PROGRESS REPORT 33

A L I S A

I really love combining techniques in creating my puppets and dolls. I am currently working on a budgie doll and decided I wanted to weave the wings. I've used a sewing ham to secure the warp and then packing the weave tightly to create a woven shape. I really love that I can create these types of shapes. 

J E N N E

Heading into Autumn, feeling the need to make some warm woolies for everyone.  Wool socks are a necessity and not cheap, but somehow over the years I have amassed a stash of quite a lot of sock yarn and it makes more sense to just make them this year.   Its the first time I have made socks completely from math and measurements and though they look pointy they fit my kid better than any other socks I have made for myself from a pattern.  I love this time of year, the slowing down and working on home projects and turning a bit inwards, it suits my hermit-y craft pursuits.  

PROGRESS REPORT 31

A L I S A

I've been working on a bunch of stuff lately. Some weaving (you can see some of it in the background of this picture), prepping for some cool classes I'll be teaching starting in a few weeks and dolls. The dolls have paper heads and I use weaving, hand-sewing, crochet and embroidery for the bodies. I'm trying to add some birds and reptiles to the bunch. I'm also thinking of making some of them into hand-puppets.

J E N N E

Aaannnd we are back!  It has been a record hot summer in the Pacific Northwest and we moved back here right in the middle of it - it has been great for starting some dyeplants in the garden to quickly harvest and dry to work with when the rain comes (and rumor has it thats tomorrow.)  I took a natural dyeing class from farm to field with Local Color Fiber Studio on Bainbridge Island a couple weeks ago in which we harvested from the dye fields in the morning and dyed in the studio in the afternoon.  I never really had the space to really get into dyeing anything until now in our new house, and this class renewed my intense love of playing with color and learning about what can be grown here in this usually short growing season.  Already planning next years dye garden in a borrowed plot, indigo and other things but for right now just cutting and keeping dahlias, marigolds and rudbeckia for days.  Heading out on a hike to look for hawthorne berries and oregon grape tomorrow, hoping to forage some to try too.  

PROGRESS REPORT 29

J E N N E

A reknitted/revision. I had this little vest along with me while traveling all of last month and realized my daughter is just growing too fast for my knitting, that I need to add another 3 inches at least to make it a "dressvest" as requested. But it "has to end with the pink and then the blue" so I found another ball of Noro Kureyon and unknit it and am now adding length with the green yarn. Its nice to have a constant companion of a project like this one while contemplating the new possibilities of moving north - new energy, new directions. How to incorporate the forest into craft? How to marry the same divine presence felt in a redwood circle to the effortless energy of weaving weft into warp?  How to keep learning, keeping your mind and your hands happy. Planning, reknitting, revisioning.  

A L I S A

I have been working on homework for my spinning class a lot lately - it's just that time of year. Anyway, it's not very exciting to photograph or talk about. It's very methodical and specific… I'm taking a little break with some more freeform stuff. Finishing making some dolls that I've had kicking around for awhile. I'm very excited about the combination of techniques and materials I'm able to use - paper, weaving, crochet and, likely, some fabric too. Here's a little peek of a siamese cat I'm making.

PROGRESS REPORT 28

A L I S A

I have three puppet heads and three puppet bodies. I have zero time to work on them now because of a large amount of spinning homework I have to do by the end of the month. Right now, I would rather be working on my puppets, but I must push on with homework. My one indulgence during homework time is that I still go to the weaving studio. These little guys will have to keep smiling at me from my desk as I spin… I'll reunite with them first thing in February! 

J E N N E

My worktable today.  Felt, Felt, more felt, designing, stitching, planning.  Little dolls, Chinese New Year decorations, lots of little things for celebrations this year.  The word for this year is INTENTIONAL and in the realm of my craft its focusing on what is relevant to our lives and what makes my heart sing.  Looking forward to the first warp of the year on the loom this weekend, making lots of real food, and making by hand the little things.  Happy new year!

PROGRESS REPORT 18

J E N N E

The sashiko stitching continues.  I keep most all scraps from other sewing projects and last week went through them and cut many into the same size to do some stitching experiments with.  I am really interested in playing with the colors of the threads vs the stitching and the combinations and possibly layers that will come.  This is another big experiment with a vague idea of what I am aiming for but letting the material dictate what will be done with it.  Yesterday Alisa sent me a picture of a poster on the wall at her school that says "Detach from outcome, commit to process."  I am really feeling that right now, freely experimenting with the materials I have and letting the process dictate where I go with it and what to try next.  

