Weavermom's World

The end of a line

2009-10-12T15:23:00.000-07:00

I have completed my outdoor art fair season. I was in Westlake, OH (Cleveland area) this past weekend. My wonderful friend Deb Nelson came from Richmond, VA to help me. We set up in a light rain. Light rain, but we still looked like two drowned rats by the end. After putting up both canopies and the grids we decided that it would be best to not put up the merchandise. The problem with two canopies is that the rain comes in between the two.

We got up early on Saturday and set up before things started. It was still chilly and cloudy when we got there, but the sun did come out. I was doing a demo for this show so I had my little loom. I was weaving tote bags out of plastic bags. I wonder how many times this past weekend I said that. We went until 8:00 on Saturday. By the end of the day I had a jacket on. For those who know me you know that it was cold.

Sunday the high never got over 50 degrees. I had on two pair of socks. I had to keep taking my shoes off so that I could weave and my feet got pretty cold on Saturday. I did discover that I can weave, right a receipt and run my charge machine all with gloves on. The gloves were a big seller.

Deb spent Sunday trying to untangle a sari silk warp for me. Her fingers were getting pretty cold by the end.

We took down in 47 degrees with a cold wind. I was not real efficient at this. I think that my brain was cold.

I have unpacked the van and put the canopy away for the season. I have three shows coming up in the next couple of months then I will pack away the stock until the spring. Or if I need a present.

Post Ann Arbor

2009-07-21T18:02:00.000-07:00

Well, another show has passed. The sales were not what I had hoped for. I had a better spot than last year, and the weather was wonderful. Then again, there is the economy. I got mixed reviews on how artists did. Some did really well, some were not happy.

I wove tote bags out of plastic bags. This really got people to stop and watch. If only I had some done before the show. That is the story of my life, "if only."

I do have some bags sewn now. Here is the picture:

Now hopefully they will sell at Arts, Beats & Eats.

Rug Warp Done

2009-05-30T17:38:00.001-07:00

I finished weaving the last part of the rug warp. Instead of weaving one or two more rugs I wove material to make tote bags. I am going to start making tote bags along with my rugs. I have asked a few people to save plastic bags for me. I figured that would be a good thing to make bags out of plastic bags. Why do I have visions of me digging through the recycle bins at store to retrieve more plastic bags? I wish that I could get my hands on some Sendick's bags from Milwaukee. They are red and very heavy. My next warp will be black and grey. All of the white bags that I have will go well with that, so with Kohl's grey bags.

While this may not have all of the creativity that I crave I must weave to sell. I am going to make it fun at least. Some of them i will line and put pockets in. Maybe I will find some cool material for the lining. There are some beautiful batiks out there.

How to weave a rag rug

2009-05-26T14:28:00.000-07:00

Most of the rugs that I weave are woven with byproducts of the textile industry. I do weave some out of material that I cut. I like the look of Madras plaid after it is woven into a rug.

These are the steps that I take in weaving a rug:

First I wash the material. Here is what it looks like before I start cutting:

Then I cut one end off at a 45 degree angle so that I can make a large bias tube out of the material. I take the selvedges of the material and line them up. Since one end of the material was cut at an angle you have to pull one end up. You can see the end of the material is now a bias.

I sew the selvedges together with a straight stitch.

I take the piece that I cut off of the end and sew on the opposite end so that I have a complete bias tube. (Sorry, no picture)

A bias tube of this length would be too hard to handle in the rag cutter so I cut it into sections of about 30" each.

Then I take each section and feed it into the rag cutter, this makes things go very quickly. You do have to be careful to not allow the material that is under the rag cutter from getting cut.

After I finish cutting a bias section I have enough to fill one of my rag shuttles. Coming off of the rag cutter you will have a nice little pile like this:
and yes, I do realize that I need to vacuum.

Here is the rug that I am working on with a piece of the original material:I made this warp to be used with several different wefts. I do wish that with this filler I had left the natural warp out.

Good Day

2009-05-20T19:42:00.000-07:00

I had a very productive day. I finished the green wool rug that I started last night, turns out that I did have enough "worms" for it. I cut all of the plaid material that I started cutting last night. I think that i have figured out the best way to do that on the new cutting table. Then I wove two rugs out of that plaid material. They turned out better than I had thought that they would. I checked the filing cabinet, there are some that will work out well with this blue/green/cream warp, and some that I think will work better with a grey/black warp. I had planned to put a 10/2 black perle warp on next and weave up the batik butterfly material that I have stockpiled. People really like black and white clothing. However I think that I am going to put a black/grey warp on next for more rugs. The rugs are selling well so I should stick with that. I probably won't put on as long a warp as I did with the current warp. I do want to get to that batik material.

