Lace Workshop - Part 3

The next two days of the workshop went much better. I was able to move on to weave on someone else’s loom and try some other lace patterns. I had already decided that I wasn’t going to kill myself trying to get all nine lace samples of the workshop done. I wasn’t really interested in doing the Danish Medallion, Spanish Lace, Brooks Bouquet, and Leno Lace patterns. I had taught those patterns in my beginning weaving classes and instead I wanted to weave lace patterns on 8 and 4 shaft looms that I had no experience weaving. The above photo illustrates some of the afore mentioned lace patterns that could have been done in the workshop on two shafts.



One of the side benefits of the round robin weaving was that I was able to weave on several different types of looms. One that I especially enjoyed was the Baby Wolf when I wove the Window Pane Lace in white. Not only did I like the lace pattern, I could see using it in a pantry door window, or as a room divider, or covering storage shelves in our new home.

It was the first time I had woven on a Baby Wolf loom. About two weeks earlier I had purchased a used 8 shaft Baby Wolf from a LV guild member and still had it folded up in our garage. I had wanted to buy one when we moved to the new house and would have room in my basement weaving room. But I started thinking that perhaps instead of buying a new loom maybe I could find a used one and spend less money. As long as it was an 8 shaft loom I could deal with the rest of the items on my wish list later. So when I put out an email about some looms for sale I added a request about looking for a Baby Wolf loom. I was quite surprised to get a reply back from a guild member who was considering selling her Baby Wolf which was an 8H and had most of the bells and whistles I was interested in. When she got back from a long weekend vacation we could connect. I was ecstatic.

Upon her return we agreed upon a price and a pick up date for the following Monday. My big concern was where to store the loom once I picked it up. My present weaving room was maxed out, my tiny storage room was full, that left the third stall of the garage which was a disaster area. I still hadn’t told my husband I’d bought “another” loom, a statement sure to get a rise out of the non-hobbyist hubby. But if I cleaned the third stall of the garage there would be room to store the Baby Wolf. So with a burst of energy on Sunday I did a massive clean up and straightening of the third stall.

I must be honest and admit all of the mess was mine to begin with, guild door prizes, weaving class looms, yarn, and wood working materials. It’s surprising what a shop vac and throwing some things out can do to improve the looks of things. I also collected fame looms for storage, and repacked yarn in storage bins. The end result was a vast improvement, Bob was so proud of my efforts, little did he know…

The other hang up was the method of payment. I wanted to pay in cash and it didn’t dawn on me until after the banks closed on Friday that Monday was Columbus Day and the banks would be closed, even though it wasn’t really observed locally as a holiday. So all I could access would be an ATM, which meant $20 bills and dealing with a daily withdrawal limit. I also found after trying our branch bank ATM on Monday that ATMs run out of money on long weekends. Thank heavens for grocery stores and their ATMs. I was able to get the rest of the needed cash from their ATM, for a slight fee--but who was quibbling at this point, and then go to Customer Service and trade the fist full of twenties for less hundred dollar bills. And I was still able to pick up the loom on time.


The lady’s husband loaded the loom in the back of my CR-V and off I drove. When I got home I didn’t want to leave the loom in the car, so I slowly rocked it back and forth to edge it out of the car. It was heavy! Once it was out and upright, it was easy to handle as it was on wheels (strollers). I pushed it back into the third stall area and waited for Bob to come home from teaching his Monday evening class.




When he came into the house in his normal manner I knew he hadn’t noticed the loom. So I figured I couldn’t put this off any longer, and told him to go back into the garage and notice what he missed the first time he walked through. When he came back into the house he was very quiet, not saying anything. He now knew why I had cleaned the garage so thoroughly the day before.

Bowling Party for 5 Year Olds!

The lace weaving workshop in Salt Lake City began on Saturday, Oct. 24 at 9 AM and would go until 4. So that meant that I was going to miss out on all the fun at my grandson Jack’s birthday party which was going to start at 2, but Grandpa Bobby would be there to help and hopefully take some pictures and help hand out cake and ice cream.

This year Jack’s birthday wasn’t going to be celebrated by a massive gathering of family and friends, both adults and children, that spill out of the house into the backyard and involve a cookout meal with a birthday cake and ice cream and the opening of a huge pile of birthday presents. The camp director mother, my daughter Carlee, was ready for a new challenge. So when Jack said that he’d like a bowling birthday party, Carlee’s creative juices started running. Much better than the ice skating party he was first thinking about--all those bumps and bruises on the little knees is not something you want to think about as a hostess.


First, an envelope with a round black bowling ball with silver writing behind a clear cellophane window came in the mail inviting us to Jack’s party. Then I heard from Dustin, our graphic artist son, that Carlee had talked to him about designs for T-shirts. She came up with something on her computer as the end result was 16 small T-shirts with this emblem on the front and a larger emblem design with the saying, “This Is How I Roll” on the back. In the process of ironing on the designs she managed to put a small crack in her granite counter top from the heat, which sent her into a mild tail spin. When she heard the crack she knew what it was and panicked. Luckily, the repair man said, the crack didn’t go all the way through, and he only used super glue to repair it. This all happened before we arrived and we had a hard time even trying to see where the crack was in the dark granite countertop.

Grandpa Bobby was disappointed that he didn’t get a T-shirt, but that’s life. The shirts actually worked out well as favors. The shirts were put on as the kids arrived at the bowling alley and it turned out to be a good way to keep track of the little 5 year olds. The photos tell the story of the fun the kids had at the bowling alley, even sister Kate, who is two got to try bowling. The ball is almost as big as she is. Her Uncle Peter helped her roll a pretty good ball from the looks of the picture.




