Showing posts with label loom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label loom. Show all posts

Monday, June 28, 2021

Weaving In and Out

A lot went on this week. As you may remember, the mattresses arrived and exploded (under control). Well, Wednesday the table arrived. We put it together and pushed it to one side. Friday the bed arrived. Putting it together was more complicated, but we managed to put the bed together that day.


Saturday we put together the trundle. 


(It looks like DH is the only one working, but someone had to take the photo, and I did help.) The trundle was easier to put together, because the construction was identical to the bed.

I still need to make pillow covers for the bed, but in the meantime, I just folded Joanie's quilt over the pillows. I put the new pillow cases on the pillows and used the little bags the bedding came in as covers for some smaller pillows we had. 


This will give you a better idea of how the room looks in use. (The other pillows were from another bedroom. They will be more useful here.) The old folding table was hard to use for storage, because the folding mechanism was in the way. It was also too big.


DH needs to put up the curtain rod for me. When the sun is at the back of the house in the morning, we have nice light in this room, but when the sun shines on the front later in the day, we have to close the room-darkening shades to keep the house from heating up, and then you can't see anything. The curtains will help keep the room from heating up so much if I want to be working in there during the afternoon and need the light to see.

The Kevät is finished! Here it is blocking:


I chose to block the bottom ribbing in points because it was expedient. It wanted to do that anyway, and it only needed to be pinned in 6 places. I used my lace blocking wires for the sides and shoulders.

Here it is blocked and getting acquainted with some of my other pieces of clothing.


Here's how it fits. (Excuse the crepey arms. I'm an old lady.)


I finished the dish mat while we talked with the kids during our regular Sunday Zoom call.


The loom is finally in use, but not before much groaning and gnashing of teeth. If you remember, I wound the warp last week. The different kinds of fiber didn't cooperate with each other the way I hoped they would, and they made a big mess when I tried to warp the loom. It was great practice, though. I had some Peaches 'n' Cream cotton yarn, so I wound the warp again, using only the cotton yarn. I still had some issues, but I managed to get past where I had the mess. I've been using the Craftsy class Floor Loom Weaving as my guide. One thing the teacher mentioned that I hadn't remembered from when I used it to make the project was that all the heddles should be leaning to the right for a right-handed person and to the left for a left-handed person. If they are the wrong way, you need to turn them upside-down, not just turn them over to the other side. I remembered we had taken the heddle frames out of the loom to move it (twice), so I decided to check. I found one set that were all on the same way, but the whole set was up-side down. That was easy to fix by taking the frame out and replacing it the correct way. ALL the others had some the right way and some the wrong way. They must have been this way when I received the loom! Here you can see what I'm talking about. Look at the two heddles in the center of the photo. The heddle on the right is set up for a right-handed person. The other one is for someone who is left-handed.


I took out each heddle frame, took off all the heddles and checked each one before putting it back on the heddle rods. When I got to the third and last frame I had to do this with, I noticed the paint on one end but not on the other. See the one with no paint? It's upside-down compared with its fellows. I discovered that when you have all the painted ends together, all the heddles will be facing the same way.


It should have been easy to realize. It did make it easier to finish the third set. Duh! I don't remember anyone's mentioning this before, but they probably did. Threading the heddles was easier than I remembered from previous projects. This must be why.



Next was to put the beater bar back on with the reed in place to sley the reed. (That black thing in the bottom of the photo is a sleeping Rocky, not a discarded sweater or jacket.)


I managed to get all the threads into the reed in the right order, which I found shocking when I discovered I had done it right. However, when I went to tie up the treadles, I discovered that the job was made more difficult because the treadles weren't quite in the right position. I have figured out that the guys had installed the treadle assembly upside-down. See those holes at the bottom of the photo where the screws go in? That's side is supposed to be facing the floor. The treadles needed to be flipped around to be in the right position. 


It's supposed to fit  down on the floor, as in this photo from our old place:


I explained to DH, and he unscrewed the two bolts holding the base of the assembly, so we could flip it over. 



I managed to tie up and throw a few picks to even out the warp, so I'm finally off to a good start. Now I'm going to weave a narrow border that will hold the fringe at each end of the rug.


I didn't need to undo anything when we fixed the treadle assembly, other than to untie the treadles.

In other news, you may have heard about the terrific heat wave that has descended on the Pacific Northwest. It isn't quite as bad here as locations lower in elevation and closer to the coast, like Portland, but it's still expected to be over 100ºF for the next few days here where we are. However, the difference between sun and shade is much greater than most places. This is what we had yesterday evening, as the sun was getting low and shining right on the front porch.


