Sunday’s ramble and pictures from my other crafting life.

Hi All,

I thought you might like to see what I do in my other life when I’m not stamping.  As those of you who’ve read my mini bio on the About page may remember I’m also a spinner and weaver.  As I was organizing my photo files I came across some pictures of various projects over the last few years so thought I would share.   The shawl pictures are from a group wedding gift to a fellow weaver in my guild.   All the members of our Weekly spinning circle contributed some handspun alpaca, llama, camel, yak and a few bits of plain old sheep!  Whatever we had that was of the softest and generally natural colors that would work together.  Then a few bits were dyed blue to add a  hint of color (not to mention match Ruthies lovely eyes)  and yours truly got the honor of weaving them all together on my Rigid Heddle loom. 

Might look complicated but trust me if you can knit then you can learn to warp and weave on one of these looms in an afternoon.  Nothing complicated as long as you can count to 100 or so.  After teaching a few such workshops trust me its doable and easy to create projects up to 10 feet in a day….unless of course you are working with over a dozen different spinners handspun product!   Different tensions, strengths not to mention lengths make for an interesting problem in weaving.   It was at last achieved though and I think the result was lovely if I do say so myself.   A pity you can’t feel the softness and warmth of the fibers.  Drapes like melted butter and silk (now that’s a strange image I’ll admit but the one that came to mind – lol!).    I just realized those are my toes in the background of the first picture!  Don’t think I ever noticed they were there when I looked through the camera lens.  

It occurs to me that the middle picture might make for an interesting card element someday.  I might also add that the fringe looks a bit rough as it’s my practice to leave fringe at the lengths it comes off the loom so the recipient can cut to their preferred length.

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This scarf is one I created for my Mother in Law – Hi Mom!  And is silk and Ramie and ribbon all rolled up into one.  Rolling being the operative word.  Did you know that silk and linen and other fine fibers should really be rolled and not folded to protect the fibers and keep your lovely textiles around for years to come?  Yep.  They should.  Silk is a tad more forgiving but linen is very, very important not to fold or if you must to cushion the folds with puffs of paper or other material that prevents sharp creases from forming.  It’s the creases that do the damage as plant based fibers tend to break and crack in the creasing. 

In the closeup you can see some of the metallic thread interspersed throughout the weave.

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And lastly is one of the many linen and wool table runners I love to weave.   One of a series I created for a series of Church Lenten Suppers one year to first decorate the tables and then later be auctioned off to participants to raise money for charity.   Rather like some of the scarves I love to knit….these take almost no thought and can be completed in under 5 hours each generally.

Hope you enjoyed this peek into my “other” life.  And yes for those of you wondering I do sell my spinning and weaving work – if you are interested in discussing a project drop me a line.

I’ll leave you today with a rare siting of a phenomenon known in our house as quilted kitty lump. 

Hugs and blessings my friends – Jean

Can’t see me….I’m invisible……and uh… don’t sit on the corner of the bed, okay??

Rats….Somehow Mom’s anti-invisible kitty cloaking vision foiled me again! (Sorry about that Sandy – Love,  Mom)