We Have Pollination!

Day 291: We have pollination! Yes, my milkweed plants are making pods! And I cannot credit the success to my intervention because the flower I attempted to pollinate by hand is not among those with swelling ovaries. That said, there are at least a dozen strikingly obvious developing pods on the plants which flowered earliest, and I think there will also be some on the plants which came into bloom a little later. It's too soon to tell with those, although it looks like a few of the flower stems are beginning to curl (as opposed to drooping). That was what caught my eye first: one curled, plump flower stem held above a mass of withering flowers. Closer examination revealed an ovary starting to swell, and then as I raised my eyes, I saw this pod, about as big as the end of my thumb! Then I really started peering in among the fading flower clusters, and saw that the pollinators had done the job I'd failed to do. Finally, I'm going to have milkweed pods!

Woven To Match

Day 290: Two more steps done and dusted! Over the last week, I have been working on stitching together the three panels of this lap throw/tablecloth as well as completing the band I'll be using for trim. Because I ran into a flaw in the warp toward the end of the band, I'm not sure I'll have enough to go around all four sides once both pieces have been washed and dried. Strangely, bandweaving shrinks more in length than cloth. You'd think it would work the other way around, given how firmly bandweaving is beaten, but experience proves otherwise. If I do run short, I'll have two options: leave the selvedges plain, or weave another length of band to apply to them. If I choose to do the latter, I will again have two options: weave an entirely different band to cover both selvedges, or weave another length of the same band since I know I have enough of this one for three sides. Choices! Choices! 

Zanshiori Placemats - Blue

Day 289: I have finally reached the end of my stash of thrums, except for the green ones which I saved out for another project. Although I used thread directly from cones for the doubled warp, the single weft in these placemats is entirely "waste," i.e., the tag ends from other projects after I cut them off the loom. This art of using waste thread to create something functional is called zanshiori, and is not necessarily limited to using the same type of thread throughout a project. Rather, it has an element of zen in it, allowing the weaver to use whatever they have on hand and as the mood strikes them. Many zanshiori pieces are highly textured by using thick yarns with thin, incorporating additional structural elements such as wool locks, strips of cloth, etc., but I chose to use 8/2 cotton exclusively. The tiny knots where I joined the threads adds organic character to the work. In other news, I finished a piece of bandweaving last night, adding the thrums to my stash for the next round of zanshiori somewhere down the line. Waste not, want not! Want waste, want knots!

Rigid Heddle Warp Chicken

Day 288: This is about as close as I ever hope to come while playing warp chicken on a rigid heddle loom. Y'see, when I started this project of zanshiori placemats, I warped for four, adding "a little bit for the Pope" as I always do to be on the safe side. When I got the fourth one finished, it looked like I just might be able to squeeze a fifth one out of the remaining warp. Since I was counting throws (280 per placemat), I could get a pretty clear estimate of where I'd wind up, and...well, if I was 10 throws short, that placemat would be the one I kept, as opposed to those I intended to gift as pairs. As you see, I might have been able to squeeze another ten passes in, but when I took them off the loom and measured them, I discovered I'd over-compensated a bit with the beat. The fifth one has the requisite 280 throws, but it's about half an inch shorter than the others. That will level out somewhat once they're wet-finished, another advantage to counting the number of passes as opposed to measuring the length on the loom.

Weaving A Rainbow

Day 287: A friend contacted me a week ago to see if I had any woven bands she could use for a strap for a musical instrument. I asked for specifics (width, length, colours), and when she replied, I put together a photo with multiple options. She selected two from the lot, one of which was the last bit left from a card-woven rainbow, but we weren't sure it would be long enough to suit her purpose. As it turned out, it was just long enough. Now it just so happens that I'm in the middle of trying to tidy up old projects before starting a new one (Max, my Bergman floor loom, is empty!), but I wanted to make another rainbow band to replace the one I'd sent out. Since I didn't want to do another card-woven one, that meant getting a tediously boring piece of Baltic pickup off my largest inkle loom. Job done, I loaded the inkle with a rainbow. Because it's plain weave, it's going very quickly. Over there on the other side of the room, the 30+ feet of band intended to go around the borders of a handwoven tablecloth is almost ready to take off the Glimakra. That will leave two inkles, the Leksand band loom and my table loom to empty. Oh, and both rigid heddle looms, but those are both quick projects.

My Mother's Crazy...Quilt

Day 286: The subject of crazy quilts came up a few days ago as a friend was preparing to go to a lecture on the subject as it pertained to those on exhibit at Whittier's birthplace. I sent her photos of a crazy quilt I'd made, explaining that I had never used decorative stitching to cover the seams as my mother did. Then it occurred to me that in the very bottom of my cedar chest, I had one of George's quilts ("George" was my mother's nickname). As I thought I remembered it, it was only a top, unfinished, but when I pulled it out, I discovered that indeed it was backed and batted...backed, with my mother's infamous lack of colour sense, with a huge peacock-tail print which would have served better as curtains in a hippie's Volkswagen van. The top, however, was tartan wool, and the seams were covered by embroidery stitches as I remembered. The quilt only measures 48" x 38", lap-robe size.

Contrary to what Patty heard at the lecture (that crazy quilts were usually made with silk fabrics), in my family, they were always made from wool suiting. When one of my great-grandfathers suits wore out, Old-old (my great-grandmother) would cut it into pieces for crazy quilting. The lecturer also asseerted that crazy quilts were not functional, being made of fragile silk fabric. True, perhaps, of those in the Whittier family, but Old-old's were definitely functional, and very warm! I remember bundling up in one when I was a very young child, the scratchy wool coarse against my skin. Old-old's also included embroidery stitches to cover and reinforce the seams, a tradition which my mother carried forward.

The discussion of crazy quilts raised a question in my mind. I found pictures of one I'd made only a few years ago, but for the life of me, I cannot remember who I gave it to. I have no idea how many quilts I've made over the years, but every now and then, someone will say to me, "I just love that quilt you gave me!" At least half the time, I reply, "Did I make you a quilt?"

Loaded!

Day 285: "Attention! Attention! Calling all Cedar Waxwings! The feast is on the table!" Both of my Mountain-ash trees are loaded...and I do mean LOADED...with fruit, to the point that I am afraid some of the branches may break under the weight. I don't think I've ever seen as heavy a crop. The Waxwings failed to appear last year (they're intermittent here), which meant that the robins had a banquet, but the trees were not this heavily laden. There's plenty here for everybody this year, if only the Waxwings will notice. What brings them here some years and not others? Are they responding to visual clues like this tree is surely offering? Or do they navigate from waypoint to waypoint with built-in GPS, having marked good food sources during spring migration? What keys them in? Perhaps I should hang out a big neon sign saying, "Waxwings welcome," if this glowing orange invitation doesn't suffice.