Mistakes are Often Useful

Ah, mistakes are often useful. I wove about two inches of the lower beetle and discovered a mistake, an obvious one, about a half inch into the piece. The mistake was in that boring section...the solid blue part at the beginning...where it was hard to pay attention - I seem to fall into a zen state and forget what I am doing. I actually don't forget what I am doing, I actually think I am doing what I should be doing...but I'm not. So, in lieu of ripping it all out...I mulled it over for a day or so and decided to change the pattern. Now future bookmarks will have two different beetles with a diamond in the center. This pattern comes out with bookmarks five inches long without fringe. They seem to maintain good visual interest and there are no long solid sections to send me into boredom. I really like this much better than the previous set up. I have one more tweak to the basic pattern and hopefully I will then have everything set to go.

I did a count today...only 112 days until I need to send 20 bookmarks in. Plenty of time! I like to have all my patterns set up so I can just weave away and watch the beetles form as I pass the shuttles back and forth.

Ah, you might wonder how is the knitting going...well, nowhere quite yet. I did sign up for the Knitting Olympics at the Yarnharlot. I said I would knit my entire sampler between the opening ceremony of the Olympics and the close. Have no idea whether that is possible...oh well, it is always good for me to have a deadline.

For example, I have a tapestry, half finished, on my counterbalance loom which has been there for over a year. No deadline - no progress this year. My rigid heddle has been warped for a long thin tapestry of my mother. The yarn has been selected and the cartoon completed. No deadline - no progress this year. I have a lovely empty Shannock loom in my living room just waiting patiently for something...no deadline - no progress. But my Small Format - Grand Idea tapestry is due for mailing in 68 days - finished almost 2/3rds of it this weekend and am considering doing another to see if I can do it better!

Deadlines are good... for me.