Cold Spell

Lately I've been writing, rewriting, photographing and revising new blog posts only to scrap the whole thing. I've said it all before in the last, what, nine years and two months. And unless I have a new discovery or a change of mind or new news, I don't want to repeat repeating myself. Because I do that. A lot. And when one works to focus on one thing and thus makes one's life smaller and smaller, one is bound to be left with few topics to ponder, even in this age of information and technology.

And I'm tired of listening to my own mild health woes, (although it was only just the other day I noticed I inherited it,) the garden, (winter half over and all kinds of bulbs, shoots and new leaves are coming out already,) and my problem with techniques. While washing two big pieces yesterday, I noticed something new-ish.

Because I'm less happy with the outcome of my pieces I've been deliberately slowing down, first physically but now my head follows. I try to concentrate on whichever process I'm working on at the moment and that only. Not that I ever tried anything else but I'm doing this even more deliberately. When successful, I can really stop "thinking" and just observe and absorb. No more thinking up fiction story lines, no more planning the fifth and sixth next projects, and certainly no more remembering all the other little stuff I'm meant to be doing.

What is happening, however, is not always what I intended. For e.g. when I'm weaving, I can't see both selvedges of wider pieces without moving because I'm concentrating on whichever side I can see, and also because my peripheral vision is not as good. While washing, I am more aware of how my body has shrunk; how much higher my bathtub is, (if you're short, you know taking down a mug from a high kitchen shelf may require a chair, but putting it back on the same shelf doesn't; I can't stretch as much as I used to); how my face/eyeglasses are closer to the water and the hot water steams up my glasses. And how uncomfortable and tiring washing has become. I'm not observing the cloth; I don't modify the degree of felting according to desired outcome like before. I know these things are partly physical, some to do with aging, but I also have a much "narrower" attention span, and I don't know how to remedy it.

The only idea I've had as regards techniques is this: my four-shaft weaving has better selvedges and shapes. This could be because I use different yarns and the structures are much simpler, but I wonder also if it is because I stand up to weave. So I might try a foot stool and stand up and weave of that, too; because the big loom operates with just one pedal rather than multiple treadles, standing and weaving is easier with this loom. If this doesn't work, I'll think of giving up wide pieces.

I can only hope I haven't passed the pinnacle of my weaving skills without noticing. But it is what it is, another curveball in my life.

"Wave" (?), not in a great shape but interesting because on one side the warp, and on the other the weft, stands out from the other set of yarns. Is that the right way to say it? It's... 2.5D.

I had high hopes for this, but I may have felted it a little too far; this one should have had fringes but I hemmed it. The colors are slightly more saturated. I haven't got a name yet.

"Nostalgia". Mom's old wool warp and possum/merino/silk weft, light and not so thick but very warm.

"Always". Mom's old wool both ways, and on rainy days it even smelled like sheep while I was weaving. Heavier and thicker and heftier than above, I don't think this kind of cloth will ever disappear. I once had a suit made of fabric that looked like this, (from Mom's stash,) but it contained mohair and I couldn't wear it. Silly me.

* * * * *

The technique thing has bothered me more than I imagined; I caught myself wondering several times what I would do if I quit weaving. Then jokingly I thought I'd garden. But I remembered the first winter after I left my last full time job, I gardened full time for the month of August, and I enjoyed it so much the following winter I gardened full time for six or seven weeks in the winter creating a rose garden for Ben. So now I'm contemplating giving myself a holiday; for a week or two I might garden all day and not worry about weaving, because there's nothing like weeding and pruning in the crispy mild Nelson winter. Except it's been 14/15 years since those wonderful winters; goodness know how my body will cope. LOL.

But I don't plan on giving up weaving just yet; I've spent too much time and energy learning this craft; that's ten-plus years of my life.

* * * * *

My short-term memory has become so bad, sometimes I have brilliant ideas and get pumped up, then blink or breathe and I forget. Some ideas that don't disappear are too good not to hold on to, but writing/doodling distort or direct them prematurely. I need a new way of saving my ideas.

Parts that Made Up my Week

Well, some of them.

I finished these.

White merino/mohair warp, undyed merino-with-scale weft, it's soft and the design is shown by the different sheen, which I like. This is sold and is going to Scotland.

Same warp, variegated white-to-pale-blue superwash merino weft. (Color below is closer to true on my monitor.) For the number of things going on in the draft, it doesn't show up and I don't know if I'll use this draft again.

