Aletta's Guitar Strap

This sweet strap was originally a custom order. Unfortunately, the individual changed her mind at the last minute about what colors she wanted. But no worries! My soul sister exclaimed I love pink!

In some ways this strap was a challenge because of the color combo. Rarely do I work with pink as a main color. But overall I think the strap is perfectly funky with its addition of orange and purple.

The recipe: handwoven on an inkle loom, 100% percent cotton yarn, 5 colors, plain/simple weave, handmade leather fobs with handstitching, machine stitching to attach slider and loopers.

Aletta, enjoy, and hope to see this strap in action soon!

 

Posted with Blogsy

Golden Yellow Border Guitar Strap

Golden Yellow Border Guitar Strap

This strap was woven on a inkle loom. It measures 2" in width.

The weaving technique is called plain weave. That kind of makes me laugh,

because plain weave can be composed of the most awesome colors! Not plain at all!

100% cotton! Colors: Golden Yellow, Olive Green, Off White, Cinnamon, & Rust.

Front and Back of strap, leather fobs need slits cut in!

Handmade leather fob w/ handstitching (made by me), black plastic slider and loopers.

The Full Strap

This strap can be adjusted 33" to 57".

This sweet strap is up for grabs, contact thru FB, etsy, or email!

Slider Close Up

Posted with Blogsy

Dad's Guitar Strap

First, I want to say thank you to the wonderful folks that have left feedback at my Etsy shop. I am starting to finally have more sales there and it makes me smile to know that the woven key fobs and trims that I make are starting to travel around the U.S.! And as always, thank you to my dear friends for supporting my weaving habit!

Dad's Guitar Strap

A few months back I posted some photos of wider bands that were intended to be guitar straps or sturdy bag straps. Then the requests came from family members, and then a few more from friends. I've finished a series of 7, and now I have 3 more to finish and then I am ready to get back to designing more key fobs.

close up of pattern detail, the front side.

My dad had been asking for a strap for awhile. I settled on adapting a pattern from Manual de Telar Mapuche. I placed it in the middle, and added combs on the side (I love, love comb designs)! The pattern is a 15 pattern pick up design and was easy to memorize. This band was woven on an inkle loom.

The Strap!

Here is the funny (sort of) story behind this band. My little guy, who has been practicing his scissor skills, decided he was going to "practice" on this band. I have no idea when he did it, but it sent me into a panic, because the strap was hanging with other for sale pieces. Luckily, he didn't cut any other bands.

close up of pattern detail, the back side.

Sadly I showed my dad, and said I would have to make another one. My dad, who can work a sewing machine told me what to do, and we were able to repair enough of it to squeeze a length of strap out of it. I also think, for him, there is a "mark" there, my son saying here I am, and my dad wanted that in the piece.

The strap (100% cotton) and leather hardware.

I made the leather hardware and did the hand stitching on them. So that's the story behind this band. And my dad loves it! Stay tuned for more bands!

 

Posted with Blogsy

Nalbinding and Change

The end of 2014 and the beginning of 2015 has been a whopper. I can't say that anything has been "bad", but difficult might describe it better. I have had to summon an extreme amount of patience, with the occasional melt down, but it the end, it reinforced the changes I've been working on for some time were appropriate, and well, needed.

But first, a beautiful picture! I had a friend come in from the east coast (who is now moving to the west coast). Seeing her did tremendous things for my heart. I love you dearly B and I can't wait for the opportunity for a road trip to see you. We went for some hiking, I'd never been to Bandelier, so here is a beauty taken at dusk. I wished I'd had a different camera lens with me, as this shot is narrow.

And because I'm (lazy), I'm not editing any of my photos, just don't have the time right now.

So what's all this talk about? Change? Pretty much for the past 3 years I've been on a declutter mission. I kind of don't like that word, declutter, it's kind of trendy right now. I used to call it "yard sale" or "let's get rid of some things" but after not one but two neuro-diverse diagnoses in our home, decluttering on multiple levels had to happen. And wow, it did make a difference.

So I committed fully at the beginning of the year to continue. But now I was getting down to the stuff that needed contemplation. Honestly, I am sick of cleaning stuff that just sits around and has no function. I do love beautiful things, but if I had a choice between my boys or dusting, I am choosing my boys. Also the hard decision came to selling some of my fiber arts equipment that I just was not using. So, yeah, it's gone. Most of the stuff I have is portable, but I did keep my rug loom, and a navajo weaving loom.