Progress

2009-05-19T18:45:00.000-07:00

I am back from the vacation from Hell, almost over my pneumonia and back to weaving. I have so many ideas and need to organize them. I want to get a lot done be Ann Arbor. That is generally my big goal for the year, have the booth filled for Ann Arbor.

I wove some rugs out of "by products from the textile industry." I sold two of them this past weekend. I am weaving more. I thought that I had more of the forest green "worms" from Pendelton. I am hoping that I have enough to weave a rug. If not I am going to weave them singularly and not doubled. I might be able to do a twill weave that way. I opened the big case of wool scraps that I have. I was not aware that there was fringe on these pieces. I did some test cutting, I am going to have to sew the ends together before I cut, the pieces are just not long enough the way that they are. I think that I will take four pieces, trim the fringe, then sew ends together by lapping them. then just cut and hope that I have guessed correctly. I am cutting them at about 1" wide. I will see if this has to go plain weave or if I will be able to do a twill weave.

We toured the Crafts Center at Berea, KY. There were some beautiful things there. A man wove rag tote bags. He made the handles out of the weft. As near as I can figure he would leave about 6 ends out, braid them then weave those six ends back into the body. These handles were not going to go anywhere. I had decided that I wanted to weave some tote bags, I think that i will be sewing my handles on unless I suddenly figure out how he did this.

I also finally figured out what I am going to do with the sari silk that didn't work out. I am going to put on a 5/2 black perle cotton warp and weave some bags out of the sari silk. I can put those really cool buttons on that I bought from Terri.

OK, lots of plans, now how much will I actually get done before the next show?

Today

2009-04-27T16:51:00.000-07:00

Today I went to a meeting for Creative Arts Council. Donna and I are trying to get this group back on track and actually focus on marketing. We got a little bit accomplished, but left a little frustrated.

Donna brought a tote bag that she had made on Cafe Press with the logo of the "Fine Art at the Village" on it. I am going to look at that again. I want to get a tote bag with my logo on it. I might even get a shirt made. The shirt would be nice to wear for shows. Someday i will loose enough weight so that I can weave something that I will wear at shows.

Last night I finally got my www.etsy.com site set up. I showed that at the meeting and started to explain how to set it up. It really isn't that hard, just hard if you don't read the directions. My "store" looks cool, I got my logo on the top of my page and it really looks nice.

We met at Terri Voight's house. We went downstairs to look at her studio. She had bins of fused glass buttons sitting out. This was a very expensive meeting for me. I have some awesome buttons. I may make some purses for these, or put them on jackets as just decoration. Then Terri showed us how to needle felt. I had been thinking about this, now I really want to try it. Janome makes a needle felting machine, that is all that it does is needle felt. Terri's needle felted purses were so cool. She printed fabric for the linings. I got so many ideas, but I don't want to copy, but I loved what she did. Oh well, this will have to wait until after my next show.

Progress

2009-04-24T04:57:00.001-07:00

I signed in today to post something hopefully interesting and found out that I have a follower. YEAH! Thanks, Debbi.

Yesterday i wove three rugs. All of the rugs on that warp so far are from recycled materials. Things that would have previously gone to a landfill but I am now making used of them. I want to make a sign for my booth something like "Ask Me about My 'Green' Weaving." People always like to hear what these are made from.

Yesterday when i was weaving I saw an ad on TV about getting a reusable shopping tote. Inspiration, I could weave tote bags on this warp. I wonder if people would be willing to pay enough for these. I have several balls of denim strips from cut up jeans. I think that would make some good bags. I also have rolls of material cut from the ends of decorating yardage. They would not be as heavy duty, but colorful. So many things that I want to weave and so little time.

A Good Day

2009-04-21T18:10:00.001-07:00

Today was a good weaving day. I woven 2 1/2 rugs and would have woven more but I had to go upstairs upstairs to wind more bobbins for the headers. The current rugs that I am weaving are done with the trimmings from girls' uniforms. Someone gave me a big bag of these strips. I thought that these would be just from the hems of individual skirts. I think that it is the selvedge from entire bolts. It is nice, I have long pieces, which is nicer when you are doing this sort of thing. I have two different colors of plaids. This one is mainly white with medium and navy blue. Then I have some that are navy blue and forest green. I figure that I will weave that one with a forest green heading.

