Prairie Winds Midwest Weavers Conference Here We Come

We are getting ready to leave for the Prairie Winds Midwest Weavers Conference at Emporia State University in Emporia, Kansas. The boxes are waiting to be loaded into the car and last minute challenges are almost met.

We will have all the usual items for tapestry weaving, including some demonstrations and a few new things. The beautiful bobbins from John Moss arrived in time and a couple more of my favorite necklace awls as well.

I have been experimenting with doing the leather wrap bracelets on the Mirrix loom. My last update showed this one on the loom with the leather cord used as warp and here it is finished. It has aventurine stones, crystals, tourmaline, sterling silver and size 8 and 11 Myuki beads.

Another view. I have added several colors of leather cord available by the foot...

and some lovely rustic sterling silver buttons to the items for sale.

Here is another one just off the loom with tourmaline and size 8 beads.

The back view with pretty silver button. There will be another one at the show that went to a new home without a picture and I hope to correct that soon. It had dark purple leather and amethysts with size 8 seed beads.

These bracelets are really comfortable and fun to wear and can be used as a necklace or a decorative holder for your snips.











Since Fall is just around the corner, at least when it comes to hand crafted/ woven items I have been thinking about an exhibit coming up for the Tulsa Handweavers Guild at the Dragonmoon Tea House. The items to be shown are Tea Towels and so I have warped a loom with some Summer and Winter towels.

I am hoping to make some progress on these when I return from Kansas. I have some nice colors to work with so it should be fun!

Here is a quick peek at the progress on the Mango Hunters. I am working on the plant now. I have been making quite a few changes to the design as I weave. There was a wooden spoon in the bowl of mangos that has turned into another mango instead. Also there was a beautiful flower on the plant which unfortunately had to go to strengthen the overall design. It will be a leaf instead.

The grande finale, a few pictures from Rendezvous in Edmund, Oklahoma.

There were many spinning wheels singing with their partners at the show and many friendly, spirited fiber folk to catch up with.

Below are a couple of pictures of the  Fiber Studio display.

A final shot of Tom at his loom with a tiny peak of Donna from WIM behind.

We had a great time!

Tapestry, Shows and June

Here is a shot of the completed tapestry for May. The new color was blue green and there are lots of references to the weather. We sure have been having some this Spring! This will be the first month on the new panel of daily practice for 2013. Many of these symbols are not apparent to anyone but me. For example the grey rectangle on May 11 stands for new Apple laptop. Yes!! My little robot head is about how I felt coming down from a very busy month or so, no time to think, just do... the tornado shapes, rain and shine and wishful thinking, it's all here.

June is underway with yellow green as the new color of the month. I imagine I can see the mellowness unfold as I have had more time to work on my tapestry the last couple of weeks. I am feeling optimistic about reaching my goal of having the Mango Hunters off the loom this year!

Next weekend on June 8 I will have a booth at Rendezvous in Edmund, OK. This will be the anniversary of the first show I did last year with the Fiber Studio. So much has happened in a year! Towards the end of the month I will have a booth at the Midwest Weavers Conference. There is more information about both of these shows to the right under scheduled shows. My good friend Jeannine Glaves will be the keynote speaker for  Midwest and I am looking forward to that and being a first time vendor there.

June first was the meeting of the Tulsa Handweavers Guild and we were honoring our 60th anniversary. Here is guild president Margaret Lee and Ruth Morrison, one of our long time members and incredible mentor for all of us taking a picture of...

the cake.

Finally, a photo of a new bracelet on the 16 inch Mirrix loom. It is a wrap bracelet with leather cord as the outer warp. It is quite long, hence the tiny warp on the 16 inch loom with the extenders in place. My plan is to have five wraps with each section being a slightly different design. It has silver beads between each of the five designs and will have a silver button closure. I plan to get another warped on a smaller loom for the show next weekend if I can pull away from the Mango Hunters in time.

Hope to see some of you at Rendezvous next weekend.

Catching Up

Here it is May 20th and it has been over a month since my last blog post! It has been a busy time so I have decided to do a recap of some of my adventures and bring the current projects up to date.

After we left for the Yellow Rose Fiber Producers show in Seguin, Texas we stopped for the first night in Salada. While there we stayed at the Stagecoach Inn, a very old and charming place that my traveling mate remembered from childhood growing up in Texas. By the time we arrived almost everything was closed, which was probably a good thing for our pocket books as there are many nice art studios and shops there. We did find a colorful Mexican restaurant open and we sat down, looked up and found the tapestry you see here hanging on the wall. We were able to enjoy it as we feasted on excellent fish tacos.

Here is a little detail of the restaurant tapestry showing some areas of exposed warps.













After dinner we decided to walk around the area a bit and happened on a park with ruins of Salada College 1859. It is unusual to see ruins in the US so we walked around and took dozens of pictures. I kept thinking there might be an idea here for something.

Here is a view of the college...

and a sample of some closeups I took.


















When we arrived in Sequin we had the task of setting up our booth for the show. Our thought was to spend a couple of hours setting up the booth and then get some sight seeing in.  In reality we spent the entire five hours setting up the booth, went back to the room and retired for the evening.

Here is one picture as we were setting up. The problem was changing out minds about how and where to place things.

I think this represents close to what we ended up with. The tapestries and the Ymmyarns make a nice display.

The beads are always popular too! It was a lovely show, well run and great venue with good lighting and facilities and we are planning to return next year.














After returning home and getting things back in order I was busy getting ready to do a program for the Tulsa Handweavers about the tapestry- bead bracelets and preparing for the Tapestry Study Group. At the same time as we were gone for the show in Texas, Tapestry Weavers South was having a great exhibit at the Quinlan Art Center and though I was sad to miss it my little four inch tapestry of Laddie did attend. After all that was accomplished I felt pretty determined to get back to the studio and do some weaving!