A L I S A

This is what my puppet looks like assembled. All the pieces that were in the last Progress Report all went into making Rocky the Goat Puppet. This is a final project for year three of my formal spinning education. I really loved how it turned out and loved the process of making it. The story of Rocky goes like this… When I moved back to Canada from the USA about 6 years ago, I was working at a yarn mill and totally getting into spinning and knowing how the textile and fibre arts work from the basics up. The mill was on a working farm that raised Angora goats for Mohair. Rocky was the first animal I ever saw being born and I really took a shine to him. I spent a lot of time with him over the next few years and the owners of the mill/farm gifted me all his fleeces. I have wanted to make this totem since then. The puppet is made out of his fleece that I was present for the shearing of and processed myself. Rocky started this amazing change in me to stay curious about materials and where things come from and to know about fibre animals and what goes into making yarn. 

PROGRESS REPORT 17

J E N N E

Sashiko has become the work of the summer. I spent a week working on clothing for my daughter and I decided to make a dress with sashiko stitching on the bodice. With sewing you have transformative powers in your hands, in your needle and thread.  You don't have to follow a pattern to the letter or use the fabric as is.  I have been trying to use up everything in my fabric stash and in this case made a new fabric out of a cut of denim that honestly doesn't match the rest of the pieces of the dress. (Look carefully at the skirt fabric, its more teal and the back has darker pieces.  Maybe only I can see it, I spent years scrutinizing shades of color in my last job and years of printing color in the darkroom)  Add handstitching, or block printing, or any sort of surface design is a way to make something imperfect more imperfectly perfect - a sort of wabi sabi magic that I am completely embracing right now.

A L I S A

I've been taking this six year long course through the Ontario Handweavers and Spinners Guild in hand-spinning. It runs for 10 days a year in a beautiful place called Haliburton at a beautiful school up there. It is much more than hand-spinning though. I've been learning all about the properties of fibre, both natural and synthetic dyeing techniques, construction techniques and, of course, all aspects of spinning on a wheel. I'm going into my fourth year this year and I'm finishing up some homework. Homework for this course is pretty intense and very specific. The planning portion for each project is much more in-depth than anything I would do for work outside of school. This picture represents a fair amount of hours of work in fleece selection, spinning, weaving and crochet. It's going to be an angora goat puppet! I will post more pictures here as I progress….

PROGRESS REPORT 9

A L I S A

My tubular weaving continues. I haven't painted the puppet heads yet, but I've finished making their bodies! I'm kind of obsessed with just making woven tubes. In fact, I've made so many of them they are starting to look "too nice"! You know, when you do something new, it might be a little weird or "off"? I like that - once you get good at something, it's starts to get nicer and more even and I always long for the "off" look of learning...

J E N N E

Drawing and cutting and sewing and redrawing and cutting and sewing and ripping out and repeat.  I hurt my arm this week in a fall, not too bad but enough to feel too nerve tingly-bruised to knit weave or hand sew so I dove deep back into patternmaking again.  Finished a redraft of the Endless Summer Tunic to reshape over my shoulders and lengthen into an Endless Summer Dress.  Cut out of muslin fabric and sewn and yes.  Ready to roll.  Finished my basic dress from Cal's Pattern Drafting course, this is the sleeve, last component, sewn together, fit, yes.  Two, no three patterns now to start sewing iterations of - the tunic and the two dresses.  

PROGRESS REPORT 7

J E N N E

Getting back to my handmade wardrobe.  I have several muslins going right now, testing different dress patterns to find a uniform in which to make a million iterations for every occasion.  None of them have been satisfying enough in fit to make "the one" so two weeks ago I started Cal Patch's Patternmaking Class on Creativebug to make a pattern to just fit me already.  I am halfway through that process (and it is MAGIC.  I have a bodice that actually FITS!)   I took a break from patternmaking this weekend to break out a new pattern to try and wow.  This is the Endless Summer Tunic, the first pattern from A Verb for Keeping Warm. I made one first too big then took a chance and made the smallest size and it fits perfect. Fabric is insane, something that has been in my stash forever, asymmetrical batik/shibori/bleach don't even know (lots going on) and silver dots printed over it.   So now I have a dress to wear while I finish my tunic from Cal's class.  So much closer to that handmade wardrobe.  

A L I S A

These are some doll/puppets that I'm working on - a Rabbit, a Goat and a Cat. I finished building the heads over the weekend and so now I have to paint them. I have to make a woven body for the Goat too. I'm totally into making these and am not quite sure how I'm going to display them. I kind of want to make shadow boxes for them and crochet and weave other stuff to jam in the boxes with them - not sure yet, we'll see.