ArgoKnot

ArgoKnot
A journal of my weaving, spinning, and knitting life
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Author name: ozweaver

Progress on Boundweave

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A rainy Saturday

And the first tomato from my garden….yes, I did eat it on my homemade bread with pesto from the basil in the garden, topped with parmesan….it was a very comforting lunch.

Here is the progress made on my boundweave wall hanging.  Aside from the tree, which is not my design anyway, I am not happy with my images.  Drat!  That second figure is supposed to a coleus plant.  Are you laughing?  (I’m not.)  And the next figure is a lady slipper.  I think others may wonder if it’s some kind of bug, or a really bad rendition of a person standing on her head.  Dear Bob says these are things that mean something to us, so I shouldn’t worry what other people see in them.  I’m trying to convince myself of that!

This is a lady slipper, this is a lady slipper, this is a lady slipper…..I still don’t believe it….

Some boundweave hints:  many years ago when I did a Christmas wall hanging on 4 shafts, I remember reading about how the weft will slant up or down according to the direction of the treadling, because it is a twill afterall.

So, if you wanted eyes or hair (or in the case above, the lower petals on the orchid) to slant in a particular direction, you have to consider that in your treadling.

So the tree and the coleus were woven by treadling from left to right across my tie up.  But the petals on the orchid did not look right done that way, so I switched to treadling ‘backward,’ or right to left.  I could have changed direction in the middle of the orchid so that the individual picks up the upper petals would have slanted upwards.  My experience with the coleus plant was that treadling either direction didn’t quite give me what I wanted, so I decided not to change direction.  The source of this information is Clotilde Barrett’s book Boundweave, Chapter 7, page 60.

The other thing that I’ve found very helpful this time around is graph paper.  On the previous project I used square graph paper and had to figure out how many rotations of the treadling sequence it took to make my weaving square.  Now I discovered on  Weavolution that Karen in the Woods is using a flattened type of graph paper, where the height of each space is shorter than the length, making squat rectangles instead of squares. I went looking for graph paper like that.  I found it at incompetech.com (clever name). Click on ‘Grid/Graph Paper.’ I chose this one, and it is pretty close to being on square per pick.  And by ‘pick’ I mean a full rotation of the treadling series, which you’ll understand if you’ve done boundweave.

I hope my next few figures are better.  I’m going to start weaving a loom now, and it’s not my design either, so I feel it’s bound (could I have picked a different word here?) to turn out better.  I’m not feeling overly confident about any of my designs, and yet 20 years ago when I did my last boundweave project, all the designs were mine and I think those figures turned out very well.

Elves and Reindeer

Santa

Santa Lucia

Onward…..

Feeding My Disappointment

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I didn’t expect to be writing a post this week.  I expected to be at the IOLI lace convention in St. Paul.  But here I am, at home, sulking a bit….

I’ve had some health issues that are too boring to write about, and I ended up in the hospital on the night before my flight.  I spent the weekend recuperating, which mostly means sleeping, and I was just barely awake for a moment or so on Saturday afternoon right when my flight took off.  Why couldn’t I have slept through that?

I’m missing a class in Chrysanthemum lace which sounds so intriguing!  It is lots of little free form pieces, mostly of a tear drop or paisley shape, that are assembled together in a technique called ‘sewing’ that does not involve the kind of sewing one would do to hem a skirt or make a seam, but which I believe involves bringing up loops through the edges of the lace that are then closed to connect the separate pieces of lace together.  I know.…that wasn’t a very good description at all.  I cannot do better because I haven’t learned it yet.

Here is a little detail of the ‘sewing’ process:

From this book….

This book cover gives a good idea of the little curved paisley pieces of lace that are made and assembled into the Chrysanthemum. I imagined myself making a simpler flower that could be used to embellish a silk blouse.  The lace was to be pale pink on my imaginary bone white silk blouse….

My class was to be each morning for the week, and I envisioned myself doing lace through the afternoons, shopping in the vendors’ hall, and seeing the lace poppy exhibit.

Today after class, I was going to rent a car to drive to the Swedish American Institute to see  Helena Hernamarck’s exhibition there.  Big, big sigh….

I only just tackled unpacking my suitcase today because yesterday the thought of unpacking brought me dangerously close to tears!  And for the rest of the day I have fed my disappointment….literally….

 I made my second batch of bread based on suggestions I got from a very interesting baker.  I bought a loaf of his artisanal bread at a local farmers’ market and learned that in addition to baking he also owns a local Italian restaurant in Old Saybrook. He bakes bread based on ratios of flour/water/yeast/salt instead of any specific recipe, and he always uses a starter.  I usually use a starter too, but my bread is not nearly as good as his!  He gave me his ratios (which he learned at the San Francisco Baking Insitute), and he gave me a large bag of high gluten flour.  He suggested two starter methods:  a ‘poolish’ which you make yourself, and a ‘biga’ which is based on using leftover pizza dough.  My first batch was based on my homemade ‘poolish,’ and the bread shown here is based on his ‘biga.’  Both techniques are delicious.  I won’t bother to describe how my husband lined my large oven with ‘reflective’ tiles, nor how I hurl a big scoop of ice cubes into the oven just after I put the bread in to bake….but these are important factors!

