'm still thinking of spaces as in fabric for applique, and that's holding me back a bit. But I'll get there, probably in about a million years, but then, if it could be mastered in a day how inspiring would that be?

The Academy of Applique

At last! The big reveal. This is the applique project that saved my sanity during our crazy month of family comings and goings. I've been invited to teach at the Academy of Applique in Williamsburg, Virginia! If that's not cool enough, I'm going to be teaching two multiple day classes, giving us a chance to really explore and savor the applique process.

 This is the class sample for the three day workshop at the Academy of Applique. The class descriptions are on line now and registration will open on September 2nd. This class is called Gather Ye Rosebuds, and in the three days of class we will have the time to play with design and color. We'll concentrate on the more flexible, modular aspect of my applique technique in this class. I'll have dozens of preprinted flowers in various sizes and shapes with which to fill our vases. We'll even have time to design and sew our own custom backgrounds to give our bouquets just the right setting. I had so much fun playing with color values and shapes I am already planning another version.

I will also be teaching a two day workshop, Autumn's Bounty. This class will be a great introduction to the basic "Hand Applique by Machine" technique. We'll have time to audition and select just the right fabrics to show off our lovely harvest. (I'm in love with the grapes.) I'm expecting that we will be able to go home with our applique pretty much finished, which is rather amazing for applique workshops, if I do say so myself.

As I've mentioned before, I've really cut back on my teaching schedule, and I haven't done much teaching on the east coast. The Academy is a wonderful gathering of all things applique. Come on all you applique artists, this is the place to bond with your people, learn new things and generally have a great time.

Time Travel

Do you ever wish away time? Do you try to mentally project your thoughts to a date and time where life will return to what ever is normal for you? I have to admit that I do. It's not so much that I'm wishing away time, I know life is too short for that, but it is sort like casting out an anchor for getting through challenging times. In a way, it's like envisioning my victory over the current situation.

It's been like that for the past month. I've tossed a marker to today, knowing that our wonderful, but hectic, family gatherings will have been enjoyed and survived. Ironic, isn't it, that not too long ago I was deep in the throws of empty nesting, and now I look forward to being back to my quiet life. That's the thing about life, I suppose. It's always changing. Normal really is just a setting on the washing machine.

Our Kansas kids were back in town for about ten days. While we were home base, they were here to celebrate weddings and reconnect with friends. We saw them in the mornings on their way out the door, and sometimes in the evenings as they regrouped for nighttime activities. We did have a lovely time on the drive down to Detroit Metro, for their return flight home. Yeah, I cried a little when they left. It's a mom thing.

Our grandchildren stayed with us for a week. They are now seven and four, and delightful, well mannered kids, and exhausting. I don't know how folks our age manage young children of their own. But, we had a great time together, and I'm grateful that they live close enough that we can be a part of their lives.

Of course, in the middle of all the excitement, I had a class sample to finish. As usual, I stressed out about it way more than necessary, but it too, is done and gone. (More on that in a couple of days.)

It won't be back to happily boring though, for a few more weeks. I'm looking forward to three days of tapestry workshop this week, where I get to be a student. And there will be autocross for Kent. From there we will blissfully slide into our familiar routine of work and play. Not that I'm counting the days or anything.

How it begins

I've been invited to teach a three day applique class next March. Three days! I'm so used to trying to cram everything I know into just six hours that three days seems like an incredible luxury. I'm excited to be able to devote time to design, color theory and embellishment as well as technique. With this in mind, I've set out to develop the class sample.

My idea is to offer students a variety of flowers (you were expecting something else?), in several shapes and sizes, and allow them to arrange their own bouquets. The challenge is to present enough choices to keep everyone happy, but, at the same time, I don't want to offer so many choices that students can't make good progress on their samples.

Here's my preliminary layout, with some of my fabric choices surrounding it. I've gathered up three different styles of main character flowers, there will be three of each in the handouts. I've used one of each here as a sort of tease, but also because it is this sort of mish mash bouquets I have been cutting from my garden.

So far, so good, right? The vase isn't showing up well here, it is actually a little more complex that what can be seen. As I'm working on the glue basting I'm also considering what sort of embellishments I will add to the shapes. I may do a little ink work on the yellow rose, but I think the zinnia and the painted daisy will need some french knots, at the very least.