Today I also finished off my waffle weave towels. It is alternating blocks of plain weave and waffle weave. It has stripes of red, blue, purple and yellow. I woven the towels out of each of those colors and black. The black looks very striking. The red is OK, the purple and blue look good and the yellow is, um, bright. I am making a twisted thread loop that I am sewing in the hem of each towel. I got the blue and the purple towels hemmed tonight. Tomorrow I hope to get the rest done.

I also need to make warps for deflected double weave scarves. So much to do and so little time.

Ann Arbor

2009-04-11T11:43:00.001-07:00

I made it, I got my spot in the Ann Arbor Summer Art Fair. I had hoped for the other side of Main Street and further down. I could get other side of street and further up or same side of the street and further down. I took the latter. I will be in spot #194 just a couple of booths from Williams. I will have electricity so that means fans, YES! There is a parking lot and a parking structure right around the corner and the shuttle bus stops at the end of the street. I am closer to the food and the hospitality area.

Now I just have to hope that this will mean more customers, at least more customers who have money to spend.

One warp done

2009-04-07T18:00:00.000-07:00

I just cut a cotton scarf warp off of my little floor loom. These are cool scarves. There are stripes of a lycra cotton yarn alternating with stripes of a textured cotton yarn. The lycra shrinks when it gets washed so it a bumpy scarf. I washed one and will see how it looks tomorrow. I wove these longer and narrower than previously. People want scarves that they can fold in half and loop through. These will be nice summer scarves.

I also got another towel woven today. They are going faster than I had thought that they would. I hope that this ambitious streak holds up. I could have a lot of work done for my shows this summer.

Handwoven Items that I Sell

2009-04-07T06:58:00.000-07:00

Here is a list of the handwoven items that I sell:

^Scarves
^Shawls
^Jackets
^Vests
^Rugs
^Greeting Cards

These are the fibers that I use for weaving:

^Silk
^Cotton
^Tencel
^Wool (merino)
^Rayon
^Bamboo
^Alpaca
^Silk/Wool Blend
^Bamboo/Cotton
^Bamboo/Silk

Good Day

2009-04-06T17:22:00.000-07:00

I got two and half towels woven today. I would have gotten more done if I hadn't overloaded my bobbins and had to untangle quite a mess more than once. It was nice to really accomplish something. I am working on discipling myself to keep working, that is the most difficult thing form me. I went downstairs to get more cotton for my towels. I went past the cutting table where I am preparing the weft for my current rug. I wanted to stop and work on the rug for a while. I made myself gather up the colors that I needed and went back upstairs.

Tomorrow I take the cat to the vet. Then I have the rest of the day to work. Goal: finish scarf on little loom, weave three more towels, and find the top of the kitchen table. It can't all be about weaving.

I'm back to weaving again

2009-04-05T15:56:00.000-07:00

I have had a pretty productive week, weaving wise that is. I got my Baby Wolf threaded, tied up and started to weave. I am weaving towels in blocks of waffle weave that alternate with blocks of plain weave. I have no idea what I had in mind when I made this warp. It is stripes of red, purple, yellow and blue. It is 8/2 unmercized cotton. For some reason I had it made at 14 ends per inch. I really don't know what I had in mind. I have threaded it at 20 epi. I know that I will have make adjustments in the tension as I go along since it is wider on the back beam than in the reed.

I got a rug warp on the big loom in the basement. It is stripes of blues, forest green and natural. I wove a rug yesterday out of selvedges. Selvedges are created when they weave tripple weave blankets. You those things that have pictures on them? Well, in order to have a fringe on all sides they have to weave a selvedge. These are trimmed off to create the fringe on the side. These used to go into landfills. Something to add to my booth for my "Green Weaving." I need to figure out a sign for that. I am planning to weave a lot of rugs out of recycled material. I will also weave some out of plaid. Those sell well. I dug through just a part of my rug making supplies and I am pretty sure that I have more than enough for this warp. I have some worms that will work with this warp. Worms are from the Pendelton Woolen mills. When they make felted blankets they trim the edges and I get worms. These also used to go into landfills. Right now I am cutting up my son's old caddy shirts. I am cutting the body and the arms into strips. Then I loop the pieces together. I cut the crests off and add them to the chains. I want to call this "Walking on Knollwood Country Club."