Along with bread, I made my first batch of pesto with basil from the garden, so dinner this evening will be pesto spread on cod filets.  Tomorrow I hope to pick the first tomato from the garden!  I will make a sandwich with my bread, spread on a little pesto,  sliced tomato, and a shaving or two of parmesan…. to assuage my disappointment….

I know this is absurdly off-topic, but really, there is nothing like a day in the kitchen to brighten my spirits….

A Touch of Lace

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On Saturday I will travel to St. Paul to go to my first bobbin lace convention!  This is the IOLI, the International Old Lacers, Inc…..a rather dowdy name for such a talented group of women keeping these amazing techniques going.

I’ve been thinking that if lace makers are like weavers, most of the attendees will want to wear a little something that they’ve made.  I’ve had a good length of lace edging laying around for a couple years, slated to be used as an edging for some handwoven linen hand towels.  But I have not even got that warp on my radar yet….  what I do have is a lovely, old linen blouse that I suddenly realized might look very charming with a lace border at the neckline.  Hmmm….. this blouse is probably more than a decade old now.  I sure hope it has plenty of life left in it since I now love the touch of lace at the neckline!

Gosh, I hope someone notices!

Tackling My Toika

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In spite of that pep talk from my son, in spite of Su Butler’s excellent website with extensive information, including photos (!) about tying up a Toika, and in spite of perusing every forum post about Toikas I could find on Weavolution, I could not get my loom to work.  When I opened a shed I had such a jumble of threads at differing heights, there was no way to throw a shuttle! And I won’t even mention how hard it was to depress the treadles.

This is a warp I made somewhat over a year ago, before I knew for certain that we’d be moving.  As soon as we decided to put our house on the market, the real estate agent we used insisted that I take this loom apart and put it in storage.  She thought my studio would show well as a second family room.  We rented a storage unit and I put both the Toika and my 40″ AVL in it, not to mention lots of other studio equipment.

The project I have on the Toika is 8 shaft boundweave threaded in rosepath at 10 epi.  I’ve used some precious tapestry warp that is hard to get these days, and I put on about 6 yards, 24″ wide to make several boundweave wall hangings.  I’m envisioning a little story board of my family.  For me I have charted out a floor loom, a castle style spinning wheel, a drop spindle, various garden flowers, and maybe a bucket for dye!  For my husband I’ve charted a boat, and anchor, and a car.  My head is brimming with ideas to include our two sons, along with various cats and dogs…. and yet…. I could not get the loom to work.

Today I came close to tears.  It wasn’t pretty….  I became obsessed with talking directly Su Butler because I believed that she was the only person left in the world who could sort this out for me.  Either she had some advice or it was time to get rid of this loom.  Shame faced, I sent her an email.  Within moments she wrote back and recommended we talk on the phone.  Hallelujah!

My Toika works like a dream now! What a relief….

So, what did I do wrong?  Well, first (and probably most importantly) the distance between the bottom of the shafts, the top lamms, bottom lamms and treadles should be about the same.  Not knowing exactly what that meant I had them within 2″ of the same distance apart.  Su said I needed to get all these within a 1/2″ of the same distance.  Bingo!  The other dilemma was my treadle height.  Doing it as described on her website didn’t give me the necessary position when the locking pins were removed. My treadles ended up slanting upwards toward the bench, and that was no fun for trying to depress them!  She was familiar with this little quirk on some looms and explained to me what to do.  Now everything is in great working order!

So, these are not the best looking trees by any stretch….but the loom is working well, and I don’t mind working on my little graphed charts to improve the image.  I’ll give it another go shortly.

8 am next morning…. I have better trees!

I was compensating for my graph paper squares too much in my first attempt and therefore elongating the trees too much.  Now I think I’ve got it!  So I will weave a header and begin the first actual wall hanging!  Can you imagine me doing a happy dance around the loom??….punching the air!  Yippee!

Better looking trees shortly….

In My Little Corner

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This is my new little corner of the world.  I feel very lucky that it is so beautiful here and so conducive to happiness and creativity!  Although you can always ‘bloom where you’re planted,’ some places are easier than others!  I do feel like blooming!


I have finally climbed under the Toika to tie up the lamms and treadles!  Go me!  It took some rather close scrutiny of Su Butler’s website,  a lot of fretting, and a pep talk from my younger son who is visiting to get me to do it.  Why are these things such hurdles for me??

And…meanwhile….in between everything else…. I knit….

One completed section of the “Ann Jacket” by Vivian Hoxbro

One virtually complete pattern repeat of “Mary Tudor” by Alice Starmore

The finished pieces of my “Soo Feminine” jacket!  ….

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