So Much For Textile Work

This is a needlecase made out of a scrap of left over weaving - by Cally Booker. I had not thought of using up scraps like that. A good idea, especially for selling at exhibitions.

On Saturday I agreed to provide drafts of various items, scarves, cushions and on Sunday I spent all day looking for said drafts. In particular, I was not expecting to find anything about the cushion as I made them years ago for my sister. But I did find the data, type of yarn, sett, what weight of yarn needed etcetera. And dated September 1982. 30 years old. Dorothy says they are holding up well. They look okay to me.

The warp is horizontal in the photo. The back is plain and the front has two blue and white boucle stripes. The first and last are woven with the back forward and then the body of the cushion is woven with a gap along the lower edge. You create fringes when it comes off the loom, sew Velcro to the insides of the side opening, push in a cushion and there you are.


I am having trouble with getting Google to deal with photos and I suspect that there is a photo of Cally's weaving - but I can't see it. I hope other people can see it.

Starting Off the New Year

Yesterday I managed to attend the Kennet Valley Guild meeting and a performance of Berlioz's Les Troyens. This was a High Definition broadcast from the New York Met in our local theatre complex. Fantastic. A cast of hundreds, all singing their heads off! It started at five and lasted five hours. So I went to bed singing (in my head). 

The result is that today is the first day of the New Year I have been at home with no commitments to do anything outside the house.  And my New Year resolution is to finish off as many projects as I can as quickly as possible. I have all sorts of good ideas I would like to carry out but I must finish off some of those underway. It is all complicated by going to London  on Thursday to attend a one-day Complex Weavers class at Handweavers Studio - and I will take the opportunity to inspect their yarn!!

But the immediate job is to deal with the post and send out several emails arising from yesterday's Guild meeting. And I have not unpacked since returning from Dundee. So that's today gone.  Maybe I will get some textile work done so that I will some photos. Maybe!!

Back Home

The photos above are of Cally Booker's new Studio (see her blog here - very nice. The room is large - and high and the heating, lighting are included in the rent so you don't get any nasty surprises. I visited this yesterday morning and then had lunch with her. Her house is only a few minutes walk from the studio block.


I drove home this morning and have tidied up a bit. I have computer trouble - I can't get at any attachments which is a pest. I have thought of a complicated way to do it. Sigh! But at the moment I must make sure I have collected everything together for tomorrow which is Kennet Valley Guild day.

Happy New Year

A Happy and Prosperous New Year. Or in the local patois 'Lang may yer lum reek'. Translated as 'may you be able to buy coal so your chimney produces smoke'.

I am in Dundee where we had a quiet and very odd New Year. On New Year's Eve, it was extremely wet so we decided to spend the day textiling. One of my Christmas presents was a bottle of decolorant and I wanted to try it out. I used it above - on the left - on space-dyed cloth. Then used the same stencil to put on coloured versions, dark blue and orange. Not sure what will become of this - it would make a good book cover.

 And another piece using an Okinawan stencil with decolourant (the white bits) and Permaset textile inks. Again this might make a good book cover.

This piece, like the others, started out as a spaced dyed piece of cotton. The colours here were blue, purple and bright yellow (at the top and now cut off). It seemed a bit messy when I ironed it off but Dorothy persuaded me to pin it up on my design wall. The more I looked at it, the more it seemed like a landscape with a waterfall. So eventually I cut out the outline of the mountains at the top, begged a white and blue dyed piece of cotton from Dorothy and pinned it up again. Then I stencilled and painted trees on it and added threads to enhance the waterfall effect. When I get home, I will machine pine trees on it. So much for only doing weaving and bookbinding and not doing wall hangings! The work extended on to New Year's Day and we found ourselves cleaning up at 0930 last night.

Today I must get on with warp winding for Kennet Valley Guild class. I have wound about two thirds of one warp already.

Earlier in the week we went through to St Andrews Museum where Dorothy's Embroiderers' Guild has a big exhibition. A very talented bunch with a lot of stuff. They have 60 members and there were 220 entries. Here are a very few

This bowl is about12 inches across by Nancy Poole.

By Pat Cowieson

I liked the hydrangeas best. Most effect with minimum complexity



 

Pantomime

Taken at the Weymouth pantomime. The Dame must have had a dozen outfits, all equally outrageous. It was the hats really.

We sorted out our belongings this morning and all went home. I have proposed that, if we do this again, we go somewhere by plane so we are limited in luggage. It took me several hours to unpack and put everything away. It is made urgent by my driving up to Dundee tomorrow to see my sister, Dorothy, in Dundee. I intend a 0630 start. So I am making sure that I do any urgent paperwork this evening and have decided to wind warps in Dundee rather than put the ikat warp on the Voyager. That's for fun and is not urgent whereas the warps are urgent. Panic is beginning to set in when I looked at the diary.

Boxing Day

We all went down to the harbour for the Bridport Boxing Day Wallow - which means the Mayor saying 'On your marks. Get Set. GO' and 100 swimmers running into the sea. Mad, if you ask me. It was very windy and very cold. The 100 swimmers included our two teenagers and they did go in deep enough to swim but came out quite quickly! And we all went home immediately.

The afternoon was spent with the family doing things to T-shirts. Charlotte went for shibori while the others went for stencils. Practice pieces of cotton  were provided and Tom was very dis-satisfied with this until I pointed out he could tear newspaper up to make the shape he wanted and then he was happy. Interesting that he was the most inventive. I was exhausted at the end. And they have to be finished off this afternoon.

I have just had a very interesting experience. Three of our four cars are parked in a hardstanding up the rouad - rather squashed - and someone wanted out. So I walked up the road in pyjamas, dressing-gown and slippers, moved my car (the last in) out and put it back. Various neighbours were peering out of their net-covered windows!!

I am going up to Dundee to visit my sister on Saturday and must think about what I need to take. I will drive home tomorrow and get there before lunch so that I have time to empty the car, put everything away and collect together what I need to take up to Dundee. I am hoping we have time to do a bit of stencilling/painting/fabric  treatment while there. I will take my warping mill and wind the two warps I need for the Kennet Valley Guild course. I am hoping to visit Cally Booker's new studio while there.

Christmas Day

I fell out of bed early this morning as I had cooking to do for lunch. All done - including the fact that I forgot I had undertaken to make a vegetarian dish for Madi's lunch. We have managed to find approximations to the proper ingredients and all will be well.

Most people have had breakfast, including me and present unwrapping is next on the list.

The greetings are to everyone who reads this. Don't eat too much and go for a walk, if possible on a beach! The background is a draft for a four colour double weave 11 inches wide in 16/2 cotton for Kennet Valley weaving class!  I am quite pleased to have finished this. I have created four drafts on the same threading.

On Sunday we all went to the pantomine Jack and the Beanstalk at Weymouth - it was packed. It was a traditional version with the audience yelling ' Behind you' and 'Boo' at appropriate moments. There was a magnificent pantomine dame who had a different outfit (outrageous) every time she came on stage. Somewhere I have a photo which I will post when I have a suitable cable. Off to unwrap presents now.

Best Wishes to you all and happy weaving!