The variegation almost hides/disguises the wave pattern close up, which I found interesting; I haven't decided if I like it or not, but it mostly gives different views closeup and from a distance.

I fringed/hemmed some more, and there are eight waiting to be washed; none waiting to be fringed/hemmed. But I'm more interested in weaving at the moment and trying to improve my techniques, particularly the selvedge of pieces wider than 40cm. This is annoying/worrying me so much I have contemplated giving up weaving, but nah, no way.

In between, when the weather and my schedule allows, I am weeding. Our garden is what it is, and I try not to be too discouraged. I've been looking for visual clues to "controlled chaos" to no avail; if you know of websites, blogs, books, please let me know. Cottage gardens are considered almost a hoax in New Zealand; here, especially in Nelson, they are extremely labor-intensive because of our mild, plant-friendly climate, but my uneducated guess is, choosing the right plants and planting in the style of a cottage garden may be the answer? And leaving no negative space, of course.

While I worked, Michael Wood's "In Search of Shakespeare" kept me company. I watched all episodes four times and I want to tackle reading my Riverside Shakespeare cover to cover again. But I might do this in conjunction with audio recordings. Some of his language I understand better when I hear rather than read.

In the last post, I said, "I enjoy time-, energy- and idea-consuming projects." Around that time I discovered this blog, which is just too wonderful not to share. I haven't reconciled how the qualities I love in these dolls can translate into how I work, but who cares!

Life is What Happens while I Think of Interesting Things to Post - The Weaving Part

In between the slow bits I worked. I fringed/hand sewed and washed:

The crawl, or whatever you call it, is a bit big to go around once and small for twice. I also fringed/hemmed these and need to wash:

I threaded the white warp on the big loom in two days, (fast for me,) and sampled and decided which draft to weave with which weft.

Yellow and orange weren't weft candidates but I wanted to check for threading mistakes. I'm nearly finished with a variegated pale blue merio weft piece in this wavy draft.

I wove two pieces on the four-browns warp on Jack and decided on the third and fourth wefts. They will be fabrics.

In A, (left in the top pic,) the weft is an undyed possum/merino/silk; in B I alternated wefts of a taupe in the warp and a gray not in the warp, which accentuated complexity of the two grayer/less brown warps. I'm thrilled with this because the kind of dyeing I've wanted to do is not "making (insert-color)" per se, but producing multiple values or sheen or slightly different hues of a base color. In fabric C I'll use an original white and its three variations of walnut taupe; this is an unlabled, fat, fluffy, udon-like wool, (so knitting yarn?) and I'm yet to fine-tune the beating but not as hard as in the sample. The last fabric will probably be D, the pale taupe also used in the warp. I think.

And I have an idea about what to do on the Klick cashmere mix warp.

* is the warp color.

I should be happy with my productivity, right? Well, yes and no. I'm happy I am making imperceptible dents in my stash. Although this Mom's old-style wool set was a fairly big bag and when I finish the second, two-grays warp, it'll be the end of a nice-sized project. I'm also glad I am accumulating pieces for an online store later.

But beyond that, ummmmm, nah.

First is my technique; you knew this. Technique was never my strong point but lately it's as if my body isn't minding my brain; I'm less dexterous. I recently hemmed, very wobbliy (?), a piece that most definitely should have been fringed. I can't weave as wide as I used to; I can't sit up high enough to be able to see both selvadges comfortably and make sure they're straight. (Loom bench, pedal, and cloth beam's structure/height prevent me from sitting any higher.) I seem to keep putting on, on the big loom, yarns that can't handle the big loom. I can't keep going.

Because I've been focusing more on stash-busting, the yarn choices tend to come first. And for expediency I've been recycling/reusing recent drafts. Of course I change fibers, colors, textures, sheen, scale to make every piece nice, but they are not unique, to me, and because I'm used to good merino and cashmere, not all pieces come out heavenly soft.

We all work in different ways. Mom and I talk about this a lot. I enjoy time-, energy- and idea-consuming projects. And working more like a grownup, in a streamlined, time-saving way dilutes my making, ergo my life. Lately I can't luuurve my pieces, not can I be bothered to loath any, and if you've been around here for any time, you know this is a problem.