Moving on the accent flowers, it's there that I hit a snag. That's my little finger in the picture. That circle is less than a quarter of an inch in diameter. I want to challenge my students, not frustrate and discourage them. Glue basting shapes this small takes skill and patience. Most of my students would probably be able to pull it off by the end of the second day, but I'm thinking that I want to keep this class fun and gratifying. So, I'm back to the drawing board to simplify and enlarge some of the smaller elements. I think I'll leave some smallish ones in place, for those who really want a challenge.

I'd love your feedback! What would you like to learn in a three day applique class? Would shapes this small scare you off, or reel you in? Would you rather work from a proscribed pattern, or would the idea of designing your own bouquet excite you?

A summer for gardening

It's been a lovely, quiet summer so far. The weather has been mild, a good mix of happy sunny days and charming all day rains. The flower gardens are really coming along, although I still have some major weeding to do on a couple of them.

Our hard winter was really tough on my perennials. Quite a few didn't survive, including several of my roses. I put off weeding and planning to see what really was gone, and what was just taking its sweet time about coming back. I've had a few nice surprises, especially from roses I was sure were gone.

The pond also suffered from the hard winter. We lost nearly all of our fish. The ice was nearly three inches thick when we finally hefted it out of the pond, near the end of April. We'd been waiting for it to simply melt away, but our cool spring prevented that. Despite having lots of aeration, I think the fish suffocated. We've added three new fish and a few new water plants. and I think it is looking well again.

 
Gracie is learning that grass is good for sprawling, but mom gets super mad when she lolls around on the flowers. I'd lay prickly rose branches between the plants to discourage her, but they seem to be her especially favorite to chew. I catch her swiping them out of the weed cart all the time.

The gardenia is now constantly in bloom, adding its scent to the lavender and roses. I've left the few milkweed volunteers, hoping to coax a monarch butterfly, or two. I haven't seen a single one so far this year.

And now for something completely different

Part Three: Learning Curves

As the previous posts have suggested, I'm learning to weave. I'm taking a tapestry weaving online class from Rebecca Mezoff. She is charming, delightful, and an excellent teacher. I've learned so much over the last couple of months, and not just about tapestry.

It turns out that I am the sort of student who would challenge me as a teacher. I wanted to know all of it, and now. In the first few passes of yarn through the loom, I knew that I was hooked. This is a new way of playing with color, and my mind just sort of boggled at the possibilities.

Part Two: Demi Duites, Pick and Pick and Weft Joins

I chafed a bit when I learned that we wouldn't get to angles until part two, and curves would remain a secret until part three! I wanted to know it all, now. I will admit to some very ungracious grumbling. And then I recognized it. I'm that student. On the one hand, it's sort of a miracle to see from the teacher's perspective, seeing that moment when the door to all the new possibilities opens up in a student's mind, when a student totally gets it. On the other hand, it's super hard to contain the excitement and discipline myself to learn to crawl before trying to fly.

When it came to tapestry, I got it. I am the sort of person who is used to catching on to things quickly, at least anything involving needlework. It's in my dna, just as much as my green eyes and freakishly long legs. But tapestry is not needlework. There are no needles involved at all. There is an entirely new vocabulary to master, not the least of which is the interaction of warp and weft.

Part One: Hatching 

We're only part way through part three, and I'm excited to see what comes next. I can't say enough good things about Rebecca's class. It's part self-directed, but with a great deal of interaction with Rebecca. She responds to questions very thoroughly, sometimes even creating new videos to clarify a point for a struggling student. If you are at all interested in tapestry, check it out. You won't be sorry.


.

It's called OLAD

Obsessive Loom Acquisition Disorder. OLAD. I knew about the malady, but never expected to be infected so quickly. Looms have very specific functions, designed for specific styles of weaving, sort of like the way sewing needles are designed for specific tasks, only taking up way, way more floor space. And I've got it bad.



My OLAD was still manageable when I had just the Baby Wolf and the Mirrix, each designed for specific purposes.

This sweetie is a terrific loom, but it has its limitations. It's considered a portable loom, so it's not quite sturdy enough for weaving rugs. (With all this fabric around me, I see many, many rag rugs in my future.) And, it only has four shafts (patterns are made by threading the warp through different shafts), the more shafts a loom has, the more complex the patterns can be.

I have woven several things on this loom, not the least of which is the beautiful overshot pattern to the left. With careful threading of the shafts and repeated sequences of treadling, marvelous designs can appear.

It was the "mathyness" that drew me to quilting originally, taking just simple bits of algebra to cipher out an entire quilt. Weaving is also mathy, and I love it!

