The thing about my inner Luminist,

is that she knows what she likes.

It drives my Storymaker 
crazy.

For her  (said Storymaker),
the repetition necessary
for a deep dive
​ into a particular
idea,
 color, 
material,
​​technique,
​function,
kind of imagery
(or lack therof),
or means of display--

​can be a teensy bit
​ hard to sustain.
The desire to put everything in context
or make it useful,
or somehow important,
or at least talk (blog?) about it,
is almost irresistible.

ps. and speaking of getting in touch
with your inner Luminist
(or whatever you might call her or him),
 if you're interested in a deep dive
and could also use some support
(you know, oxygen tanks and such),
check out Rebecca Mezoff's new class
Design Solutions For The Artist Weaver

She is doing a free Webinar about it
tomorrow, January 16th
so check it out while you can. 

pps. Full disclosure --  Rebecca includes extended interviews with different tapestry artists every month during the Design Season, and I am the person for January. 
We did the interview at the end of filming all the videos for Fringeless, our four selvedge tapestry class, and I was so excited by it all that I fear I waxed enthusiastic the entire time. 
Then again, do I ever not?
And isn't tapestry worth it?
​
Speaking of which...
Next week, ​the American Tapestry Alliance (ATA) 
will present  a media tour on Instagram.
There are prizes and everything.
More info below.

This year's theme: Weaving Small.
​In anticipation of ATA's 13th international, unjuried, small format exhibition, follow seven weavers on Instagram for ATA's 3rd Tapestry Media Tour, as they share their approach to weaving small format tapestries. Participate in the tour and win one of 22 prizes like Rebecca Mezoff's Little Looms online course, a three-month membership to the online textile School of Sweet Georgia, one of five Hello Looms and more.

To increase your chances of winning one of 22 prizes follow ATA's Instagram @americantapestryalliance #TapestryMediaTour between January 20th-26th and comment on each of the 7 stops, i.e., daily posts, featuring each of the weavers below:

• Jan 20th: Rebecca Mezoff @rebeccamezoff
• Jan 21st: Sarah Swett @sarahcswett
• Jan 22nd: Briget Cetera @brigetcetera
• Jan 23rd: Patti Kirch @pattikart
• Jan 24th: Claudia Chase @mirrixlooms
• Jan 25th: Kathe Todd Hooker @kathetoddhooker
• Jan 26th: Janna Vallee @everleayarn

Prizes include:

• One of five mini Hello Looms
• Rebecca Mezoff’s online Mini Looms course
• A three-month subscription to the online textile school School Of Sweet Georgia
• One of five Hokett Tiny Turned Beaters
• One of five free entries into American Tapestry Alliance’s Renditions 2020, ATA’s 13th international, unjuried, small format exhibition
• One of five free one-year memberships to American Tapestry Alliance

Once upon a time
​when I was young and curious,
I spent many hours
drawing and weaving
my naked self.

Sometimes, of course,
I was also able to draw my friends. 
Vicki (the one with the long blonde hair
in the tapestry above),
was great about whipping off her clothes,
and holding still in an awkward position
​while I plied my pencil.
But given that I was a full time stay-at-home mum
(I spun miles of yarn while hanging out with Henry),
as well a full time tapestry weaver
working madly on my drawing skills,
the live model at hand when my son was napping
was usually me. 
Besides, most of stories I wove
were autobiographical
 (assuming you are willing
to accept that my friends and I
really did ride through the night sky
on high-whorl spindles),
so it was both practical and necessary
to render my own thighs.

Back in those pre-digital-camera days
it was also more sensible, time-wise,
to set up a couple of mirrors
and spend a few hours
drawing my backside
than to try to take photos of said rear end,
send them to the photo place,
, wait while they were turned into prints,
(hoping all the while that  the position I'd photographed
was the one I actually wanted),
​and then draw from that.

Time factors aside,
I'd end up spending a lot of time
looking at my body either way,
and if I was going to be judgmental,
better the real thing seen only by me
than photos that could hang out for decades.

What amazed me then though,
and delights me now,
is what a great help
 judgement-wise,
all that drawing proved to be.
That fleshy form
those motherly thighs,
the smiling C-section scar
with its the little pooch above,
 slowly ceased
to be objects of angst,
and became instead a collection
​ of truly lovely shapes that,
​ if only I squinted just right,
​and did a lot of erasing and unweaving,
I could somehow maybe capture 
with graphite and yarn.
​
Also, it always has been hard to decide what to wear.