I have a scarf warp on my little floor loom. It is stripes of textured cotton and stripes of cotton/lycra. After it gets washed the lycra shrinks and the rest bubbles up. Next I am getting some verigated ecru/taupe/natural cotton yarn. Hopefully this will make some nice summer scarves.

Black yarn

2008-10-26T10:48:00.001-07:00

I have dyed black yarn before, but I have never dyed cotton black before. The last time that I dyed yarn black I was dyeing silk. It took three dye baths, but I got that nice inky black color. This stuff is coming out a kind of dark grey/faded black. Some turned out pretty good, but not inky black. That yarn started out grey that I dyed black before. It wasn't black enough. I am weaving black and red, and it is turning out not too bad. The red is kind of making the black blend in as I am weaving with about three or four shades of black, none of them that nice inky black.

Crocker Park Fall Fest

2008-10-17T15:01:00.000-07:00

It is not a good sign to leave for a show when you don't feel well. Even worse if you start to feel sicker along the way. I did not have great expectations for this show, the stock market took such a sudden tumble last week. I figured that no one would be buying handwovens. I had my deal on my booth from the Guild since I was demonstrating and a cheap hotel room. Gas is always cheaper in Ohio so I wasn't loosing that much.

I did get two alpaca scarves done before I left so that people would know what they were going to look like when I was done. I had a van load and decided to make the best of it. A least I would get weaving done.

It turned out to be my best show of the year, I guess that wasn't really saying a lot, but it was good for me. I sold both of my "sample" alpaca scarves before noon on Saturday. Sales were slower on Sunday, but still not bad. Either the people there hadn't heard that the economy was bad or they decided that after all of that bad news they needed a treat. It was also one of my first shows where it wasn't beastly hot. People would actually try things on. I did like having the double booth to spread my work out in.

This does have the down side of "if you sell well you need to weave a lot to replace that." Back to work.

Dying while Dyeing Black

2008-10-04T07:01:00.001-07:00

I have been dyeing some cotton yarn black for over a week now. The first batch turned out black, but it started out dark grey. The rest was natural. I love this cotton, but Webs is discontinuing it and there is no more black. I have gone through almost the entire 8 oz. container of black fiber reactive dye. I am resorting to using Rit dye today. I have started to make the first warp and I don't even have enough black to finish the warp for red and black shawls, much less weft then warp and weft for the white and black shawls.

I like doing painted warps, but that is more creative. This has to be just so and no variations.

I must say that the red and black do look good together.

I got the grey alpaca scarf warp on the little loom for next weekend. I am hoping to get one scarf woven and finished. I really need to get at least two red and black shawls done for next weekend. It is not looking as if there will be any rugs for the next show, unless I get a sudden surge of energy.

2008-10-01T17:07:00.001-07:00

Catching Up

2008-10-01T16:40:00.000-07:00

Well, the summer shows are finished. The ones that I thought would be wonderful were either just OK, or really bad. The ones that I was not expecting that much from were good. I will never figure this out.

The fact that the economy kept trying to see how much worse it could get and the heat, this was not the summer to be doing shows.

This can also be called the summer of art show storms. In Kalamazoo during set up I had two tornado sirens and a thunderstorm. The ended up being my best show of the summer. Crocker Park it rained the first night after we were set up. The next morning I discovered that a scarf had falled on the ground and was soaked. i just rang it out and hung it in the back. while we were rolling the sides up I forgot about water on the roof. I pushed the back wall in place and got about 2 gallons of water dumped on my head. It was one of those days when my hair actually looked good. Deb and I got a good laugh. We got a brief storm on the last day near the end. I foolishly had taken the sides off early. We moved what we could to the dry side of the booth and then decided that it was time to pack it in. I packed up about 45 min. early. My sales increased there by $9.06 over the previous year. Wow, that was worth it. The Hathaway Brown show had to be my most disappointing. My sales were worse than either of the previous shows, and Kalamazoo was a one day show. Then the organizers were choosing to ignore the storm that was approaching and getting bigger. Deb got me organized and we started to pack up loose things, then stock that no one had looked at. By the time we got to taking the grids down the storm had hit. We were both soaked. At one point we had to stand there and hold on to the booth. Yeah, fun.

I had great hopes for Ann Arbor. The first day was really good, then things slowed down. It was HOT there. The kind of heat where people needed medical care. My mother was not able to come to help so Deb volunteered her daughter Ann. She was a big help getting me set up and came and went during the show so that I could get breaks and she would get food for me. Deb made it there on Friday. Ann still hung around, she was really starting to enjoy the show. We had a brief shower, but Deb and I are so good at this that there was no problem. Everything in the booth and sides down. We even zipped a family in with us. Deb stood at the back of the booth and swept the rain down the gutter. I told the people that I would not let them out until they bought something, but that didn't work. My sales for that show were not where I had hoped, but I will be back.