You may remember that our furnace went out last Fall and we replaced it with a unit that included air conditioning. It's a very efficient and quiet unit, operating with a fraction of the energy older models require. Here's a photo of our thermostat inside the house at the time it was so hot outside.


We have it set on 78ºF, and it pretty much stays there. Upstairs it's a little bit warmer, so we run our little portable air cooler in the bedroom, which keeps it comfortable.

What a week! And DH has an unpleasant medical procedure today, which requires that I drive him. It's supposed to continue to have record-breaking temperatures, but I hope this week goes more smoothly.

Where's my blog: As you may know, the entity that notifies people when a blog they follow posts will discontinue notifications in July. This motivated me to link my blog to Bloglovin', as I did some time ago with The Doll's Storybook. If you are following my blog want to continue following after July, I recommend you go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: Just finished the Dish Mat, but there's still the Brioche Shawl Feathers shawl. I will be working on it again, now that the Kevät is done.

What's on my sewing machine: Its cover. However, I will be making the pillow covers and revising the curtains soon.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. No progress this week. (Are you kidding?)

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Look-alikes. Pippa wishes she were more like the other dolls.



What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still listening to The Rose Code by Kate Quinn.

What's in my wine glass: Crystal Range Barbera 2019. Excellent.

What's my tip of the week: We occasionally eat vegetarian hot dogs with buns, but so seldom, we need to freeze most of the hot dogs. I put the hot dogs, two-by-two, into sandwich bags and tuck each pair into a larger zippered bag with two buns. When we're ready to eat them, I just pull out the pair of dogs and buns, just the amount we need.

Where's my book: Mariah: Stories from the Doll's Storybook is available from Amazon worldwide. Also available from BookBabyBarnes & Noble and other booksellers. Royalties go to support pediatric cancer research and treatment. The three stories in the book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with few changes. The stories (and links to them) are Being LittleBesties, and Distraction.




Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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Monday, June 7, 2021

Heddles Up!

You may remember from last week's blog post that we moved the loom down to the living room. With the removal of the loom from the workroom, I'm ready to redecorate the space.


I made some simple curtains, so I can block the sun and still find my way around in there. With the room-darkening shades down, as is the case on hot day, it's almost totally dark. This is going to be cozier, too. We expect to have a houseful over the Christmas holidays, so I thought it might be good to get a daybed for this space. The quilt is the one I helped my friend Joanie make for her bed. She left that and the quilt on the wall to me when she passed away. Under it is the wicker hamper that houses almost all my spinning fiber. It should fit nicely in front of the day bed, except when the trundle gets pulled out. It weighs almost nothing, so is easy to move. Now that it's out from under the long folding table in the room, I can get a shorter table, which, I hope, will be the right thickness to attach my ball winder and swift.

We are off camping again! Expect a full report next week.

In the meantime, I've made some progress with the Kivät sweater. I'm finished with Color B. The rest is just texture.


If I get bored with the sweater, I can continue with the Brioche Shawl Feathers shawl. I have the yarn all caked up and ready to go.


I will also take the dish mat, which is still on the needles, because it takes no concentration, so I can work on it while talking to people.

Some of the choir rehearsed in person again Wednesday evening, masked and distanced, accompanied by the rest of the singers online via Zoom. We rehearsed Rutter's "For the Beauty of the Earth" and after the Zoom session ended, the in-person choir recorded it. That will be used to make guide tracks for the other singers to learn and submit their virtual recordings, which of us who participated in-person will also do. We were singing with masks on, so I don't know how clear it will be. I didn't manage to get a photo of the rehearsal, but we came out to this:


The rainbow went all the way over the church and came down on the other side, but I couldn't get it all in the photo. We were all enchanted, though. "For the Beauty of the Earth," indeed!

The loom looks cozy in her new spot.


After we get home from camping, I'm planning to warp the loom and start some rag rugs for the house and then for the trailer using the instructions I found in my eBook copy of Handwoven's Master Weaver Collection Favorite Projects and Lessons from Tom Knisely.


Here's a screenshot of part of a page in the rag rug instructions to give you an idea, only he dyed sheets to use, and I plan to play with my stash, so mine won't be anywhere near this organized. I'm planning to have fringe on each end, too. I plan to aim for 30 X 50" for all three house rugs, so a little bigger than the rugs in these instructions.


It has been a long time since I warped my loom, so I'm going to run through the process by watching that part of the Craftsy class, Floor Loom Weaving. I've been reviewing the process, and will watch each part again as I do it.