 A few weeks ago
as a break from holiday madness,
my now adult son
(boatbuilder and sometimes spindle maker
because fruit and trees and all that),
was rummaging in the basement
for what he thought were carefully stored
mementos of his youth and found,
not the outdated and now non-canon
Star Wars memorabilia he was hoping for,
but rather one last and forgotten box
of these notecard--
my own reminders of a time long gone.

It wasn't a huge box,
but there were enough inside
 to put together some sets
and they are now in my web store
for as long as they last.

It's been surprisingly lovely
to spend time with these images --
 to think about the incredible joy of that time:
of drawing and weaving,
 studying color and shape,
 honing tapestry techniques, 
 practically bathing in natural dyes
(see the tapestry Indigo Bath on this page),
and of giving in to the freedom
of being interested in the dailyness of life
 and of rendering those days in wool,
a pick at a time, 
even as they unfolded.

Looking at the note cards today 
I see that in the years since I wove them
things have not changed all that much.
There are fewer nudes to be sure--
seemingly, it is more compelling
to draw the skirt I just wove
or sweater I recently knit
than my lovely soft and sagging flesh--
even if it is still hard
to decide which of them to wear.

But the joy of rendering the days,
 of learning to work with new (to me) materials,
of recording  the ways
in which different aspects of  life
overlap, influence and interact with one another,
and of transforming some
of those impressions into tapestry,
is as entrancing as ever. 

And if the way I go about it has changed--
 the tapestries more focused
the narrative less voluptuous--
well, I put it down to the emergence
of the my inner Luminist,
an aspect of my creative psyche
which (or maybe who),
​ after decades of contentedly hanging out
and quietly observing
​the heretofore unchallenged Storymaker,
now insists on a fair share
of creative control.

These days, indeed, it might be said
that their very differences 
​now drive my creative life.

(FYI, it is me, the Storymaker who is responsible for this blog.
Just saying).

(And if I didn't take pleasure where I find it,
the Storymaker would have nothing to work with).

Anyway--
if you're interested in reading more
of this nonsense--
or about a body of work
created by their disagreements, 
hard copies of Backstrap Dialogues
are also once again in the web store
along with the PDFs.
I've  even stocked up on envelopes,
so if you want one -- now's the time.

 Not to do the hard sell thing
but alas, like the Note Cards,
 hard copies of Backstrap Dialogues
are in limited supply,
and it is unlikely that I'll reprint.
Cuz you know --
more ideas to try--
​inner arguments to have--
 things to make--
approach ever changing
and always
somehow
happily
the same.

A year ago, 
the first of January
fell on a Tuesday--

and the blog post from that day
​is all about the making of tiny books.

In fact, 
when I checked out my blog archives
I noticed that the whole month of  January 2019--
indeed the entire year--
(for though I may sometimes scoff
at the impositions
of human-imposed calendars,
and work on official holidays,
weeks, months and years
do provide a useful framework,

--not unlike a loom,
or a four selvedge warp
within whose limits
a gal can experiment to her hearts content,
changing her mind,
from orange to pink
​as she will),

--the entire year,
(as I was saying),
is punctuated
by the making
of little tapestries,

within which
I have drawn comics 
of me weaving,

coloring each drawing
with K Jodi Gear's
​hand made watercolors,

the creation of which
provides
not only materials for more tapestries,

but also inspiration
for said tapestries
​as well.
​How meta is that?

Here's hoping
I can stick to the point
with fewer parenthetical
and/or creative
asides
in 2020.

Or maybe not?

Who knows.
Except to start off this New Year's Eve,
I'll leave you with a photo of Heptys in waiting--
 so beautiful, all lined up--
and delicious to test --
a highlight of the holiday--
for what could be more satisfying
than possibility--
 intense haptic delight in the moment--
while making yarn
that will provide similar pleasure
​in the future?

--aka: three projects to keep
my holiday angst
​ in check.

