Reverse Decorating

Packing offers the opportunity to decorate in reverse.
Take away the things that do not relate to the current life.
Here is the scarf collection I've woven since I begin the process of moving.
(Actually there are 3 more I didn't photograph)
These are all Woven Words, bamboo warp and recycled cashmere weft.

Another aspect of reverse decorating is the pack away what you want to keep and create arrangements from the things you want to sell. Any beaded bag collectors out there?

Staging yarn for packing can be decorative as well.


By tomorrow I might discover just how much I have left to do before moving day.

Loom Humor

Who knew what would happen if you dropped the first and last letters from the name TARSES? As I was tossing out paper, I found this old poster from when I was selling at craft fairs. Not wanting to throw away a perfectly good piece of paper, I used it to wind back my last warp in this place. As I was weaving my next to the last warp, I glanced over and couldn't believe my eyes.

Meanwhile at the other end of the apartment...
Quandary: Should I move the cedar chest full or empty?

When I say "I", I actually mean the movers.

Urban Nature

Kai contemplates grub rich rotting stump and bamboo root construction.

A bountiful harvest from the rock garden. This was a wonderful day! It was the perfect interlude between sorting and tossing.


I have finished going through all the old letters, photographs, negatives, greeting cards and postcards. Tomorrow I will ship off photographs and memorabilia to original owners. I have no more words.

I thought I would take pictures of it all, but I have been too absorbed.

Next Tuesday night I will be sleeping in my new apartment....

Festival of Moving Rock Garden Bloom Immanent

As a "virtual" gardener, I thought I would show off the volunteer poppies that crept into my rock garden. Unable to decide what to do with some beads I collected over the years and all those "special" pebbles (I'm still pondering my shells), I scattered them throughout the garden. When my favorite young lad visits on Friday while his mother digs up a little of the black bamboo, I will give him a special treasure hunting basket.

It may not seem like I am staying on target, but I am totally focused on the Festival of Moving.

On Friday in celebration of summer and 18 happy years in my apartment, I am planning a mini-Potlatch. If I get it together, I will make it "virtual".

The dictionary says:

A ceremonial feast among certain Native American peoples of the northwest Pacific coast, as in celebration of a marriage or accession, at which the host distributes gifts according to each guest's rank or status. Between rival groups the potlatch could involve extravagant or competitive giving and destruction by the host of valued items as a display of superior wealth.

[Chinook Jargon, from Nootka p'achitl, to make a potlatch gift.]

A mini-Potlatch stops well short of competitive giving and destruction of valued items

On the Other Hand....

It was time to take a little break from sorting, packing, and even weaving to get this piece THREADS OF TIME shipped out for an upcoming show, "High Tech--Low Tech" at the Oregon College of Art and Craft in the Hoffman Gallery from July 3- August 28th.

The center "thread" is tencel from Just Our Yarn, and the other two "threads" are ikat dyed bamboo from Habu. All of the yarn is leftover from weaving projects. All of the yarn is wrapped around matte board shapes.
I love wrapping yarn. It is the perfect blend of mindlessness and mindfulness.

I hear a file drawer calling me....

Piles

As I move through my soon to be old apartment, I notice stuff starting to collect into piles.

Here is a small pile of un-knitted cashmere scraps. If there is a spinner out there who wants me to save and send thses, let me know.

Then I have piles of thrums. This pile happens to be mostly bamboo although I have silk thrums and chenille thrums galore. If anyone has use of colorful thrums, now is the time to let me know. I will happily send for the price of postage.

Ah, now cashmere sweaters are piling up again. These will get sent East to the Un-knitting Factory.
I am not moving far, but I am moving deep. I am excavating papers. (some of which go back almost 40 years). The blue bag is recycle, and the white with red letter is shredding

The things on the shelf have made it through the first cut. As I progress, I get more ruthless and have to empy the bags more often. I have 8 file drawers full and several loose boxes of memorabilia and photographs. Compress!

INSPIRED BY BONNIE

I am so excited to present the latest 2 in the "Inspired by Bonnie" column!

WOVEN WORDS present a novel way to introduce color into a woven shawl.

In talking with my friend, the word comfort kept coming up and I felt led to weave that for her. So here is the

COMFORT shawl.

Kimberly
Click over to her blog for more delicious pictures, details, and praise.

My experience with woven words:

I am an experienced weaver and love to weave with many colours.

Whenever I visited your blog I was always impressed by the horoscope and woven-words cloths.