The next weekend I was at Orchard Lake Fine Art Fair. I figured any show that was 8 miles from home had to be worth it. OK, so I should have listened to Donna and skipped this show. I did the spot on Fox 2 News Morning for the show. I figured that this way people would be just rushing in to see my work. A lot of people said that they saw me on the news, but none of them bought anything. I decided to put my feather gloves out for this show since there were not rules against them. Am I glad that I did that, those were the majority of my sales. I did not even make booth fee there. I did meet some wonderful artists and had a good time. Don't look for me there next year.

I tried Levis Commons again. I had a much better spot, very nice artists on either side of me. The sales were better, but I have to admit that Toledo is just not a wearable art town. Then there was the Mold Spore Inn and going out to eat with other artists and discussing getting "the girls" in position. There was also discussing the yin and yang diet. Yeah, fun time, but off the list for next year.

I will be back at Crocker Park in two weeks. They are doing a new show, Crocker Park Fall Art Festival. I am getting a double booth for free if I will demonstrate weaving for the weekend. Good deal. I am still hotel room hunting and hoping that I do not get another Mold Spore Inn. Back to work.

I Have Made the Big Time!

2008-06-01T15:54:00.000-07:00

Whoo Hoo!!!! I got the call last week, I got a spot in the Ann Arbor Summer Art Fair. I had just walked in the door from tutoring and the phone rang. It was the guild office. I had a choice of three spots and three booth sizes. since I wanted a 10 X 10 booth that made this decision very easy. I don't know how good of a location this is, but hey, I'm in.

I am not working hard at getting things done. I finished the wire weaving that I was working on. I took all of the pieces off and glued them on to barrettes. They look pretty good. I showed one to Donna, she was pretty impressed. She asked me how much I was going to charge for them and how I was going to display them. We discussed pricing and she liked my idea for pricing. I told her that I couldn't get matt board scraps at the store so she gave me a huge bag of them. I can make some pins out the ReFabrication scraps.

I want to have a lot of items priced under $30.00 for my shows this year. I don't have scarves in that territory, but I hope to do a lot more plain chenille ones. Those will cost less, maybe some cotton ones also.

I need to get some vests and short jackets done before my Cleveland shows. I don't think that I need to worry about Kalamazoo, but they do sell well in Cleveland. Lots of little things for Kalamazoo.

Starting again

2008-05-19T08:11:00.000-07:00

So my plans to come home with seven finished scarves did not exactly work out. My new fringe twister DIED!!!! I was not happy. I did not get even one scarf done and I took up all of that suitcase space with seven scarves.

While we were in Santa Fe we went to galleries and studios all over. I am so inspried to weave now. I just have clear what I have off of my looms and get going. Unfortunately I have four gardens to clean out and a house to put back together. Maybe it will rain.

Update

2008-05-09T09:32:00.001-07:00

OK, so I have not posted for a while. Let's make that a long time. I need to really get back into big production. I have a show in four weeks, then shows the next two weekends after that. I am taking a batch of scarves with me on vacation so that I can get the fringe twisted. Then I will just have to trim and finish when we get home. I will need more jackets and vests before the next show. I want to weave some placemats for Deb since I will be staying with her for two of the shows. I will see if I have room to take the heavy chenille scarves with me.

Progress

2007-11-06T15:44:00.000-08:00

I am weaving Christmas Tree dishtowels. I had not been counting so I rolled them off of the cloth beam, yeah, I know that you are not supposed to do that. I had seven of them done. I am going to weave one more then start with the snowmen towels. After that four pink ribbon towels. I some how doubt that I am going to get them done in time for my guild meeting on Thursday. Always good to have a goal.

Monday Morning

2007-08-27T05:47:00.000-07:00

A not so successful show. This makes it hard to get the creative thoughts flowing again. I have the Michigan Weavers Guild exhibition to prepare for. I am going to pu in my Geisha kimono, I want to weave the painted silk in an advancing twill, also hopefully make a coil silk basket. I would make it in some festive colours and do it kind of free form. I had planned to dye and felt some silk, but that is just not going to happen. Time to know when to call it quits.

OK, time unpack the van and sort things out. The things that people don't realize are involved in doing a show.