family – Page 2

A New Direction…

August 2, 2015 | 1 Comment

It’s less than a week until my son’s wedding! I have finished my projects, but I’m still deep in lists– lists for everything we need to bring to the wedding– a list of what I need for myself as well as what I’ve promsied to supply for the ceremony…..lists for meals before the wedding, and a list for what I need to host the wedding brunch at my son’s new house the day after the wedding.

Meanwhile, I can’t help thinking about weaving projects. I’ve gotten precious little weaving done on the small tapestry I started onboard late winter this year. What I have done on it has been quite fun–lots of swirling water and the beginnings of the tentacles of a Portuguese Man of War. Very soon I will have my first attempt at pulling the warp around the loom so I can continue weaving up the warp. I’m more than a little anxious about this, but once I’ve done it I hope it becomes something I can count on doing. It will allow me to have smaller looms on board if I use this kind of warp. Check out my new attempts at holding my cartoon in place–a small, very powerful magnet. These little magnets will jump right out of your hands to fly together they are so strong. And a very large paper clip. Neither is a good solution, but I muddle on.

And I’ve been planning my next floor loom project. It’s so hard to choose what to weave when I have so little time at home and so many ideas. I think I will weave yardage in Plaited Huck (same structure as my recent linen tote bag). This time I will make a warp of tussah silk in natural (sort of a pale oat color–not shown in the photo because the cone is the size of a small loom) with random stripes of several silks from SanJo that are also cool natural colors, but matt–no sheen like the tussah. One is smooth, another is boucle and the third has wonderful dark flecks in it. The weft will be golden tussah, in the center of the photos. It will become yardage for a top I hope to make…

But here’s my NEW DIRECTION–all caps because I am very excited about this! At this time of year for the past 3 years— the threshold of late summer–I have become rather anxious and a bit cranky (might be an understatement) that my weaving time at home is rapidly diminshing. This year I have even less to show for myself than previous years… sigh…

Yesterday morning I was looking at some messages on Ravelry and then clicking on various links to other things. Isn’t that the recipe for suddenly losing half a day? Following various links on Ravelry, a site for knitters, I stumbled on Laverne Waddington’s website about backstrap weaving. Here is the first photo that caught my attention.

Are these not WONDERFUL??? A little voice is saying to me: Are these not exactly what you’ve been wanting to weave??? Book covers and handbags. The little voice again: That’s why you’ve woven and sewn two tote bags in the past year. That’s why you took a class on making paper forms for handmade books…..you can do this….YOU can do this on a boat!

Look how Laverne personalized these book covers with the initials of the lucky friends who will receive them!

There are lots of small bags on Laverne’s site too, and lots of simply beautiful pick up designs. Go take a look!

Oh, be still my heart! I think backstrap weaving might be a wonderful new direction for me. It will fit on the boat. It will satisfy my need to weave somewhat complex cloth. It will allow me to continue my new interest in making book covers and handbags. It is taking all my willpower not to make a loom right now… I must stay focused on the wedding for 8 more days, then I can come home and get started!

Funny how things come to you when you need them. I’ve known of Laverne for a number of years now. She and I are in a number of the same online groups. I see her stuff on these groups now and then and marvel at her beautiful weaving. It just never occurred to me until now that this type of weaving may be the perfect solution to weaving onboard.

Whirlwind Tour of NEWS in a Summer that is Zipping Past

July 19, 2015 | Leave a Comment

This year I decided against registering for NEWS, New England Weavers’ Seminar. Instead, I thought I would make a day visit and include some good friends from my old stomping ground in New York and New Jersey. I would give them a little taste of NEWS just before their own regional conference, MAFA (Mid-Atantic Fiber Association) began.

Here we are at the end of the day….a bit worse for wear, but so happy to be together and to have been so inspired by all the exhibits at the conference.

We had a terrific time at NEWS, although I did feel a twinge of regret when I saw that Margo Selby was offering a class in double weave. Take a look at the work she exhibited in the faculty show. Who wouldn’t want to study with her??

Maybe I should start with the faculty show… This is Barbara Herbster’s work.

This is a repweave table runner by Lucienne Coifman from my own guild in Connecticut. She is a superlative teacher, and someday I hope to study rep with her.

The Gallery Exhibit is always exciting, and I was particularly excited this year! I won 5 awards for my tapestry “Sunset on Wilson Cove.” It is most likely the last time I’ll exhibit this piece so I was pleased that it had quite a swan song. The three awards that blew me away are “1st Place Tapestry and Transparency,” “Judges’ Choice,” and “Peoples’ Choice.” I am thrilled! The other two are “First Time Entrant at NEWS” and “Best in Tapestry from the Textile Arts Center.” Can you tell how happy and surprised I am!

We all loved the upholstered footstool right below my tapestry, woven by Susan Wright. What great use of color. It’s a beauty.

This stunning runner caught all our eyes. Ruth Buchman manged to create a threading that is mirrored but gives such sense of assymetry. Then her color choices were superb–greys and blacks with just the right touch of yellow that also gave a strong impression of assymetry. So the piece has a calm balance in color and weave struture while also giving the impression that it is not symetrical. Brilliantly done!