There were “teams” of about 5 children with one adult on each lane, with bumpers in the gutters to prevent the infamous gutter balls. After the single game of bowling which I heard seemed to go on forever, the keglers had pizza and a special birthday cake which Carlee baked in the shape of a bowling alley, shown in the photo below.

The party wound down about 4 o’clock and parents arrived to pick up their children. Jack and Kate were still raring to go, however the adults were wiped out. When I got back to the house from the lace weaving workshop the adults were slumped on the couch and easy chair, barely moving. Another successful birthday bash.

Back in the Saddle Again--Before I Forget How to Ride

Have you ever avoided something because you just knew it was going to take forever to get it done? But, by putting it off you just make it worse? That’s me. I think I should form a Procrastinators Anonymous of America group. PAA -- that sounds just about right, doesn’t it. Like a tire going flat. paaaaaa. This is my story…

I planned to take a week off my blog to attend a lace weaving workshop in Salt Lake City, well, it’s turned into more like two. The workshop was put on by the Mary M. Atwater Weaver’s Guild on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, October 25-27. That overlapped with our grandson’s fifth birthday party on Saturday in SLC, which was a nice fit with our schedule. We also planned to stop in Cedar City to check on the progress of the digging of the new basement. The SLC guild was holding their meeting in Provo Thursday night with Madelyn van der Hoogt, the editor of Handwoven, as the guest speaker. So I was hoping that we would be able to arrange our trip to fit that date in too.

On Thursday morning of the 23, my husband Bob, our dog Mac and I headed north in a packed car with suitcases, a small cooler, a warped table loom, folded loom stand, and a sack of birthday presents for the 6+ hr. drive. (More about our time in Utah in up coming posts.)

When I’m away I usually check my email and stay current, but this trip I didn’t with the excitement of family and the workshop. (Mistake #1) When I returned home to Las Vegas on Tuesday the 28th after another 6+ hr. drive, I tried to get ready for a machine embroidery class. I had just purchased the unit to go with my Bernina 440 sewing machine the Wednesday before the lace workshop, and the mastery lessons started on the 29th. Tight planning. I had to work the next day and had to load some software on a new to me laptop, and, of course, I ran into problems. Finally at 11:30 PM I decided I would have to cancel out of the class sessions and wait for the next round of session in January. Superwoman I’m not! I had already glanced at my email and saw that the messages totaled 127, and I passed on cutting the total down. (Mistake #2)

After work on Wednesday I had to round up some weaving equipment to take to a weaving and spinning demonstration the next day at our neighborhood elementary school. I didn’t work on my email or blog. (Mistake #3)

The school was celebrating Nevada Day, a state holiday observed on Friday, by having a pioneer dress up day on Thursday. During the noon hour recess some of our guild members were going to be out on the play ground spinning and weaving as part of their pioneer days. You can see us in the above photo.



Friday, the 31st, I babysat my granddaughter, Paige, to give my son an Art break in the morning and I went shopping at Quiltique in the afternoon as they were having a nice sale as part of their Grand Reopening from a huge remodel. 30% off of quilting yardage is great just before the holidays. Trick or treaters were out that night, and it was so warm that we had a small get together with neighbors out in the street while the little ghosts and goblins came around. This is a picture of Paige, our granddaughter in her first Halloween costume. Another day of avoidance of the computer. (Mistake #4)


Shopping and UNLV football game on Saturday. Poor UNLV, another loss, TCU was really good. By bedtime no blog and no email dealt with…on Sunday night when I finally opened my email there were 190 messages. Yuck. Today I finally got the totals down to single digits. Not a pretty story. Time to get in the saddle again.

The WOW! Group - Weaving on Wednesdays

Two years ago three or four of our weaving & spinning guild members started getting together a couple of Wednesday mornings a month. At first we met at my house but last year we started meeting at Wooly Wonders, a knitting and weaving shop on the east side of Las Vegas, and we decided to start meeting every week. We call ourselves the WOW! Group - Weaving on Wednesdays Group.

We’ve grown to eight to ten members, some arriving early, some late--that’s always me (have to check my e-mail first). We talk a lot, drink our coffee & tea, knit, crochet, spin and even do some weaving. We often bring in rigid heddle looms or tapestry looms, like Kathy who is working on a sort of fantasy landscape in Noro yarns shown in the photo.

I brought in my 8H Leclerc Voyageur table loom, but didn’t do much weaving. I work at the store tomorrow and Friday and probably will get some weaving time in then. I’m trying to weave off the bookmarks as I’m going to need the loom for a workshop in lace weaving in Salt Lake City in late October. The bookmarks have a black rayon thread warp and a variety of pattern wefts. They are a variation of bookmarks from the March/April 2007 Handwoven article, “Elegant Bookmarks” by Syne Mitchell. Last year our guild challenge was to weave with warp smaller than we usually weave with. Boy, this warp sure fit the bill. I could have gotten by just by using 20/2 as a warp, but I was fascinated by the beautiful pattern of the bookmarks.

I’m not sorry I did the project, once the correct sett was worked out for my rayon warp and the warps stopped breaking. But I’m sure not going to use this tiny a warp thread any time soon. I’m ready for something a bit bigger. When the warp comes off I’ll be able to take some photos of the different pattern wefts, some of the bookmarks actually turned out nicely, and the broken warps were easily hidden.


In the photo, Nancy is spinning with a drop spindle, but often brings her wheel to spin with. She is one of the founding members of our guild, and is an excellent weaver too.

How do your guild members get together between meetings? We find we enjoy the weekly get together to exchange ideas and show what we’ve been doing, and look forward to the next week's gathering.