New York Day 3 (part 1)

On the third day, some of us went to the Cloisters. It is a branch MET that is devoted to the art and architecture of medieval Europe. It sits on four acres of parkland that is absolutely stunning. It was as if we were not on Manhattan Island at all.

Here is our first view
One of our group, Katie, has a frog that she has had for about ten years. He came with us and decided to pose for a few pictures.
Here is one of the inner courtyard gardens. We were there on a nice warm sunny day.
Another view. The columns that support the archways are all topped with different carved gargoyles (for lack of a better name)
They are all very different.

One of the highlights are the Unicorn Tapestries. We were allowed to take pictures but no flash. Apparently one flash can be as bad as months of sunlight. Which is why this photo is so blurry. I was also told that note taking could only be done with pencil. Pens are not allowed. There were about 6 school tours happening simultaneously while we were there and so I was able to follow them around for a few minutes and listen to some of the explanations and descriptions of some of the artwork.
There were many stain glass windows
Here is the Italian Cloister walk.
It was about this time that I figured out how to use the panoramic setting on my camera.
Two different views of the same building.

Tomorrow....Day 3 the afternoon.

New York Day 2

Day Two: The first order of business was to go to Surtex. Surtex was a big Surface Design trade show. Truth be told, there wasn't a whole lot to interest me and the group that I was with quickly went downstairs to where there was a Japanese Design Show as well as a Furniture Design Show. Photographs weren't allowed, so I have nothing to show you from that part of the day. But I will say that some of the things that people are making these days are mind blowing!

At about 2:00, Bron, Katie, and I walked up to Columbus Circle to wait for our friend Cheryl. Cheryl was one of the few in our group who didn't stay in the hostel. Her brother lives in the southern part of the island and so she was able to stay with him.

We did some shopping then headed down to Times Square.
Off to the garment district and more shopping. I have to admit that I only bought a few things. Most of the stores that we were looking in were for a much younger crowd. And I couldn't believe how loud some of the stores were. Loud and crowded. I am very glad that I have never had to work in an environment like that!

And of course we took the subway. Many, many, many times.
Then it was back to the hostel for more beer and snacks on the "terrace"

Tomorrow....Day 3

New York

As Kansas reminded me, I have been a bit remiss at posting lately. For that I am sorry and have no really good excuse. A lot of little piddly ones to be sure. But nothing earth moving.

But I have been busy though and will try to get people up to date with what I have been up to.

First up is the New York trip. 21 of us from the school hopped on a bus early Saturday morning and headed down the road. The group was pretty much evenly divided between adults and students which made for a nice mix. Did I take any pictures of the trip? Nope. This one of Madison Avenue was the first one.
Most of us stayed in a youth hostel. Jazz on The Park was, when all was said and done, a hostel, but it was relatively clean and not too noisy. After midnight. They had a basement "lounge" and once we settled and went for a little walkabout, we all came back and ate whatever we had managed to scrounge up. This is only a small part of our group.

The hostel boasted a continental breakfast, but their "kitchen" had been closed down by the board of health for operating without a licence.
Breakfast was still being served, but it consisted of a bagel, butter, and tea or coffee. The next day, they mixed it up a bit and served jam with the bagel.


Sunday morning a group of us decided to go to the MET. It was on the other side of Central Park so we decided to walk through the park. This was the last picture that I took that day. Because my batteries died. I knew that I had more at the hostel but figured that if we went by a store I could buy some. We didn't go by a store that sold batteries. But much to my dismay, I discovered that evening that I had batteries in my backpack THE WHOLE TIME I was wishing that I had my camera. Sigh.
In any case the MET was amazing. We then headed down to Greenwich village and found a fabulous Indian restaurant that was willing to cater to various allergies. There were six of us and we all picked a dish and shared. It was wonderful and very filling. More wandering and somehow, the others managed to find room for some gelato, and then homeward bound. Or hostleward bound. I stopped and picked up a couple of beer and met some of the rest of the group on the outdoor terrace. Then to bed and a surprisingly good sleep.

Tomorrow...Day 2

Blended handspun

While digging through my stash, I came across some superwash roving that I had picked up on sale. I soon found out why the price was so great. It wasn't roving so much as bits of roving and clumps of fleece. Something needed to be done to make it spinable.
After dyeing it in reds and oranges, I blended it with some silk that I had also thrown in the pot.
This is a DK weight yarn that is so soft and dreamy!
338 yards
Hand blended merino and silk
Hand dyed

Pipers at the Gates

On my way downtown the other day, I came across there fellows out side of a church. This is not an everyday occurrence, but at the same time, neither is it unheard of. I don't know why there were there, or what they were doing ( besides practicing for some even). I certainly wasn't going to interrupt them and ask! But it did sound wonderful and it did make the bright day just a little brighter.