We had three days where we had to use our new AC, which was lovely. Wednesday the high was in the 90s! It was so nice not to have to get up at 5:00 AM to open the windows and bring in the cool air to try to get through the day. Friday a low pressure front brought in cooler air. It was the cause of an attack of osteoarthritis pain which continued all day and all night. The only nonnarcotic medication that works for me for this kind of pain is aspirin, which I don't like to take, so I didn't. The heating pad helped some, but by 5:00 AM, I relented and took some aspirin. In 15 minutes the pain let up, and when the medication wore off, it was tolerable and letting up. I was fine the rest of the weekend.

For some cuteness, here's a photo of the pups after they returned from the groomer on Monday.




Where's my blog: As you may know, the entity that notifies people when a blog they follow here posts will discontinue notifications in July. That motivated me to link my blog to Bloglovin', as I did some time ago with The Doll's Storybook. If you are following my blog and want to continue following after July, I recommend you go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: Three projects: Kivät sweater, Brioche Shawl Feathers shawl and the lowly dish mat.

What's on my sewing machine: Just finished simple curtains. Nothing new yet.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. No progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: A Conversation with Emil. Pippa has learned that Emil can communicate with animals and wants to know more about it, including whether her bear can talk to him.




What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still listening to The Black Moth by Georgette Heyer, about 1/3 finished.

What's in my wine glass: Terra D'Oro Barbera from Amador County. Pretty good!

What's my tip of the week: Easy homemade TV dinners make camping easier. I still have a couple of the lasagne dinners from the last time I made lasagne, and I decided to put together this easy dinner for the next night. It's Quorn faux chicken cutlet on top of a Trader Joe's frozen hash brown potatoes and covered with mushroom sauce. Everything except the sauce was already frozen when I assembled it. I cover with foil, then the piece of cardboard that came with the trays, on which I write what the dinner contains. When we're ready to eat, I cook it in the oven at 300ºF for 40-50 minutes (the longer time for higher elevations). Easy cleanup.




Where's my book: Mariah: Stories from the Doll's Storybook is available from Amazon worldwide. Also available from BookBabyBarnes & Noble and other booksellers. Royalties go to support pediatric cancer research and treatment. The three stories in the book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with few changes. The stories (and links to them) are Being LittleBesties, and Distraction.




Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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Monday, May 31, 2021

Exhausting Recreation

What a busy week! We had a great camping trip, leaving Monday and returning on Thursday. This was our setting:


The white 5th wheel is ours. The other RV belongs to Charlie's brother, Jim.

We found the stroller to be very useful for Rocky, although he surprised us by walking 1 1/4 miles with no problem. He isn't very fast, so if we wanted to move faster, we used the stroller.


We camped with some friends from the Meet-up group here in Bend. It was a very relaxing trip. Cooking and cleanup was minimal, because we ate homemade TV dinners, sandwiches, cereal and boiled eggs.


Rocky needed help to get up onto the bed, but he really enjoyed it.


The issues we had were few. First was the discovery of a leak around one of the vents on the roof, which Charlie fixed. We found it when I discovered the bed was wet. It had rained the night before we left. I put the bedding over the two picnic tables when we arrived at the campsite, and it was all dry within a couple of hours. The other issue was learning that one of the two batteries for the trailer was not very good. It wouldn't hold a charge. The low temperature Tuesday night was 32.2º, which was pretty cold for sleeping in the trailer without turning on the heat, but with two humans and two canines all under the covers, it wasn't too bad.

The pups enjoyed access to the water, although we had to keep them from wading in too far because of the current.


The two ladies who participated in the camping event each bought one of my books. (I had brought two along.)

I got some knitting in. Here's my progress on the Kevät sweater.



I just added the stitch markers between the pattern repeats, because it's getting more difficult to tell where the chart starts and ends, now that I've finished the first colorwork section. The yarn for my Brioche Shawl Feathers shawl was delivered the day we arrived home.

Our son and DIL arrived Friday evening for the long weekend. (They are still here.) Their canine family member dug up one of the marigolds in the newly planted vegetable garden, so Charlie had to do some repair. Fortunately, he had plenty of marigolds still needing planting.


We walked to the playground on Saturday, so the boys could play and run off some energy. They are going home today.

While our son was here, we moved my loom down from my workroom to the living room, where there is an empty corner with two windows. He helped us put it together. Years of Lego building put to good use. I had written down the order in which I had taken it apart, and I had taken photos of each step. Each set of hardware went into a bag labeled which which part they went to. It was still a challenge to put together. We (or better, they) persisted, and success came at last.