Here is a shot of the April diary.






I finished January through April as the first panel of the yearly project so I also have a picture of the finished panel on the loom. I decided to make a new warp and tie on to the old one so that I could put all three panels on the loom together. So I rolled up the finished one and started the second panel with May.








Here is a shot of the new warp added on. I took several shots of the process of warping and adding on the new warp so I may write a separate post about it. I am so grateful to Rebecca Mezoff for her great blog post about warping the Gobelin Loom as it has been very helpful to me. There is a link to the right if you are interested in checking it out.
















Next is a photo of the May tapestry diary coming along.









My next big ambition was to make some progress on the Mango Hunters.

Here is a photo of the work completed after the first turn and before the last.

Here is the progress to date.











A detail of the completed bowl of Mangos which makes me happy.

A photo which shows the END of the cartoon which makes me very happy. I feel like I have been running a marathon and the finish line is in sight! Only a few months away!

One more shot just to emphasize how exciting this progress is. I am already thinking about the next one. My optimism knows no bounds!

On the Road Again

Just a few words before we hit the road for the Yellow Rose Fiber Producers Fiesta in Sequin, Texas. It should be a nice time of year to be driving through Texas and we are looking forward to doing this show for the first time.  The plan is to leave early Wednesday morning. Today I have the challenging task of loading the car before me. I haven't started packing any clothes yet and that will depend on the nooks and crannies that are left after the shop stuff is safely inside.

 A picture I snapped this morning of some things that are waiting for me. I am almost finished gathering it up!

Here is an update on the April tapestry diary. I have woven the road for today as that is what is on my mind. April is warming up now and beginning to feel like spring in Oklahoma.

I have also done a little spinning for the Sheep Breed Sampler tapestry and I am planning to bring it along to demonstrate at the Show on my 16 inch Mirrix with treadle. I have four sheep ( yarns) ready to go including Gotland, CVM, Bond and Shetland to add to the 12 already grazing.

I have also made several bracelets new for this show and I have two tapestry bead cuffs to demonstrate on the 12 inch Mirrix, an Affinity bracelet on the 8 inch Mirrix and a no warp ends bead project on the 5 inch Mini. A nice variety. I also have a couple of hat bands to display and several tapestry pieces.

Here is a small update on the Mango Hunters. I am closing in on those Mangos. I should be further along and hope to be back to steady progress in May. It has been a very busy Spring!

By the way, the second place winner in the Mirrix contest was Laura Arena from Port Charlotte, Florida not so far from my birth place, New Port Richey. I have sent her a selection of wool and silk Ymmyarns in colors she seems to like very well. Congratulations Laura! I hope to have a picture sometime in the future.

I haven't posted in a while about the Tulsa Handweavers Tapestry Study Group primarily because I am usually to busy to take pictures. As a little follow up though I am pleased to say that the guild has agreed to buy the Archie Brennan/ Susan Maffei DVD set. This is exciting news because I know we have members that will benefit from the wonderful instruction they offer. I know I have greatly benefitted from my set. There is a link to the right if you are interested in more information about them.

It is always my intention to do a little blogging from the road but it doesn't always work out that way. The pesky need for some sleep gets in the way sometimes but I am planning to try.

Marching into April Pick by Pick

Here is the latest installment of the 2013 tapestry diary. It starts on March 1st in the lower right corner and goes through April 1 in the upper right corner.

One of the things that I have been experimenting with in this years daily practice is pick and pick. This is a pattern that is usually introduced early when studying weft faced weaves as a way to achieve a vertical stripe pattern. In concept it is simple, one pick of a color followed by one pick of another color will create a vertical stripe. It is a good way to illustrate the visual effect of the physical reality of plain weave. One pick covers half the threads, the second pick covers the remaining threads and it takes both or one pass to weave a pattern repeat in plain weave. Like most simple things it can be a powerful tool if understood and manipulated with skill.

My favorite reference for pick and pick is Carol Russell's Tapestry Handbook. The entire second chapter is devoted to a sampler of pick and pick. In this sampler the suggested practice will not only introduce the pattern capabilities of this technique but the many color blending possibilities that can be achieved.  There is even an exercise for creating an isolated area of pick and pick within a larger ground which is very useful. While pick and pick is pretty simple to weave, complications do arise in keeping the edges neat, beginning and ending wefts so that the color sequence remains correct and avoiding draw in.  One of the most impressive offerings in this book is the wealth and variety of tapestry work illustrated and there are several images that show a creative approach to using pick and pick techniques within a larger work. One of the most exciting things shown, is how by changing the relative values of the colors wonderful effects of light and atmosphere can be achieved as well as a variety of patterns.

In several of my older diaries there are experiments with pattern using pick and pick. In the example at left are tree trunks and windows in buildings.

In this little scene it becomes a fence.

In this detail from the Mango Hunters it becomes pattern for a textile within a textile.

In this one the subtle value changes suggest light rising at the horizon.

Here are a couple of leaves from the Mango Hunter that suggest a hint of shadow or flickering light with pick and pick.

I use pick and pick as a decorative technique in many of the bracelets too. Here is one that shows a standard vertical stripe pattern.
















In the next series of photos pick and pick, dots and horizontal lines are used to transition  from a pale gold to a red violet and back
on a recent bracelet project.

Starting at one of the ends...

moving around to yellow orange, orange and coral.

Here are some darker values toward the center.











Then moving back into the oranges and golds...

and ending back in the golds once more.

















Concluding with another shot of the February and January diaries from this year it is easy to see a variety of pick and pick both subtle and bold. It will be even easier if looking at the details I suspect.

I am even planning on doing my initials in pick and pick for this years diary.