It's been a busy few days - work has picked up and I got to spin a little bit, and even crochet a little bit. Then I received my vintage Easy Weaver in the mail today and I wove a little bit. I used my Mellificent corespun yarn and some of my supercoils alternated with leftover Enchanted Knoll sock yarn.
Maybe I'll make it into a wall hanging or probably a purse...don't know yet. By the way, this is so soft! Now I really want an Ashford Knitter's Loom!
This past weekend took me to Riverside, California, to attend Color Connects. I had promised Nancy of Custom Handweaving that I'd help her and Cal out and so for the next three days, I helped sell, spin and I shopped till I had to pick out the pennies and lint from my wallet - yup, I shopped myself broke.
I also met some wonderful people, including Henry and Roy Clemes of Clemes & Clemes based in the Bay area. Henry let me spin on both the Traditional wheel, and the "kit" or "modern" wheel, and they both spun like buttah! I wish I could get one! At least the kit wheel! Oh well, with my S45 edging out my two other wheels as to first preference these days, Clemes will have to wait. But I highly recommend their wheels and drum carders!
Henry was also the only one since I began spinning that actually explained how the double drive wheel works and how on earth the tension screw/knob works to adjust the tension or angle on the band that goes around the bobbin, and why one needs to always use a piece of string and not monofilament for their wheels (monofilament rounds out the groove, which totally affects the tensioning of the bobbin to influence the take-up...or something like that). See, even I seem to know what I was talking about there. I think.
I have some pretty cool video of Henry spinning on both Clemes wheels!
The Greater Los Angeles Spinning Guild had their own booth that was definitely very fun, engaging and full of activity. They held spinning competitions and also taught non-spinners how to spin. Gwen asked me if I'd like to have some of my yarns featured in their booth and I gladly obliged. There were three of my yarns just hanging out for the weekend - my Viva La Vida yarn, Bikini Botom, and my green supercoils. The rest of my yarns, primarily Crosspatch Creations handspun were all featured at the Custom Handweaving booth. I totally need some kind of commission here, I think.
Anyway, I totally salivated over so many things and wished I had the budget to buy everything I wanted. Susan's Kitchen had some luscious alpaca roving (mental note: visit her etsy store!); Lisa of Soap-Plantation had some wonderful merino-tencel roving to dye for (I bought one!), Shari had some gorgeous roving and yarns, one of them being Sandy's of Homestead Wool & Gift Farm!
Nebo Rock Textiles had some beautiful roving, locks and handspun yarns. I was totally drooling over the locks and the tussah silk. I ended up emptying all my pennies to buy 2 oz. of angora fiber just as the market closed on Sunday. Before that, I purchased a weaving book by Rebecca Smith of Loom in a Tube. Turns out, what I really want to weave are tapestries and so the PVC pipe loom I built was perfect for it, not as a rigid heddle loom. Goes to show what I know about weaving - nada! But her pieces were amazing. I'll be trading with the other Nancy (Nancy who helps out the first Nancy at Custom Handweaving) my beginning weaving book for her weaving with beads one so I can incorporate weaving beads in. But first, I have start from the beginning!
I did purchase some books from Custom Handweaving - primarily Barbara Walker's Treasury of Knitting Patterns (500 patterns in all!) and Knitting Design from Teach Yourself Visually series. I have my eye on some color books and may get that from her in a week or so. I chatted with Ruth of Dizzy Ewe and John Marshall, who has the most exquisite Japanese textiles. He showed me how Japanese velvet was made and reminded me how Velvet (berodu in Japanese) is written in katakana. Amazing man!
Janice Rosema dropped by and spun her new Spinolution Bee wheel, while I got to spin a few wheels at the Custom Handweaving booth though I so missed my Louet S45. Speaking of my Louet, it is totally a dream to spin! I haven' spun any novelty yarn lately because I've been spinning some thin yarns which I then navajo-ply to dk weight yarn. Not too shabby! Today, I dunked all my navajo plied handspun mill ends and dyed them a bright turquoise color! Tomorrow I'll show it all off - it's currently drying in the corner.
All in all, it was a wonderful weekend. I got to meet spinners, knitters, crocheters - all crafty people like you and me, and I had fun. It was actually nice to get away and I'd forgotten how wonderful it is to be with creative people again. Probably my only complaint would be that it would have been great if there had been more non-spinners, non-knitters there for us to convert.
Someone did say that spinning seemed to be a dying art and if you based it on this weekend's turnout, you just might have to agree. But I have to disagree. We spinners are not a dying breed. Or are we?