I plan to make some rag rugs for the house and the trailer, but I think our son deserves one, too.

We had some great meals while the kids were here. DDIL is a great cook, and they brought their veggie share with them. We played "I Spy" and "Guess the Animal" during dinner. 


While the kids were visiting a friend here in Bend, we Zoomed with our daughter. She had lots of news about what they and the kids have been up to.

I'll have to whip up another story this week. Part of my cushion of prescheduled stories was used up with the activities of the past week taking over, and we go camping again next week. (!)

Where's my blog: As you may know, the entity that notifies people when a blog they follow posts will discontinue notifications in July. Those two things motivated me to link my blog to Bloglovin', as I did some time ago with The Doll's Storybook. If you are following my blog want to continue following after July, I recommend you go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: The dish mat, the Brioche Shawl Feathers and the Kevät sweater. Progress on the dish mat and Kevät, but none on the Brioche project...yet.

What's on my sewing machine: Dust

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. No more progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: "Wheels on the Court." Emil tells Jolena about his latest letter from Holly, in which she tells about playing wheelchair basketball.



What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still reading The Black Moth by Georgette Heyer. Barely started.

What's in my wine glass: Empyrean Lyra Pinot Noir 2018 Yamhill-Carlton.

What's my tip of the week: If you bake salmon, skin-side-down on a piece of foil, don't use cooking spray. Just add a little oil and whatever seasonings you want to the top of it after you place it on the foil. Bake it for 10-12 minutes at 425º. When it's done, the salmon will come away from the foil and leave the skin behind.

Where's my book: Mariah: Stories from the Doll's Storybook is available from Amazon worldwide. Also available from BookBabyBarnes & Noble and other booksellers. Royalties go to support pediatric cancer research and treatment. The three stories in the book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with few changes. The stories (and links to them) are Being LittleBesties, and Distraction.




Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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Monday, December 10, 2018

Fiber Studio and Preparations for Christmas

We're almost done with the fiber studio. Here's a look at the Billy Bookcases and the loom. (Still some work to do on the loom, but I need help unscrewing the nuts on the bolts.) The wicker hamper will go under the work table when it's available.



I picked up the base unit for the light table/cutting surface on Tuesday at Lowe's. All we had to do was bring it up the stairs and plop it into place, although we still need to put a hole in the back or side for the cord for the light table lights. It swallowed a lot of the extra fabrics I had in boxes. The thread rack was an Amazon order.



I am happy with the sewing table. I was able to get a lot of the sewing tools into the cubbyholes in the table.



Here's the closet corner. Inside is still a mess. I need some more shelves. The Coca-Cola crate that holds the little shoes for the dolls still needs to be mounted on the wall.



My "Peggy's Sistine Chapel" is ready to be hung on the wall, but we need a friend with a special ladder, because it has to go over the stairs. DH is going to cut off the excess length of the batten that will hold it up. (You can see the mark where he needs to cut.)



I've made a little progress on the Kisu Takki Cardigan. I'm knitting both sleeves together with steeks between them.



Now I've started cooking for Christmas. Here is the Lohipiirakka (salmon pie), a Finnish family tradition for Christmas Eve. Into the freezer (now up and running) it went.





Then I made the lanttulaatikko (rutabaga casserole), another family tradition.

Saturday, Mariah and Billy accompanied me to see Santa. This will be part of a future story. Santa was a good sport. He pretended that the two dolls were ordinary dolls, and they pretended to be what he pretended they were. They were able to make their wishes known, however, because Santa speaks doll. I have no doubt they will get what they asked Santa for.




What's on my needles: The Kisu Takki Cardigan for Jolena, now knitting the sleeves.

What's on my Sparrow 15: Sleeves for hanging quilts. Two down, two to go.

What's in my hoop: Still the Spring Flowers quilt, no progress again this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Happy Hanukkah, Charlotte!  Charlotte explains Hanukkah to the other dolls. This week's story will be about Caroling and an adventure with real children. 

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still The Ladies of Ivy Cottage by Julie Klassen and Rachel Maddow's Bag Man podcast. No chance to listen this week.

What's in my wine glass: Tuesday Night Red, 2018. Pretty nice. We're sampling some wines we've had no access to in Utah. We can even have wine shipped to our home here. (We could smoke pot, if we wanted, but I have no interest.)

What's my tip of the week: Fill an almost-empty freezer with loaves of bread, of if you need to, a pillow or two. Air in the freezer falls out when you open the door, requiring more energy to return the temperature inside to what is needed.



Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.