1.  a twined basket 
made with
dead leaf cordage
(iris, daylily, cornhusk)
​ and coffee filter yarn

roughly but satisfyingly mended
​with a lopsided eggbeater drill,

some hand spun linen,
and a couple of needles,

now the middle of being read
with enormous enjoyment
(extra powerful since it is once again sturdy)--
and with particular joy
because Kate's first chapter
is on mending....

that turned out to be too big
to fit through any doors in my house

but which nevertheless
makes a fine blind

for photographing 
the rare and non-migratory
​ ten foot pink flamingo.

Life's grand and absurd, eh?
Might as well
​let the good times roll on
(even when the gifts inside
​ are invisible).

​at least once I begin.

Before I start
there is always
​ the moment
when it feels like a chore.

​"Almost out of pages, Sarah!
Stop spinning
and make a new book.
NOW!"
(so bossy)

Of course I forget all that
once I actually start tearing and folding paper.
And once I've made or found the cover
I'm immersed until done.

The cover thing has been growing on me.
My first coptic bound diaries
didn't even have them,
the top and bottom signatures
having to do the job.
Then, to save that lovely paper,
I covered the books in scrap cardboard
gleaned from the backs of pads.

It is only in making the last three
that I've been brave enough
to try a thing
I'd been consciously avoiding--
stitching tapestries onto books
not as decorative objects,
but as paper protection.

At the same time
I was also concerned
that it would be painful
 to watch my precious
 tiny tapestries
grow grubby 
​with dailyness.
Are they not works
​to go on walls?
"Be careful, be careful, be careful."
Who needs that?

So far, neither concern
has been warranted. 
​(for which I'm hugely thankful),
though I'm not sure  why.

And since both practices 
are now well established
 I am no longer intimidated
or embarrassed,
or stopped
(injury or  unavoidable circumstances notwithstanding),
by much of anything.

It could also be
that using a thing I've made--
be it sauerkraut, sweaters,
shoes or a skirt--
transforms it back
from precious object-hood

into a treat,
so that lacing up my shoes
(oh that moment
when the grubby, familiar cloth
snugs up around my ankle),
or opening up the diary
and watching the marks appear
(so that's what today feels like),
becomes an pleasure
worthy of anticipation--
a daily gift
that cannot be matched
by anything purchased.

Or perhaps it is merely
the fathomless joy
of surprise:
--how today's run
is different from yesterdays,
--how the thing I draw
is never the thing
​I think I'm going to draw,
--how the same route
and the same apparent image
(me blogging, or weaving, or spinning),
rendered over and over and over
still feels like a miracle,

ps. those running shoes are now well into their second winter (I have a low pair for warm weather). I waxed them for semi-waterproofedness which is one of the reasons they are so grubby -- the dirt sticks to wax really well.
For more on these running shoes (and others),
Click here

there is coffee filter yarn.

The sun is shining.

And the narcissus--

almost blooming--

​are casting shadows on the wall.

After the weaving/knitting  confusion
of last week's post
I was pretty sure that today
I could stick to the point.

The trouble began
when I began to gather 
photos--

for no sooner had I found a few decent pictures 
--of fleece prep and spindle choice,
--of knitting and ripping out and knitting again,
--of the three-needle-side-and-sleeve-seam-bind-off,
--and of the joys of putting a mock turtleneck
on what I had previously considered
a square-necked garment
(making it a square neck that looks round, 
to riff off of Roald Dahl),*
*see chapter 23, Square Candies that Look Round

than I got completely distracted
by the other three (or is it four now?)
sweaters I've knit from this same fleece
(a Targhee/Debouillet from Nancy Ortmann).

What caught me up
was thinking about how,
though I used the same Hepty Spindles
and spun virtually identical singles
I treated the final yarn making process quite differently:

--dyeing and carding the fleece, spinning all the singles, then plying and knitting
vs
--chain plying each spindle full of singles, then dyeing and knitting then all
vs
--chain plying each spindle full and knitting it right away.

Before long I was all bogged down 
with gathering pictures,
covering my computer desk top
with images to explain my choices,
and trying to describe why each approach
suited the mood and project of the moment
(and also getting sucked into inspecting old projects
with the wisdom of hindsight)--

and soon I'd totally forgotten
that your patience for such nonsense
(at least all in one blog post)
would soon be exhausted--
especially when what I REALLY wanted to do
​was talk about the third choice,
the one I used for the most recent two:
-the Somewhat Slanted I'm wearing as I type
-and a Magic Medium 
that I've worn like crazy since July
but don't think I've blogged about
because I hope to revise the magic Medium pattern
and figure it'd be better to talk about it
when I've got the new, more versatile version done
(though of course anyone who has bought it on Ravelry
will get a revised version if/when I get 
a round tooit). ​

So in the name of sticking to the point
I deleted all that historic nonsense
so that I could say
that
​though potentially filled with imperfections
(each skein slightly different
due to my spinning mood
and the weight of the spindle
from one end of the cop to the other)
just-in-time spinning 
 with a plying stick/wand
is my current absolute favorite. 