Octomom

In our house, when we cut open a pepper and find those funny little growths inside, we call them baby peppers.
The other day I cut open this orange pepper and found not one or two babies, but eight!
I couldn't resist the octomom comment with all of the media hype surrounding that poor, misguided woman.
The pepper was headed for a sauce.....
I chopped up the babies and chucked them in the sauce too!

Happy Mothers Day to all you mothers.

Another from the vault

Superwash merino and wool boucle warp and merino and silk weft. This one is dreamy!

Legs on my camera

Nicole got a new pair of tights the other day. When I downloaded the photos the other day there were many many many pictures of these blue tie dyed legs! This is a girl who like clothes, unlike her older sister! In fact, the other day when I told Mira that we were going to buy her some new sneakers and Mira moaned (even though she agrees that she is in need of new foot wear), Nicole piped up and said "Mira, you should just go shopping! That way you can get used to it!"
I think that I am going to be in trouble!

Raku

Since Christmas, Mira has been taking a night pottery class. The first part was "pottery for teens" which she didn't like very much because her classmates were more interested in running round the school and socializing than with actually making pots. SO when the second set of night classes were ready to run, she asked if she could be in the adult one. I talked to her teacher and he said that it was fine because she actually had enough focus and was serious enough to be with the adults.

The class was 7 weeks but on the last week they really couldn't make anything so Chris decided to do a raku firing. Raku is a quick firing method unlike the conventional firing methods that take more than a day to slowly bring the kiln up to temperature and then hold it there and then let everything slowly cool off.

The first thing that you have to do is put on protective clothing. The kiln is really hot!
Then using long metal tongs you put the pots in the kiln and shut the door and wait 30 to 45 minutes.
The tongs are grabbed again and the hot pots are taken out and put in a garbage can containing crumpled newspaper and sawdust.

This creates quit a bit of smoke and the newsprint and sawdust catch fire.
After about 15 minutes, the pots are cool enough to be quenched in water where they cool enough to handle and get scrubbed off!
Here is Mira with her pot.
She was not happy that it was her last class until the fall.
But I am taking a raku class this summer! It is part of the Edventures program that is running this summer. I am teaching a temari ball workshop and as an instructor I get a discount on any one workshop that I would like to take.
If you are going to be in the area this summer, you should check out the long list of workshops that are being offered.

Kayak

The other day we took delivery of a couple of kayaks that Uncle Sandy bought for the kids for Christmas.

They arrived well wrapped in plastic. Nicole though that if it was warm enough to be looking at a boat, it was warm enough to be in a bathing suit. It actually was a surprisingly warm day!
Bill made the first cut in the wrapping.
With the help of many hands, the plastic was quickly peeled off.
One final tug and it was free!
Then the paddles and what not needed to be examined.
Everyone is very excited to try them out. We had to restrain people from "trying it out".
Although we did have a flood this year,

there seems to be a distinct lack of water in our back yard. A trial run will have to wait until we are ready to go to the lake.

I don't think I showed you these...

Silk noil boucle scarves that were dyed and woven using three different wefts and treadlings. It is amazing how much different a small change can make!

Pod Making

Last month, I got a call asking if I could make something out of paper suitable for a gallery show. I needed to commit right then and it had to be ready in about 10 days.

I said, "ahhhhh........ OK"

So I started doing some experimentation. A few of the first ideas were not terribly successful. But they were the spring board to my final project.
One of the paper vessels that I made had been made with some coloured fine scrap booking paper. I decided to try my hand at dyeing some paper and somewhere along the way the fact that I had my leaf screen from my leaf pillow project popped into my head.
So I screened a few different types of paper and then dyed them, cut the leaves out and began to play.

I needed a form on which to put my leaves and thought that a balloon would work quite well.
It worked well enough that I started to print and dye my papers. Four sheets in all which I had to cut into smaller sizes to be more manageable. They started out larger than a sheet of Bristol board and ended up being larger than 11 x 17.
The paper was first printed and then I mixed up my dyes and started painting.
First a yellow, then a yellow green
and finally a green. I know my hand looks rather like the undead, but that is the very snug latex glove that I am wearing.
Here is one of the final pieces of paper
and here is the lot of them drying. Thankfully the drying only took a few hours and I was able to start on the cutting and cutting and cutting
The final "Pod" took about a week to make including drying time. There were many many layers of paper and paste and drying was difficult.
But it has given me an idea about something else to do with paper. Maybe next year.