I usually try to make the colours flow in my weaving.

What I like about woven words is the very unexpected arrangement of the colours and the way they harmony. What pleased me is that I do not have to bother the colours look nice.(or not) They are just there and they will find there own place and they look nice.

About the sett. 20 ends per inch feels perfect with the material I have woven with. I am glad you tried 18 ends per inch and considered 20 an inch the best, so there is no need for me to try another sett.

Greetings,

Irma

So finally both cloths are finished and I like them both. The red/pink one is warmer and woven with wool.

The turquoise one was woven with two threads of thin silk and is more a summer shawl.

They both have a very good drape. I think the silk one will wrinkle a bit while wearing, the woollen one doesn’t wrinkle at all. It was nice to do the woven-words weaving. Thanks again for all the information.

Irma

Virtual Packing

As I continue to weave, I am sorting and packing in my mind. Hopefully this will translate into a seamless move.

I have gotten carried away with my close-up lense. When I use the cashmere for the weft, I triple the strands. Whereas I love this picture, I do not love the single dark strand.

So I switched to 3 lighter strands. I kept a little bit of the dark in there. I may or may not take it out once I have finished the weaving.


I hope to complete this scarf today, so it's time to get back to the loom. Plus the sun has actually just come out. Most people around the Northwest will be glad, but chilly rainy weather encourages indoor activity--the very thing in which I am engaged.

Back to work!

Moving Spirit

A lush experiment completed
From left to right:
All the warps are Bambu 12 (each end doubled)
1. Sett 24 epi (before wash) 7 1/4 x 72 (after wash) 7 x 63
2. Sett 20 epi (before wash) 8 1/2 x 76 3/4 (after wash) 7 3/8 x 66
3. Sett 18 epi (before wash) 12 3/4 x 76 (after wash) 11 1/2 x 67

I know I wondered if the shrinkage would be greater with a looser sett, but I didn't notice a great difference. Anyone good enough at advanced calculations could figure out the relative shrinkage.

All the wefts are un-knitted cashmere sweaters tripled. I am sorry you can't feel them. I know you would agree with me that the 20 epi feels the very best. (soft, resilient, and loft)

I'm almost finished weaving Jane's words LOVE, HEALTH, GRATITUDE. I decided to sett at 20 epi

Meanwhile I am trying to decide on the weft for Marjorie's words LOVE, HUMOR, NATURE

Concerning my impending move: I signed a lease yesterday. Here is the floor plan of my future home. It is quite a bit smaller than where I am living now, but this will be my opportunity to simplify.

Condominiums include studios, live-work spaces, lofts, and one- and two-bedroom condos. There are 153 units ranging in size from 340 to 1,066 square feet. There’s also 8,800 square feet of street-level commercial space housing 5 businesses.

To encourage social interaction, there is a 14-seat theater, fitness center, library/lounge with gourmet kitchen, several gardens with rooftop views and waterfalls, an art studio/hobby room, Pea Patch and a billiards room.

Moving--Step 1--Virtual Yard Sale

I had to start somewhere, so I just went through all of my weaving and crafty type books. These are the ones that will not make the move with me. I just looked each one up on Amazon to get the bottom and top price for all of these used titles. I thought I would give you first pick in my first ever Virtual Yard Sale.

Terms: Negotiable. Buyer pays shipping.

Taking Stock and Loose Ends

As I was thinking about packing, I started to wonder about what all of the cashmere would look like in a big pile on the floor. The big red ball in the lower left is a little bigger than a baseball. I have already used the cashmere to weave 11 pieces. My mother sure like to keep her hands busy (grin). I have 16 more sweaters ready and waiting for my next visit.

Oops, I accidentally erased the picture show the next Woven Words off the loom. I will show you more on this, but I kind of liked this picture. Here we see 3 different setts: left 18 epi (unwashed), top right 20 epi (washed), lower right 24 epi (washed)

It is too late for me to wash and dry the 18 epi piece, but I can't wait to do that tomorrow. I will wash and dry it exactly like I did the other two.

Ta Dah!

It's really real! I looked out my window today and saw the sold sign. I knew it was in the works, but until you actually see the sign....I couldn't bring myself to give you a blow by blow account. All I could do was go back to the looms and begin to weave off everything on my "to do" list.

Stay tuned for the next segment---where will I be living a month from now? Will Grace and Gary be happy in their new home? How much will I have to dematerialize?