Rebecca Mezoff's Little Looms course

I've been taking my time going through Rebecca Mezoff's new little looms course (check it out here) and enjoying it!

 I'll have to post some progress photos of my weaving, but here is a photo of some of the looms I have in stock, playing card style:

 I've also been spinning, with the idea that I'd like to spin some yarn for tapestry weaving. I have a cool spindle from TurtleMade, a 3d printed Standard spindle, and spin with it every so often. I also have a large Carry Cherry spindle from Russia, but only tried it briefly. I like it, it's just big!
Here's the TurtleMade with some spinning in progress:

Although Rebecca's course is not closed captioned, I'm finding it to be an excellent way to practice listening with my cochlear implant. I'm familiar with the subject, I'm able to pick out enough words to be able to follow along; watching her warp & weave is a bonus, and I would enjoy that even if I couldn't hear a thing! It really is exciting to be able to understand so many words... I do better with her course than I do in the audiologist's booth! 20% in the booth (with a challenging map, possibly better with my older September map)...as a wild guess, 50-60% with Rebecca's course & I understand enough words to fill in the others with context.

This isn't the blog I usually use to report CI progress, that's the Rambling Warps blog. I'll cut & paste this and expand a bit.  Here's the link.

Hopefully I'll have some more pretties to show you next time...I've got a couple more spindles on the way, 2 from SnyderSpindles on etsy, and some purple fleece (braid)...eventually I'll pick out a gradated one or two, or a few more colors.

Hokett Looms at Weaving Rainbow

Hokett Looms are here! Click on Hokett Looms & Tools to get to the page.
At the moment, we only have 8 dent Original and Intermediate sized looms. More will be added as interest increases.

These looms are fun to weave on! They are portable. You can work on them on your lap or on a table. Jim Hokett has special stands for them.

More photos coming soon!

Hokett Looms coming soon!

I have a few "regular" sized Hokett looms, and "intermediate" sized Hokett looms, and a couple of tools that are great for tapestry weaving. 

Right now, I only have 8 dent looms in the regular (original) and intermediate sizes in stock. I will be putting them on the website soon, hopefully early this week.  If you'd like to buy one, email me at weavingrainbow (at) gmail dot com, or leave a comment.  Here are some details about the stuff I have:

HAND LOOMS, ORIGINAL/REGULAR SIZE: 

They're about 7" wide by 8" long. The weaving area is approximately 6" by 6-1/4".  
There are slots at the top and bottom for warping. You can warp by putting your warp thread into the slot and wrapping around to the next tooth. You don't need to warp around the back.
There are videos that show how to do this.

The looms are shaped like a capital "I" and shaped so it can be held in one hand. 

They are made with a variety of exotic and domestic hardwoods.  8-dent $30.00 each.

HAND LOOMS, INTERMEDIATE: Same as “ORIGINAL”, but about 9" wide and 10" long.  Weaving area is 8" x 8-1/4”.

 8-dent $50.00 each.

BEATERS, TINY BARB:  Ideal for tapestry work on a variety of looms.  About 3/16” x 1” and 2” to 4” long with a hole in the end to string yarn or cord so that you can hang it from your neck!  Teeth about 1/4” long.  Wide variety of exotics and domestic woods.  $6.00 each.

SHED STICK, DOUBLE ENDED:  Each end tapered and shaped.  Great for picking up warp threads & holding them open.  Variety of woods.  About ¼” x 1/2” x 7” - $6.00 each.

This is my regular sized loom with a tiny barb beater, little beater, needle & shuttle. I keep it in a Moon Pie tin along with some yarn, and other accessories. Fun!

Looking for ideas part 2 (A to Z challenge... and a few words about being blocked...

I forgot to post the A to Z list, it's down below!

At what point does an artist know what to draw, paint, weave, knit, sculpt, etc.?
Sometimes you just know, and when that happens, the process seems to flow.

When it doesn't, it's an artist block.
It's still good to keep trying... fake it til you make it.

I had one of my small looms, a new-to-me Northfield Jori loom, in my lap and started weaving some little squares, and decided to dovetail the edges. That was a mental exercise. I'm not what I'll do after that. So many possibilities... but I'm not sure which one.

Last February, I had an idea, and the idea started from "maybe a Tardis" to what I sent to the Tapestry Unlimited show, shown on this blog entry (you gotta click this to see it!). I was walking back from the yarn store in Austin, and knew that I needed to go back for a certain yarn, because it would be good for a starry night sky.

Another time, there was a picture of an owl in my loom from several months or more prior, and one day I decide to weave it with some words:

It was a process, it flowed, it fed my soul while I worked on it. I love words, though weaving them is sloooow.  Sarah Swett has a way with words, both printed, and woven... her woven words are fabulous!

