Put To Good Use

At the end of this month the Chilliwack Spinners and Weavers Guild is saying goodbye to two valued members. Both ladies are moving to new communities where they will be closer to family members. We will miss them here, but wish them well in their new adventures.

As always seems to happen with a move, some downsizing and purging is done. I was the recipient of one departing member's destashing of some cotton yarns. I'll put them to good use! I made the above fringed cowl using a lovely cotton/linen yarn that was part of that destashing. It was put up on bulky large core cardboard tubes and I felt the best way to store that was to not store it at all, but to use it immediately.

I'm going through the smaller remnants of cotton with a similar thought, making up mixed colour warps to empty as many of the cardboard cores as I can. The first warp is for a run of plain weave towels in colours I'd not likely want to use for clothing.

I also pulled a few colours that happen to coordinate well with the floral print of pinafore I sometimes wear. This Inkle band will be made into another interchangeable band for my medical information tag.

Thank you ladies for the time you've spent with the guild and the service and friendship you have provided. You shall be missed.

A Start

It may not be much, but then I'm not much of a gardener!

Over the years all of the flowering plants and shrubs that were here when we moved in have gradually been removed. My husband is a great lawn guy. Our lawn always looks golf course pristine, but he's not much for anything that gets in the way of the lawn mower. That means that whenever landscaping renovations are done plants are removed but are not replaced. Tulips are mowed down before they have a chance to store energy for the next year's blooming.

I love flowers but not gardening so I've never dared complain much. I miss the flowering shrubs and my big magnolia tree. I understand why they had to be removed but I miss them.

A few weeks ago my husband brought home a 1/2 wine barrel to use as a planter. I went out and bought plants for it today. Knowing next to nothing about plants other than a passing acquaintance with a few plant names, I chose a "Yellow Canna Cannova" (Calla Lilly) as the tall feature plant in the back, 3 geraniums (violet, white, and a white-to-pink) in the mid-ground, and at the front a cascading petunia and some sort of cascading vine (lost the tag).

Hopefully the plantings will all do well and will fill out and be a pretty "welcome home" by our side gate. I consider it a learning experience. We'll see how they do and change up our choices next year if need be.

Monsoon Calamity Indulgence

I was given a lovely gift of a huge 1050 yard cake of MonsoonCalamity gradient yarn in the "I Must Be Crazy" colourway. It's a fingering weight yarn made up of 4 finer strands held together. The colour changes gradually throughout the ball.

As soon as my loom was free I wound a warp to coordinate with it.

I put a few stripes of the gradient yarn into the warp and then for the remainder of the warp I chose mercerized cottons that harmonized with it.

The warp was then woven with the lovely gifted yarn as weft, keeping the colour gradient in order.

Final result after wet finishing is 16" wide x 4.72 yards in length. Or in metric terms it is 41cm in width and 4.32 metres in length.

I haven't decided yet what to make with the finished yardage. I think ti could be lovely clothing of some sort. It's soft, has great drape, and washes up beautifully by machine.

Wardrobe of Wristbands

The jewelry findings I have been waiting for for months have finally arrived. Now some of the Inkle bands I've been weaving can be made into wristbands that will work with my medical ID bracelet.

The lobster clasps hook into both sides of the information disk making the bracelets interchangeable. 

The information portion sits relatively hidden on the underside of my wrist,

While the more decorative Inkle band shows on the top. 

I've made beaded versions before but the Inkle band ones are incredibly comfortable and are easy and inexpensive to make.