03/12/2015

It has been too long since I posted on the blog. I have been working very hard on some handwoven bracelets. I've had a lot of epic fails but I did get a couple of nice pieces out of the deal. I even bought myself a special bracelet loom.

I'm planning on starting back at the St. Augustine old city farmers market on Saturdays, at least every other Saturday starting this weekend.   Wish me luck.

Here are a few pictures of what I did come up with.

One of the problems I'm having is the figuring out the finished size of the bracelet along with the added in fastening. I also have to take into consideration how much the technique I'm weaving has in take-up. Sometimes you can lose up to 30% of your weaving with work face take up. So I ended up with some that will very much be children's bracelets,  as they turned out too small for an adult to slip over their hand.

On this one I tried a little inlay technique. 

The first one you see here is a lead slips on to an adult's arm. The one you see on the right has charms all the way around it and it is so stinking cute. But it is only big enough for a child to slip onto their arm.

A choker or two made it into the mix also.

I really love this blue and purple together.

And of course I also had to add in some natural elements. I made these buttons from slices of tree limb. Juniper/Cedar of course.

I absolutely love these glass beads for the closure.

And here we have another one with the Cedar button…

Ii got a thread crossed on the backside of this next one. But I made it for myself anyway. So I just hide the flaw on the inside and wear it anyway. It just slips over my wrist no closure.  This technique creates a very heavy boardy/stiff         fabric.  So I just sewed the ends together and slip it onto my arm. It is so heavy in fact the sewing machine really didn't like working with it.

And we all know how much I love to do scrolls. I will indeed be doing more bracelets. I'm trying to find something where I can finish one or two in a day versus 1 a week. 

The baskets and the weaving handbags are much more time-consuming so we'll see how it goes. Stay tuned there will be more prototypes coming.

8/25/2014

Trying a technique that I have only done once before.

It is called 2 heddle intermesh and i got my info from laverne waddington's 2 nd book!  Find her here http://backstrapweaving.wordpress.com.

This technique allows me to put a motif on a weaving with a solid background no stripes, or dots in the background.

Started off kind of wonky, but by the time I got to the second motif I was on a roll!!!

And it is somewhat reversible also.  It just depends on the design/motif.

My second 'pebble weave'!

July 1, 2011

I tried all kind of new skills today.  I warped a circular warp on my new warp board.  That little board works like a charm.  I used a new method of lease sticks, also worked like a charm.  I made three sheds, one plain weave, pebble one and then pebble 2.  I only had one tiny mistake...two crossed warps in the same shed, fairly easy to fix compared to redoing the entire shed system.  And here are the results.

Here is the new warp board with my circular warp on it.  Please notice how straight the pegs/bolts are.  Absolutely no leaning (which means consistent tension)!  I warp tight too, so this is a wonderful wonderful thing!

Here you get to see my new 'lease sticks'.  The metal rings make this so much easier than tying bow's with string.  Less waste also.  Another plus.  These are just shuttles that I made years and years ago from Home Depot paint sticks.  Free is good too.

Here you see that I am all warped up and ready to go.  The lease sticks are now on their side and tied to one another.  This keeps my plain shed wide open, very easy to get the sword inside.  You also see string heddles on pebble shed one and pebble shed two. 

I am tied onto the dresser, but once I am off and running my feet will brace the stick that the blue band is tied to.  This is why I did the circular warp.  It is actually twice as long as what you can see on the top.  Now, when I have woven as far as I can reach, I will rotate the warp around so that I can weave some more.  So I never have to roll up the woven part closest to me.  This way when I want to I can brace the furthest bar with my feet and the warp never changes length.  It just rotates around the bars.  This makes me part of the loom and self sufficient.  I won't need to try out what to tie up to a sturdy fixed object (it needs to very strong for those who are not aware), which can be difficult to find at times.

 

Here you get to see my nice clean shed! 

Here you get to see the 'Pebbles'!  My head is gonna bust I am so excited.