Edit: Please click on the pod picture to make it larger, the colours are much richer and more accurate.

Graperama

One lovely 8 oz skein of merino in DK weight merino.

Oh so yumy!

Back Yard

Some people have flowers in their yards.

Hmph.

Some of us still have snow.

Although there is a show of a promise.

Who knew?

Yesterday some jerk put gum on Mira's seat in the library when she got up for a few minutes. They were her favorite pair of pants and she managed to pick most of it off, but not all. A google search later I had many different suggestions from the ice cube trick (would probably work better if the gum hadn't been ground in and sat on for the rest of the day) to soaking it in gasoline (like I was going to try THAT one!)
One of the easiest methods was to let it soak in fabric softener for 15 minutes and then scrape it off. After weighing the pros and cons of gas vs. fabric softener, I chose the Fleecy.
Now I will admit that I let it soak closer to 45 minutes ( I was weaving and sort of lost track of time) but with a little application of a finger nail and about 5 minutes worth of picking, the gum is gone! The pants are in the washing machine and I hope when they come out of the dryer, it will be like it never happened.
Some kids will still be jerks and I hope they get what is coming to them.

Bathroom Hazard

Bill never has to worry about encountering pantyhose in the bathroom, but he often has to deal with either warps or woven scarves. He never complains about the hazards that he finds in the bathroom whether they be warps, scarves, or skeins.
These four scarves are out of the same merino that I talked about a few days ago. They are three strands of the really fine merino that were warped as one. These will be about 8 inches wide and in pinks, oranges, and red. A little more girly than the blue ones will be.
They are in the cue (or at least will be when they dry).
The cue seems to be getting longer and longer. I really want to have a lot of stock for the Christmas season. But there is something else that is new this year. More on that later!

Fibre Hazard

If I am spinning roving, it usually gets split and dropped into a gift bag that sits of the floor near my spinning wheel. If I am spinning blended fibers that are in batt form, they usually get split a few chunks at a time and chucked on the small table that my computer sits on which is next to where I use my wheel.
Behind my table is a plant stand.
We have many many plants and the usually get hauled outside every second summer or so for a re-potting and a trim if necessary. Sticky, a philodendron, seems to be growing out of control. He is definitely in need of a trim having reached down about four feet to hang just above where I toss my split fleece. I had a good laugh the other day when I realized that Sticky had become a "Fiber Hazard" and had captured some silk and merino that I had blended and had been spinning.

On the loom

I have a series of mixed warp scarves that are slated for the dye pot. These scarves are a mixture of cellulose and protein fibers so that when I put them in an acid dye vat, the silks and wools will dye while the cotton and rayon will remain white or cream. I tried this with one of the mixed warp scarves that I wove last year and was quite pleased with the results. These scarves are one of the instances that I will warp front to back. In these the fibers are silk, silk noil, cotton, mercerised cotton, rayon, silk noil boucle, wool boucle, and a mystery shiny nubby yarn that doesn't dye in the acid dyes.
I have four woven, four on the loom, and four more in the queue. I am trying to get as many warps wound on the lovely large warping mill at the school before classes end. I also would like to get some dyed before I have to switch to my still functional but much more primitive dyeing "kitchen" in the back yard that consists of a 4'x8' plywood table and a hot plate powered with an extension cord.

Call for squares

Please pop over to Warming Grace. When you get there, you will understand why.

In the Queue

I was fortunate enough to get a bunch of really fine merino wool (2/24 and 2/32) for a song. But the thought of weaving something so fine for production leaves me in a cold sweat. Even paying myself a modest $10 per hour, the cost would soon be out of the range of what most people around here are willing to pay if I wove it at its correct sett.
So last summer, I made up and dyed a warp as an experiment. I took three strands of different colours and used it as one warp element. I changed a colour every now and then to get a gradation across the warp. At least that was the plan. Then I quickly slapped some dye on it and steamed it and...... yuck. The colours that I had chosen did not really work very well with the original colours of the yarn. Except for one scarf on one end that was browns.
So I did what I always do when something hideous comes out of the dye pot... I threw it back in. This time it was into a blue vat. The brown end scarf hung over the edge well out of the dye. Unfortunately, this resulted in a slightly felted warp and when I tried to put it on during the Christmas production rush, I decided that I did not have the time nor the patience to deal with such a felted mess at that time. Lease sticks in, I rolled it up and chucked it back into a basket to be dusted off when things were a little calmer. Things were calmer in February, so I set to wind it on my loom front to back.
Most of the warps that I put on are done back to front but I had the opportunity to learn the front to back method about 8 or 9 years ago. Knowledge is rarely a bad thing so I tried the method and decided that for the most part, I liked back to front better. But I did see some applications for the front to back method.
The first is when I am combining two or more warps. From time to time, I will dye two wraps separately and then combine them in stripes.
The second is when I have made a mixed warp by holding a number of different types of yarns as one unit when warping and then separate them when threading. Winding the bunches on the back as one unit and then threading them leaves me with no end of tension issues. Especially as I use many different types of yarn with different amounts of stretch and different amounts of resiliency.
The third is when I have a sticky warp that is mildly felted. It seems to be much easier to strum and stroke the yarns through the reed than to get them to behave going through the lease sticks.
Here are two of the four scarves that came off of that warp. the colours are washed out a bit. So what else is new?

