yikes

I've been super terrible about updating and I'm just popping in to say that it's going to stay that way for a little while. I'm running pretty hard to keep up with school since it's the end of the semester and teachers are trying to cram that last bit of knowledge into our brains. I promise I'll be better once school is over!

Snow and Puppies

It snowed a monstrous amount yesterday. I just want spring to be here - why does the snow have to come :( BUT we just got some super cute foster puppies, so I can just spend more time with them :) They are 5 weeks old and away from Mama (bad bad BAD). They are much to young to be without their mother, so whoever dumped these puppies on the rescue is stupid as well as the usual irresponsible. I have to admit that I have no patience for people who end up giving their animals away/ having them taken away or don't take care to keep more babies from happening. I'll stop ranting so you can look at these cuties! They aren't the best pictures since I took them with my phone, but they'll do.

Annita Magee

My weaving class went to Annita Magee's studio on Wednesday. Annita is a weaver who is also a very good tapestry artist. She showed us a bunch of her awesome tapestries and she sells some special yarns that some of us bought to use in our tapestries.
This is Annita^
This is one of her tapestries from Norway (I believe) the writing in he corner means seven brothers if I remember correctly
This is a cute tapestry based off of a small piece of a larger famous one with a girl and a unicorn
This is what she was currently working on.

here's a close-up, you can see where the yarn has gone around the warp (white up and down) threads. You can also see how tightly packed the yarn is.

I'm back!

I've magically appeared back home. The snow seems slightly more bearable and somehow more horrific at the same time. I have a lot of picture that I've put up on my Flickr account if you would like to see them. I took a lot of pictures of various flowers and there are some good ones from the Portland Zoo. I hope everyone is doing well.

I haven't finished the quilt yet. I'm quilting the border and then the binding and then I'm done. I am going on a field trip today with my weaving class so I'll bring back some pictures!

Vacation!

I'm heading off on vacation! By this time tomorrow I will be on a plane headed towards 'home' aka where I grew up. I promise I'll come back with lots of pictures and there is a small possibility I will post while I'm down there but it is very, very slim.

Three cheers for Spring Break!!!

Nancy Perry's Studio

Here's a whole bunch of pictures in random order from Nancy Perry's weaving studio/home. It was VERY cool and I am so jealous of the set-up she has! She works primarily with silks. She had GORGEOUS material all over the place and I just wanted to steal it all!

This is Nancy on a spinning wheel. Since all of us got so excited over it we get to have a spinning demo on Wednesday - so maybe I'll be spinning my own yarn for my last project ;)

This is a tapestry that Nancy had made, she said she doesn't do it much anymore though. Unlike 'normal' tapestry this has a back weft and then additional weft to make the white shapes - so the back looks like a plain piece of fabric.
This is Nancy's (huge) AVL (?) loom. It's honestly just a really basic weaving computer. I tried to get a video of her weaving but it didn't turn out and won't play on anything - I have no idea why.
Here is one of Nancy's hand dyed silk scarfs. This one was a really nice yellow color called gold rush, the picture really doesn't do it justice!
My mother squealed over this one so I took some pictures for her.

She did the same thing with this one

This is another hand dyed silk scarf is emerald isle green
This is Nancy with a huge stack of her hand dyed/screen printed sewing silk.







It was a great trip and really fun to see all the cool things she does!

Something new and easy

I made myself a quick something yesterday. It took all of 5 minutes and now I have a lovely useful headband! I had this idea while I was falling asleep the other night and now I have implemented it. I used my (very favorite) stiff muslin and a nice light blue quilting cotton and a piece of thick elastic to make myself a lovely headband. It fits quite nicely and so far has done a very good job at keeping my hair out of my face. I'm thinking that over the summer I could make some of these to start up my own etsy shop :) let me know what you think and what would you be willing to pay for one of these if you have an opinion.


I have also been plugging away at the quilt. I'll see if I can get some pictures to show how far along I am. It's very small work so it's hard to take a picture of something that is mostly invisible.

Oh my goodness!

Sorry I've been so terrible about updating lately, I'm trying to keep up with life and it's not working so well :p I had a craft fair thing to go to yesterday so I actually got up at a reasonable hour and sat at that all day and then ended up going to work and staying there until 2ish in the morning. I did make quite a bit of progress with the quilting yesterday though. I also got a little bit of weaving done, I'm almost halfway through my sampler. My weaving class is going on a field trip on Monday so I'll try and get some cool pictures of the weaving studio we're going to.

I hope everyone is having a good weekend!