Mom said she's been taking fewer pictures when she travels and this is also true for me. With failing memory, fewer new/fresh experiences, and not a lot of records, life seems to lack impact. And I've not, in the past, been a finding-joys-in-small-things kind of a person; I prefer my life to be saturated with sparks, the exact opposite of depression.

I need to find a good in-between place where I can work consistently but still experience brilliant, sparkly joy.

* * * * *

I got to work in the garden Monday and Tuesday. Alright, that's a small-things joy, but it was nice. Like weaving, gardening makes me concentrate on the immediate task. I find that restful.

Life is What Happens while I Think of Interesting Things to Post - The Non-Weaving Part

I've been going through the cyclical "Should I or shouldn't I (continue to blog)" thing, mainly because I've not had an interesting thought in a while, (more in the next post,) yet suspecting I'll continue one way or another because this is good therapy and the only way I will know in the future how I spent my life.

I knew I needed a week or two to recover from visitor-receiving and I had scheduled hibernation/regrouping, but it's taken me a bit longer. I had a day and a half of the old mild-to-moderate depression following three days of rational/considered diagnosis, when I was physically off-the-scale tired but not depressed, because I continued to plan my near-future projects and didn't have insomnia. Besides, I'd not had episodes since 2011-ish so I thought I was over and done with it.

I had other symptoms; any light was too bright, I startled even more easily at the slightest noise, I slept a lot, and I either had no appetite or binged on junk food. Came a week ago Wednesday, I think, when I lied down in front of the fire mid-morning and waited for time to pass.

Tic toc.

Tic.

Toc.

I had a few good books and pretty magazines within reach and opened none.

Luckily it was gone by Thursday morning, so I've been back to my prematurely-aging-sloth self. It hasn't helped that the weather has been sucky; we've had a bit of rain where some days were as dark as early evenings inside; sunny-cold-and-windy ones when I dressed like the Good Year Blimp only to last half an hour outside; and a handful of perfect days when I happened to want to continue what I'd started the previous day, i.e. work, which I thought was sensible, all things considered. I haven't cooked well, I didn't think of collages, and wasn't going anywhere near drawing.

I was happy to discover work was the one thing I could stick with even if/when I'm in a bad shape; if this is my coping mechanism, bring it on.

What else. I thought about people and socializing with no conclusion nor new resolve.

I thought about aging, health and my weight, and have contemplated taking herbal pills to kick start but reached no conclusion; my gardening is no exercise, at least no cardio is involved, so I need to walk more.

I turned 57 eight weeks ago but I keep seeing myself as "almost 60", which in term invites aging-related woes, I suspect. I try not to listen so attentively to my mother's and her friends'/acquaintances' health problems but she is incessant and my body, not my head, appears to empathize/align with her. I remember coming home with new ailments after my trips to Japan.

Come to think of it, when she was pregnant with my brother and I was twelve, I had her symptoms for a month, though I couldn't tell anyone because it was a particularly busy period for my parents.  But what kind of a kid experiences phantom pregnancy at age 12, right?

I look at the mirror often enough, or so I thought, but it's when I see myself through Ben's eyes, or his photographs of me, that I'm truly taken aback and burst out laughing, although that's not his intent. This one's from last night; I call it, "A Whale Resting by Two Wool Swatches." Ben gave me a nice haircut today, though.

The garden continues to overwhelm me as I look for more permanent solutions. I learned from a BBC garden show the phrase, "controlled chaos"; I like this but don't know what it means in the garden and the examples they show are anything but chaotic. Cottage-y at best. Just not in straight lines.

In fact, I'm learning that optimal methods of propagation is different between the UK and Nelson; ours are more basic and easier. Which suits me. And then garden show hosts of course have multiple buildings, material and tools galore, which I don't want, and don't always need in Nelson, so I have to be selective in following advice. There hasn't been a good/permanent NZ garden shows for about a decade now, so I watch UK and Australian shows and go for the middle ground in terms of climate.

One disappointment I discovered only a month or two ago is that in Nelson we are not supposed to have negative spaces; every bit of ground needs to be planted to deprive the weeds of sun and space, or paved/concreted. Over time we've tried some expensive alternatives using newspapers, plastics, rocks/pebbles, tree barks and of course mulching in the past, but they don't stay in a good shape for long. Last weekend we ripped up one such small area to discard the plastic and Ben dug 50cm to get out convolvulus bulbs the size of a small child's head. The weeds went deeper, grew under the worked/covered area, and resurfaced 2 and 3 meters away, so we have to dig up a wide area next.