Maybe it's just repetitive muscle strain (and not from massage!), but carding has totally given me tennis elbow or lateral epicondylitis. It started a few weeks ago when I decided to tackle the garage - lifting heavy boxes here and there - so I could get started with creating my own little fiber studio in there. I figured that my back was pretty strong, but that night I realized that though I may have a strong back, I guess my arms aren't as strong as I thought. My right elbow started to hurt, and it got worse when I carded on higher than normal stand the next day.
It's also curtailed some of my knitting, though not my spinning (whew!). As long as I keep applying acupressure on the painful spots and loosen it up with massage, it seems to be getting better. That, and making sure I card on a table height that's just right for me.
This weekend, I decided to tackle carding some art batts on my carder - bent teeth or not. I hated seeing that carder sitting so sheltered inside its plastic bin and wondered if I would have to sell it. But HollyEQQ changed all that. Ever since our brief twitter exhange, I've been carding like crazy. And spinning those batts I've carded, too.
Today I carded some of the Kool-Aid dyed locks that Nancy (the other Nancy) gave me last year. It was a full box of fiber that she needed to get rid of - and I carded these batts with it. I finally figured out how to adjust the drums on my Strauch Petite and now I can pack over an ounce of fiber on it! I'm one happy spinner, that's for sure!
Peeps on Parade (over 4 ounces!)
Last week I finally got started with my PVC loom and though it's not done yet - I'm still missing the reed and the rests for the reed, I warped it just to see if the tension "knobs" work. So far, it does, but until I get the reeds, it's still "in progress". I've been thinking of getting the reed for the Ashford Kniter's Loom because I hear it accommodates spinners' yarns - and that's me :)
So far, I think I've spent about $20 for the all the pvc (I used some of the pvc for a floor swift) and the two dowels, and maybe another $30 for reed. I don't know if it would have been better for me to buy a loom, but since I already had one to begin with and couldn't figure it out (I traded it for my Petite drum carder), it's amazing how a little bit of DIY helped me figure out the ins and outs of rigid heddle weaving - so far.
A long time ago, while browsing my mother's extensive Reader's Digest books library, I found this book called Crafts...or something like that. And from that book, I taught myself how to do macrame (hey, it was the 70's!), make a corn cob doll (again, it was the 70's), and make my own weaving loom!
It worked then, and I seem to have it down to a science - a frame, some string, a stick as a shuttle and as a result, I had some crudely woven tapestry only I could love. I think the rest of my family thought I was nuts.
Fast forward a few years later (actually, decades) and on a whim, I bought myself a Schacht 20-inch Flip rigid heddle loom. I was so excited I was absolutely shaking with excitement as I pulled this thing out and read the instructions - and wondered, "what the - what warp? what weft? wait a minute, what the hell is a rigid heddle? wha-?"
Then I stuck it in my closet and waited for some illumination to occur. How things had changed since that fateful day when I made my own loom...
Anyway, to make a long story short, today I sold the dang thing and in its place, I got myself something that is more my speed.
A children's version of a loom. I know, I'm a wuss.
But I made a coaster. Actually, two.
Besides, it turns out that what I was familiar with was a frame loom, much like what Navajos use to weave their beautiful tapestries. And while we're on the subject of weaving looms, I'm thinking of making my own loom first before buying one. Here's one DIY weaving loom that's pretty cool!
And if you already have a loom and were thinking of buying a stand, here's a pretty cool video on how to make your own stand.
The issue of the stand was actually what made me destash the Flip - because there is absolutely no room in the house for a loom unless I displace one of my three wheels and a few bins of fiber - or maybe in desperation, Leo or Truffles (though neither would be very happy about that).
But destashing my rigid heddle wasn't too bad. It's part of this learning curve in the world of fiber. First the Babe, now the Flip. But I did finish another handspun yarn though. This one was spun from a Crosspatch Creations batt called "Wolf Creek". And while spinning it, I felt that no other name but "Wolf Creek" would do.
Nebo Rock Textiles had some beautiful roving, locks and handspun yarns. I was totally drooling over the locks and the tussah silk. I ended up emptying all my pennies to buy 2 oz. of angora fiber just as the market closed on Sunday. Before that, I purchased a weaving book by Rebecca Smith of Loom in a Tube. Turns out, what I really want to weave are tapestries and so the PVC pipe loom I built was perfect for it, not as a rigid heddle loom. Goes to show what I know about weaving - nada! But her pieces were amazing. I'll be trading with the other Nancy (Nancy who helps out the first Nancy at Custom Handweaving) my beginning weaving book for her weaving with beads one so I can incorporate weaving beads in. But first, I have start from the beginning!
Last week I finally got started with my PVC loom and though it's not done yet - I'm still missing the reed and the rests for the reed, I warped it just to see if the tension "knobs" work. So far, it does, but until I get the reeds, it's still "in progress". I've been thinking of getting the reed for the Ashford Kniter's Loom because I hear it accommodates spinners' yarns - and that's me :)