And here's why:

A gal can even lounge on her bed
and pretend to take a nap
while chaining
if she really needs a break
but can't quite bring herself
to put down the yarn.
​
And what's not to love about that?

ps .  For more about using a plying stick,
check out this blog post:
Cool Tools

pps And sigh.
I still feel compelled
to tuck a few photos of those other two methods
at the bottom
because there they are on my desktop
​and I want to tidy it up
but  will dispense with the descriptions
​as I think I'm almost out of words.

Method One: spin all the singles and mix them up

Method Two: spin and ply, then dye (Henry's Shop Shirt)

And Bonus for reading this far:
​The Proper recipients for both these last two garments:

Last night I cast off the last stitches
of my fourth Somewhat Slanted Sweater.

This morning I gave it a good bath.
I mean.
White fleece?
Spinning, plying and knitting as I go?
For months?
Lots of time on the road?
Talk about a grime magnet.
And who is going to wash her hands
every time she picks up
spindles or needles?
Well, maybe you.
Alas, not me. 

Anyway, it should be dry by tomorrow
so I can try it on all clean and blocked.
​
For some reason,
these somewhat slanted sweaters
fit quite differently before
and after
blocking --
esp the sleeves
which  have a tendency
to
lengthen-- 
(knitter beware...)
so there is not much point in taking photos
until it has finished this growth spurt. 

Sleeve increase aside,
I'm amazed at how individual
each version is--
as individual, indeed, 
as those that I've seen
made by other people.

For there have, by now,
been a fair few made
and I'm super excited
​because the Somewhat Slanted pattern
 and the Sarah-Dippity Skirt
now have their own Ravelry Pages.
so other versions can be linked.

Getting this Ravelry page up
is a thing I've been meaning to do for ages
and can't thank Vicki enough
for helping me make it happen--
and also the wonderful Ravelry team
for linking these two patterns 
to patterns I've produced over the years
 (for other publications).

Because Ravelry is a knitting site, however,
my two weaving PDFs can't go there
(at least as far as I know),
and it may be because of this
that instead of process photos
of the new sweater,
this blog post has been taken over
by a wool and paper conspiracy:

It is a bit  high-handed--
though as you may have noticed 
my materials have no compunctions
about bossing me around,
and a four selvedge warp
can reduce me to a state
of worshipful acquiescence
every time.
But really,
who could resist being seduced
by such yarnish loveliness?

 And if, in the meantime,
you too want to feel
the four selvedge magic,
​(and are willing to take the risk of life take-overs)
Rebecca Mezoff and I
are having an unprecedented one day sale
on our online four selvedge warping class FRINGELESS.
The class will be 25% off on Monday, December 2nd, 2019.
The code is: AllFourSides
(fyi- Rebecca's other amazing classes are  15% off that day only
with the codeword: FyberMonday).

ps -- AND LOOK!
It's now Tuesday,
the sweater got dry,
and amidst all the things that I thought would keep me from blogging today
(why I wrote most of this yesterday),
I had time for a quick snap!

Mock Turtle Somewhat Slanted
+ a sliver of (one of my many)  Sarah-Dippity skirts
= a  warm and comfy outfit
for a busy day.
Yum.

Do you ever find
 at the end of a medium-big project
that your mind is particularly vulnerable
to the enticement other ideas?

Well, that's how it was for me anyway,
As I finished weaving
the Digestive Biscuit Tapestry last week,
the pile of multi-hued coffee filters
my friend Jodi had collected
in the process of making
her amazing watercolors--
a pile of luscious color
that​ I had carefully stored in a cupboard
to avoid just this problem--
would not stop calling to me.

Clearly, 
the out-of-sight-out-of-mind strategy
is only temporarily effective.
Ignore them though I did
as I cut the tapestry from the loom,
no sooner had I set down the scissors,
than I put the tapestry aside to rest,
dismantled the loom,
and made a tiny indigo pot.

