Color & Grayscale

There were a couple of requests for a picture in color of the yarns I dyed for my tapestry class. Here they are in both color and grayscale. Digital cameras are the best!

I need a couple of high and low contrast colors. Looks like I have just what I need.

Revisiting an Old Friend

It's time for a new project...most of my looms are empty and I am getting over that feeling of loss that I get when I have finished a big project. I will post a picture of my finished tapestry called Window to the Sierras after the conference in March. Don't want to ruin the surprise for those special folks who have signed up for the Visalia ASCH conference.

Now it's time to see what my new sixteen harness loom can do. One reason I bought it was to get better definition and have more freedom than with the eight harness in designing patterns. I am going to make a bookmark with a similar setup as the ones I have done previously just making those changes which occur due to twice as many harnesses.

So here is my first draft of the new beetle pattern I designed, it's a Aristobia beetle from Thailand. I also expanded the double diamond pattern I was putting on the top and bottom of the bookmarks I woven last year.

Rule one with taquete weaving...make sure you have enough heddles on your tie up shafts before warping. I need 62 heddles on shaft 1 and 16 if I want to make bookmark...but since I want to make two...one for me and one for you...I have to go order some more.

Off to Village Spinning....

A Better Value Scale

Well, I dyed some more yarn to achieve a better set of value contrasts. Here is a picture with the results. Much better than what I had before.


The Createx 'black' that I dyed in the lower right pushed to a lovely dark green. I also dyed a marine blue and a violet which came out quite close in hue and value. They were Createx dyes also. The Havana browns, from a procion dye, turned out to be lighter values than I expected. So not having enough low values I used up some leftover Rit dark brown to get the dark brown in the lower left.


The upper left is a light blue grey which was the base yarn. It's a 12/2 silk which I cooked overnight at low in a crock pot per Sara Lamb's suggestion prior to dyeing.


So now, all I need to do is warp my baby shannock tapestry loom at 10 epi and I am all ready for my tapestry workshop in March.

Colors to Soothe the Soul

Here are the first results of my dyeing using the leftover dyes from the Sara Lamb class I took last week. The yarn is 100% silk.

The colors from right to left are yellow, turquoise, orange, scarlet and trash green. The photo is true to the colors...so what was called yellow turned out green. I assumed this happened since the silk was not white it was more of a blueish grey. Of course, there could have been contamination of the yellow - - it was a long and somewhat messy class! The trash green was an amalgamation of any dyes folks used which where greenish. They all went into one bucket. I also have some trash red...which I dyed the next day.

I like the colors but was hoping for more contrast. Turns out all the colors I dyed are pretty much the same value. Check out the black and white photo of the yarns all balled up and ready to be woven. I will definitely need to dye up some dark colors before the tapestry class in March. I need a couple of high contrast colors. I am thinking of a rich purple and perhaps a dark green.

Sara Lamb Workshop

Here are my completed dye samples from the Sara Lamb workshop I took this weekend. Quite a few samples for a day and half.

I decided to put my samples on a key chain - like a painter's sample book. I find putting anything from a workshop into a notebook is the kiss of death. Once in that notebook on that shelf - all it will do is gather dust until we move. By putting the finished samples on a key chain hanging in plain sight I will now have another useful tool for my endeavors.

In lieu of painting a warp in the afternoon of the second day, I took some sample leftover dyes home. So, now it's time to dye up some tapestry yarn for the next workshop!