re heming my saori bias dress

  look at the bias dress hem center back. this is before....... hem was 8" or more longer in back than the sides and front.  

now the hem is more even and I added pockets from the cut off hem trimming

This is the dress I wove in april on my saori loom and sewed. The bias hem just kept "growing"  and was 6"or more longer in the back! So I  re hemmed it and cut off quite a bit enough for some unusual pockets .I like it much better now with pockets, room for my cell phone, keys and other things and to wear over leggings.

saori mobius scarf

my wild saori scarf, it is warm and cozy.

learning to knit

You met Hope in my earlier posts . She is a wonderful 7 yr. old home schooler that took to Saori weaving like she had  been weaving for years. She asked if I could teach her to knit. So gladly I agreed and we stared knitting classes. I showed her the knit stitch and off she went only needing me to help sort out some un dropped stitches and some increases that snuck in and how to cast off. She said she really liked weaving, it was fast and more fun but she kept on knitting till her garter stitch kitty was done today. I could tell she was happier weaving but I am so proud of her because she stayed with it till she finished.

Kitty's name is moon shadow, after the Cat Stevens song, which she sang to me , then we sang it together. I have a feeling that our next classes are going to be Saori weaving again but look at this adorable cat out of lama and wool yarn she knitted and stuffed. She finger knitted it's tail and I brushed the yarn lightly to help it's "fur" bloom! Well done hope!

New Saori woven scarves

Rains came this week and I wound a new warp for two scarves. one for a new Saori santa cruz studio student, susan, and one for me. It was perfect weaving by the wood stove .
 This scarf is the mobius scarf/cowl scarf that you use the beginning warp{ untied} as the weft yarns at the end of the scarf . When you have woven the scarf, untie it and and weave each warp as weft at the end to give a pointed fringed finish.

susan in her hand spun and knitted shawl holding her hand spun skein of yarn

winding bobbins on the saori loom

inserting the warp as weft technique

lovely colors

Susan came wearing her exquisitely hand spun hand knitted lace shawl in rose hues. and a lovely hand
 woven stole she had woven on her ridged heddle loom. She is very talented and her mobius cowl scarf turned out fantastically rich. I love the yarn choices she chose. We had a wonderful time discussing looms and fibers, and history as we wove.
she finished her cowl and is going to twist the fringes at home and send me a photo of the finished weaving. we found out we have the same lumix camera too.

and here is susan's lovely finished mobius cowl 

Autum

Today I looked out at the back deck and sighed how I wish those happy gold and red tones would linger longer than a few weeks.
we have  two storage sheds that I have embellished  and while I was photographing the trees I remembered that my saori weaving was dispersed among the assemblage on them, so as the sun's angle is lowering this season I am cheered on by my saori weaving !

the ginkgo tree 

Fibers and fall and SAORI weaving

This week I have been working in the studio clearing the weaving fibery things away from the wood stove. my new saori order arrived from osaka japan and now my studio is a frightful mess again! so I went out and took a photo of wool fiber I dyed and carded that got carry away into the plum tree leaves on the deck by the wind.  The influence was clear when shot the photos. The colors were echoing each other.  welcome fall.

I went to quail hollow ranch's FIBER DAY and took saori looms. Among the participants were

a young special needs child who loved weaving for hours  on the saori piccolo loom and Amber , a student, came and spent quality time with the sx60 loom weaving in oranges, yellows...... turning  foliage colors. Her piece  was lovely. It was pouring outside but no one noticed after shaking off rain from their coats they entered a warm atmosphere of happy fiber artists smiling and truly having fun. Participants who came  learned about spinning, braiding ,lace making , dyeing, inkle weaving and tapestry as well as being introduced to Saori weaving.

Amber's weaving off the loom

UPCOMING learn to weave work shop

tide pools

noro sock yarn

This week I finished weaving 4 scarves for samples at a local knit shop on my up coming "weave a scarf in 4 hours" class for beginning weavers outreach classes i am doing this month. Since the class room is small and on a 2nd story with the only access being a narrow steep stairway I decided that pre warped ridged heddle looms would be the the only solution. This week I spent warping the looms and weaving samples for the store.Well all I can say is am totally spoiled with my SAORI looms. My neck and shoulders ached from using the ridged heddle looms and my feet were yearning to treadle . I even clamped one to a higher counter so that I could stand and weave to see if that helped. It did not.My conclusion is that ridged heddle weaving is one of the least expensive ways to try out weaving and is portable but NO comparison to the saori looms as far as ergonomics and ease of use and just having more fun. SAORI'S win hands down. Those who think they will love and want to continue to weave and learn to warp can always come to visit Saori Santa Cruz studio,and take classes to expand there knowledge.

habu silk and stainless steel yarn

before washing

after washing

The scarves were fun to do. I tried to invent fun but easy learn to weave techniques. one of the scarves is silk and stainless steel yarn  by Habu ,which when put in hot water curls and morphs delightfully.magically transforms before your eyes.

the candy store

The sample scarves are hanging at the knit shop in Santa Cruz for potential weavers to get inspired and sign up to weave a scarf class. Now to see if the swift stitch will attract would be weavers?

From yarn to weaving, designing and sewing a blouse

The title sounds like a class offered at a national weaving convention, no it is me teaching Hope just 3 months into her 7th birthday in my studio.

 I met Hope when her dad brought her to our home  in september when he and his crew were doing construction work for us. I looked outside, saw her just hanging about,  and went and introduced myself . I asked if she was going to be back the next day and she said her mom had just had a baby a few days before so yes she would. I  then asked if she would like to try to learn to weave and she smiled and that was the beginning of of this journey. She wanted to weave fabric and make a vest. we started with a bag then each week we just kept going!  when she was done with her second weaving cloth and we saw it off the loom we both agreed that it seemed more like a cropped top would be better than a vest. We talked about design and I showed her a photo of a similar tops we were thinking of. So she and I designed her top cutting out the lining first for a pattern, fit it on the child's dress form, pieced her hand washed and dried saori weaving and cut out and sewed and lined her blouse/top she wanted it smooth on the inside against her skein. She did everything but thread the sewing machine, and warp the loom. So praise or criticisms all go to her, a fiber artist in the making. This is her inner expression and no one else owns her creativity. All I have to say is Hope is amazing! LISTEN ....... this is the sound of a child giggling that is NOT in front of a TV or a computer game , but WEAVING!    The link to the whole process from yarn cloth to blouse is on the picasa photo stream link here on this blog

elm street bridges saori banner installation photos

all cultures and diversity are beautiful together

Remember when back in August I posted photos for the elm st project back in Massachusetts ? I posted photos of my banners on this blog as they were in progress. well the
the week long installation took place at  the end of august and photos are starting to arrive. Thank you jeen for the time and effort you took to drive down and take some photos, and saori worcester took wonderful photos too. I  heard that my chartreuse predominate banner has been taken up as a sponsor and all of the money raised will go towards children's weaving classes back in Massachusetts who other wise could not afford them.
 one of my banners is third from the right.
"Your banner { the chartreuse  and navy} was sponsored by Neal & Paula Rosenblum of Worcester, whose daughter Beryl has Down's Syndrome and comes to weave with Mihoko whenever she is on vacation from her residential school." nat saori worcester