Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Knitting, Weaving…as the years tick by

Jan. 10 042

Friday was my birthday, and as a little treat I ordered a kit for the cute lace beret from Sunday Knits. It arrived just in time for a weekend of knitting!


I used one skein of Carol Sunday’s yarn called ‘Angelic,’  a blend of merino and angora (80/20).  It has turned out somewhat large, as you might guess from the tam on the right.  The Fair Isle tam on the right is somewhat small, but at least wearable!  The lace beret really is not wearable.  I’m considering shrinking it…which probably means I’ll be giving it to some little girl for her dollie.  Sigh….

Jan. 10 034

The beginnings of the medieval spinner.  You can see at the bottom that I practiced making eyes and lips.  I figured I’d do this small sample of her face before tackling the entire piece. It seemed to me that her face and hands require the most detail, so if I worked out the sett needed for those I’d be ready to decide on the size for the whole work. At this sett of 10 epi the entire piece will be 24” x 24”.

I also thought I’d submit this small exercise to the ATA small format exhibit, but I think I missed the deadline for the paper work! I guess I was distracted by my birthday, which was lovely!

Toika

The Toika is (mostly) tied up!  I need a second spool of Texsolv for the rest of the treadles, and I need a boatload more stoppers for the cords to the treadles.  The hardest part is done, and I feel like I’ve conquered a huge feat!  I’ve been looking at weave structures for a table cloth.

Alas, no taka dai, but with the loss of my husband’s job, he is way too busy concentrating on what he’ll do next to tackle a woodworking project. 

3 comments:

Valerie said...

Happy belated birthday. So sorry the beret came out large. The tapestry looks lovely.

Life Looms Large said...

Happy Birthday!!!

Any way you can make the beret into a bag?? (A bag with holes I guess?)

I'm so excited and distracted by the picture of your Toika and talk of a tablecloth. I was just hanging out with my weaving group today, and three people have tablecloths on their agendas. I do...but in the far distant future. I'm eager to see what you do! (When I visited Vavstuga in Dec, the woman next to me wove a whole tablecloth for a square table in less than 2 hours. I was amazed!) Of course, designing and dressing the loom take a long time, so it's not all about throwing the shuttle!

The tapestry will be beautiful. I love that there are disembodied eyes and lips already done.

You packed a lot into that post!!

Sue

OzWeaver said...

Thank you, Valerie and Sue, for the birthday wishes!

Glad to know there are others with dreams of tablecloths. That's the very reason I wanted this great big Toika! And I really want to visit Vavstuga...maybe this year!