But just as, after a time, all those straight lines in quilting designs began to chafe, so it is with weaving. So, I needed a tapestry loom.Tapestry weaving lets me draw with yarn. It's the weaving world's equivalent of applique. I am taking an online class from Rebecca Mezoff, and so far we are only up to geometric forms. The class has been just marvelous, Rebecca is a terrific teacher.










This is my final project for Part One. Curves aren't actually covered until Part Three, which is next month, but I couldn't help myself. They were supposed to be circles, those blobs, but at least the top one ended up a convincing oval. Even the triangle was a bit of stepping out, we're only just now getting the the lessons in triangles, in Part Two.

And now to the OLAD, one more type of loom, this one a for-real floor loom, a heavy duty loom that can handle rug making, and also with more shafts for more intricate patterns. I've been watching for a used loom to come up for sale nearby, and one did, just last week.

Introducing the Norwood. These looms have a delightful Michigan history, built by a furniture maker out of cherry wood.

She has eight shafts, and a weaving width of almost forty inches. She also has a sectional warp beam (it's the spiny looking thing on the left), so I'll need to learn how to work with that.

I wish I could say that I was done buying looms, but I fear I have a couple more in my future. I'm certain that I will eventually want a larger tapestry loom, and I'm also considering a band loom, to weave intricate, skinny bands of color. But that's it, really, who actually needs a loom with more than eight shafts, or hooks up to a computer, or is just bigger? Nah, I'm done with OLAD, really I am.

A Loom Room

 To say that the office was a disaster would be an epic understatement. This picture shows the cleanest part. I am too embarrassed to show you the rest of it. The room was crammed with stuff. Parts of books and patterns, printing stuff, binding stuff, paperwork and general junk was piled higher and deeper and filled every corner. And it was all stuff we thought we needed. The room was so bad that, even though I relish a challenging organization job, I turned a blind eye to this room.

And then there was IKEA. I love IKEA, and luckily the nearest one is about two hours away or I'd be in big trouble. Fine furniture it's not, but its a big cut above chain store stuff and that's good enough for my purposes.

This wall is the office. What used to take up the entire room is now mostly hidden behind doors. The desk that filled a quarter of the room (and harbored stacks of homeless paperwork) is gone.

A center for tapestry weaving is replacing it. Instead of the jumbled mess from the first picture, a Baby Wolf floor loom awaits. I was worried that I'd gone a little bold with with paint color, but now I love it. The room positively glows! I can't tell you how many times I've gone back to the room because I thought I left the light on.

The room is still a work in progress. I'll be sewing up new curtains, there's a new top coming for the tapestry center with room for the bobbin winder. And before much weaving can go on, I'll need a proper bench.

My buddies always said that one day my stash would cause me to expand into another room, but I don't think this is exactly what they had in mind.

Now with even more applique!

As I mentioned earlier, I decided to make templates for the stems instead of using bias strips. It seemed like the best way for a couple of reasons. First, I wanted the motifs to be very uniform in shape, cutting templates would eliminate the wobble that sometimes finds its way into bias strip stems. Secondly, this stems are really rather thick, getting them to lie flat might have been a challenge. And last, working with a very dark background meant that even the brightest light box would have a tough time showing the guide lines. These motifs span the background from the pieced block to a background border, so I'd have to squirrel around the entire quilt to do the marking, placement and sewing of the motifs. Ick.

To make life even easier, the entire motifs were sewn together before placing them on the background. They can be held in place with fewer pins, and since the flower parts and stems are already stitched, all that is left to do is stitch around the perimeter.

This close up shows the stitching on the appliques. I'm a big fan of Superior's MonoPoly. It really is the best there is, super fine, flexible and yet strong. Love it. I've used clear here, the smoke color would have been too dark.

I didn't quite know how I was going to quilt it, I rarely do. I thought that the quilt was already busy enough, decided that the eye needed quiet places to rest. In the end I quilted the snot out of the background and added just enough stitch in the ditch on the appliques to give some dimension. Most of these spools of thread returned to the bin unused.

Here it is, all basted up and ready to quilt. This is the moment of terror, when I take this quilt top that I really love and chance ruining it with my quilting. Yeah, even though I've been machine quilting for more than thirty years, I still have to talk myself down before I attack the quilting.

Of course I didn't take a picture of the finished quilt, I was working on a deadline and wanted it out the door. But I wanted to show you a little bit more of the piecing. It's not perfect, although I am very happy with the overall outcome. What I wanted to show is how the seams are pressed. Instead of following the old rule of pressing towards the dark, I pressed all the seams away from the background. In doing so, the design fabric is elevated, pushed forward visually, making the background fabric recede. Stitching in the ditch around the piecing will push that background even further back, giving the design a real opportunity to shine.