This is another of Ruth’s pieces in the gallery exhibit. Stunning doubleweave.

This is Sarah Fortin’s double weave fabric. I have no idea how she gets some areas to pleat and rise off the flat surface of the background fabric. Beautiful colors and beautiful weaving.

This piece by Suzi Ballenger is stunning! It has silk cocoons attached to it and the weaving was done with her open top beater tool that allows you to move warps, which creates the warp undulations in the fabric.

This fun–and beautiful– bag, called “Take Me Shopping” is by Karin Borden.

There was also a special exhibit of Mary Merrill’s tapestries woven over the decades from the 1950s when she began weaving until her death in the 1999. Her family generously shares her work at gatherings like NEWS. Look how fresh and lush her colors and her shape making are in these two works. This was when I wished I could be at the conference for the entire weekend, so I could come back and visit more than once!

I’ve only been to NEWS twice now, and both times I have to say that my favorite displays are the guild tables. Unjuried though they may be, the work is excellent, and both times I’ve been so inspired that I simply cannot take it all in.

Each guild chooses a theme for their display. This year one guild did textiles inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright, another displayed projects woven by one of their members who has passed away, and another guild woven projects based on personal memories. There was a guild whose inspiration was gardening. I have a photo of a curtain called “Spinach and Blackberry Salad” from that display. Our guild did a display of handbags based on the project that Area 4 did last year of weaving lunch bags and matching napkins to coordinate with a mug that belonged to someone else in the group. It was a grab bag choosing of mugs, and then you designed and wove the lunch bag and napkin to give the member who owned the mug you selected. It was such a wonderful way to weave for someone else, and it honed our design skills along with our weaving skills. My lunch bag was not part of the display since I gave it away last summer, but I have been so intrigued with making bags lately that I submitted my newly finished large tote bag for this display. My photo makes the bags look like a bit of a jumble, and the lighting was harsh. It was actually far more striking than it looks here.

Connecticut Guild’s display of Area 4 lunch totes and handbags.

The Frank Lloyd Wright display.

I think the next image may have been from a picnic themed project, although if so, I missed reading the details of what this group’s theme was. Lovely weaving!– a basket tote and a handwoven band for your stawhat.

“Spinach Salad with Blackberries” from the gardening inspired display.

Stunning tableware woven by Jo Ann Miner.

None of us supported the vendors as we should have. I hope they fared better with other visitors. I was looking for some fine silk to add to my upcoming project for plaited huck blouse fabric, but no one had what I needed. I have some fine tussah silk from my stash as well as some silk I got last summer at Convergence from a vendor called “SanJo.” I want to get the warp on sometime in August so I can get the fabric woven in time for a workshop in October with Sarah Fortin on sewing with handwoven fabric.

Why am not tackling that warp sooner?– BECAUSE we have our son’s wedding in less than three weeks! I am feeling rather confident about my two wedding projects–the ring pillow is done!

And here is my wedding outfit. The blouse is a vogue pattern for a boatneck tunic sewn by a wonderful seamstress in Amston, CT. I then embellished it with silk ribbon embroidery to coordinate with the brown silk pants.

Want to see a closeup? I’ll take that as a ‘yes.’

And to top off the outfit I am having some ballet slippers embroidered by a woman in Altanta who has an Etsy shop called AJuneBride. My shoes will look something like this.

Well, I let this get absurdly long so I’ll stop for now even though I had lots more to say… next post.

Summer’s Swan Song

September 13, 2014 | 2 Comments

A few images from our morning walk into Essex to have coffee at our favorite spot.

Today really feels like autumn, and I wore long pants for the first time this season. All the gardens along our way are bursting with everything they’ve got in the last weeks before frost. It is a breathtaking time of year!

Sunflowers in a long border of sunflowers, zinnias, and roses.

One of my favorite houses where the Kousa dogwood berries are framing a view of the front door.

And right next door is my friend Jane’s house. She has beautiful gardens, and at this time of year the focus is purple Russian sage and bright yellow sunflowers along her picket fence.

Right near Jane’s house is a house where the older residents grow a very large vegetable garden. To me it verges on being a farm. They have pole beans, various types of squash, corn, tomatoes, and in late summer the pumkin vines grow almost out to the street.

Clever Mr. Farmer has trained the longest vine onto his big apple tree.

While having coffee we met a man who just returned from Portugal, where he and his family have a house in Nazare. His wife was born there, so they visit each year, and he had lots of good advice for us. I will get busy honing the details for our trip…

And on this first crisp day I will warp my new copper loom for the upcoming Joan Baxter workshop. I am leaving tomorrow for a whole week at an inn in Rockport, Massachusetts, where 12 of us will spend time with Joan developing our individual cartoons for tapestries about the sea and the shoreline. More on that when my idea gains some clarity.

Also, today, I am making the second batch of baguettes from the recipe in the current issue of “Cooks Illustrated.” (If you want the recipe you have to buy this issue!) The first batch was the best baguette I have ever made myself (thank you CI!!). I reached my goal of making a baguette that could rival Balthazar’s Bakery in NY….a goal I’ve been heading toward for decades!

