a snowball?

well, i managed to squeeze all of the alpaca on the drop spindle, and it doesn't look so much like a drop spindle as a softball with an antennae (or a jack in the box head). i wound it off, skeined it, and fulled it, and now have a lovely bundle of white alpaca laceweight.

i've been playing with the idea of dyeing it a soft aubergine with cochineal, but figured perhaps the white plainness may work in my favor. maybe. just guessing really. not going on any data to back this hypothesis up. we'll know in a month though, won't we?

the muslin sacks are all sewn up, corded, and tagged. it's a good thing i thought of labeling, as they're mostly indistinct from one another. i feel almost like a bank robber with sacks of money; hey, it's what they look like to me.

after picking up some color grown cotton roving yesterday, i'm down to two empty sacks. hmm. luckily i have enough cord and material for several more, and they're quick and easy to sew up.

little weavings

i've been struggling with my last couple of warps. i get an image in my head, not clear or precise, just go with it, and put planning aside. pretty much just warping first and thinking about the weft later. with this set of weavings it worked out well, as i was able to experiment with a variety of warp threads and techniques.

using a fine paper yarn and a strip of bunny fur created a light, tiny weave with open spaces woven in silk. i need to frame this one, but am still working on that part.

this one was a mixture of kasuri remnants from a previous piece; very speckled.

the curly weft threads all but lost the linen warp, which is cool, as it brought focus to the pile weavings. it was quite fun to try these surface embellishments, hopefully i can use them in future pieces.

linen on linen can be boring, but the pattern really comes through, and the shots of cochineal dyed cotton add interest.

this yellow thread was really fun, so chunky, and made the pattern huge compared to the first one. i played with some pile weaves and a chain stitch like weave in purple yarn.

there was a tiny bit of warp left, so i finished off with some cottolin and bamboo.

i have another linen warp now on the loom, but i'm a little lost as to what weft will be going on it. i had wanted to use a tsumugi silk yarn, but it completely overwhelms the warp, so i need to do some planning. i shall spin some wool, and think some more.

the last of sweet things

well, i've eaten the last of my malebranche matcha cookies today. i decided to make an occasion of it, and made some fresh sencha extra green tea (a blend of my gift of sencha from the ladies of the cafeteria from when i was in kyoto, and matcha tea from ippodo). i paired the cookie with a frosted rice cracker, served up on my grandmothers' noritake china.

i like the play between the lines of the cracker and those of the tea pot, as well as the white and green balancing. i've had two cups of green tea everyday lately, usually between breakfast and lunch; it sets me up to go out and work in the studio.

although matcha is my favorite flavor in baked goods and icecream, genmaicha tea has quickly become my favorite drinking tea, and mixing it with matcha to make it extra green is quite delicious!

space to work in

ah, photos. what would the internet be without them. everything in the studio is coming along nicely now, so i thought i would introduce you to my new/old "dyeing laboratory and weaving studio":

the dye laboratory and tea brewing station.

skein winder, gokoh, and kasuri shifter.

ze loom, with the new addition of jazz bands to prevent floating harness syndrome.

my workstation, complete with idea/inspiration board.

now that smell (japanese incense courtesy of lisn), sight, and touch (sheepskin bench cover) are taken care of all this space lacks is sound. i was hoping to get the vers 2x for my ipod, but they're not manufacturing them again until spring. phooey. so i'm on the hunt to find one, and haven't had any success thus far, as they didn't produce any this year.

gifts to exchange

at the last fiber guild meeting, we did a little handmade gift exchange. as i didn't have anything on hand, i needed to create something. and, as so often the case, i waited till the last minute to do so. so, the evening before, i got out the sewing needles, buttons, and small scraps of cloth, and decided to make a cloud pin with a raindrop embellishment. i kept things simple, and took an idea which i had worked on in japan; to line up the button holes with the holes on the pin backs i use, and to sandwich the button between two bits of cloth which can be trimmed to whatever shape one likes.

when gift wrapping, i like to repurpose, as it makes things more interesting that way. so the paper i wrapped with was packing material used to cushion glass, and the bow was made from candy foil.

the button sandwich pin needs more development, but the clean lines you can achieve is quite nice, and the simplicity lends itself to minimal embellishment. i quite like the look of the aerated paper as well, and luckily, i need to order another beaker, so, yay, more wrapping material!