Quite the Spread

5th Tuesday of the Month Potluck!

All the pretty warps!

Show and Tell

Shannon and the Scarf that came off of the loom last week.

Betsy and a skein of yarn she bought while she was travelling this Summer.

Mark and his first double width weaving project, a table runner

Me showing off the bobbin lace I am working on to make cards to sell for our building fund!

The last picture is a stack of finished articles ready to go up in the shop! Till next Tuesday, Tina for all

Wheeling and Dealing

Yesterday I picked up a few fleeces for an aquaintance of mine, well we haven't actually met but we will meet this Fall when I take her the fleeces and we swap wheels. You see her yarn spinning is going a new direction when at the same time my yarn spinning is going in the exact opposite direction! She wants to spin finer yarn and I am working on relearning how to spin thicker yarns and lots of it. So anyway, while I was there I went ahead and bought a fleece for myself and one for Karin. Oh, here it is!

This is a Tunis fleece which is a breed of sheep we haven't worked with before. This morning while I was loading the fleece into the car, I also loaded up a loom that was going to a new home with one of the other weavers. Oh, Here it is!

Shannon wanted to ask my opinion on an upcoming swap she is doing with a Basket Maker. She wove a couple of runners for the Basket maker to chose from plus we decided she could throw in a bowl cozy to boot! Oh, here is Shannon with her stuff!

Shannon then told me about some stuff she had in her car that people had given her and so we went out to take a look. There are 2 Llama fleeces and that Irish Shawl that Patty brought in last week. Seems it is going home with Shannon! Oh, here are Shannons new things!

Patty, Liz and Liz (yes, we have two!) are sharing weaving patterns and measurements. Oh, here they are!

Pearl and Judith are in a deep conference about something, while Mark and Jenny are working hard. Oh, here they are!

Among all of this wheeling and dealing, Karin and I managed to fix the brake on the Leclerc Compact. Oh, here it is!

We replaced the wood screw that kept coming loose with a bolt and a locking washer and 2 nuts. That should hold it for awhile! Just after lunch Samantha and I took off to her house to put together her new loom! It is a sweet little Leclerc that is older than most of the Leclerc looms that you can find on the web. Oh, and here it is!

This is the loom when it was still at my place, but it looks the same in her sweet house. There is always a hustle and bustle around the Center, sometimes it's ideas sometimes it is equipment, sometime there is money involed sometimes there isn't, but there are always things coming and going or as my Husband calls it, we are Wheeling and dealing! That is all I have for today, let me know if you would like to see anything in particular. Tina, for all

Wearable Handwovens

Often I come prepared with a plan for the blog, but many times, I don't know what my theme for these posts will be until I walk into the Center and something catches my eye. That is the way it was today, I walked in and from across the room Bonnie's warp was yelling "My turn, My turn!"

You can actually see the book that Bonnie is getting her inspiration from in the corner of the last picture. "Simple Woven Garments" by Sara Goldenberg and Jane Patrick. Here is a picture of the top that Bonnie fell in love with enough to choose colors, wind a complicated warp and set to work weaving the yardage necessary.

Right after that, I was put to work on a finicky brake system, the whole thing unscrews as you weave and advance the warp so that you have to constantly have the screwdriver to hand. Although I didn't fix it totally, all we need is a bolt that is one size narrower than the one we have. That should be easy to find at the hardware store.

Now for show and tell, Pat had a bag that she has made out of a piece of fabric that was too little for a placemat, she will add it to our items to sell for our new building fund.

Jenny made another table runner. She loves how you can do so many different things with the same warp, all that there is left to do is twist the fringe! We love both sides of this fabric!

Patty brought in a cape that her mother had bought in Ireland many years ago. It is still in great shape and she just had to share it with us! She also brought in a scarf that she had finished out of variegated yarn in simple plainweave. She was singing the praises of how quickly this project came off the loom and how nice it was to let the variegated yarn sing in the fabric.

Judith brought in a scarf she had finished at home for us to admire! Variegated yarn to the show again!

Barbara brought in a couple of scarves that she has been working on at home. One of them is sparkly!

Tried and True

Here at the weaving Center in Norris, TN, we have a very good library that has been curated for years. Weavers leave there books to the library, and we keep an eye open for any new books that might fill a gap in our book collection. Basically there is little that gets past our watchful eyes. Despite this huge library there are a few of the books that we just keep going back to time and time again. The book I would like to highlight today we affectionately call the Green Book. It is Marguerite Davison's book, A Handweavers's Pattern Book. Many, many weavers began their weaving journey using this book.

Right now there are 4 of us using the Green Book. First up is Mariyln, She is weaving from a selection of 11 weaving patterns for one threading, that you can find on page 15 in my copy of the green book. The pattern is called Swedish Rose Path.

Next up is JP, he wanted to make sure that I put on the blog that he had to rethread this warp 4 times before he got it right! Again, like Marilyn, JP can choose from among eight different weaving patterns on this Rose Path threading. His pattern is on page 16 in the Green Book.

Jenny too is using the same book, she is on page 13 with the Traditional Bird's Eye sample. Jenny has 21 different patterns at her disposal!

I too am using the Davison book for my latest project. But I have left the Birds Eye and Rose Path and have moved over to BarleyCorn for the very first time! I had some trouble getting the threading right on this project. In fact I think the fifth time through was the charm! I also struggled weaving this design until I figured out that I was alternating tabby like I would with Overshot. That was a mistake, there are 2 plain weave treadles but only one of them is to be used for Barley Corn. My pattern is called "Rose Point Pattern" and I have 2 different treadlings and it can be found on page 86 in my copy of the Green Book.

I just have to show you the back side of this pattern, which I like every bit as much as the front side!

Liz was the only one taking a warp off that I saw today. This is the fabric she wove to use for bowl cozies.

Next week we will take a look at another book we just keep coming back to. See you next week, Tina for all