Yikes.

Warped

It's been an up-and-down week, but I managed some work. I didn't do it in good balance, (not much gardening in spite of three beautiful still, sunny but chilly days,) and I might regret having so many warps on so many looms at once. But I'll live.

I made a warp with the navy version of the previous gray mill-end fine merino, and started wondering what silk to use in the weft. Mom wants an uplifting, light-colored piece; she wanted me to withdraw one of the grays from the Suter but I don't do that, and she's so not a gray person, and I so enjoyed weaving with this yarn, so I'm looking forward to this project.

I made warp of cashmere mixed with a few other things, some of which I overdyed with walnut shells way back. It's on the 16-shaft Klick because one of the pieces is Mom's commission she wants it in a many-shaft weave, and I'm not putting another cashmere warp on the big loom in the foreseeable future. But even on this loom I'm not confident if this yarn can withstand all the ups and downs. I may come to regret this. I need to design a lovely curvy threading to be woven in a straight-forward, regular lift plan. Another piece will be a Thank You pressie. Unless I get so frustrated and cut it off.

I made two warps with Mom's old wool; one in two grays, another in four browns, again some overdyed in walnut shells. I had in mind fabrics, but these wash up so deliciously I may make at least one shawl from each warp. Or two.

The brown warp is waiting to be threaded in Dornick; I have more of the two un-overdyed brown to go in the weft first; haven't thought beyond that.  

 The two grays' weft candidates are waiting to be called up.

I recounted the number of merino/mohair warp ends. 520, not 500 as written down, which makes me wonder how many I have in the black version, which I made immediately before this, and for which I wrote down 500 also. I need to make a few drafts but they will be similar to or modified versions of what I used for the fine gray merino. Or not.

Some nights ago I fringed roughly 55% of this piece; I need to finish this before I forget how many times I twisted each way.

And as long as I'm in a brown mood, (because I'm so not a brown weaver,) I may make one more warp before I sit down to weave. Or not.

Joy Spilled Over to the Weekend

On Friday Maria brought me lemons from her tree and a skein of snow-white silk, wrapped in cute cloth and ribbon; she called my attention to the ribbon but I was so taken by the purple polka-dotted swatch I was speechless. Kath brought us bread to go with my bean soup and apricot squares but you are mistaken if you thought I'd take pictures of apricot squares before getting stuck into them, my dears.

Having an ally like Maria makes me feel confident I will eventually be able to make use of any fabric I weave. Somehow. These are from Mom's stash and interesting in this instance she bought many colors of the same yarn which makes the stash easier for me to use. (She usually buys one skein or one skein each of a few colors.) They are old-fashioned, greasy, scaly wool. The four smaller balls I overdyed with walnuts years ago tell me the resultant cloth will full beautifully.

More stash-busting idea mixing/matching shades/fibers/styles. The four brown at the left, (I excluded the tiny dark brown,) will become another fabric warp.

Next warp, merino/mohair mix, approx 17/2, (110/2 in Kiwispeak;) I usually thread the same size merino from the same source at 18EPI but this yarn doesn't full so I'll start sampling at 20EPI. I had written down 500 ends, but I had 26 inches in the raddle. Humm...

Weft candidates: possum/merino/silk in natural/brown, merino in variegated light blues, and a skinny (78/2 from memory) merino with a little bit of scale. I say a little bit because merino-with-scale as I know/learned fulls far more richly than this one, but it's still a lovely yearn.

I had a great idea for a fourth weft while winding on the warp, then the loom make a cracking sound halfway through, something you might expect if 100 warp ends broke at once. I couldn't find anything unusual with the loom nor a single broken warp, though, so I kept winding gingerly. I might be in for a rude surprise later.

I remembered the fourth candidate when I walked into the stash room but I haven't retrieved it. The stash room hasn't been put back in order and everything is still pushed against the dresser and, well, in chaos as far as accessing/retrieving goes. One reason I haven't remedied this is I have been wondering if/when I will go back to drawing/mixed media, and how much stuff, among them collage material, to keep. I won't ever stop playing with them, but I have accumulated a bit in the years I took drawing lessons, and I know that if I culled them the room would be roomier. Hummm...