I started doing an alphabet sampler, I called it XYZ and I put it aside for some time, and when I pulled it out, it was ruined... maybe mice got to it, but I may see if I can do something with it, perhaps mount it on another piece, and go from there..find some way to secure the loose ends.

We'll see how this goes..photo another time if I  still have the piece! 

Here is the list of things I did for the A to Z project:

A: Abstract
B & C: Bluebonnets in a Can
D: Dancer
E: Evan
F: Feet
G: Gary
H: Harrison
I: Indy
J: Jimbo & the Rev
K: Kittens
L: Laborador (Daisy) (and Reuven)
N & O: Needlework Owl
R: Reuven (with Daisy under "L")

So I've got A through L, N, O and R... missing M, P, Q, S through Z... eleven more.

 

 

 

 

 

Looking for ideas: 29 Faces

Yesterday, I was going through my blog to copy the photos over to my Flickr account so we have them in one place. Patchworkgirl57 is my username. Most photos are designated family & friends, so if you're one of the above, leave a comment.

While going through the comments, I found the 29 faces challenge from May of 2012, and the A to Z challenge, but I didn't finish either, so why not make that the project for the rest of this month or year? I thought I wanted to do 29 faces last month, but no luck there.

Here's the list of faces that I did. The list may not be complete:

May 7: Jessica (art group model)
May 9: Indian Blanket Face
May 13: Doodle face: imaginary face, white ink/black paper
May 14: 3 portrait drawings of our art group model
May 17: Imaginary face in ink from this tutorial
May 18: oil pastel face, imaginary
May 20: Nannie (ink)
May 21: Donna Summer (ink)
May 23: Donna Summer (watercolor)
May 23: Jimbo (ink)
May 27: wacky watercolor
May 27: orange haired imaginary face, elegant lady
May 29: 3 pictures of Frida Kahlo
May 29: imaginary guy
May 30: self portrait

Doodle face:  white imaginary face on black paper

I found 19 photos from that other blog.. they're not necessarily in order... so 10 more!



  




 

  



 

    

  




I'll post about the A to Z challenge in another blog, another day.  

29 Faces

4 years ago in September, I did close to 29 faces. I'm going to try doing it again this year.

Here's the link to the challenge blog if you'd like to join:
http://29faces.blogspot.com/

these are some of my faces I did in 2012, and I posted a few here as well. This is one of my favorites:

I'll try to get those promised photos of my knitting & needlepoint today!

knitting & needlepoint & some weaving, too...

I thought I posted something about my latest knitting obses...project. It's this project here, but I don't have updated photos at the moment. I have a mystery yarn that I still have not found out what kind of yarn it is, but sometime in the next couple of weeks, I hope to make it to a yarn store to either find out what it might be, or find something it's compatible with.

I went through a bit of confusion with this yarn: I saw it on eBay: it was listed as a "bulky" wool yarn, but it's not much thicker than Aran or Chunky, closer to worsted weight... it also doesn't seem like 100% wool: when doing a burn test, it smells like wool, but beads up like acrylic in the end, so I think it's a wool-acrylic blend...it's very soft.

I put it aside & it kept popping up. I thought about giving it away or bringing it to the thrift store..finally, one day I put it in one of my boxes & didn't see it for a while... a couple of weeks ago, I found a pattern that I thought it would be perfect for, but I don't think I have enough to make that whole shawl. I don't have a McMorran balance to check the yardage of the yarn..one day I'll get another one. I think this shawl would be rather nice in this yarn.

Anyway, I started knitting the shawl and decided to try a different yarn with the pattern until I can find more yarn to go with the other yarn: Red Heart "With Love" starting in Mango, and when I get to the hearts section, I'll switch over to the Fruit Punch color. Hopefully it'll be an easy care yarn.

It's a good project to work on while watching shows: lately I've been watching Big Bang Theory, but I'm about to watch The Addams Family movie, so I'll get a bit more done.

I've also been doing needlepoint. I have a small turtle project with different stitches that I keep in my back pack, and also have been working on another small project with 2 apples, a few green leaves & a yellow background. I'm still unsure about the yellow background, but I may jazz up the colors for it.

I'm practicing on the smaller pieces in preparation for a Unicorn in Captivity canvas I found on eBay. It's nice... while I'm practicing, I'm deciding on threads/colors for it. I'd like something sparkly for the dark blue background & will figure that out soon.

I also have a new-to-me Northfield Jori Jr loom... but haven't decided what to weave on it. I did a small piece on one of my copper looms using all the yarns from a kit... and forgot to measure the lengths of the strands. Oops. Here's that piece:

I need more practice weaving... this is lumpy, lumpy... also I was playing with dovetailing. I don't know if blocking will fix things: tapestry weaving likes to decide its' shape, which depends on the skill of the weaver!

