February 2020 Newsletter

​The snow melted in the nick of time for many of us to make it to our January 18 meeting! A few discoveries made during this week of snow covered isolation: I can shovel snow. Snow is heavier when it’s starting to melt. When the best choice is to stay inside, I can weave a towel in an afternoon, and sew the finishing edge on a rug in a day. I discovered I can weave on my rigid heddle loom while a small dog naps on my lap. Even though daffodil fronds are very cute poking up through a blanket of sparkling white, I’m glad it’s gone. Even though shoveling snow for an hour earns 10 WW fitness points, I’m glad it’s gone. Even though I wove two towels and a scarf while “trapped” inside, I’m glad it’s gone. Even though my new snow boots tested well for warm and dry in the snow, I’m glad it’s gone.

Before the snow, when people could still travel, I had help getting 10 yards of warp on my 8-shaft loom, for a block twill towel project. This is the structure we’ve been weaving as a group at the Jansen Center, but I had not done a block twill project at home for a couple of years. The draft is from Madelyn van der Hoogts’s Weaver’s School samples and creates an optical effect. Block twill is a straightforward threading and I have a system for managing the threading units, so imagine my consternation when I made a major mistake threading the blocks! After taking out three-fourths of the threads, rearranging the heddles and re-threading, the pattern is worth the wait. An extra block appeared somehow in the treadling of the first towel. After that I took a break to rewrite the treadling diagram larger and clearer, and tape it to the castle, with a pencil handy for marking off each block as I weave it. This is not a pattern that lends itself to a lot of playing around with stripes and color variations so it is a good discipline practice for me, using just one color for each towel. 
After the snow, a small group of WWG members traveled north and were welcomed by the Greater Vancouver Weavers Guild. Toby Smith presented a delightful slide talk, showing the way that stories can inform the design of our ordinary weaving, embedding information about home and the visual experiences of travel. We plan to invite Toby to present a program for the WWG in 2020. In the meantime, thinking about color and story, I am working on my 2020 Color Challenge project, based on Linda Rees’s yarn wraps. I am eager to see what everyone creates! 

At home, or out and about, here’s hoping that your projects are satisfying, your companions are compatible, and your boots are dry.

Warmly,

Carol Berry,
2019-2020 WWG President

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