I do hope that someone heading to Paducah for the show would be kind enough to send a picture of my quilt in the collection. It's the only time one of my quilts will hang in a major show. And at next year's show, when the quilt is auctioned off to benefit the National Quilt Museum, I hope it will bring in a tidy sum.

Piecing the Background

When my BFF remarked on how complex the center star looked, I just said, pshaw! It's not nearly as hard as it looks. After all, the feathers are merely half-square triangles! No biggie.

Well, yes biggie. It turned out to be quite the challenge to piece. I was so engrossed in figuring out what to sew next that I forgot to take more pictures. (I could have sworn that I did!)

Sure, the half-square triangles were a snap, but after that, each step took a lot of consideration. I tried to plan out the order of the steps in advance, but gave up and decided to just hope the star would tell me what to do next. It did, but, I have to say, I haven't sewn this many inset seams in one block before.

The block was designed to finish at 23", because it made the math a little easier. I was totally surprised and impressed with myself when it came out to just the right size! With a block with so much fiddling about, I was sure that it would be off by a country mile.

But here's the secret: aside from the ability to figure out piecing order, which did take a bit of advanced piecing know-how, the sewing part only requires the most basic of quilt making skills.

It makes me sound so curmudgeonly to say it, so totally old school, but mastering accurate cutting and sewing will never let you down. Learning just two skills, understanding how to cut out right sized pieces, and that holy grail of piecing, the quarter inch seam allowance, will open the world of piecing to you.

One more skill was needed for this block: understanding inset seams. They are made to sound so scary, but the secret of success is just to always sew away from a fixed seam. In other words, we begin a new seam right where we left off.

I've loved the challenge of this quilt, and I'm seriously considering making it again. I'm sort of into pastels at the moment, so maybe I'll make a very girly version to replace the one that got away.

Glue Basting

Applique isn't hard, it just takes time. It's methodical, and I think that's what I like best about it. Or maybe choosing the colors. Either way, it's a step by step process. I like to set things up so that I can see my progress, for this quilt I decided to do all the red flowers first, because there are more of them, and when they're done I'm more than half way done with the flowers.



That, and a good Craftsy video on my tablet. I'm learning all about different yarns and the projects they are best suited for. In no time at all, I have a beautiful pile of red flowers. Ta Da! And I've learned a few things about yarn.



I must have a touch of OCD (or CDO, as I prefer to have the letters in alphabetical order), because I used this project as an opportunity to finish off all my partially used glue sticks. Keeps things tidy, you know?

When all of the glue basting is done the shapes are organized into motifs.

At this point, I decided to use templates instead of bias strips to make the stems. I want the curves to be uniform, so glue basting seems to be the best course.

I'm off to make the stems, and when I'm done with the glue basting it will be time to stitch the motifs together.

While I've been away...

Lots of little things have happened in the last couple of weeks. Nothing exciting really, just day to day sort of stuff. Anyone who's read this blog for any length of time knows that I struggle with the idea that what I do might be interesting to anyone else. But, there are lots of blogs out there that I love to read, so, here goes.

The deadline for the Pilgrim/Roy Invitational Challenge is fast approaching. My goal is to ship it out by Friday, but we'll see how it goes. It's been my main focus for the last few weeks.

Quilters often think, when they see an applique intense quilt such as this, that it's hard to do. While the piecing gave me bits of fits (can you say inset seams?), the applique is just simple shapes. The motifs are not difficult to do, but they do take time.

I struggled a bit, with the fabric choices. As you've seen, I really wanted to use polka dots, the challenge fabric just begged for polka dots! But I was seriously dubious about my original selections, and had pretty much given up on the idea. I had a brief retail therapy opportunity before speaking for the Gathering in Fort Wayne, IN on National Quilt Day, where I found this perfect palette of dots.

All tone on tone, multiple values, perfect compliments to the crazy challenge fabric. (Yes, those are fingerless gloves on my desk, it can get pretty nippy in the studio.) Once I had just the right fabrics, I just dove into creating the templates for the applique shapes.

It's been a while since I've worked on a project with repeating motifs, but by marking each piece (I call it my addressing system), I'll know where each shape belongs. As the flowers were cut apart, each shape was stacked up on the appropriate fabric and then pressed in place. Another big bite of the project is done.