Then something happened that devastated me completely for a week or so, until I blocked it out. I had to think about it again last week as I sent it off for assessment. And I cried,

Every two weeks I back up everything on to an external hard drive. And in my "rushing" I didn't put the drive back in the safe.

My little guy, picked it up, and dropped it in a bucket of mop water.

15 years of digital files gone. Yup, every single picture. Baby pictures, everything. Years of genealogy work. GONE.

The photos and the genealogy stuff really was the only stuff that mattered. Our whole music library was on there too, but that is "replaceable".

All I can say is IMPERMANENCE.

And to keep it going, some of my online accounts were hacked, had to spend a week changing all those freaking passwords. And last week my brand new iphone just died. Everything on there, GONE.

What I am choosing to think is FRESH START.

Okay, so enough whining.

I see I have some catch up of projects. I decided I had to go all crazy and make a pair of nalbind socks in November last year. Knee high nalbinding! Mammen Stitch (Finnish Stitch 2+1). This was my first project in nalbinding. I wished I'd done a different type of heel. Worsted weight wool yarn. I will need to make a pair of garters for them. Who says only reenactors get to wear garters! I will be wearing these under my jeans!

So that's it for now! Not my usual packed with details kind of post, but at least some pictures!

Meandering Tablet Weaving

Note: this draft of a blog post has been sitting for quite some time. These bands were done in August or earlier, and some have been sold already. I wanted to add links, but I unfortunately can't find the time! We've been back and forth to the hospital with both my sons, and sadly my oldest is still in there :( I've become completely unreliable at doing anything in a timely manner! But my sons are worth it!

I keep waiting for a "break" from my daily happenings. And I do get a few here and there, and I quickly set up my backstrap tablet weaving project to weave a few rows. But both my kiddos have the cold virus with croup. We've never had croup before, and wow, it's terrible. So weaving time is out. I hope to catch up on reading, writing back, and a couple blog posts that have been sitting in draft for awhile.

Morning Weaving the first of my images that I saw at Pinterest! Whoop!

I thought I better get this blog post started because, for the first time, someone pinned one of my images to Pinterest. I hadn't started pinning my images yet, for I didn't think I had enough readers, but two individuals actually shared my photo on Facebook, one person I don't know, but I am sending a thank you to Annie for sharing (as I suspect that may have led to pinning, lol!).

But before I get into the details, I have to tell you I was about to give up on Facebook, for my weaving and my personal page. I don't want to install another app for messaging, and I rarely use the laptop/home computer (I would have to wait on line for a turn, lol). I've stopped using twitter (need to delete that permanently) because I could not figure out how to "use" it. I made my Instagram account private, as I watched Instagram delete people's for apparently no reason, and now I rarely accept new people unless I recognize their name from somewhere. Generally, I find Facebook a time waster (no offense), but there is one group that saved me from giving up.

The Historical Tablet Weaving Group is, well, downright awesome. Most everyone is a happy bunch, and it is fantastic seeing everyone's weaving and learning. And if you're looking to weave something historical accurate in certain time period, this is a great place to start.

Anyway, that's about it for my technical updated! Almost everyone is done with their withdrawal from me cutting off the cable tv in our home!

.kivrim/running dog.

I wanted to actively start doing what I call two-pack tablet weaving. One pack moves one direction, the other moves in the opposite. What better place to start than with Kivrim (I affectionately call it meandering) and Rams Horn variations. And wow, the sky is the limit for patterns on the internet.

.running dog/kivrim, in wool.

.running dog/kivrim, in cotton.

I started with a basic Kivrim often called Running Dog. Then I moved onto the classic Rams Horn, and then it's variations. I used this opportunity to sample the following yarns: size 10 crochet cotton, sabanilla weight churro wool, Shetland fingering weight wool, peruvian fingering weight wool. Out of all these yarns, the Shetland did not work out for me on my Inkle loom. And yes, all of these were done on Inkle.

The surprise for me was adapting a John Mullarkey variation, and, wow, it came out spectacular. This was not something I could have predicated, and this is the band that is now floating around the web. This band will be available as a key fob shortly.

What I learned: I love doing two-pack weaving!

And lastly, if you become a member of TWIST, there are a wonderful selection of articles and drafts available.

 

Posted with Blogsy