And while I wait for next round of dough to rise, I’m having a fresh tomato sandwich with mozzarella and basil on day old, lightly toasted, leftover baguette. Hard to imagine anything better!

Short Time and Underway…

April 28, 2014 | Leave a Comment

That’s a phrase I hear every morning when we listen to the Cruiseheimer’s net on our sideband radio. Boats on the move to new destinations….some heading north to get above the Florida border before hurricane season starts on June 1….or people headed ahsore for provisions and/or sight seeing.

One week from today I will be winging back to the US for a visit with my older son and his girlfriend at their home on the outskirts of Baltimore for a couple of days. In the meantime, we have a full week of beautiful destinations planned as our final week aboard and as a tour of the Exuma chain for Rob and Kandice.

Before they arrived I tried to finish up on my small tapestry exercise of circles within circles….didn’t quite make it!

The piece will end in the area where the threaded bar is so I’m not too far from the finish line. It’s been a fun project, but I guess I will have to spend some time on it at home. I cannot bring it with me, so it will sail home with Bob.

On our walk to the airport to meet Rob and Kandice, we passed lots of roosters and chickens with their chicks. There were big black roosters and white ones, and lots of colorful chickens. The roosters are very good at avoiding our camera, and the chickens are pretty good too, although they are encumbered by their brood of little chicks following them around. The best shot we could get was the backsides of a retreating family!

A very different kind of trip to the airport than what we normally experience! At the airstrip we sat in a gazebo to await Rob and Kandice’s arrival!

And then there was Rob, waving to us from what should be the co-pilot’s seat! He had a wonderful time sitting next to Chester the pilot. Rob took some amazing shots of the flight and videos on his Go Pro of the flight and the approach to Staniel Cay. He even saw Pandora at anchor as they made their final approach.

The kids have played with the pigs on Big Major’s Spot, and we’ve seen just how quickly little piglets have grown! Bob probably could not pick up that little pink pig anymore! Rob and Bob went snorkeling in Thunderball Grotto at low tide yesterday, and Rob took a lot of video of the fish and a sea turtle that he swam with for a while outside the far end of the grotto.

We’ve seen some wonderful sunsets, some shooting stars, and some amazing clouds…

Today we will have a short sail to Over Yonder Cay. This is a private island, beautiful beyond belief, and entirely self-supporting with their own energy. There are three large windmills on this island….later today we will get a guided tour from the island manager, Ethan, and I’m sure we’ll learn a lot more about how this stunning place operates.

The rest of our final week will include time at Warderick Wells, Compass Cay, and Shroud Cay.

My shawl is on the final repeat of the lace pattern….now what am I going to work on during my flights home? Wondering if it’s still cold enough in Connecticut to wear wool/silk socks…

A Very Strange Post

February 6, 2014 | 3 Comments

This might be the strangest entry I’ll ever post here. Perhaps too much information….but there you go. I made a brief post almost three years ago that my father died very unexpectedly. He chose to be cremated, and he asked that his remains be released at sea. When he talked to me about this, long before it was on anyone’s mind that it could possibly become a reality, he suggested Long Island Sound. He sailed there most of his short time as a sailor. But during that short time when sailing was so important to him I knew that he longed for bigger and warmer waters.

At one point he and my mother bought property on the West coast of Florida, hoping to settle there and keep their boat there. That never came to pass. And at the time he passed away, he had no idea that Bob and I also had big plans to sail farther than our standard stomping grounds, from the Chesapeake to Maine. My father was never interested in Maine. He was a southern boy all the way through, and he never got used to living in the northeast.

So, over the past 2 1/2 years that he has resided on a shelf in my house….(I know, please don’t judge me!)…I have had an underlying knowledge that he would love to be set free in the warm waters of the Gulf Stream. His remains could travel the world in a way he’d always dreamed of doing in life.

My father and I always had issues, and I’m disappointed that we never could find a common ground while he lived. At least in this I think I can make him happy. My biggest regret is that my sister and my kids, who all loved him, cannot be with us to experience the moment. I have told them all my best guess as to when I’ll be doing this…. it’s hard to be exact, even in the 21st century, when the plans involve sailing! At the specified time this afternoon they will send positive energy out for their dad and granddad and say prayers. It’s long overdue, and he deserves this.

“Parable of Immortality”

I am standing upon the seashore.
A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze
and starts for the blue ocean.
She is an object of beauty and strength,
and I stand and watch until at last she hangs
like a speck of white cloud
just where the sea and sky come down to mingle with each other.
Then someone at my side says,
” There she goes! ”
Gone where?
Gone from my sight . . . that is all.
She is just as large in mast and hull and spar
as she was when she left my side
and just as able to bear her load of living freight
to the place of destination.
Her diminished size is in me, not in her.

And just at the moment
when someone at my side says,
” There she goes! ”
there are other eyes watching her coming . . .
and other voices ready to take up the glad shout . . .
” Here she comes! “

— Henry Van Dyke