Mom told me about a lecture series she found in her neighborhood; a young Japanese anthropologist/film-maker addressing belief systems in Bali. She was so excited and I was so envious I started watching BBC's Lost Kingdom of Central America and Lost Kingdom of South America, some of which were available on a NZ telly channel website. This is curious because Central and South Americas are the last big regions I've become interested in, largely because they never popped up in world history classes when I was a student in Japan, except the Incas, Mayas and the Spanish expansion. But textile-wise, I've been aware they are so important and fascinating.

In one of the episodes a scholar mentioned the iconography on a beer vessel; this one had on the outside motifs from an older, geographically-distant culture which initially developed and promoted beer, but the inside was decorated with motifs from the later, local makers'/users' culture.

And I've been dwelling on the idea of iconography.  

And I've been trying to write a blog post on my Japanese blog on how to wet-finish cashmere and wool. Since Christmas.

And there are eight off-the-loom pieces at various stages of finishedness on the floor.

Hummmm...

Mid-May

Already! It has indeed been an unusual few weeks: my cold, the rain, Mom, Mana. Did I mention the rain? Wellington and the lower North Island had horrendous rain, landslides and flooding. Nelson? Well, lots and lots of rain and a wee bit of thunder and lightening, in between brilliant Sunny Nelson days. But no flooding. And as you can imagine, vigorous growth outside.

In the last week, as I tried to reenter my normal life, I had two too-exhausted-to-cook-up-excuses days, one productive weaving-and-cleaning day, one town/errands day, and today, Kath and Maria, who didn't know each other, came to lunch. Kath's second musical collaboration is being produced in town, and one of Maria's submissions to Changing Threads received an award; the show opened tonight and I hope to read about it on her FB page soon. Great things happening to friends!!

Me, I finished weaving the black-merino-overdyed-with-walnuts warp end, which was longer than I expected and for a minute I thought I might get a proper scarf, but no, it was around one meter. Now I'm wondering if I should make a crowl. 

Mana's Visit 4

Friday was weaving day; she trying to finish the scarf, I putting on a warp for a intriguing weft she brought from Japan. We took a late afternoon break to visit potter Royce McGlashen, a spot of wine tasting, and a walk around the airport at dusk. She finished weaving both projects just before midnight and we had a wee celebration.

 

Saturday we did what was left on her To Do list: the Saturday market, some more shopping, Centre of New Zealand, (her hometown is the geographical center of Japan,) before taking off to Auckland, then on to Hong Kong, Osaka, and home.

I am exhausted after a long month of visitor activities. It's been fun but I have missed my quiet, uneventful life. I hope to get back on my usual weed/weave schedule, but I'm gonna need a few days, folks. 

Mana's Visit 3

Still on Tuesday, after dinner, adrenaline-pumped Mana wanted to learn how to make jam with no added sugar, (cook fruits a little, let it cool, add chia seeds,) so we did that. These late nights are getting harder on this old body, and I've declared to Ben I was planning to sleep all day next Sunday.

Day 3, Wednesday morning, we talked about family, (both our fathers passed away in the last two years,) food and did a bit of cooking. As I type, in the late afternoon, she's weaving her scarf as that progress dictates what we can do tomorrow, her last full day here, and whether she can tackle another small project she brought from Japan.

Tonight on the menu: dinner when Ben comes home, followed by a much anticipated trip to the supermarket.

Mana's Visit 2

Day 2, Tuesday, (can't believe it was only our second day,) we had breakfast at the Suter Cafe, and walked around town, shopping a little, mostly kitchen gadget places but also quite a long time at Carol Priest.

Then Pat brought us to her house for a lovely lunch, (Mana may be blogging about it with pictures,) we looked closely at Pat's tapestries, and then Pat showed Mana how tapestries are woven.

 

We moved on to Pat's newly tidied, (and I mean, tidied, with surreptitious stash gone and a chair, a love seat, and a large desk installed, or they may have existed but were in hiding; something to aspire to, weavers,) where Pat showed her Ikat work, Moorman Technique, Indigo and Kakishibu projects, and a myriad of strange and wonderful yarns Pat's collected mostly from Japan which neither Mana nor I have ever encountered.

Mana was particularly intrigued by the Moorman Technique and it's application on clothing fabric; she was already thinking of a Jacquard at her work capable of this technique.

Me, my brain was overflowing so I concentrated on the boys. Larry said photographing black dogs is no fun because all features disappear; I can verify it's true at least without good sunlight. Poor Dudley.

A wonderful time was had by all.