The blue warp that was the first picture is destined for the same treatment. It is narrower than the 12 inch wide scarves that came out of the last batch because apparently men like narrower scarves. And women buy men scarves. Market research is a wonderful thing.

Happy Easter

Even though it is snowing ( here is the weather forecast)

Snowfall warning in effect.

Today

Cloudy. Periods of snow beginning early this morning. Amount 5 cm. Wind becoming north 30 km/h gusting to 50 this morning. High plus 2.

Tonight

Periods of snow. Amount 10 cm except 5 cm over western sections. Wind northwest 30 km/h gusting to 50. Low minus 1.

Monday

Periods of snow ending in the morning then cloudy with 60 percent chance of flurries or rain showers. Wind northwest 30 km/h. High plus 2.

But the egg hunt is on in the house. Or as I prefer to call it, Home War 3. Nothing like chocolate to bring out the greediness in a bunch of children.
As for me, I made a big egg. It was a paper vessel for a show that opened Thursday. Did I get a picture of the final object? Well, in a way. I had a photographer from work take some pictures for me because I needed some good pictures for a submission to another show. And seeing as the deadline was that day, I didn't copy any of the pictures off of the CD that he gave me. As soon as I find my jump drive I can get them from him. Or wait for my CD's to be returned at the end of the month. Or I can go to the Crafts Council Gallery and take a pathetic picture on my own. We all know how great a photographer I am.
This picture makes it look HUGE. It is about 18 inches high and maybe 12 inches across.
Unfortunately, this Easter is not happy for all. My friend Joe had his apartment building burn last week. I know that everyone got out alright and that Joe is fine. I haven't been able to pin him down so I don't know if he found a new place yet. I do know that he was staying in a hotel and that he was wise enough to have tenant insurance. Joe is a collector of artwork and the thought if all of his paintings, prints, photos, drawings and other artwork being damaged is heart-wrenching. Add to that the thousands of books that he had collected, (Joe is a poet and owns a small independent publishing company) and his losses cannot be recovered. His apartment was not burned, but the water damage is extensive.

This is the second friend that has lost their home and/or possessions due to fire in the past year. Add to that my parent's barn and the massive damage caused by the flood last year too many New Brunsickers, and this add up to be a pretty bad year and a very depressing post.

On the bright side, I found a twill sampler in an old copy of "Handwoven" that a friend gave me that is 62 different treadlings for a four harness that uses the standard 1234 threading. I haven't done it yet but I put it on my "to-do" list. If anyone would like a copy, you can let me know, I'll get your address via e-mail, and send you one.

May all your chocolate be yummy! Happy Easter.

Aw shucks.

Thanks to Leigh who granted me this award.

"This blog invests and believes in the PROXIMITY-nearness in space, time and relationships. These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in prizes or self-aggrandizement! Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers!”




I am touched to have been given such an award by someone who I find very inspiring. I have recommended Leigh's blog to several of the weaving students as a great resource. Her posts are always well written and easy to follow.

I am going to pass this this award on to D and T, Dave, Teyani , Valerie, Kansas, F.Pea, and Dani. Thanks for all you help and friendliness. You all make the blogging community a nicer place.

In Like a Cow

The gals are in their new home, and as mom said, they didn't even wipe their feet! They are really dirty from bedding down in hay and now that they are able to bed down in sand, (and soon go outside) they will be cleaner and happier. There are a few things that are not quite finished but they will be able to get done around milking time and once the cows begin to spend more time outside.
Thanks to all for the donations and support. Mom said that she is trying to write thank you letters, but has been finding it hard to find the time. As they say, a farmers work is never done. Or maybe that was a woman's work is never done? In any case, a woman farmer gets no rest what so ever!

Mamoo, you rock!