Puttering

It feels like I've just been puttering, doing small projects.

For starters, some years ago, I wove this yardage for curtains. I don't remember why I took them down, but our old front door curtains needed to be replaced and they did the trick!

I finished the last baby blanket on Sophie.

And I've been playing with more of the crocheted creatures from Edward's Animals. Here's a Lakeland Terrier,

 

a Cocker Spaniel,

and a gray cat.

 

My grandbaby needed a hat for Groundhog Day.

And he definitely needed a Dude sweater!

This may not look like puttering to you, but for whatever reason, this time around, each step to dress Julia has felt like a separate project. This Tencel basketweave will be yardage.

 

This is the first time I've ever knitted up a swatch and actually washed it. My usual is to knit it up, measure to make sure I'm getting the right number of stitches per inch and rip it back out.

I just finished spinning this fiber with Gingie and plying it with Suzie.

And next up is this cotton.

This "wool" was spun up, but not plied, because I didn't know what I wanted to do with it. Typical. Anyway, when I realized I needed a hat, I went ahead and took the singles and Navajo plied it (finger crocheting the spun fiber while spinning it some more). 

Knitting it up took no time, so, here we are!

 

Spinning My Wheels, In a Good Way

I've been spinning my wheels, in a good way. My hubby and I got back on the road for what turned out to be 9400 miles of driving (his wheels).

My wheel, Gingie, and I kept ourselves busy.

 

Starting by spinning some black bamboo, I then plied it (twisted it together) with the Dark Matter 50/50 SW(superwash) Merino/Tussah Silk I'd spun on our last outing. Then, Gingie and I spun and plied the 60/40 SW Merino and Tencel. The color's a lot more of a medium greenie-turquoise than it looks here.

And, what? You thought that was it? Nope. It was a Long trip. I alternated spinning with knitting an afghan on circular needles. (There's that theme, again.)

 Don't ask. OK, fine. Ask. ...Sigh. I've been designing a double knit (two-sided) afghan on paper. But, when I got this far, I didn't like the way the corners looked. I couldn't leave them the way they were. So, I just ripped them out and re-knit them. ("Just", she said.)

We made a side trip to the Amana Colonies in Iowa and watched a basket weaver at work with her home grown willow.

We stopped to poke around at this mill in Frankenmuth, MI. If you have a fleece that needs cleaning and carding (organizing all the fibers so that they run in the same direction), this is the place.

In Pennsylvania, along the side of the road, we saw a sign for "handwoven rugs". We ended up chatting with the Amish weaver and his mother here in his workshop for about an hour. It was delightful!

He had recently obtained this all metal loom in pieces. Rebuilding it has been a challenge, but he's looking for a loom that doesn't require treadling. If they can figure out how to make it work, it'll give his legs a break. If anyone has any info on this loom, I can pass it on...?

In our discussion, they mentioned a weaver in an antique store down the way, called "The Nut House". We saw the sign and stopped in. The weaver showed me some circular---there it is, again!---weaving she's been doing and gifted me with a hoop and instructions so that I could give it a try when I got home!

All roads lead to Vavstuga Weaving School in Shelburne, MA. No time for classes, but I called about an hour before we got there. Tonya unlocked the door and let me browse. I opened my pocketbook...

You'll be shocked that I left all of this behind. I did, however, make inroads into their books, baskets and tools.

It looked like everything there was handwoven. If it was cloth, it was handwoven. I want my linen closet to look like that. No store boughten silliness for me!

We spent a day at Greenfield Village in Dearborn, MI, and probably an hour chatting with the weavers in the weaving shop.

Look up! Max showed me this two-story jacquard loom.

Like a player piano, one sets up the pattern by arranging the cards which you can see along the left-side of the loom and photo. Once everything is set up, just press the treadle, throw the shuttle, beat and repeat.

The next loom is set up with a fly shuttle. Do you see the handle hanging onto the cloth? If the shuttle is on the right, pull the handle towards the left. If the shuttle is on the left, pull the handle towards the right. Pulling on the handle makes the shuttle "fly" across the loom. This way, the weaver doesn't need to reach far over to the side to throw the shuttle on a wide warp.

Here's a counterbalance loom being threaded

This machine is a loom that was last used to weave cloth for cars' interiors. They rarely turn it on and use it now, because it's just Too Darned LOUD!

Here's a wool carder.

If you look Very closely, you can see the silk being reeled off of the cocoons onto the wheel at the back, one fine thread at a time.

Now, from Greenfield Village, inside to the Henry Ford Museum.

Drool.

I remember seeing this, or something like it, when I was a girl. It's a kitchen from the 1700's, and a walking wheel.

Heading west, towards home, these beautiful woven articles were being shown in a store at Mesa Grande, CO.

And it all comes back around to Gingie and me, spinning some more bamboo as we wheeled home.

Time for a Road Trip

My husband said it was time for a road trip.

So Suzie, my Majacraft, and I finished spinning and plying the wool/silk I'd been playing with.

And I finally blocked the cowl I'd knitted of my handspun (yellow to green) and store bought (charcoal).

Then, I headed to my LYS (local yarn store) for an afghan in the making. I found the pattern on Ravelry. Instead of knitting it in strips, I planned to drop a few edge stitches from the pattern and make it all in one piece.

Gingie (as I've said) is a Pocket Wheel. She was made on a nice, humid island in Washington state. The dry air during that trip we made in the spring to Death Valley was a bit too much of a shock for her and, not a common occurrence, it split her wood. Jon McCoy (Mr. PW) said he'd fix her up and send her back to me. We put her in the car and off we went!

This time around, we pretty much visited all of the volcanoes in the Cascades range from Lassen in California, all the way up to Mt. Baker, just below Canada. This photo was taken at MacArthur-Burney State Park.

At Maryhill Museum in Washington, right on the Columbia River, there was an exhibit of Trade Blankets.

Are you drooling, yet?!

As we drove, Gingie and I finished spinning and then Navajo plying this silk from Anzula. Then, we dropped her off with her personal Geppetto on

Whidbey Island.

This was taken at Picture Lake. We'll have to work on our selfie skills. This looks more like photo bombing.

In Oregon, we followed a sign to an alpaca farm and store.

I'm going to have to quit my day job in order to have enough time to play with all of the wonderful fibers I just couldn't do without!

A road trip plus a month, and I completed the afghan and

gifted it to my daughter and son-in-law.

And I finally finished the sample towels I've been making on my drawloom!

Cotton/linen warp with cotton weft. The patterns are from books, pinterest and my doodles. If you can draw them on a grid, they can be woven. It's been a good summer!