And why not?
The sun was shining,
the chickadees were chirping,
and I could take the drips outside
(wearing two sweaters and an apron),
to turn some of those
yellows (from rabbit brush),
pinks (from Cochineal),
and vaguely off-white ones (from coffee???)
into a range of greens, purples and blues. 

Then I thought --
"The tapestry 
 surely would like
​to rest a little longer--
which leaves me time
to cut a few of these into strips
and add some twist."

It  was kind of like ​creating
​my own box of crayons--
unsurprisingly addictive.

It was also,
I noticed,
​ a great way to avoid
the inevitable finish work
 on this fringed tapestry 
(my first in a couple of years
that was  not warped
using the four selvedge technique).

As I twisted the linen warp ends
​and sewed slits,
​I wondered how long
I could I gaze upon
those freshly spun coffee filters...

For not only did I want to see
that amazing color
neatly tapped into 
weft-faced splendor,

I also wanted to examine--
on a tactile level--
whatever it was that had led me 
to make the mid-tapestry leap
from linen to wool
a few weeks ago.

Alas, this was not a large enough experiment
to come to any great conclusions,
so more experiments will hopefully ensue. 

Here's, however,  what I did note:

1. that weaving with wool
is familiar, forgiving,
elementally comfortable
and I LOVE it beyond words
(and in the midst of weaving words).

2. that I'm still super  interested
in my ongoing cellulosic adventures--
in pursuing materials that come my way
friendly, familiar,
and easy to weave
​​or not.

​3. That weaving tapestries
in whatever material
is an amazing thing
to get to do.

This
is the flushing mechanism
on the tank of  our toilet.

And this (below)
is our toilet.

Or perhaps I should say --
 our former toilet.

For despite the unutterable aesthetic pleasure
of a wooden toilet tank with a copper liner,
a brass flushing mechanism,
and the ability to control the water volume
by how long you push 
on said brass button,
we replaced the whole thing last Saturday.

We were sad to see it go,
but after 30 years with us
(the tank itself is from the 1930s/40s),
aesthetics were not enough
to overcome an aged mechanism
and the extra water used
when flushing with a bucket
to actually get things 
 down the pipe.

Short of digging a hole and building an outhouse
(still illegal in town, alas), 
our new toilet is grand.
It meets all the low flush standards
for our aquifer-sucking region
and the wooden seat
helps it feel like the old one
(now at the local building recyclers 
where they are sure someone will want it
for a non-functional restoration--
wooden tank? Copper liner? Brass flusher?
what's not to love?) 

So all is Grand -- 

Except---


​--for the dreaded
PACKING DETRITUS!!!!!!

The cardboard boxes
in which the toilet was shipped
are at least recyclable.
But the protective foam?
Not likely.
And how horrible
to stuff our garbage/landfill
with plastic-encased air.

Also, how to throw away
something that is kind of interesting
in and of itself:
interlocking sections that can lie flat
or be folded into the edges and corners
that protected the toilet
from chips and cracks
during transport--
thus preventing more waste.
A person could make something --

But arghghghghg--
why fill the house
with pieces of foam I don't need.?

Also arghghghghg---
how to avoid buying  things
that inadvertently
generate trash in my name?

Needless to say,
​ I didn't sleep terribly well--
because in the middle of the night
​I had an idea.

And first thing in the morning
I put it to the test.

It's not pretty to be sure,
but a piece of fabric tossed over the top
helps with the aesthetics.

And amazingly
​- it's  actually great:
firm-- yet squishy, 
stable--yet wobbly enough
to keep my hips moving gently as I weave--
like those giant exercise balls you can sit upon
without the rolling issues. 

Also, the height is easily adjustable
in 1 1/4 " increments
which makes it a super simple way
to deal with some of the ​pipe loom ergonomic issues
I raised last week.

This morning,
needing the tuffet to be slightly taller
than the double width allowed
I experimented
​with the two solutions below.
Both are the same height.

Who knew?


ps.
It turns out that a standard pillowcase
is exactly two blocks wide by three blocks long
and I'm currently sitting crosslegged 
on a foam block/pillowcase raft
firmly yet comfortably insulated
from my cold floor.

Maybe if I put the tapestry tower
on top of the raft ...
​