Next piece, I may try more squares & rectangles, or may do some curvy pieces & circles.

I'll post photos of the shawls & apple & turtle pieces next time. Maybe the apples will be done! I'm done stitching the apples, need to finish the leaves & the background. I can only stitch needlepoint during the day when the lighting is better.

I found a video that shows how to block needlepoint... I don't have money to send my pieces to finishers, so I'll learn how to do it myself. I have a piece that my mom did & may take it to a finisher. I don't know yet; it depends on how my finish work turns out..

U/U Tapestry update.

The tapestry was mailed a few weeks ago. I forgot to update that I did some more work on the tapestry: I didn't like the way the ukulele came out, so I wove another and attached it to the tapestry:

The photo of the tiny uke above was taken on top of my ukulele case!

Here's the completed tapestry:

Untitled/Unjuried and almost Unplanned tapestry

I recently completed my piece for the ATA Untitled/Unjuried show that will be held in Minneapolis this summer. It took me about a week to weave, several months to hem & haw about & I finally got closer to an idea for what composition I would weave when we were in Austin at the end of February.  At first, it was going to be based on Starry Night with a Tardis, and then I decided I wanted to put something musically related and thought "hmm, one of the 3 musicans (Picasso)"? So that's what i've got. The piece is titled "One of the 3 musicians and a ukulele". Maybe the word "unplanned" should be in it somewhere... I'm not sure. I started out with this idea:

Then decided to eliminate the Tardis & the Musician... as I wove, I decided to put the musician in after all, and wove it:

Tomorrow, I'll mail it.

I used different yarns & some silk hankie fiber. Wool, wool-silk, and even a wool blend that had some acrylic in it. I made an exception for this piece because I saw the yarn & thought it would be great for the squiggles. I'm happiest with how the sky came out in this entire piece. Eventually, maybe I'll do better with musical instruments, if I decide to weave them again...

I re-warped half of the loom right away, this time with cotton seine twine. We'll see how I like it, but my first love is wool. Sarah Swett feels the same way and discussed it in this blog entry. I think I decided that I like wool warp from the early days when I was playing with Navajo weaving.

I have another project coming up that I'm kind of excited about, a fake journal. Roz Stendahl started it.  I haven't decided what I'm going to do in my fake journal, we'll see... be another person or be in a different time or dimension or WHAT? Older? Younger? Dunno... We'll see. I'll decide on Thursday... I picked up a few books from the thrift store to take apart to put new paper in... OR I might get an art journal, perhaps the Strathmore mixed media book... or both. 

Still being creative!

It's been a LONG time since I posted. Hopefully people will just get notified in email that I have!

I have been knitting & weaving, and maybe I've posted a thing or two on my Ravelry page. Check patchworkgirl's projects there if you wanna see.  I guess I just don't love taking pictures, or rather, uploading them, cropping, and re-sizing them once I've taken them.

The next couple of weeks will be devoted to getting a piece ready for the Untitled/Unjuried show in Milwaukee... or maybe not. I want to get the "Harrison" tapestry finished first so that I can use that loom. I've got other looms. I want to use this loom.

3 letters to go...

This past weekend, we went to Austin for Jugglefest. I always make sure to go to Hill Country Weavers when I'm down there. It's about 15 minutes walking distance from the Gym where Jugglefest was held at theTexas School for the Deaf ...I went 4 times last weekend: Saturday, once before & after lunch & again on Sunday morning & before we headed out of town. 

The last trip was because I had an idea for a specific project for some yarn I saw there... while walking back to Jugglefest, I passed an artist that had some pretty cool colored drawings. One of them was of the 11th doctor, and I would have bought it except I was not sure which doctor is my son's favorite doctor. I got her card with web info.

As i was walking, I thought "hmm, maybe I should get back into practice doing portraits." then I thought, "or maybe try doing a part of a portrait for a tapestry, but I don't know how well I'd be able to do that, and with so little time, trying a new technique? Um. No. I then thought that I should do that Tardis based tapestry that I've been wanting to do and enter it in U/U. Then I realized I should have bought tthe yarn that had the most yellow in it rather than the green based one and that's why I decided to go back so that I could get it.

Hopefully the letters are visible.

A: this is a juggling bag that I bought from Juggling Thingies for small yarn projects. John Nord (the proprietor) pretended to be horrified by the idea! 

B is the last yarn I went back to get with the tapestry project in mind..

C is a yarn I bought just because I like it (same type as B, different color).

D & F are ruffle scarf yarns by Trendsetter called Flamenco. I still haven't quite figured out how to use it except for rolling the yarn stretched out (F) onto a piece of cardboard to hopefully make it easy to work with. I don't know if I will knit with it or crochet with it.

E is a cotton "shoelace" yarn that is so soft that I am using to make an Amanda hat.